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The Rationals: Temptation's 'Bout to Get Me |
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Total Energy Records
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Friday, 13 January 2006 19:07 |
The Rationals
"Live" at the Grande Ballroom
October 27, 1968
Alive!/Total Energy Records
By John Sinclair
The Rationals were one of the brightest lights in the mid-1960s Michigan rock & roll firmament. Under the guidance of their manager, Hugh "Jeep" Holland, the quasi-mop-top quartet emerged in matching uniforms out of the Ann Arbor high school scene to score with a succession of 45 singles produced by Holland and issued on his A-Square label.
Local and regional airplay--CKLW Radio, based in Windsor, Ontario, across the Detroit River from downtown Detroit, was Number One in both the Motor City and in Cleveland, some 200 miles to the east--led to Cameo-Parkway Records in Philadelphia picking up their singles for national distribution, and there were big hopes of national stardom in those final days of the pre-rock LP era.
But while the Rationals continued to pursue the pop success formula of the early sixties, the times sort of passed them by. And when the Grande Ballroom opened on October 6, 1966 (the same day LSD was declared illegal nationwide), thoroughly modern bands like the MC-5 and the Chosen Few (with Scott Richardson and Ron Asheton) vied with their Top 40-oriented contemporaries like the Rationals, the Woolies (with Bob Baldori) and the Bob Seger System for the hearts and minds of a rapidly-changing audience of post-teen suburbanites and long-haired urban hippies.
When the MC-5, SRC (Scot[t] Richard[son] Case), Third Power, Savage Grace, The Frost, and other Michigan groups went on to score national recording contracts for albums with labels like Elektra, Capitol, Vanguard, and Warner/Reprise, the Rationals never fully graduated from the 45 rpm era to make a major-label album for national distribution. Instead they were signed rather late in the game by Detroit deejay Robin Seymour to a small locally-based label and released a single album before fading into oblivion and eventually breaking up.
Rationals lead singer Scott Morgan, an outstanding talent, turned down an offer to take the lead vocalist spot in Blood Sweat & Tears--leaving the door open for David Clayton-Thomas to gain a lengthy career in the popular music industry--and went on to form a band in the early 1970s called Guardian Angel.
After Guardian Angel flew apart, Morgan eventually signed up with the MC-5's Fred Smith as lead singer for Sonic's Rendezvous Band and then fronted the Scott Morgan Band for most of the 1980s. A European release caught the attention of David Fricke at Rolling Stone and enjoyed some fervent proselytizing from Pontiac, MI native Dave Marsh, but it failed to secure American distribution.
Most recently Scott has made an album for Ann Arbor-based Schoolkids Records under the rubric of Scot's Pirates (with former Up bassist Gary Rasmussen and ex-Stooge Scott Asheton on drums).
Guitarist Steve Correll, bassist Terry Trabandt, and drummer Bill Figg seemed mostly to disappear from the music scene for many years, turning up finally in the early 1990s to do a series of Rationals reunion dates in Michigan with their more visible colleague, Scott Morgan.
Neither the Rationals' A-Square and Cameo-Parkway singles nor their one totally obscure album have been re-issued in the modern era, which is something of a shame, but--thanks to Patrick Boissel and Alive! Records--curious listeners can now sample the sounds of the once-popular Ann Arbor quartet recorded "live" at Detroit's Grande Ballroom in the Fall of 1968.
The Rationals opened the Sunday evening all-ages concert, a benefit for State Senator Roger Craig's re-election campaign. Craig was also Grande promoter "Uncle" Russ Gibb's personal attorney, which explained his presence at this otherwise unfathomable affair.
The benefit was headlined by the MC-5 and was, in effect, a final tune-up for the recording of the 5's Elektra album later that week (October 30-31). One MC-5 performance from this concert, "I'm Mad Like Eldridge Cleaver," has been released on the MC-5's Power Trip CD and Ice Pick Slim 10" LP.
The Rationals and the 5 shared common roots in the American rock & roll era of the early 1960s, when they were all in high school in Ann Arbor and Lincoln Park, respectively, and the members of the bands were great friends. Only months before, the 5 would have opened for the Rationals, but as popular attractions their roles were in the process of serious reversal, and the Rats can be heard on this record striving mightily to update their approach for the audiences of late 1968.
Their repertoire is also in flux at this date, as the Rationals' program eschews their 45 hits for an eclectic selection of rhythm & blues favorites like "Fever" by Little Willie John, Tampa Red's "Don't Lie To Me" (also popularized by Fats Domino on Imperial), "I Put A Spell On You" by Screamin' Jay Hawkins (you can hear the MC-5's very different arrangement of this shared tune on their Power Trip CD), Koko Taylor's currently popular "Wang Dang Doodle" (also recorded by Howlin' Wolf), the Chuck Willis classic "Feel So Bad" (also a hit for both Elvis Presley and Little Milton), and the Knight Brothers' soulful blues ballad, "Temptation's 'Bout To Get Me," a Scott Morgan tour-de-force of the time.
The sound is rough, befitting a primitive sound-board recording from 1968, and the performances are no smoother, but you can hear the Rationals get down and cook on material that definitely carries a lot of emotional weight for the band's members. It reminds us that the rock generation of the 1960s was primarily informed and inspired by the work of Black rhythm & blues artists and not other suburban white people, a fact which lent primacy and emotive force to their own music in a way which has been totally absent from the popular music scene for about twenty years now.
This is the Rationals, "live" and raw in 1968, a proper introduction to an undeservedly obscure Michigan band long lost in the cobwebs of time. Listen, and enjoy. We've all waited a long time to hear this one.
--New Orleans
May 31, 1995
For my brother David,
on his 50th birthday
Big Chief Productions Presents
The Rationals
Temptation's Bout to Get Me
"Live" At The Grande Ballroom
October 27, 1968
Total Energy Records NERCD-3004
1 "Fever" (John Davenport/Eddie Cooley)
2 "Don't Lie To Me" (Hudson Whitaker)
3 "Temptation's 'Bout To Get Me" (The Knight Brothers)
4 "Ha Ha" (Rationals)
5 "I Put A Spell On You" (Jalacy Hawkins)
6 "Bop Bop" (Rationals)
7 "Wang Dang Doodle" (Willie Dixon)
8 "Feel So Bad" (Chuck Willis)
Recorded "live" at a benefit for Senator Roger Craig at the Grande Ballroom, Grand River at Beverly (one block south of Joy), Detroit, Michigan, Sunday, October 27, 1968. Recording engineer unidentified.
THE RATIONALS are Scott Morgan, lead vocals, flute, percussions; Steve Correll, electric guitar; Terry Trabandt, electric bass; Bill Figg, drums.
Produced by John Sinclair For Big Chief Productions
Digitally transferred from original 7" master reels by Keith Keller with Doug "Action" Jackson and John Sinclair at Chez Flames Recording, New Orleans, January 7, 1993.
Special thanks to Scott Morgan, Wayne Kramer, Frank & Peggy Bach, Gary Grimshaw, Uncle Russ Gibb, Jeep Holland of A-Square Productions, Keith Keller, and Doug "Action" Jackson. The producer would like to express his appreciation and gratitude to Jerry Brock and Barry Smith at the Louisiana Music Factory, 225 N. Peters, New Orleans, LA for their extraordinary assistance and support during the course of this project.
(C) 1995, 2006 John Sinclair. All Rights Reserved.
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