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Hey, Ken Burns -- have we got a high concept for you.
Yes, sir, that ''JAZZ'' series sure was swell. But let us hip you to another indigenous American music that's just begging for the documentary treatment. We're talking about garage rock. You know -- that snotty, primitive stuff that actually used to sneak onto the pop charts back in the '60s, great pulp classics like the Kingsmen's ''Louie Louie,'' Sam the Sham and the Pharaohs' ''Wooly Bully,'' and ? & the Mysterians' ''96 Tears.'' It was a rudimentary, insanely catchy three chord stomp bashed out by kids in the first flush of rock love. Most of them got their start on cheap guitars and chintzy organs in their parents' garages, just trying to express themselves with limited tools and talent, and in the process wound up creating actual folk art.
The garage genre was first codified on the 1972 double album compilation ''Nuggets: Original Artyfacts From the First Psychedelic Era, 1965–1968.'' That seminal LP, now regarded as the sacred text of garage enthusiasts, was compiled by Patti Smith Group guitarist Lenny Kaye, then a rock critic. ''Originally, I was just trying to gather together a lot of great singles that were in danger of being forgotten,'' says Kaye. ''But the further I get from it, the more I see how cohesive the feeling of that music and style is.''
And that far out, fuzz toned, Farfisa organ driven sound has been creeping back into pop culture ever since Rhino Records released a dramatically expanded four CD ''Nuggets'' boxed set in 1998. That same year, Smash Mouth got airplay with the Mysterians' ''Can't Get Enough of You Baby.'' Perhaps most crucially, this past March, Springsteen guitarist and ''Sopranos'' made man Steven Van Zandt announced he would copromote a concert series called Underground Garage Saturdays at the Manhattan nightspot the Village Underground, booking acts both old (the Zombies) and new (the Greenhornes). Van Zandt, the genre's de facto spokesman, just persuaded Northeast retailer the Wiz to feature a garage section in its stores.
You could also smell the garage fumes at this year's South by Southwest, the annual music biz confab in Austin. One of the most buzzed about showcases was by the White Stripes, from Detroit, the new garage mecca. And Rhino will release a second ''Nuggets'' box June 19, focusing on international garage bands.
John Felice, singer and guitarist with Boston's The Real Kids, sees history repeating itself. ''In the early '60s, music was crap until the British Invasion,'' he says. ''Then, in the '70s things were awful until punk came along. It seems to be happening again with garage rock.''
Considering pop's current doldrums, it's no surprise that kids are looking to the garage for kicks. Garage chic is even spreading to Tinseltown: ''Black Monk Time,'' a film about the '60s cult group the Monks, is in development with Moxie Pictures. Johnny Lydon (a.k.a. Johnny Rotten) costarred in a Warner Bros. pilot for a show about a garage band. Meanwhile, L.A. based legend Phil Spector is said to be interested in producing Detroit's Outrageous Cherry. How long before the major labels start sniffing around the scene?
Jon Weiss, copromoter of the Village Underground series and founder of Cavestomp!, the annual garage fest from which it sprang, wonders what they're waiting for. ''This is a very viable sound, commercially speaking,'' he says. Elektra Records A&R exec Leigh Lust agrees: ''There's definitely the potential for this to be big…. I could see [a garage band] popping out and selling a million records, pulling the scene up by its bootstraps.''
Still, some purists are skeptical. ''In a way, it would be horrible if big labels started [signing garage acts],'' says longtime booster Miriam Linna, whose Norton Records specializes in obscure '50s and '60s rock & roll. ''It's always been a pretty small clique of people that has been heartfelt about digging this music. Back when it started, it was an outsider kind of thing. Adults and big companies didn't go for it. It was a teenage world.''
Of course, pop music will forever be about teen kicks, and garage rock offers those in spades. Last week, deep in the heart of Garageland -- the nightclub Old Miami, in downtown Detroit -- the vibe was joyously sophomoric as a notorious local band called the Piranahs kicked up a squall somewhere between the Stooges and the Thirteenth Floor Elevators. They launched into a cover of Pere Ubu's 1978 arty garage classic ''Life Stinks'' that seemed intended to inflict permanent aural damage on anyone within earshot. Ah...now that's what we call music.
Additional reporting by Evan Serpick
