Grit, Noise, and Revolution: The Birth of Detroit Rock 'n' Roll

24. “Uncle Russ”

24. “Uncle Russ” In the fall of 1969, WABX was still the most popular of the three FM stations programming “progressive rock” in the Motor City.1 But WKNR-FM received a big boost in August when Dan Carlisle joined the station, going on the air in the afternoon after jumping ship from WABX. Carlisle cited “the unwillingness of the station to offer a competitive salary” as the main reason for leaving.2 Aside from money, Dan was also upset that Rudnick and Frawley had been dumped from the all-night show for allegedly making nasty remarks about the bathrooms at the Grande Ballroom. Carlisle typed a letter of resignation and left it on the desk of station manager John Detz. Unfortunately, he forgot to add his signature, so Detz wound up having to quiz each deejay to ‹nd out who had actually quit.3 At WKNR-FM, Carlisle joined an air staff that included former Keener-AM Top 40 deejay Jerry Goodwin, who had gone through some sort of transformation after embracing “underground radio.” The station also bene‹ted from having Russ Gibb, the proprietor of the Grande Ballroom, on the air each weekend. Along with playing the records, “Uncle Russ” would “rap” with listeners on the air. Gibb says, “We sort of made things up as we went along. It was all sex, drugs, and rock ’n’ roll. The McDonald Drop-outs, Kilo the Dog, and Roger Goodtime were some of the characters I dreamed up for skits on my show.”4 “Russ’s show was giant,” says Dan Carlisle. “It was great. It worked for him, worked for WKNR, and worked for his club.”5 In addition to the Grande Ballroom and his weekend radio shows on WKNR-FM, Russ Gibb’s business interests kept expanding . For a time he was operating the Grande-Cleveland, as well as promoting concerts in Toronto and St. Louis. During the last weekend of May he had produced the big “Rock and Roll Revival” 218 at the Michigan State Fairgrounds. A week later, on June 6 and 7, it was “Under the Stars, Russ Gibb Presents,” a concert headlining the Who. In September Gibb would organize the Meadowbrook Pop Festival. He had also signed a deal with the J. L. Hudson Company , owners of the big department store chain, to stage a series of free concerts at the company’s various store locations. If that wasn’t enough, “Uncle Russ” was set to appear in a new TV show airing on channel 62.6 The only thorn in Gibb’s side had been the emergence of the Eastown Theatre. Aside from some of the Grande crew who rebelled to operate the See Theater at the site of the old Village on Woodward for a short time in 1969, the Eastown posed the ‹rst serious challenge to the Grande. Russ had even shown interest in buying the Eastown from owner Bob Bageris, who, despite drawing good crowds, quickly found himself struggling on the business side. The deal fell through, and the Eastown closed for a while. Then Bageris contacted Aaron Russo, a promoter from Chicago who owned the Kinetic Playground, that city’s major rock ballroom . Russo visited the Eastown and felt that it had “potential,” commenting on the “good acoustics.”7 He entered into an agreement with Bageris to manage the venue. After checking out the competition at the shabby Grande, Russo announced that he was in a “state of shock.” He “couldn’t believe that was the Grande Ballroom .”8 The Grande had in fact become run-down. Earlier in the year Creem magazine had chided Russ Gibb because the ballroom was “rapidly deteriorating.”9 The bands that played at the Grande, as well as the fans who paid to see them, complained about the horrible condition of the bathrooms. Uncle Russ claimed that it was dif‹cult to replace the bathroom ‹xtures because they were “old fashioned and out of date.”10 As the Eastown was threatening his livelihood, Gibb decided to shut down the original Grande Ballroom. After striking a deal with the Nederland brothers, who owned the Riviera Theater just around the corner, he opened the hybrid Grande-Riviera, in its place. The Eastown held around seventeen hundred people. Gibb’s Grande-Riviera, with a legal capacity of around twentyseven hundred, would now jump way ahead. After securing a “Uncle Russ” 219 dance license, a concert license, and a theater license, and Russ opened the new location...