Brother Crimewave

Brother Crimewave is a Detroit-based multimedia personality. He plays guitars and basses and is a singer-songwriter.
He began playing guitar, receiving his first 1/2 hour lesson from John Goff who owed him $3.50.
He first stage appearance was with The English Ryders whose rhythm guitar player quit. The club owner hired a 5 piece band and would settle for nothing less. Brother Crimewave's amp was on but the volume turned all the way down. The club owner was none the wiser. BC did however get to sing backup vocals. And he got paid full band member share!
Shortly thereafater, he began actually playing and being heard in a few other bands. In 1967, while in Mexico City, he played one night at the Hullabaloo Club with Los Profetas, whose rhythm guitar player was too hungover to perform. BC was paid 100 pesos ($8.00).
Back home when one of the bands he was in needed a bass player he switched to bass. In 1968 his playing was suspended while attending Wayne State University in Detroit. That didn't last long. BC was radicalized, joined the White Panther Party.
In 1970, while living at the White Panther pad in Detroit, one of his fellow Panthers, David Gaines let him use his acoustic guitar and suddenly Brother Crimewave could play lead guitar.
In early 1972, BC had bought a Gibson SG Deluxe and a couple of 15watt Univox amp. Ahead of each amps was an ElectroHarmonix LPB1. A Y-chord was attached leading to an LPB2 which was plugged into the SG. Feedback and sustain for days!
Brother Crimewave started a power trio, Synthetique 999, playing all original material. The drinking age was lowered to 18 and the bars hired no bands playing original music. So instead, BC and other bands playing their own tunes resorted to playing "keggers" (hall parties).
In 1975, Brother Crimewave formed yet another power trio, Kenny Mirage and the Hallucinations. And continued playing Keggers. BC did play at two different bars during that time. One the 5 Dueces at 22222 Fenkell (5 Mile Road) was eventful for the fact that the bar owner pulled a gun on Brother Crimewave because his feedback and tape echo effect woke him from his nap at the bar!
At the other bar, JJ's in Livonia, Michigan, on the third night of a 5 night stand, the owner said, "Take a break. Take a long break." When asked by the owner "What kind of music is this? You said it was Top 40", Brother Crimewave replied, "It will be someday!"
Eventually Kenny Mirage and the Hallucinations broke up and Brother Crimewave (this time as Gravel Dirty) teamed up with Palomino Young to form "Young and Dirty". Their first gig was at Bookies Club 870 and there were quite a few bars that would hire bands playing original music. But the pay sucked. BC made more money playing "keggers" than the "new music" clubs.
After having enough of Palomino's drunken temper tantrums, BC (Gravel) quit, found yet another alter-ego, Calvin Dean and formed Calvin Dean and No Reputation. That lasted for about a year and a half until he quit that band because nobody else was interested in playing outside Metro Detroit. It was time to move on.
Meanwhile Brother Crimewave became a live sound engineer beginning with The Four Tops at the King's Row Showcase Lounge on West Chicago and Meyers in Detroit in 1977. Later he toured with The Chi Lites .
Brother Crimewave was also the local and touring soundman for Dark Carnival featuring Ron and Scott Asheton of The Stooges . Eventually he was fired by "Colonel Galaxy" for refusing to take less than the agreed upon payment for services rendered.
Brother Crimewave is also a music producer and the co-owner of Rockdigi , a digital recording studio and attended The Recording Institute of Detroit in 1996.

The photo of Brother Crimewave with dark hair is from the rear jacket of the Young and Dirty 45RPM single "I'm So Sick"/"Medicine Man" on Scratch & Purr Records recorded in 1980. The photo was taken by Sue Rynski , now based in Paris, France. The photo editing was done in 2007 by Stephen Czapiewski of Uncle Deercamp .

In the early-80s, Brother Crimewave was the closed-circuit camera operator for Clutch Cargo's at St. Andrews Hall in Downtown Detroit. At the same time he along with Dave Donavan handled the promotion and production of live music at The Old Miami in the Cass Corridor . In 1983, he moved his video operation from St. Andrews to Todd's Sway Bar where he also was the house VJ.

In 1984, Brother Crimewave moved to Hollywood, CA. In December 1984, he opened as a solo act two nights in a row at the Beverly Theatre in Beverly Hills, CA for Nina Hagen with 2,400 people in attendance at each performance.
In 1985 Brother Crimewave became Chief Engineer of (the now defunct) Platinum Sounds, Hollywood, CA.
From 1985-88 Brother Crimewave appeared in several movies and television programs.
He appeared in Less Than Zero with Robert Downey Jr., in Cop with James Woods, in You Can't Hurry Love with Bridget Fonda, and in an Alfred Hitchcock Presents episode The Creeper with Karen Allen.

Brother Crimewave also appeared in a Max Headroom episode, an NBC Movie of the Week Streets of Justice and a Disney movie The Invisible Kid .
Brother Crimewave also appeared in two music videos playing a contruction worker in It's Only Love by Cheap Trick (watch the video below) and an old Native American (song title unknown/video never released) by The Cruzados (formerly The Plugz ).
Meanwhile Brother Crimewave continued mixing live bands like Sinister Angel or recording musicians like Brian Wilson founder of The Beach Boys .
In 1989, he returned to Detroit and started The Rockhouse Recording Company now known as Rockdigi .

Graphic by Dan Boyd
In 2008, Brother Crimewave recorded, mixed and mastered and (along with Skid Marx ) co-produced Are You For Real? the first CD album by Circus Boy which was released in November. A review of the CD in the Metro Times can be read HERE .
Brother Crimewave & Hiawatha Bailey at Circus Boy Wrap Party at Rockdigi
Photo by Karen
Presently he is co-producing a new CD Album by the internationally acclaimed Carolyn Striho . It is expected to be released in Spring 2009.

Brother Crimewave Rocks HERE.
Brother Crimewave Rocks Media
"It's Only Love" (1986) featuring Brother Crimewave as the "hardhat" in the first ever video using American Sign Language (ASL) for the hearing impaired.
Brother Crimewave also dabbles in digital movie making. In October 2007 he composed and performed soundtracks for two movies at Pahfest: Hollywood 2007 one of which, Wheels On Hollywood Boulevard, was a finalist.