KILLER FROGS IN TRANSATLANTIC BLITZ

Allen Park, Mich., USA - April 1974 — A bunch of us are in the Allen Park Hockey Rink, supreme arena of this bratwurst burg, watching BTO break on thru to Cobo Hall while the sweat off the pubes condenses in the air, when out comes this bunch of funnynosed dark-complected guys outfitted in spangles crossbreed Arabian Nights and hey-mofo-I’m-a-rockstar. They set up and begin to play this odd swirling churn which sounds like “Jumpin’ Jack Flash” with Joujouka stirred in, so being the steely lobed old cynics we are we retired to BTO’s dressing room to drink up all those Mormons’ beer.

Which is where, later, I first met Les Variations,, the world’s first FrenchMoroccan hard rock band. They return from their set bouncy with distinctly anti-gallic cheer, and assert themselves most ingenuously; “Alio, Lestair, I am Alain Tobaly, zees eez my brothair Marc who plays lead guitar, that’s our drummer Jacky Bitton and Jo Leb who zings, we love America and rock ‘n’ roll, ’ey man, you like Vats Domeeno?” Meanwhile the frosting on the cake is this semiportly guy about 40 years old standing in the corner in black trenchcoat and maitre’d’s pencil stasche; that’s Maurice Meiman, and he’s the main chef d’rhythm ‘n’ druse in this band, i.e. his oud (a traditional Moroccan instrument somewhat like a gutsier lute, formerly popularized here by Ahmed AbdulMalik) and violin serve up the real swirling Arabic drone which is principally what they’re referring to in calling their first album Moroccan Roll and what gives them promise of being the first group to take the wedding of eastern music to rock one modal noodle farther than the Velvets did with “Black Angel’s Death Song.”