Yo…
It was time to go home.
During the late ‘90s my time loitering around Windsor and Detroit had come to an end. I packed up my meager belongings, temporarily ignoring the relentless Y2K apprehension that our civilization was doomed.
My Dad showed up in a van and we spryly shoved my everythings into the back.
I clambered into the passenger seat and figured I had one last time to enjoy 89X.
My email went to Hotmail; it’d be a while before we could all consistently listen to any radio station anywhere on their "website." 89X is fantastic: Radiohead, Blur, Pixies, Garbage and…Green Day. All late ‘90s rock…just glorious music.
The radio DJ talked about Green Day.
My Dad did his Dad duty: did you forget anything? I shook my head: I have everything I need. Let’s go, home.
He put the van into D and we eased on down the road.
In one of those rare cinematic moments we all get in this life: 89X began playing Green Day’s Good Riddance (Time of Your Life):
“Another turnin’ point, a fork stuck in the road
Time grabs you by the wrist, directs you where to go
So make the best of this test, and don’t ask why
It’s not a question, but a lesson learned in time
It’s somethin’ unpredictable, but in the end is right
I hope you had the time of your life…”
At the time with one chapter closing and feeling hemmed in by an uncertain future; it was easier to look back than it was to look ahead.
Who knew what the future would hold?
I thought the Green Day song was about me and my experiences.
Turned out it was also about Detroit: doom was coming and it wasn’t Y2K.
“For what it’s worth, it was worth all the while
It’s somethin’ unpredictable, but in the end is right
I hope you had the time of your life.”
By the 2010s Detroit was facing a grim demise: Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick resigned following felony convictions.
Close to a million homes were designated as uninhabitable; they should have been demolished, instead they were left to openly rot like unbrushed teeth. Detroiters who did have functional homes were refusing to pay taxes. The city’s conifers were running low.
On July 18, 2013, Detroit became the largest U.S. city to file for bankruptcy. (New York City got close to bankruptcy.)
At one point 40% of all street lights in Detroit were simply not working. Obviously, crime was an issue. Literal darkness as well as an apt metaphor. The city couldn’t see a way out.
From Charlie LeDuff’s incandescent book Detroit: An American Autopsy published in 2013:
“And it is awful here, there is no other way to say it. But I believe that Detroit is America’s city. It was the vanguard of our way up, just as it is the vanguard of our way down. And one hopes the vanguard of our way up again. Detroit is Pax Americana.
The birthplace of mass production, the automobile, the cement road, the refrigerator, frozen peas, high-paid blue-collar jobs, home ownership and credit on a mass scale. America’s way of life was built here. It’s where installment purchasing on a large scale was invented in 1919 by General Motors to sell their cars.
It was called the Arsenal of Democracy in the 1940s, the place where the war machines were made to stop the march of fascism.”
Detroit was my ex who’d gone downhill. I dunno if I got hotter with age but I certainly didn’t fall apart like that.
Baby…what happened? After all the good times we had…how did Detroit end up like this?
I was fortunate to spend so much time in Detroit in the late ‘90s. Back then the city had so many infectious dreams.
I’m not a baseball guy at all but I went to a handful of games at the old Tiger Stadium in Corktown. (The last Tigers game at the stadium was held on September 27, 1999.)
These days we rarely see cars on the streets or highways covered in rust. There’s something endearing about that plain hardship that I miss. The old Tiger Stadium was a terrible stadium. There were columns that blocked views, big thick booty TVs were bolted into the rafters even though some of them didn’t work. Or work properly.
The stadium leaked…we stubbornly decided it was leaking water.
I’d gone to a few Blue Jays games but Toronto lacked the history of the old Tiger Stadium. Babe Ruth hit home runs on this field. This was a sacred space: it was a baseball cathedral. It was a movie that was so bad it was good.
I yammed delicious ballpark hot dogs. I even caught a ball from an outfielder while he was warming up. There were a handful of us just sitting in this large empty section, more seats than humans. The Tiger pointed at me and threw the ball up. It was thrilling…and annoying; I was enjoying my hot dog.
I can’t even remember the dude’s name. You can show me mugshots of Detroit Tiger players from the ‘90s and there's no way I’ll even be able to identify that player. Thanks Baseball Man.
I didn’t get an opportunity to go to Detroit Lions games. That was a mini-regret. It was hard to get tickets because that was during the era of Barry Sanders. The Lions were terrible but Barry was electric.
Again, I’m not a football guy but you can tell quality when you see it.
Barry Sanders was breathtaking.
I’d tune in on Sundays to watch Lions games…it was a background thing. I’d wait for the TV announcers to get hype then look up to see what Sanders did.
A slightly larger regret was I never got to go see any Michigan Wolverines football games where Charles Woodson was playing. He was marvelous.
(Yes: I know. Tom Brady played at Michigan from 1995 until 1999. So he was there. And I’m sure I saw highlights but all everyone talked about was Woodson. Seeing Tom Brady back then was like seeing early U2 in the early ‘80s. Sure, it’s a fun story to tell but all the good stuff came much later.)
And the Wolverines for basketball. My heart. Of course this was shortly after the Fab. 5. So they still had a lot of swagger. And baggy shorts! And Fab Five: Basketball, Trash Talk, The American Dream a non-fiction book by Mitch Albom when he used to write about sports.
It was an extraordinary time to be at Michigan. Tickets were so hard to get, I had few funds…it was a legitimate combination of factors. Still, I wished I tried harder.
(Since then I’ve seen one NFL game live and gone to a couple of NCAA basketball games. I’ve never been to a college football game ever…I gotta do that one time.)
Joe Dumars was wrapping up his time on the Detroit Pistons. Grant Hill was their impressive rookie and boy could that kid ball. It was so different going to a Pistons game with all the dense history…the ending of the Bad Boys era, The NBA team had eras! The Toronto Raptors had just started and had no history or eras, it was like being with a toddler.
The Detroit Red Wings were doing hockey things. In those hazy ‘90s Detroit sports infused the city with a vibrance. While the music gave the city some soul.
Some guy named Eminem released the Slim Shady EP on December 10, 1997. It was his follow up to his debut album in 1996: Infinite. I didn’t know who this white rapper was but I was hearing more rap music coming out of Detroit. This is fresh.
(The Slim Shady LP came out on February 23, 1999. That’s the start of Eminem and Dre and the Em we all know. His movie 8 Mile came out in 2002. Back then one dark night, not far from 8 Mile my friend pulled into a gas station. While he pumped gas, I sauntered into the gas station convivence store to buy candy. The staff were behind bulletproof glass thicker than a nerd’s Coke bottle glasses. The thicker the glass the worse the neighbourhood remains a protective American axiom. I would visit 8 Mile twice more before Em’s movie came out.)
Around the same time an upholsterer named Jack White formed…The White Stripes. The White Stripes had their first live performance on August 14, 1997, at the Gold Dollar bar in Detroit. I’d only read about CBGBs, Michigan had a garage rock scene.
How could a city produce grimy hustlers like Jack White (rock) and Eminem (rap) like that? This was edgy before edgy stopped being…edgy.
Creem: America’s Only Rock 'n' Roll Magazine is a 2019 documentary emphasized Detroit was always like this: grimy and loud but not always in that order. Creem’s print run lasted from 1969 to 1989. And gave us…gave me Lester Bangs. I too stayed up all night to write. And think. And dream.
Lester Bangs: “They make you feel cool. And hey. I met you. You are not cool.”
William Miller: “I know. Even when I thought I was, I knew I wasn't.”
This cool Almost Famous scene with Lester Bangs is devastating. I couldn’t be cool if I went out on a Fall day without my jacket.
Lester Bangs wasn’t just a music critic, he was a cool critic, a scene critic and more.
Detroit has always been about the music. Stevie Wonder and J Dilla are Detroit Magic.
More magic. The Techno Six in the late ‘80s. (The Six: Juan Atkins, Blake Baxter, Santonio Echols, Eddie Fowlkes, Derrick May and Kevin Saunderson.)
One of Detroit’s greatest musical contributions has been overlooked and undervalued: Techno. The electronic-music phenomenon was created by Detroit DJs in the 1980s…big banged by The Techno Six.
That spark transformed dance music internationally and blossomed into the multibillion-dollar industry of EDM today.
And just who were The Techno Six who gifted us all with this incredible techno music? That’s the exploration of Kristian R. Hill’s God Said Give ‘Em Drum Machines which screened at the 2022 Tribeca Film Festival.
Since I’ve been writing about the past here’s an attached My Summer Lair interview from 2022 where Kristian R. Hill and I talk about Detroit’s past.
Detroit is coming up because for the first time since the late ‘90s I’m going back to Detroit. (I’m in the city, right now!)
Since my Dad and I left in the van listening to 89X I’ve only been back once…barely. In January 2011 I came for a handful of hours, had dinner, enjoyed a Pistons game and departed. We didn’t even stay overnight.
Now, I’m spending a few days in the Motor City. 89X is gone, it’s a country station now. How is that progress, yo?
Detroit has had another resurgence…is it like the ‘90s? Better? Different? I’m curious so let’s go and find out.
I’ll use this space to report back.
Welcome to Detroit, where if you get that promotion
Don't worry, man, them bullets will still be at your ass firin'
I still call it safe, I would suck if I was umpirin'
~ Big Sean “Detroit vs. Everybody”
We live and have lived fascinating and wild lives. The things we’ve seen...
In this era of gambling I’m betting on Detroit over Everybody…
Sammy Younan
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Sammy Younan is the affable host of My Summer Lair podcast: think NPR’s Fresh Air meets Kevin Smith: interviews & impressions on Pop Culture.
The Rebirth of Cool Detroit