By Scott Pohl, WKAR News
http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/wkar/local-wkar-995479.mp3
DETROIT, MI –
Motown wasn't Detroit's only source of music in the 1960's and 70's. The Motor City also spawned rock music stars like Bob Seger and Ted Nugent back in those days.
One of Detroit's biggest rock stars was Mitch Ryder. His string of hits as a solo artist and with the Detroit Wheels included Devil With The Blue Dress On, Sock It To Me, and Rock N Roll.
Ryder has written an autobiography called Devils and Blue Dresses: My Wild Ride as a Rock and Roll Legend.
WKAR's Scott Pohl spoke with Mitch Ryder this week.
Sex, drugs, and rock and roll is an often-used phrase, and in Mitch Ryder's story, there's plenty of that.
And like many of his contemporaries, managers and record companies made most of the money from his record sales and performances. Ongoing disputes with managers left him with little money and no American recording contract after his string of hits ran out.
"When somebody hurt me," Ryder says, "I kicked back. It was just my street savvy from what I had learned here in Detroit, and yeah, big, powerful men don't like to get kicked, even if it's kicked back. So, you know, they made me pay."
Ryder hasn't had an American release since the John Mellencamp-produced Never Kick A Sleeping Dog in 1983. Where he has found an audience is Europe, especially Germany. American fans might be surprised to know that he's recorded more than 30 albums and toured extensively there.
"They don't even care about Devil With The Blue Dress On," Ryder says. "I mean, they like it if I want to do it. It's not a part of what they know about me or understand about me. What they know about me and understand about me is what I've given them since I arrived on their shores, and that stuff has been not in the American marketplace."
Now, Mitch Ryder is trying to get back into the hearts of Americans with the upcoming release of his book Devils and Blue Dresses. He says writing it was a personal challenge to see if he could write, and that's why he didn't use a ghost writer.
Copies of the book will include a newly-recorded CD called The Promise, recorded in Hollywood under the guidance of Grammy award-winning producer and fellow Detroiter Don Was.
"For me, the whole experience was really magical," Ryder says. "I brought some very good songs, wrote all of the entire album with the exception of one live song on the album which is an interpretation of Jimmy Ruffin's What Becomes of the Broken Hearted, but a very powerful interpretation. The CD reveals the fact that at this age, space and time in my life, my voice is literally better than it's ever been."
With much of the work on the book and the CD behind him, Mitch Ryder is taking on yet another challenge. He'd like to surpass the success of shows like Jersey Boys, by writing a more traditional musical, along the lines of Les Miserables.
Mitch Ryder hopes all of these projects will show people that his career has been more than the songs they hear on oldies radio.
"I don't really want to go to my grave and the only thing that they can point to is a recording that's 50 years old, or 60 years old," Ryder says. "I don't want that to be my legacy. I want to prove that I haven't wasted my life as an artist."
At the age of 66, Mitch Ryder says his health is pretty good, despite the indulgences of his past and the occasional cigarette today. If he has his way, his fans will soon know a lot more about what he's been up to since his Rock And Roll heyday.