Detroit 's MC5 also came out of the underground rock music scene of the late 1960s . They introduced a more aggressive evolution of garage rock which was often fused with sociopolitical and countercultural lyrics of the era , such as in the song " Motor City Is Burning " ( a John Lee Hooker cover adapting the story of the Detroit Race Riot of 1943 to the Detroit riot of 1967 ) . MC5 had ties to radical leftist organizations such as " Up Against the Wall Motherfuckers " and John Sinclair 's White Panther Party , and MC5 performed a lengthy set before the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago , where an infamous riot subsequently broke out between police and students protesting the Vietnam War and the recent assassinations of Martin Luther King , Jr. and Robert Kennedy . MC5 , The Stooges and the aforementioned Velvet Underground , are now seen as an influence on the protopunk sound that would lead to punk rock and heavy metal music in the late 1970s
1968 Democratic National Convention
1968 Democratic National Convention
Counterculture of the 1960s