A long-admired Detroit music figure is offering dozens of items for sale from her personal collection of rock memorabilia.
In an auction that runs through Wednesday, Sept. 16, guitarist Mary Cobra is parting with a diverse array of rock art, rare record pressings and other mementoes reflecting decades’ worth of music in Detroit and beyond.
“I go to see it, I got to feel it, but it’s time for somebody else to enjoy it now,” says Cobra, founder of the soul-rock garage band Detroit Cobras.
Her collection, available for online bidding at Wax Poetics, was amassed during her many years immersed in rock 'n' roll and the Detroit scene. Much of it was originally accumulated by her longtime partner, the late Ben Edmonds, an acclaimed rock journalist who
also did stints with several record labels and had an eye for retrieving future collectibles from office bins when fellow staffers ditched it.
Rare items include a 1968 Grande Ballroom admission pass signed by Russ Gibb, who operated the westside psychedelic rock hall. The auction also features a selection of Grande postcards — mailed to fans to hype upcoming shows — adorned with colorful contemporary art promoting the Yardbirds, Grateful Dead, James Cotton and others.
For record aficionados, Cobra’s collection also includes several rare test pressings and acetates, including work by the Doors, Lou Reed, Cher and the fabled power-pop band Big Star. Also highlighted is an ad slick depicting the original, controversial cover of the Rolling Stones’ 1968 album “Beggars Banquet.”
On the art front, there’s a host of eye-popping concert posters, including work by the late Gary Grimshaw, and Cobra is even offering up a vintage bit of apparel: a tailored suit worn by drummer Johnny “Bee” Badanjek when he headed to New York with the Rivieras, the band that would become Mitch Ryder and the Detroit Wheels.
Cobra’s auction comes amid efforts to minimize belongings inside her Detroit home, and she found it easier to part with stuff as she went: “Once you start condensing things, you go, what the heck.” Still, there was one item she toiled over before giving in: a 1964 test pressing of the Ronettes’ first and only album.
Cobra, a fixture of the Detroit scene for several decades running, trusts that her long-cherished memorabilia will wind up in good hands.
“It's time for other people to have a look at it, because it really is cool stuff,” she says. “My love of Detroit and records has to be shared and passed on. It can’t just die away with me.”
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Rare Detroit rock items up for bidding from collection of Mary Cobra
