This Detroit Garage Rock Band Dress Up Like Partying Neanderthals

Caveman & Bam Bam, and the group’s latest track “Gotta Dance,” is all about unleashing your wilder side.

That tracks with the evolution of Caveman, also known as Frank Woodman. The long-haired guitarist was first spotted by local music fans outside of venues, starting in parking lots, on street curbs, or down alleys with a small, fuzzed-out amplifier and his guitar. 

Woodman had already been writing and performing music that was less raw or primal by comparison.

He sang in a family band with his daughter on vocals and his son on lead guitar, channeling neo-psychedelic pop-rock but with a distinctly Detroit flavor. The Caveman band was Woodman’s outlet for his lifelong love of gritty Detroit garage rock, from the Stooges in the ‘60’s up to the Paybacks and the White Stripes of the late 90’s and early 00’s. 

He started hitting venues by 2012, playing conventional sets with a drum machine. Brandon Moss, or Bam Bam Moss, had been a friend of Woodman’s as well as an admirer of the project and is a drummer in one of Woodman’s favorite bands, a heavy-hitting post-punk rock band called Bars of Gold. 

Over the last several years, the duo have been donning their Cavemen costumes as though they were alter-egos; but it wasn’t necessarily like becoming superheroes, or turning into living cartoons, it was something more visceral than that.

When they go into Cavemen-mode, it’s like they’re tapping into all of the exuberance that is ignited inside anyone who loves rock ‘n’ roll music as much as they do. Sometimes we might not let that exuberance out, sometimes we might hold it in. That’s just not the case with Caveman & Bam Bam.