Black Flag: For Good and All
Do I like this band? Do you?
Before I jump in, I owe it to my pal Sam—who was kind enough to assemble a playlist1 and thoughtful commentary on Black Flag—to sort of explain the terms of this exercise. I’ve covered the motivation elsewhere. I’m going to listen to the songs and read through his commentary, and offer a more-or-less extemporaneous set of reactions. At the end of the exercise, I will have settled (for myself and no one else, but for good and all) whether or not I like this band.
Also, I have to say, part of how this will inevitably go—me being me—is that I’m going to be a little snarky about it. I want to be super-clear: My harshness is not intended as any form of disrespect to the person making the playlist for me. I really appreciate Sam’s perspective. I just need to process my own—often unfair or biased—feelings about the band/songs.
Here goes!
Depression: This sounds exactly like a Black Flag song to me. BF suffers in my view from sounding just like a band like them sounds. There are more than a few hardcore bands, and with a couple of exceptions they run together for me. And there are some ways I find this genre kind of grating. Specifically, the weakness of the guitar sound leaves me cold. Especially in music that is supposed to be so HARDCORE! it’s weird for the guitar to sound so puny. For this track, lyrically, not since Geezer Butler failed to understand the meaning of the word paranoid2 have I found a reflection on an unpleasant emotion/mental illness less moving.
Police Story: Second song, second singer. I have trouble when a band’s personnel changes. It works for certain acts where the “band” is really just whoever the principal songwriter has playing with them. BF clearly revolves around Greg Ginn, and the rest is a rotating cast, but it doesn’t work for me here. These hardcore bands are supposed to be all about solidarity, and that is deeply undercut when you’re always changing your line up. Though I have to admit the story of BF’s best-known singer, Henry Rollins, joining the band by auditioning DURING A SHOW is pretty fuckin’ cool. I have nothing to say about the song itself.
My War: Sam’s notes do a nice job explaining what Rollins brought to the band:
While Rollins is not a straight edge person nor is BF a straight edge band in the same way that H20, Minor Threat, or Shelter/Youth of Today are, the consistent pushback against rampant consumerism and coporatism of the 80s almost seems like they should be considered "straight edge adjacent." in AA lots of folks talk about how “diet is more than what you eat, it's everything you take in”; Rollins seemed to embrace that with these albums, and there was a lot of internal, personal journeys in this lyrics.
All respect to Rollins, whom I find a delightful personality, even if he comes on a little strong with all his indie credibility rants, the vocal delivery ends up sounding again, like the guitar, weak. And weakness isn’t bad per se, but in the context of hardcore, seems to undercut the point.
Modern Man: I appreciate that Sam included this one. BF has been a band for a long time and have gone through a lot of changes. I respect that. The early aughts brought an era few people celebrate and a sound that has a weirdly heavy metal influence. This song is a great example of how incongruous (in a bad way!) this stylistic turn was. There’s a Sabbathy intro that then falls right into something that sounds like what? a Black Flag / generic hardcore song.
Nervous Breakdown: This one’s pretty good. There’s Sex Pistols kinda vibe that they’re pulling off and this is a solid punk song.
TV Party: I like this song. I’m glad it’s on the list. This exercise has crystalized for me my reaction to Black Flag. They’re not that clever or insightful, but they are aggressive about having a message (plus the music is kinda lame). This song works because while it’s sarcastic, the basic dumbness being parodied is also the basic dumbness that permeates the band’s catalog. They succeed despite themselves here, I think.
Ok, so do I like this band? Nope. And now I feel fine about that because I’ve given them some consideration and resolved their place in my personal musical cosmos. I hope Sam isn’t offended!
(Spotify autoplayed a Misfits song as I was listening and writing and for a sec I didn’t realize what was happening, and I was like, okay, Black Flag! No such luck.)
I’m still accepting playlists for this game, so make one for me, and I’ll shit all over one of your favorite bands too! Or maybe you’ll win me over!
Agree? Disagree?
NB: Sam linked me to a version of “Depression” that is not on Spotify. I appreciate the distinction between that version and the ones on Spotify, so if you really want to do justice to his vision, here is the link to the version he prefers: The Ron Reyes version of “Depression.”
For the record, I love Sabbath and that song in particular.
<<I have to admit the story of BF’s best-known singer, Henry Rollins, joining the band by auditioning DURING A SHOW is pretty fuckin’ cool.>> But not as cool as Keith Moon doing the exact same with The Who a couple decades before, and literally destroying the drum set of his predecessor. (Though guessing that guy didn't think it was very cool.)