Cody Gaisser

THE FIRST FOUR YEARS

RATING: 7/10

The First Four Years is the origin story of one of the most important bands in the history of music (and one of the most important labels in the history of music). These songs are partially responsible for the whole DIY/alternative/indie music subculture. It's prime hardcore punk. It launched a gazillion bands and labels. "Influential" barely says it.

The guitarist Greg Ginn turned his hi-fi business into SST Records to distribute these songs between 1978-81, during which time the band was fronted first by Keith Morris (who would leave to start Circle Jerks), then by Ron Reyes (who would rejoin Black Flag decades later), and finally by Dez Cadena (who would subsequently switch to rhythm guitar). Chuck Dukowski played bass and helped run the label. Brian Migdol played drums at first, then Robo. Henry Rollins isn't in the band yet, but this is the stuff he loved so much that he quit the ice cream shop and devoted his life to Black Flag for years.

The songs (mostly written or co-written by Ginn, with some contributions from Morris, Cadena, and Dukowski) are short, fast, and loud. The lyrics are cynical and nihilistic, with themes focused on dissatisfaction with society. The first few tunes with Keith Morris on vocals most resemble the archetypes of classic punk rock. "Nervous Breakdown" is an anthem in the vein of the the Stooges or the Dead Boys, while "Wasted" recalls the Damned. The music and vocals get more intense when Ron Reyes takes over the mic: "Jealous Again" could be a particularly malicious New York Dolls tune. "White Minority" is a somewhat muddled critique of white supremacy. The band's rage increases further with the arrival of Dez Cadena. The band's future directions are foreshadowed in the atonal lead guitar fills of "Six Pack", the spoken intro of "I've Heard It Before," the atonal shouting of "Machine", and the sluggish riffing of "Damaged". Their twisted rendition of "Louie Louie" holds up better than any of the throwaway cover versions on The Great Rock 'N' Roll Swindle.

The First Four Years is really great music if you like angry men screaming at you over loud guitars (which I do!). It wouldn't be a bad introduction for someone new to Black Flag. It is a lot of hardcore fans' favorite album. It also somewhat prepares the listener for the strange trip that follows with the band's later albums.

DAMAGED

RATING: 7/10

Considered by many to be the band's definitive album, Damaged picks up where The First Four Years left off, but the group is even more dour and angry now. Dez Cadena has switched to rhythm guitar, Henry Rollins has taken over on vocals. Robo still drums, and Greg Ginn plays guitar as always. Chuck Dukowski turns in the best bass guitar work of any Black Flag album.

"Rise Above" is the band's anthem in a way, adding some self-empowerment to the band's usual distrust of authority. The early song "Six Pack" has been reworked. "What I see" is dark and ugly, with monstrous bass. "TV Party" proves the band are not utterly humorless. "Police Story" chronicles the antagonistic relationship between punks and police. "No More" sounds like insanity. The album starts to feel more heavy and plodding by the end, though.

Damaged has one foot in early punk rock and the other in the kind of metallic noise Black Flag would later create. I see the album not so much as the band's mission statement as a slightly awkward transitional work which also happens to be their most well-known record. It's very good though. It all gets very weird after this one.

MY WAR

RATING: 9/10

My War is a controversial album in Black Flag's catalog. Contemporary critics were pretty harsh on it. To some fans, it is the sound of Greg Ginn and Henry Rollins ruining the band. To others, it is their masterpiece. Basically, it's the point at which the band starts getting weird.

Dez Cadena, Chuck Dukowski, and Robo are out, which is sad; but new drummer Bill Stevenson (of the Descendents) is in, which is a good thing. Ginn's aggressive guitar music is becoming more exploratory and atonal. With the band "between bassists," he pulls double duty, though I have to say I prefer the bass playing of Chuck or Kira on the other records. Henry Rollins is getting more expressionistic on vocals, which suits the music well.

The first half of the album is a bunch of eccentric hardcore bangers ("My War," "Can't Decide," "I Love You"), but by the second half, Black Flag are having psychedelic doom metal excursions reminiscent of Black Sabbath and The Stooges ("Nothing Left Inside," "Three Nights"). It could almost be confused for hippie music, but the vibes are all wrong and the trip is very bad. My War is the best representation of Black Flag's earlier and later sounds in a sort of harmony (dissonance?) with each other, and it is their album that grips me and puts me on the edge of my seat the most.

FAMILY MAN

RATING: 5/10

This is arguably Black Flag at their weirdest. The first half is intense solo spoken word poetry by Henry Rollins (without the band). The second half is a series of noisy instrumentals (without vocals). The poetry is a little much to take seriously, and so are the instrumentals, kinda. "Armageddon Man", the one song where they bring it all together, works. There's certainly nothing "typical" here. I respect it.

SLIP IT IN

RATING: 7/10

You can probably gauge from the album art that this isn't going to be a nice, friendly record for all occasions. It's more song-oriented than Family Man, but it's still plenty freaky and aggressive.

"Slip It In" is the band at their dirtiest in every way imaginable, even if it weirdly dabbles in slut-shaming. "Black Coffee" is the last thing Henry Rollins needs, because he sounds pretty "Wound Up" as it is. "The Bars" is one of the rockin'-est songs the band ever recorded, with some propulsive bass-playing by Kira Roessler. The instrumental "Obliteration" is unnecessary, but it doesn't detract too much from this otherwise solid set of songs.

I dig the Ginn/Rollins/Roessler/Stevenson era of this band, and this is them firing on all cylinders.

LOOSE NUT

RATING: 8/10

Loose Nut is Black Flag at their heaviest and tightest. It's also their most song-oriented album since Damaged, and it's a better collection of songs. The production is slick (by hardcore standards), but the drums are sometimes a little unnatural sounding.

"Loose Nut" is an aggressive opener, more or less what one would expect from Rollins-era Black Flag. "Bastard In Love" is the closest the band gets to pop, which isn't really that close after all. "Annihilate This Week" is a queasy boogie about self-destruction. "Modern Man" is sludgy and metallic. "This Is Good" brings a healthy dose of structure to Greg Ginn's atonal guitar riffing, but there's still room for a hilariously chaotic solo. "Sinking," one of the band's best songs, bringing together all of the rock, punk, metal, and avant garde influences in one place. "Now She's Black" is a righteous closer, and the other songs are good as well.

Some people think the band sold out because there's a little reverb and delay on the recording. I don't. This is Black Flag at their best.

THE PROCESS OF WEEDING OUT

RATING: 6/10

Greg Ginn has always favorited wailing lead guitars, and here he pushes that to the extreme in an instrumental context. I love this because Ginn's chaotic guitar wizardry is disarming to behold. Kira's bass is probably as forward as it ever gets on a Black Flag album, thankfully. Bill Stevenson's drums tie it all together. It reminds me of krautrock or Peter Green's The End Of The Game or King Crimson with a head injury. Some people say it's influenced by jazz and/or twelve-tone music, which is fair, but this is brutal guitar music first and foremost. It's my favorite of Black Flag's instrumental tangents.

IN MY HEAD

RATING: 8/10

The final album of Black Flag's original run is a collection of unpredictable riffs; and in a sense, it's also the band at their most melodic. It still sounds like a bunch of aggressive dudes (one of whom happens to be a woman) purging their bad emotions through intense music, but the songs are more focused here than on some of their more experimental records.

"Paralyzed" shows off Ginn's rock & roll guitar roots, but that doesn't mean he doesn't get weird with it. "The Crazy Girl" and "Black Love" are all sharp angles and dissonance, while "White Hot" has extreme metal tendencies. "In My Head" is a furiously heavy stomp, and "Out Of This World" just makes you want to move. The sing-song major-key tune "I Can See You" is extremely unusual for Black Flag, almost sounding like the alt-rock band Pavement (who didn't exist yet). "Drinking and Driving" is straight-ahead hard rock until it comes time for a wacked-out guitar solo. "You Let Me Down" fuses spoken word with dissonance in a way that wouldn't have been out of place on Family Man.

The band are in top form on this album, and the production is more naturalistic than on Loose Nut. It's fascinating to hear a hardcore punk band turn to weird arty guitar noise with spoken poetry and then integrate those ideas until they just become really uniquely themselves. The band went out on a high note, at least until Greg Ginn revived the Black Flag name decades later.

BLACK FLAG