BLACK FLAG: Damaged LP

There are records that soundtracked a movement, and then there is Damaged. Black Flag's 1981 debut didn't just define American hardcore punk, it picked up the genre by the throat and shook it until something new fell out.

Henry Rollins had been in the band for less than a year when this was recorded. Greg Ginn's guitar work was jagged and wrong in all the right ways, more blues mutation than anything the punk orthodoxy had sanctioned. MCA refused to distribute it, calling it anti-parent. SST put it out anyway. The rest is the reason you own a record player. Rise Above, TV Party, Six Pack, Damaged I and II, each one a document of a particular American frustration that hasn't aged because it was never really about a moment, it was about a condition. Every patch jacket with a Black Flag bar logo is a direct line back to this.

Vinyl LP. Standard modern reissue. Genre: Hardcore Punk. Originally released 1981 on SST Records, USA.

Fans of: Minor Threat, Dead Kennedys, Descendents, Circle Jerks, Bad Brains