Classic Albums #2: Black Flag's Damaged
 

Is there a better soundtrack for a pillow fight?

Or punching a mirror, even.

An undoubted triumph of a disc, tempered with the fact that Professor Hank Rollins soon added his humorless bellowing into the mix.

Hank's finest hour, I'd say

never heard the album. never will. dont care

i don't like black flag very much, mainly because of greg ginn. he is a terrible guitar player. like, the worst i've ever heard besides those magik markers chicks. that being said, they do settle into many interesting grooves on this disc, and this was before they got to... greg ginnified. and before you say "GREG GINN IS BLACK FLAG!" .. well, yeah, and that's why i don't really like black flag too much.

not bad, but.. certainly.. more influential and interesting to talk about than actually GOOD. but maybe i just haven't heard the right stuff yet. family man is one of the worst albums i've ever heard.. but damaged is alright. not good, not bad.. just alright. rollins is great on it!

Pretty slicken' album. I have it on vinyl. Black Flag, to put it short, well basically Black Flag is Greg Ginn.

Good album. I especially like the song What I See.

It was always a puzzle to me, how SSt decided which records to release in the UK. This wasn't released over here until 1985, but their other albums were available, including the awful Loose Nut and Slip It In.

Same for Double Nickels On The Dime, which I had to buy on import.

And Damaged is one of the best albums ever made, to add my opinion.

doubles nickles on the dime.. now there's a classic album :)

I have never heard this album. I heard Black Flag back in the 80's and all the skater kids were into them, but I always was drawn to Minor Threat and the Misfits.
I may need to delve into the Black Flag.

This album is awesome and raw as all hell. Gotta dig the shitty lyrics and the crappy guitar solos, it's all part of the fun.

If someone described a punk record to someone who'd never heard any, and then sent them into a studio to record something. They'd probably come out with something like Spray Paint.

Why not? You won't know what your missing till you hear it. It's a classic, but /i think minor threats discigraphy beats it everytime.

Greg Ginn's crappy guitar playing changed my life.

Nothing is more beautiful to my ears than a Greg Ginn guitar solo.




Oh yes. My War is a better album, btw.

the sound of punk colliding into itself and turning itself inside out, screaming in agony as not only it's nerves get severed and it's skin flayed but it's own insecurities and neurosises being a much rawer ripped vein spilling battery fluid.

the first time i listened to it, i thought it kinda sucked; i waited some 5 or 6 years before i could locate a copy because there's no independent record stores and american hardcore punk never caught up here, i basically read all about the band and just thought how this album could sound, how furious and blinding, but when i finally got it, i got an overpriced cd version at the retail chain store in a ritzy mall, it sounded really thin and henry seemed very forced back, plus it was so dissonant i wasn't prepare for it, then the opening chords of "depression" started and the fucking world slowed down, right there and then was the ultimate translation of a feeling i had, not that of depression itself but the anger and frustration it generates. then the rest of the album sucked too.

it's one of my very favorite albums, so punk yet so original, it's a watershed; it also shows how the universe or destiny or karma or whatever you want to call it, works. dez was supposed to record the vocals of this album but the previous two attempts in the studio proved faulty; while dez was an spectacular singer, the record belongs to henry, greg's lyrics, although written by and for himself, were the reason they hit a stronger chord with the hardcore kids instead of the older punk veterans from l.a., since they really embody what teenage angst is: hard, dramatic, merciless, punishing and contagious; it's meant for the kids to sing while beating the crap out of each other at shows, it only seems natural that a 21 year old fan from hxc's capital (washington dc) would deliver the vocals.

furthermore, dez got moved to guitar, and the added weight makes this album's impact even harder, providing a sharped edged rock bottom to the rock bottom (the ever reliable robo) of the band for both lead guitarists of the band to just explode, greg's guitar is amazing for it's ineptitude yet stinging precision in all songs here and chuck dukwoski's equally burly yet shredding bass parts were so intrisicable to the sound that no band with no other members could come up with something like this. it's 25 years later and still no one has been able to come close to damaged (not unlike their earlier or later stuff, which has been copied to death).

they still had some really amazing music altering moments (side b of my war, the process of weeding out) and they eventually got better musicians (kira roessler and bill stevenson) but damaged remains, without question, a document of it's time and something completely timeless.

I prefer other Black Flag albums but it is a damn good album. I downloaded all of their albums about a year ago due to the stupid prices record stores ask for Black Flag here. Although today I saw a bunch of their albums for $25 each. I didn't buy them, like I said, I downloaded them. Seems fitting for such a band.

I think this was the second punk album I ever bought after listen to hip hop exclusively until I was 15. It's probably one of my all time most listened to albums.

Spot on. Although I really can't stand any of My War at all. Nonetheless, will Rep when I can.

Agreed! Absolutely spot on.

My War is a fine record, pretty much everything they did after My War was stodgy heavy metal (and I don't mean that as a compliment, pop pickers).

Still, nothing can detract from Damaged's greatness.