by John L Murphy
Blogtrotter
April 7th, 2013
How
“The Bars” signify not only Black Flag’s relevance three decades after
their career, but the impact of punk upon those who in this collection
were usually far too young to have seen a gig makes this photographic
and journalistic anthology compelling. As I was born the same year as
Dez Cadena and Henry Rollins, and as I grew up watching this L.A. scene,
I admit some surprise.
Everybody interviewed with the icon is
younger (with one exception: Ron Spellman, a second-generation tattoo
artist a few years older) than me–or therefore the famous Hank whose
arms, torso, and back became ever more inked as his power as the band’s
longest-lasting singer dominated the band’s image and presence. Why
tattoos perch or crawl over the bodies of the hirsute or hairless
hundreds in these pages portrayed, whereas earlier punks did not tend
(as chronicler Stewart Dean Ebersole, Spellman, and Chuck Dukowski
concur) to decorate themselves with so many or so “graphic” an array of
body art remains more an observation than a consideration. Yet, the
generational gap between those who come after the band who choose to don
The Bars and those who heard the band in its heyday persists.
While
I wish this aspect was explored more, this isn’t a sociological
treatise. It’s an angular presentation that mingles Ebersole’s own
rambling memoir of life in Red Lion PA with his coming-of-age with the
Flag. Interspersed are intelligent interviews with band members,
Spellman, and photographer Glen E. Friedman. (Greg Ginn no longer talks
to the press; Rollins talks to them but not here.) I share what Ebersole
wrestles over: feeling that by the 1984 “My War” LP (if not the title
track, which was punchier than most other tracks) the band’s move away
from hardcore to jazzier and sludgier textures did not do the ensemble
justice. Ebersole returns to this over and over, and many who identify
(as all tattooed do here) their favorite song, singer, and album by the
band list “My War” often in both categories. The editor locates this
pivotal point (before the band ended in ’86; note the current revival on
two tours by a version of Black Flag and one of Flag) as a very punk
rock one.
That is, the band challenged its followers not to
expect conformity, and undermined its own fan base. “Upon exiting, Black
Flag seemed to kick down the temple.” (255) They always tried to take
charge. Friedman reminds readers how the band, under SST’s aegis and
Ginn’s command, forged a collective identity itself at “The Church” and
its relentless devotion to rehearsing and touring, and managing itself.
While Ginn’s brother, Raymond Pettibon, earns full credit for his design
of their logo, I recall that its symbolism might have eluded those who
first saw it on records and flyers (if not yet tattoos). The four black
rectangles always remind me of a row of amps.
The band’s name
evokes for me–as Chuck Dukowski reminisces–the bug spray slogan “Kills
ants on contact” famously borrowed by the band in a Hollywood Blvd.
counter-PR, anti-Adam Ant stunt, and the popular insecticide of the era.
The anarchic connection appears to have motivated Ginn to change the
name of the group from Panic, coupled with his brother’s icon as a
memorable non-verbal logo and a rallying image of its vision. Ebersole
finds that its lyrics (unlike the Dead Kennedys or I may add the Clash)
have not dated as much for they were not paired to Reaganesque
depredations. The deeper anarchic resonance may, however, intentionally
or accidentally matter less to some who don the four staggered, as if
pixillated, dramatic and stark black bars.
Billy Atwell sums this
up (one of nearly four hundred wearers featured) as therefore pure
hardcore. “They say something without saying something at all.” (89) Ron
Reyes reflects: “People don’t get the cereal brand they eat in the
morning tattooed on them.” (125) So, what does this “secret handshake”
register as? As I lack tattoos, and as Black Flag is a band I like with
some songs but pass by with many more from that problematic later
period, I approached this volume of those who had heard this music a
decade or two after me–and often far from its home turf–with
curiosity.
Scanning the testimonies from band members, Ebersole
and his mates (his own tattoo is via a girlfriend’s birthday gift), and
those inked, the whole counterculture-as-commodity connection appears
underexamined. (A couple of slips on pg. 276: Kira Roessler went not to
“Yumi” but “Uni[versity]” H.S. near UCLA; so did Paul not “Bean” but
“Beahm” aka Darby Crash.) Rightly, many who were in L.A. around ’80
lament the turn to violence that kept such as me from the mosh pits as
they grew increasingly full of the jocks who used to pummel the artsier
and the lonelier who tended to comprise the first punks and the band
themselves (not sure about Rollins, although certainly he was less
pumped up when he joined…). Ebersole notes NYC scenesters featured
more tattoos but that this faded with British bands and then earlier
American ones–only to return with Rollins and mid-80s hardcore. But I
kept wondering if this ink-as-marker identification was less radical or
subversive than its wearers often assumed. As with many features
promoted by those who place themselves outside the norm, the norm tends
to catch up, surround, and profit off of their promotion.
One
encounter moved me. “Chaz” returns from Iraq after leaving part of his
leg behind. At Walter Reed VA, he wakes from a coma and tries to get
back together. He finds Henry Rollins as part of a USO tour standing
there at bedside. Chaz tells him about his ambition, and he soon dons
his Bars.
I am not sure how many have tattoos of the Bars on more
inaccessible or intimate areas; the ratio of males to females here
appears to balance that of those inked overall in American (and
Canadian, British, and Continental) cultures where many get by as
bartenders, skilled workers (or not workers!), artists, or creative or
casual laborers a bit off the corporate or mainstream grids. I kept
turning the pages–which mimic punk collage as you need to find your way
around the text and images and odd juxtapositions–expecting to find a
familiar face. While I did not, I saw people that I’d like to meet–an
indication of Jared Castoldi and Ebersole’s casual but approachable
style behind the lens.
Back to Stewart Dean Ebersole’s Author Page | Back to Jared Castaldi’s Artist Page
