Thirsty and Miserable;: A Critical Analysis of the Music of Black Flag by Tim Murr

Thirsty and Miserable;: A Critical Analysis of the Music of Black Flag Reviews

• 
  Guy

  "So fuck the critics, we're all here for Black Flag."
  
  While I can sympathize with the author's fervor and what Black Flag has meant to him personally, it's really, really hard to find anything redeeming about this slim book. The lay-out is clumsy (and Times New Roman,... seriously?), it's full of typos (even in names and album titles), the punctation is inconsistent, the writing messy and at times frustratingly convoluted, the arguments underdeveloped and repetitive. If you're after a 'critical analysis', you should not just describe a sound as 'monstrous' or mention that a rhythm section "(...) really lock(s) it down". And then there's the tone, for some reason often defensive and/or agressive. The one that clinched it: "I'm no sexist and I hate to call a woman something demeaning, but Tipper Gore is a straight cunt." Okay, man.
  
  This might be a well-meaning... thing, but it's not a critical analysis. It's a rant, a series of diary entries that no editor (if there was one) should have allowed to pass.
• 
  Paul

  A point by point analysis of the band's career. I view Flag from a different perspective but that's the joy of music. The important thing in writing about music is to express your opinion coherently and to do the research, which Tim absolutely does. I should know on this one since I was a reviewer at Spark Plug Magazine, so it used to be my gig. Well done book.
• 
  Mark Oconnor

  Pedestrian at best, boring and inaccurate at worst. The author clearly did next to zero "research" and the analysis is nonexistent. This is a series of one or two page so called "chapters" which appear to be hastily written with little to no editing (this thing has a shit ton of typos) after flipping through the album insert and glancing at the back covers of the albums. There is literally nothing in here I have not read/heard before, and a lot is straight up wrong, incorrect. Bill and Kira did NOT quit the band, and neither did Chuck. All three were forced or vibed out.
  
  He also obviously didn't even listen to some albums such as "On Broadway" as he claims the song "Martyrs" ("No Martyrs", actually) is the EXACT SAME SONG as "Yes, I Know". Same music, same lyrics, same everything. Yet the author states this is a kickass NEW track that everyone should check out who is reading this! He even talks pretty extensively about how much he loves the infamous 1982 Demos with Chuck Biscuits on drums. That song is literally track two of this unreleased session. Wtf?
  
  He is also fucking obsessed with every single version of "My War" that is not the title track on the album. Live, recorded, literally ANY singer other than Henry is superior in his mind. Why, only God knows. I personally find the album version the most spine chilling with Henry's insane and intense screaming and feel that it blows any other version I have heard, even the live '84 version, out of the water.
  
  I guess the author read Get in the Van, but did not interview anyone even remotely involved with the band or SST, and makes a bunch of opinionated, rather ignorant commentary. To sum it all up, this guy is scratching his head wondering why fans of "The First Four Years" era early Black Flag are not gushing all over the 1985 "Loose Nut", an album that is toothless, over produced, slick and full of boring mid-tempo songs. Yet he can't for the life of him understand why other BF fans give this one a miss and it hasn't gotten it's due. That pretty much says it all.
  
  CAVEAT: Yes, I know plenty of Black Flag fans love Loose Nut, both the song and the album. What I'm saying is the fans who love EVERY singer but Henry, who HATE Henry like Spot and blame him for ruining Black Flag are not going to be Loose Nut fans. I find it to be the least interesting album they ever produced, honestly. Why 2 out of 5 instead of 1? It was a short read.
• 
  C.J.

  A Fair Assessment of the BF discography
  
  I was aspecting a little more musical analysis of Black Flag’s music, and a few details could have been fact checked and corrected (Rollins’ Rise Above album has 24 songs, not 21 as mistakenly stated by the author), but the general analysis of the band’s discography (including a more than far assessment of What The…) is very good.