Barred For Life – How Black Flag’s Iconic Logo Became Punk Rock’s Secret Handshake – Stewart Dean Ebersole
PM Press, P.O. Box 23912, Oakland, CA 94623, Usa, www.pmress.org
What a great idea/project: Travel the world (well, the USA and a little of Europe), visit people who have tattoed Black Flag’s logo, the bars, take a photo and have them given a short statement why they did it, what they think about the band, a funny story, whatever is on their mind. Spice it up with „interviews“ that dont read like interviews, (because you only see the answer and some short roundups that dont read like questions), but more like „memorys“ of these involved people: Dez Cadena, Glen E. Friedman, Ron Reyes, Keith Morris, Rick Spellman, Chuck Dukowski, Kira Roessler and Edward Colver. Almost all those text give a very good picture of what happend to Black Flag from the perspective of the individual, too bad Ginn and Rollins where not ready to contribute…..
Complete it with your own story, how you grew up, got in touch with Punk Rock / Hardcore, your thoughts about – of course Black Flag, among others, what you thought about when they changed, how you became a adult, kinda droped out and ended up doing the book. More then 320 pages with almost 400 hundred shots of people who have the bars tattooed, big, small, good, bad, old, young, on various spots, male, female… it is all there, alot to look at – in black and white and amusing to read. Obviously not everybody has something great or intelligent to say, but that is not the point. It is about the people (there are barely any „famous“ people in here) and their bars and their relation to the logo and the band. Not more, not less.
I love the cut and paste looking layout, but suggest you read Ebersole’s writings in one piece, not page by page, interrupted by the peoples statements, you might loose track. Since his remarks are a bit excessive, here and there, especially when he talks about the logo and its meaning for the world or the scene at least… I have a feeling that is a bit over the top, but I might be wrong – who knows. In other words, parts of the design make it hard to read the authors writing. But this does not smaller the great effort and the years that went into „doing“ this book, resulting in a couple of fun hours for the reader. I have to quote one statement here, from Townsend „Sned“ Sulivan, Age: 46 from Atlanta, GA whos occupation is: Martial Arts Instructor.
His favorite Blag Flack singer is Dez Cadena, his favorite Song is Room 12 and he likes the Damaged album the most (all people involved get to name their fav’s). „I was at a Black Flag show, and during the show somebody spit on Henry Rollins. Henry stopped the band and demanded to know who spit on him, saying, ‚I am going to beat up whoever spit on me after the show.‘ He talked alot of shit. After the show me and my friend waited for him. He backed down – said that the threats were all just part of the stage act.“ This should be a hardcover book, not paperback. Therefore it is not expensive. 24,95 US $ (dolf)
Isbn 978 1 60486 394 9
[Trust # 161 August 2013]
