Episode 219: 1986
What’s up everyone? This week on the pod, we talked 1986 - a killer year for hardcore. Check out the episode here, here, or here, and check the playlist here or here.
It’s a group effort this week on the stack with both Clevo and Bedge helping out. Before I hand off the baton to those dudes, let me remind you on Episode 126 I made the case for 1986 being the greatest year of hardcore. Get in those archives and handle bidness:
Imagine arguing hardcore died in 1986 when this album came out in 1987, this album came out in 1988, this album came out in 1989, and on and on.
What a straight up fool.
BEN MERLIS AKA BEN EDGE AKA BEDGE:
"By 1986 Hardcore was over. The participants died, failed, lost interest, moved on, OD'ed, got girlfriends pregnant, whatever -- but there was more. The scene itself committed suicide." - Steven Blush, American Hardcore: A Tribal History
1986:
Debut releases by Slapshot, Insted, The Offspring, Dag Nasty, Underdog, Crumbsuckers, Crippled Youth, Lemonheads, Beowulf, Straight Ahead, Egg Hunt, False Liberty, and Bl’ast!.
Husker Du signs to a major. Dag Nasty fires their first singer in early ’86, their second singer quits in mid ’86, and they get their third singer by late ’86. Bad Brains get groovy, 7 Seconds gets wimpy. Naked Raygun, D.I., False Prophets, Mad Parade, and White Flag keep what’s left of 1.5 alive and then the Adolescents save the day by reuniting in the nick of time. It’s a big year for crossover with releases by Cro-Mags, Ludichrist, Crumbsuckers, Agnostic Front, The Accused, and Beowulf.
Bands who break up: Embrace and Rites of Spring (the first emo tears are shed), Dead Kennedys and Black Flag (best dressed man is retroactively STOKED).
Steven Blush declares hardcore dead, because he never heard of youth crew or RKL and hates crossover and NYHC. 15 years from now Zack will NOT throw him into a garbage can and regret it for the rest of his life.
Bedge theorizing here:
WHY WOULD SOMEONE FROM THE ’82 generation think HC is dead around this time? My theory: Bl’ast! Feels like rehashed Black Flag to them, UC feels like rehashed Minor Threat to them, Cro-Mags is a hair too far in the metal direction for them, and there are far fewer good records in ’86 than in ’82-’83. Also, going to shows is EVEN scarier than it was four years previous, so I’ve been told.
BRIAN RISTAU AKA CLEVO:
“1986 was the year music reached perfection.”
I have said this many times, half jokingly at most. In 1986 I was fourteen and entering high school. And although I didn’t experience all of it at the time, many classic albums across every genre were released that year. Beastie Boys, Metallica, Slayer, The Smiths, The Housemartins, and so many more. But we’re here to talk hardcore. 1986 is a weird year; some people will mistakenly tell you that hardcore was dead in 1986 while others put the era on a pedestal.
When we approached the Super 7 episode for 1986, we were all overwhelmed with choices (this is where I will tell you to go listen to the episode if you have not already). If you’re not familiar, we talk about each year by each creating a 7 song playlist fantasy football draft style. The order for this episode was Ben, Dan, Zack, and myself. There are so many tracks to choose from in 1986 having the last pick wasn’t an issue.
When I prep for most of these episodes, I list all of the releases I can think of from the year. Usually I search my iTunes and Discogs libraries for the year we are doing, plus we have a doc we use to brainstorm for each year. Then from each release I pick a few tracks from each one, thinking of the must haves for my list. For 1986 I wasn’t too concerned, because even with the fourth pick I was getting a great list.
Here’s what we came up with:
Pretty great lists all around, but there is a lot we didn’t get to talk about. My approach to these lists is to pick good songs while having good conversation and not have all of us end up talking about the same records. If you look at our 86 lists, you’ll see a lot of overlap, with all of us choosing Cro-Mags, Uniform Choice, and Youth of Today tracks- with good reason. Even after that there is still some overlap, but we left a lot on the table.
To rectify that I wanted to reimagine these lists using a format where once a release is picked, no one else could pick from it. Probably not doable for an episode, unless anyone wants to listen to us talk for 4 hours. This format dramatically changes the strategy.
Here’s how it played out:
First Round:
Youth of Today – “Stabbed In The Back”
Uniform Choice – “No Thanks”
Cro-Mags – “World Peace”
Slapshot – “Back On The Map”
No surprise Ben and Dan stayed with their choices, Zack wisely took a Cro-Mags track, which would have been my choice and I represented Boston with Slap Shot.
Second Round:
Dag Nasty- “Justification”
7 Seconds- “New Wind”
Poison Idea – “Made To Be Broken”
Bad Brains- “Intro/ I Against I”
Ben gets to his Dag Nasty pick a little earlier, as does Dan with 7 Seconds. Zack grabs his Poison Idea track quickly, and I snag Zack’s original Bad Brains track, adding the Intro. At this point almost all of our picks from the first three rounds are spoken for.
Third Round:
Bl’ast!- “I Don’t Need II”
Agnostic Front- “The Eliminator”
Straight Ahead- “Think Right” (End the Warzone)
Naked Raygun- “Home of the Brave”
Here we see our first new additions to the list. Ben takes a Bl’ast! track he overlooked originally, Dan finally gets that AF track in, Zack gets a Straight Ahead track we all forgot previously, and I move up my Raygun pick.
Fourth Round:
Sick of it All - “Pushed Too Far” (Demo)
Anti Cimex- “Time To ?”
Fourth round and picks are still solid. This version of the playlist isn’t bogged down by tracks not being on Spotify. Ben sticks with Verbal Assault, Dan reaches for his tape copy of the SOIA demo, Zack can type Anti Cimex and not have to try to pronounce it, and I stay away from the US with a Gauze track I had on my honorables.
Fifth round:
Egg Hunt - “We All Fall Down
Hooligan - “This Is a Song for You”
Crumbsuckers- “Super Tuesday”
Ben stays on brand with Egg Hunt, Dan with a deep pull for a Japanese Oi! track, Zack gets a great Exploited deep cut, and I go for a Crumbsuckers track I really wanted to get on the original episode.
Sixth round:
Descendents - “Wendy”
Angelic Upstarts- “I Stand Accused”
Conflict - “This Is the A.L.F.”
Underdog- “True Blue”
Ben gets a song I’m surprised didn’t make the episode, Dan with a very Dan pick, Zack with something we could have had a good talk over on the episode, and I get the value pick of the draft, a track we all forgot about in the original episode.
Seventh round
Samhain- “Mother of Mercy”
Crippled Youth- “Can’t You See”
Slayer- “Altar of Sacrifice/ Jesus Saves”
Hüsker Dü- “Don’t Want to Know If You’re Lonely”
Ben gets accused of linestepping with a Samhain track, Dan gets a value pick with Crippled Youth, Zack finally gets payback for all the linestepping we do and takes Slayer, and I go for the college rock anthem.
As we were reimagining the playlists we kept thinking it would get weird as we got later into the process, but it never really did. The only release that didn’t carry over to the revamped list was my Gang Green pick, but with the 4th pick I grabbed Bad Brains and Underdog tracks when I could.
Hardcore Still Lives. Until next time…peace!
- Zack
These write ups are a great addition to each episode. Nice to see Clevo discuss 185's recalibrated list.
Here's a few of my own 1986 honorary mentions from bands that didn't feature on the 185 list:
[ ] Negazione – Lasciami stare (from Lo Spirito Continua)
[ ] Dead Kennedys – Macho Insecurity (from Bedtime for Democracy)
[ ] B.G.K. – The Greatest American Zero (from Nothing Can Go Wrogn!)
[ ] Life Sentence – Problems (from Life Sentence)
[ ] Negative Gain – Nuclear Winter (from Back From The Dead)
[ ] Vicious Circle – Common Denominator (from Reflections)