OBCBYL: Minutemen

Next up in my little celebration of the 10th anniversary of Our Band Could Be Your Life: Minutemen.
One of the big points that OBCBYL (named after a Minutemen lyric, for the record) makes is how independent music, and these bands it contains profiles on, pioneered the idea that just regular folks could be in bands and release albums. But a lot of other bands still felt like rock stars. Look at a picture of Henry Rollins from Black Flag. Dude's still all ripped and good-looking and above average. The Minutemen were, by their own description, "fucking corndogs." Fat, goofy, nerdy, working class dudes. But dudes who really stood up for what was right, politically, lived/played/toured economically soundly ("jamming econo," as they say), and just kind of inhabited that admirable populous stance. They weren't punk in dress or style, they were punk in their heart. True punk. Their music was whatever they wanted it to be, and that was often challenging to the thuggish, fast/loud spirit of punk. But everyone loves a dorky underdog, right?

I'm probably going to be doing one of those on-air radio "salutes" per week, so the Minutemen will have to wait until next week. But, if there's any choice cuts you want to hear, feel free to let me know.