biggest blackest

Big Black - Hunter's Safety (Tommy Bartlett Dies In Pain) from WNUR's The Middle Of America Compilation (1984)

There are those days when climbing up to the top of a water tower with a twelve pack and a deer rifle sounds like a good idea.

What can be said that hasn't already been said about Big Black; you either like them or you don't. Sometimes they don't like themselves. I recall reading that guitarist / vocalist Steve Albini said that after listening to Atomizer nearly a decade after it's release, found most of it embarrassing. It's understandable that any artist is going to be far more critical of their own work than any fan or reviewer. But I have to argue that after twenty years, most of their music holds up pretty well. Of course I state this with a time biased opinion, having been exposed to Big Black in late 1985 just as I was starting to really expand my musical tastes. There was a sinister pleasure to playing their records to the uninitiated; it was a confrontation, if not an outright "up yours" to anyone who ascribed rules or guidelines to what music - punk rock, in particular - should be. Their music was the sonic equivalent of the skinny high school geek, fed up with being pushed around, justifiably beating the shit out of the varsity quarterback. There was a validation in listening to their records because damn it, they were that good.

Bonus points for having great liner notes.