Who knows who/what is Black Flag these days? After a lawsuit launched (and lost) by Black Flag against Flag, the fans of the iconic hardcore band may be a bit lost in this slump. And honestly, they are gonna be even more confused when they see the artcover for the new Black Flag album! What.is.that? Isn’t this green cartoon really ugly… and is that thing puking? It’s not even ugly in a good way!
At least we know on what side Pettibon is because this doesn’t look like it is his style at all!! Which is weird because Pettibon is actually Greg Ginn’s brother and Ginn is Black Flag (with Ron Reyes, Dave Klein and Gregory Moore), whereas Flag is Keith Morris, Chuck Dukowski, Dez Cadena, and Bill Stevenson, or ‘basically just all the guys that wouldn’t play with Greg Ginn’ as Keith Morris put it in an interview. So Ginn probably pissed off his brother too, and Pettibon has been since doing art for Flag instead as this t-shirt demonstrates (he was already doing art for Morris’ other band OFF!).
Ginn may have lost the lawsuit but he is trying to win another battle, he is releasing new music with his band and Flag can’t say the same thing, are they really a band if they only live on nostalgia, if they never come up with new material? ‘What The…’ will be released on Ginn’s own label, SST Records, on November 5th, and this will be the first Black Flag album since 1985. The artwork sucks and I am not sure about the music either, as we have been able to listen to ‘Down in the Dirt’ for a few months now, and honestly it matches the artwork.
In any case, here is the track list, and despite the 22 songs, the album will probably be shorter than this Arcade Fire’s one!
01 My Heart’s Pumping
02 Down in the Dirt
03 Blood and Ashes
04 Now Is the Time
05 Wallow in Despair
06 Slow Your Ass Down
07 It’s so Absurd
08 Shut Up
09 This Is Hell
10 Go Away
11 The Bitter End
12 The Chase
13 I’m Sick
14 It’s Not My Time to Go-Go
15 Lies
16 Get Out of My Way
17 Outside
18 No Teeth
19 To Hell and Back
20 Give Me All Your Dough
21 You Gotta Be Joking
22 Off My Shoulders