OFF! , at Vacation Vinyl, Tuesday December 14th, 2010: Snap Your Synapses Back In Place -by Alyson Camus

I never had the chance to see Black Flag live, but many are saying that the new band OFF!, which Morris formed last year with Dimitri Coats (Burning Brides) on guitar, Steven Shane McDonald (Redd Kross) on bass, and Mario Rubalcaba (The Crypt/Hot Snakes) on drums, brings back memories of the legendary hardcore band.

OFF! was giving a free in-store show for the release of the first 4 EPs vinyl box set, and many musician friends (among them Skot Alexander from 400 Blows) were there for the occasion. ‘Thank you for coming’ said Morris, ‘This store is my Saturday morning hangout’, he thanked us for coming out on a Tuesday evening, in the middle of the Christmas capitalist shopping season…

As soon as the raw and fast riffs start, Morris stares around him like a wild reptilian predator ready to jump on everyone, then he screams his way through the chaos, triumphantly riding the sonic tsunami, whereas all the musicians look like they are ready to blow up the room at any time.

If the songs are short, Morris is doing the small talking between each adrenaline-injected tune, remembering the Black Flag old days when they only have 16 songs to play, dropping some big names, Metallica, Rage against the Machine,… over all saying that Black Flag had inspired a lot of people even though they did not know what they were doing…and by the same token making fun of the Smashing Pumpkins, with their (I paraphrase) ‘big Hummer with the Jacuzzi and the 5 dive bars,… not our path,…you can hope, can hope for the American dream and shit like that…’
Like in his songs, Morris always goes to the essential of his thought really fast, even though his talking can be quite funny and entertaining, but I realized after a while, that each of his little spoken interlude was in fact introducing the next song.

One of the songs was a eulogy to a friend, Jeffrey Lee Pierce, whom Morris spoke about in praising terms, saying that his punk group, The Gun Club, had been the best thing that California had ever produced, showing the band black t-shirt he was wearing.

At 55, long dreadlocked Morris has kept all the rage of the past completely intact, he is angry and pissed off as we all should be! And he is here to remind us that Hardcore will never die.

Set list