Bad Brains: A Rasta Rock Band

http://www.da.wvu.edu/XMLParser/printstory.phtml?id=24754

Friday Nov 10, 2006
Michael Witherel
Correspondent

If there ever was a racial barrier surrounding rock 'n' roll, heavy metal and punk rock that seemed to make it exclusively "white" music, then that wall was smashed in the late '70s by Bad Brains. Bad Brains did a lot for the American Hardcore scene, which was a reaction to the British Punk Invasion of the mid to late '70s, and they may be credited with the beginnings of East Coast Hardcore.
Four black friends from suburban Washington, D.C., musically surpassed all other bands in the genre at that time. Not only did they have the speed and volume in their music, but they hit all the notes and showed the rest of the rock 'n' rollers up. It was one of the first bands to mix Rastafarianism and reggae with music like The Ramones and The Clash, something that Sublime would do years later.
Its first self-titled album has been considered by those among the scene to be one of the best hardcore albums ever. The album comes on with a wall of sound and doesn't stop until the CD is over. However, it also show its range and influences when it goes into traditional Reggae dub songs found throughout the album that sound like they should be on a Bob Marley record.
Its shows were wild, and after getting banned in pretty much every club in D.C., the band moved to New York City and immediately ruled the scene.
Totally committed to Rastafarianism, they were a sight to see, four black men with long dreadlocks and armed with electric guitars. They were fast and aggressive. Listening to songs like "Banned in D.C." and "Don't Need It", one can hear the passion that musicians had at the time, something that is rare in the bands today.
The Bad Brains are gone now, and we're all poorer from it. I was lucky to see the band in one of its last incarnations called Soul Brains when I was in high school. But by that time, the band was about done creatively and had committed to exclusively playing strictly Rasta music, which was only a part of what made it great.
Bad Brains should have been huge, but like many other great bands, it just wasn't meant to be. So it go.