Dem rockers broke the scene

For any fan of Hardcore and Punk I think it should be clear that the Bad Brains are definitely one of the greatest bands ever. This should be a fact that's just not up for discussion. Yes the Cro-Mags are great and so is Black Flag, and yeah I like Agnostic Front and your band is great too, but the Bad Brains are just something else. I'm not saying they're better than any of the bands previously mentioned, but they're just something else. I don't even care if you don't really like the Bad Brains or if their music is not your thing: if you can't even just appreciate them, I don't think you can truly appreciate Hardcore. And that's not even an opinion.

The Bad Brains were pioneers that pushed the boundaries of a subgenre that on itself is all about pushing boundaries. As far as I'm concerned the energy, intensity and raw power that is displayed on their recordings is still unmatched today. Keep in mind the Bad Brains didn't have access to one 10th of the equipment nor to the logistical or financial resources every crappy band has nowadays, yet their earliest recordings still blow most current bands right out of the water, almost 30 years later.

To back up every word I said, allow me to share some Bad Brains live footage with you. Obviously I would've liked to upload the entire 'Live At CBGB 1982' footage, as that's just unmatched, but I suggest you just go buy that on DVD and watch it religiously as I do.
Meanwhile I put up some footage that was filmed by the Dutch national television in 1988, when the Bad Brains played Holland on their European tour. I hope some punkrocker soon infiltrates the Dutch national TV-station and steals the entire session from their archives. For now we'll have to settle for the Bad Brains playing 'with the quickness', 'the prophets eye' and 'I against I', with a short introduction in which we see the HR sniffing flowers while a sweet reggae-tune plays in the background. Little later you can see that the reggae-song is not background music edited in, but it is HR walking around with a portable cassette-player blasting reggae music. If you thought that's weird: the song he's playing is in fact taken from HR's own solo-record ('while you were sleeping' of 'Charge'). Some next level stuff right there.

Here's 9:22 minutes of coolness and brilliance. Enjoy.