Live '84

Live '84 is an album released by Black Flag in 1984 on SST Records.^[9][10] It is a live recording of a show played in 1984 and features mostly tracks from My War and Slip It In. A video was shot simultaneously and was briefly available through SST; the now-out-of-print video has been widely bootlegged.

Live '84
Live album by Black Flag
Released	December 1984
Recorded	August 26, 1984
Venue	The Stone in San Francisco, California
Genre	Hardcore punk, post-hardcore, jazz fusion, sludge metal
Length	75:28
Label	SST (030)
Producer	Greg Ginn
Black Flag chronology
Slip It In (1984) Live '84 (1984) Loose Nut (1985)

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[1]
Alternative Rock	8/10[2]
The Boston Phoenix	[3]
The Encyclopedia of Popular Music	[4]
MusicHound Rock: The Essential Album Guide	[5]
Punknews.org	[6]
The Rolling Stone Album Guide	[7]
Spin Alternative Record Guide	4/10[8]

The album was originally issued as a cassette-only release, almost simultaneously with Slip It In. In 1998, Greg Ginn remixed the album for CD reissue.

Recording

The album was recorded at the Stone nightclub in San Francisco, CA.^[11]

Critical reception

Maximum Rocknroll called the album "a superior quality live tape showcasing an evening with a seminal, legendary, masochistic, poignant, chaotic beast of an outfit who have not lost one iota of aggro."^[12] Trouser Press wrote that "Black Flag concerts were typically an utter mess, which suits the songs perfectly, making this chaotic explosion naturally one of their best releases."^[13] The Spin Alternative Record Guide deemed it "tolerable until the lounge-core latter half of side two."^[8]

Track listing

1. "The Process of Weeding Out" (Ginn) – 8:31
2. "Nervous Breakdown" (Ginn) – 2:06
3. "Can't Decide" (Ginn) – 5:01
4. "Slip It In" (Ginn) – 5:54
5. "My Ghetto" (Ginn/Rollins) – 1:14
6. "Black Coffee" (Ginn) – 4:53
7. "I Won't Stick Any of You Unless and Until I Can Stick All of You!" (Ginn) – 4:53
8. "Forever Time" (Ginn/Rollins) – 2:20
9. "Fix Me" (Ginn) – 0:53
10. "Six Pack" (Ginn) – 2:26
11. "My War" (Dukowski) – 3:34
12. "Jealous Again" (Ginn) – 1:59
13. "I Love You" (Dukowski) – 3:19
14. "Swinging Man" (Ginn/Rollins) – 3:10
15. "Three Nights" (Ginn/Rollins) – 6:10
16. "Nothing Left Inside" (Ginn/Rollins) – 6:25
17. "Wound Up" (Ginn/Rollins) – 4:00
18. "Rat's Eyes" (Ginn/Rollins) – 4:21
19. "The Bars" (Dukowski/Rollins) – 4:38

Personnel

• Henry Rollins – vocals
• Greg Ginn – guitar
• Kira Roessler – bass
• Bill Stevenson – drums
• Tom Troccoli – backing vocals

References

1. Dougan, John. "Live '84 – Black Flag | Songs, Reviews, Credits, Awards | AllMusic". AllMusic. Retrieved July 3, 2015.
2. Thompson, Dave (April 12, 2000). "Alternative rock". San Francisco : Miller Freeman Books ; Berkeley, CA : Distributed to the book trade in the U.S. and Canada by Publishers Group West ; Milwaukee, WI : Distributed to the music trade in the U.S. and Canada by Hal Leonard Publishing – via Internet Archive.
3. "The Boston Phoenix February 06-12, 1998: Vol 27 Iss 6". Internet Archive. Retrieved April 18, 2022.
4. Larkin, Colin (2006). The Encyclopedia of Popular Music. Vol. 1. MUZE. p. 630.
5. MusicHound Rock: The Essential Album Guide. Visible Ink Press. 1999. p. 112.
6. "Black Flag - Live '84". www.punknews.org.
7. The Rolling Stone Album Guide. Random House. 1992. p. 62.
8. Spin Alternative Record Guide. Vintage Books. 1995. pp. 44–45.
9. "Black Flag | Biography & History". AllMusic.
10. Thompson, Dave (March 9, 2000). Alternative Rock. Hal Leonard Corporation. ISBN 9780879306076 – via Google Books.
11. Earles, Andrew (September 15, 2014). Gimme Indie Rock: 500 Essential American Underground Rock Albums 1981-1996. Voyageur Press. ISBN 9781627883795 – via Google Books.
12. "Live '84 cassette".
13. "Black Flag". Trouser Press. Retrieved March 9, 2021.