It’s been 25 years since the release of Stiff Little Fingers’ debut masterpiece Inflammable Material. It feels like half as many years since the last time I sat down and listened to great music that made me want to break stuff, but this past weekend I did. I’m older and less agile now, so I didn’t break stuff after listening to Material, but this is more because I’ve awkwardly grown comfortable with being a part of “the Establishment” and the only stuff available for breaking were the things I’ve paid for myself and treasure in my adult appreciation of materialism and ownership. It’s funny how we age, but can’t seem to let go of the passions of our misguided youth.
Stiff Little Fingers amazed me and defined my youth in a way that only the Clash had done before. Never mind the Sex Pistols, these guys don’t suck. More important, they weren’t about Vivian Westwood’s latest collection of crap, they were about revolution and anger and breaking stuff. They were a band from a city that gave the world nothing but bad news and heartbreak. They were punk rock. With the love of John Peel, they gave us raw disillusionment, a weird pity, and really great songs. More important, they gave me the strangest sense of hope. From the angry “Suspect Device” (“They take away our freedom/In the name of liberty/Why can’t they all just clear out/Why can’t they let us be” – Patriot Act II comes modernly to mind, but let’s leave the politics out of this), to the tuneful “Bits of Kids”, Stiff Little fingers has remained a staple in the upkeep of an old lady who’s grown tired of following the silliness of the pop culture world.
My best boys from Belfast were accused of selling out as early as 1982, with the release of Now Then I’ve never thought much of critics who readily shout “sell-out!” at the first sign of success. There is, after all, a difference between growing up and selling out, and Stiff Little Fingers can’t fairly be accused of the latter. There are only so many ways that you can say “f*** authority” in two-and-a-half minute intervals, and any artist who fails to recognize this runs the risk of boring their audience. Despite a few of my more hardcore comrades, back in the day, scornfully re-christening the band “Limp Little Whingers”, I never felt the melodic catch of songs like “Good for Nothing” and “Stands To Reason” suggested a compromise of artistic integrity as much as they did the growth and progress of an ever-changing band. I certainly wasn’t going to stop listening because they refused to record “78 RPM” over and over and over again; in fact, I would have if they did.
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Article comments
1 - Mark Saleski
definitely a great (and underrated...maybe even unknown) band.
every once in a while i pull out my vinyl copy of Hanx.
great stuff.
2 - Emily
Mark,
I wouldn't say "unknown", but I agree with you that they've never gotten the attention they deserved.
3 - Larry O'Brien
God, I loved SLF. I don't know if it's _really_ the music, or just the associations, but I can't imagine anyone _not_ getting a rush of adrenaline just from those opening moments: "Inflammablematerialplantedinmyhead.."
But a new album? I dunno'. They seem so rooted in a time and place and, dare I say it, age. Can 40-somethings really be legitimate playing that kind of music?
4 - Emily
Yeah, Larry, but they've come a long way from "Suspect Device". The raw anger may be gone, but the talent isn't.
5 - Nigel Richardson
SLF -- wow, was any band ever pushed under the carpet of punk history so completely? Even Sham 69 have a better rep. I'd forgotten all about them.
For a few months they were the business, the music for leaping around to and having meaningful shouty arguments about, but I have to admit that I never gave the band a second thought after 1979, couldn't tell you if they made a second album, broke up, whatever. Couldn't say why. Other bands to listen to, or maybe their version of "social realism" became a bit too much of a chore to listen to after a while. Was that when we old punks decided we'd had enough yelling and it was time to start listening to Kid Creole and the Coconuts instead -- or was it when we switched to the more internal traumas of Joy Division and Magazine? So hard to get the chronology right....
6 - richard
There still going in UK tour July 04 check out www.slf.com....... Saw them last year brilliant!!!!
7 - Asylumseekers
The Real Punk Asylum Seekers are a 5 piece "Punk Rock Review" tribute type band playing the best Punk Rock songs from the heyday of PUNK. The band was formed at the start of 2004 thanks to desire to authentically reproduce the sounds and energy from the 70's punk era
We were sick of hearing the nicey nicey bands that were playing all the local venues. The first gigs showed us for sure that interest in punk was on the way up again.
Concept:
Get people drunk
Make them loose their inhibitions
Introduce them to the joy of punk rock
Give them a night to remember
Punk 4 us came and never went away!
8 - Donald Strawson
I never discovered SLF until the late eighties, I've now seen them 15 times. Quite simply the best band in the world ever!! Songs like Nobodys Hero, Suspect Device and Tin Soldiers have stood the test of time, As strong and vibrant as ever and the newer stuff is not too bad. Stuff like Strummerville and Guitar and Drum are excellent.
9 - real punk
The Real Punk Asylum Seekers are a not what they think there cracked up to be. Not to be trusted their preformances vary greatly and are defo armchair saddo. Up yours Mick!
10 - MURPH
Stiff Little Fingers,still great live, energy,anger,speed,.Congrats on 30 years fellas