Youth Brigade “Sound & Fury” 1983. Better Youth Organization records (part of the band’s the BYO organization to promote punk shows and record production). Sound & Fury, Youth Brigade’s debut LP, was recorded after the legendary 1982 tour with Social Distortion, documented in Another State of Mind which you can watch in full here.

This album was on HEAVY rotation at parties and all-ages gatherings that I attended in the mid-80′s, one of those records that I still know every song’s lyrics. Some great songs (“Sink with California” and “Fight to Unite” that criticize nationalism, give a nice little geography lesson and promote unity and understanding, “Modest Proposal,” “Sound & Fury” and “The Circle” that describe the energy of a punk show and mosh pits – as well as the circle of life and death, the punk peacenik track “What Are You Fighting For,” suicide awareness is highlighted on “Did You Wanna Die” and the rather un-punk “What Will the Revolution Change?” which clocks in at a-really-long-and-complex-for-punk 5+ minutes) and a couple of stinkers (“Jump Back” and “Duke of Earl” both kinda suck). Probably my favorite is the anti-police “Men In Blue” which combines punk rant/chant with some rap that as teens we’d recite when seeing the local men in blue.

***Well I was walking down the street just the other day and the cops picked me up for something I didn’t say. There was no reason, there was no rhyme, they just fucked with me to waste some time. The scariest thing? They could have wasted me, the cops have the power and the guns you see. Simple lines, stay in school. You’re just not cool if you don’t follow their rules. I would understand if I’d committed a crime, They coulda locked me up I woulda done my time. Well I didn’t do nothing to the man had said. So he jacked me up and he cracked my head. We could bitch about it and we could complain, but it ain’t gonna stop until we break our chains. The story and it ended had just begun, they were back real soon for some more of these fun. What are we gonna do about the men in blue?

***lyrics transcribed by me so probably some wrong but I did my best.