Minor Threat
Complete Discography

Release Date: 1990 | Tracklist

As a rule of thumb most people really like to take credit for the accomplishments they've made in their life. If someone is responsible for starting an internet trend, they generally like to wipe it in people's faces. They like to show how smart they were, before everyone else was. This trait has a tendency to show in a lot of music fans. Lots of people like to claim that they were the first people to hear about a currently popular band. Lots of people like to claim they were part of a now popular scene when it was only in its humble beginnings. Lots of people like to brag about how cool they are. This is why Ian MacKaye must be one of the most perplexing people I've ever heard about. He single handedly invented a culture, he helped greatly develop the sound of a musical genre, helped develop one of the most respectable record labels in any music genre, and finally every band he"s been in has been regarded as original and essential. After Teen Idles MacKaye's high school band broke up, his legacy began. Forming Minor Threat must've not seemed like much back in 1980 but now it is impossible to not see their influence on hardcore music, and even the music scene as a whole. Fiercely independent, extremely original, and unwilling not to speak their mind Minor Threat helped create the stereotype of a hardcore band. Sticking to his word unlike many of the bands before and after him, once Minor Threat started to become scene "legends", MacKaye broke up the band. Not wanting the constant praise as he acts as if he is just another member of the scene. After their demise all of Minor Threat's songs were collected onto a Discography so that new fans could easily become familiar with the band.

To review every track on Minor Threat's Discography would be pointless. This album is much like Minutemen's Double Nickel On The Dime in that almost every song is short and to the point. There is a constant sense of evolution considering the album features recordings from the beginning of the band until the end. While Minor Threat's sound was not that different from the other popular hardcore bands of their time (Black Flag, The Dead Kennedys, and Bad Brains) the passion and precision they did their music with is what really made the band stand out. Also MacKaye's brilliantly crafted lyrics also greatly helped the band to gain much notoriety in the scene. Songs like "Straight Edge" and "Look Back and Laugh" have become classics in the punk scene and have helped Minor Threat to live on in infamy. Like I said before, reviewing every track on this album is pointless because every track is great, while they may all sound similar the 40 and so minutes that this album lasts are some of the most emotional, life changing minutes impressionable youth and music fans alike will find. Minor Threat like many great bands is an experience not just music.

To give this album anything less than a five would be a crime. It's probably the most recognizable staple album of the hardcore genre. It has had tons of effects on numerous people's lives. It has more intensity than most of the albums I own and most of all it has feeling. The members of Minor Threat felt every guitar riff, every drum hit, every word shouted, as if it were part of them and that's what makes this album such a classic. Maybe the band was just lucky and in the right place at the right time. But as MacKaye has proven with Fugazi he has a knack for making music that sticks in people's lives, Minor Threat's discography is no different.

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4.4 superb

Rank: #6 for 1990