...eighteen songs in fifteen minutes. On he face of it, the music was skeletal, but with Boon's skronk guitar, Watt's chordal bass, Hurley's busy percussing, it was more than the sum of its parts. While the music was eccentrically funky, like a highly caggeinated Captain Beefheart running down James Brown tunes, the songs railed against injustice, materialism, ignorance, and war; the lyrics could have been written by an idealistic young intern at The Nation. And this is while most forward-thinking youths were listening to English mopemasters like Echo & the Bunnymen and the Cure.
Our Band Could Be Your Life: Scenes from the American Indie Underground 1981-1991 - Michael Azerrad
MINUTEMEN released their debut album, The Punch Line, on this day in 1981 through SST.