Why Black Flag’s “Slip It In” is the Most Unpunk Punk Album Ever

When I’m pissed my nimble fingers get fired up to type an eloquent rant that most likely very few people will read and even less will understand. I don’t care. I’m angry. I want to punch Henry Rollins in his stupid face. Just let me unpack this.

I avoided Black Flag for years because the type of guys that sported their t-shirts and tattoos told me everything I needed to know about the band. Flash forward to me now, in May of 2020, in a pandemic quarantine, 951 days sober and far gone from my days of going to punk squat shows in the Lower East Side, doing drugs, and concerning myself with politics of the “music scene” (trust me, you need drugs for that).

Regardless, I have and always will love punk music. So I’m absentmindedly spinning a playlist I find online of classic punk as I happily work on some freelance riddle writing for a crossword puzzle app. Then, the song “Slip it In” comes on.

Screeeeeeeeech

I come to a goddamn halt. The track opens with what I’m praying is a fictional conversation between a guy and a girl where the guy is convincing the girl to sleep with him. I’m crossing my fingers that this will be an anti-rape anthem in the likes of Date Rape by Sublime but NOPE. No, my friends. This is a boo-hoo angry man hymnal of slut-shaming.

As I said before, the song opens on what is essentially a rape dialogue. After an unnecessarily long and self-aggrandizing intro, Henry Rollins voice chimes in contrast with a woman’s voice saying “slip it in” every other line. I’m going to put some of the lyrics here for reference.

You’re loose

(Slip it in)

Put your brain in a noose

(Slip it in)

The next day you regret it

(Slip it in)

But, you’re still loose

You say you don’t want it

You don’t want it

Say you don’t want it

Then you slip it on in

In, in, in

You feel like a whore

(Slip it in)

But what you did the night before

(Slip it in)

You decided to be all loose

(Slip it in)

And go all crazy

This is the theme song to a rape. If someone were to try and represent slut-shaming and gaslighting in a poem, this would be it. Brett Kavanaugh would play this on repeat as he does bicep curls with a 5lb dumbbell. Suddenly, the people I’ve met who are fans of this band coming off as icky to me makes sense.

I decided to indulge my anger and dive deeper into this record, and see if anything was redeeming about it. Nope. Just more of this bizarre entitlement over women that the writer has a crush on. Check out this ode to stalking in the track Wound Up.

I walk by your house

To see if you were at home

It was my only chance

I felt so alone

Everything else on this record lacks substance and displays a lot of self-pity and what I would call whining. Now, I love a good apathetic moment, but not paired with rape and 4chan-esque anger towards women who enjoy sex. This is a slightly louder and angrier version of those guys who claim to be “nice” but when a girl rejects them, they call her a whore and try and ruin her life by hacking her computer and sharing her nudes.

I will always love punk music, and bands like the Dead Kennedys and Leftover Crack are evergreen in their hate for nazis, sexism, and abuse of minorities. But, like cancer, misogyny and racism sneak in and slowly kill what was once a cry for rebellion embraced by all. I am aware that before this album, Henry Rollins wasn’t a part of the band, and that the music from the pre-Rollins era was much more bearable.

Unfortunately, Henry Rollins is like a cockroach that survived a nuclear war. He just keeps showing up like the uninvited vermin that he is. Like all loud, complaining men who are full of more hot air than a blimp, he’s been the featured guest on the Joe Rogan podcast several times. Ever try and watch a documentary about punk music? Here comes Henry Rollins to run his mouth about the contributions he thinks he made to punk music.

Henry, the only contribution you made was to inspire more shitty, brain-dead young men to act as gatekeepers to the punk scene to anyone they don’t deem as worthy… aka women and minorities.

Now that I’ve gotten that off my chest, It’s time for me to go back to pretending like Black Flag doesn’t exist. Henry Rollins, if somehow, someway, you ever see this… please for the love of God, just fuck off.

Disclaimers: I mentioned other musical artists in this article, i.e. Sublime and Leftover Crack. They are not perfect and both have displayed some bad behavior over the years, but I think they make relevant comparisons in this article.