Hardcore Punk legends Bad Brains have recently teamed with Org Music to bring you remastered reissues of their seminal releases.

With the help of the band, Org Music and Dave Gardner spent over a year tracking down the best possible audio sources for each title, including many original analog tapes that were previously thought to be lost for good. It’s been a very in-depth process for everyone involved, uncovering lost master tapes, unreleased recordings, never before seen photos, and archives from decades past.

‘The Youth Are Getting Restless (Live At The Paradiso, Amsterdam, 1987)’ will be available in January 2023, followed by ‘Omega Sessions’ scheduled for Summer 2023, and ‘Live at The Fillmore 1982’ scheduled for Fall 2023.

Darryl Jenifer, the original and long-standing Bad Brains bassist, was very happy that Bad Brains got back all the master rights and recordings. In the following interview we will discuss how it all came together.

“Bad Brains has a life of its own”

How involved were you with the process of getting the masters finally coming back to the band, uncovering lost master tapes, unreleased recordings, never before seen photos, and archives from decades past?

Darryl Jenifer: Ultra involved as expected and involved as anyone would be when it comes to one’s life works, one would hope. Bad Brains has a life of its own, always moving and morphing into various currents of positive energy and love.

Let’s talk about the sound, what are some of the key differences that remastered editions offer?

Overall sonic textures are vital to the listener, it’s important to deliver a honest no nonsense professional master, that way people won’t think your work is a demo. [Laughs]

It must feel very exciting to find many original tapes that were previously thought to be lost for good…

Well, there’s finding stuff, then there’s people returning your stuff versus finding out where your stuff is, it’s all good. The stuff belongs to Jah anyway. Bad Brains belong to the youth and people.

It’s actually pretty incredible that all nine albums will see this treatment.

Yes, I wish I could re-mix a lot of the music as well, but the times were different back then, different ears, speakers, amps, different air.

Then there’s the Org fanzine, a sixteen page fanzine-style booklet, printed on newsprint, which features never before seen photos, vintage concert flyers, and new writings about the band from contemporaries like Henry Rollins, Chuck Dukowski, Jack Rabid (Big Takeover Magazine), and Jesse Malin. Let me take this opportunity to ask you about the very early days. If we were to visit your teenage room, what kind of records, singles and fanzines would we find there?

In my room you would find albums like ‘Presence’ by Led Zeppelin, ‘Frampton Comes Alive!’ by Peter Frampton, then stuff by Black Sabbath, Return To Forever, Brand X, Weather Report, Earth, Wind & Fire, Lonnie Liston Smith, Roy Ayers, the Dickies, the Ramones, the Damned, Generation X, the Buzzcocks, Sly and the Family Stone.

I think all of our readers would truly appreciate it if you can take a moment and speak about the albums. What runs through your mind when hearing each of the albums today.

I haven’t listened to Bad Brains albums for decades. I know what the musical intention was during the sessions and I can feel if that was achieved, sorta like too close to the forest to see the trees syndrome. One thing for sure: Bad Brains were very serious about Bad Brains.

“We were just unafraid of playing what we wanted”

It’s incredible that you started as a sort of a Fusion band. Mind Power was influenced by Return to Forever and Mahavishnu Orchestra. Would you like to tell us what was your initial idea?

We started Mind Power as teenagers before we discovered Punk Rock. We never played a show as Mind Power and we only had one song. Bad Brains took over the idea of Mind Power in a matter of months. People like to say we were a fusion band and a reggae band, we were just unafraid of playing what we wanted to play all styles at once.

Your sound transition is notorious… turning your way to hardcore punk. How did that come about?

Punk showed us that we could express ourselves and have a message. Punk is freedom, think about it… you don’t even have to know how to play an instrument, all you have to do is WANT to play, so cool. Thanks Punk Rock! Imagine me parroting Stanley Clarke genius bass lines and Paul Simonon (The Clash) smashing his bass after playing half cocked reggae bass lines … AWESOME.

And how did you first get influenced by the Rastafari movement?

In the beginning Bad Brains were PMA (positive mental attitude) soldiers, then Bob Marley inspired through his music and message showed us our rightful mission, the next level. Thanks Bob. I accidently saw Bob Marley perform live at the Capital Center, I was originally there to see Stanley Clarke. It was an unforgettable experience.

How did the punk audience react at the beginning of the band when you started playing reggae tunes?

The first audience to witness our Reggae Punk transition live was Ian MacKaye, Henry Rollins, Alec MacKaye, and a few other first fans. They wore beanies to our show and skanked around saying “Yes Mon,” they thought it was funny and kinda heckled us, but Bad Brains does not care about anything when we are doing our thing … Big up to those guys.

Did you miss the Washington days when you moved to New York City?

We didn’t miss anything during those years. We were singularly focused on Jah, Bad Brains, PMA and the mission, no time to be missing stuff.

I guess this will be impossible to answer, but still, what would be the craziest moment that happened while playing?

I’ll never forget the time a random Skinhead came on stage skanking around me, I fun lovingly attempted to kick him off the stage and my foot got caught in his suspenders launching backwards into my rig, I still kept rocking though … The life and times of Bad Brains is filled with positive and negative experiences.

What are some of the most important players that influenced your own style and what in particular did they employ in their playing that you liked?

James Jamerson’s phrasing, Percy Jones’ plucking, Stanley Clarke’s chords and harmonics. I invented my rock bass techniques from these players. Geezer Butler, Aston “Family Man” Barrett, Lloyd Parks, Errol “Flabba” Holt and so on.

Do you have any other active projects going on at this point? Will you continue to record new albums?

I have been working on a solo album with tracks with Lenny White, John Medeski, Jamie Saft, Ben Perowsky, smoothed Rubba Dub hybrid stuff, and remixing my nephews material, Bedouin Soundclah. I’ve been painting a lil, riffing a lil, and just all around OG staying creative and keeping my dream alive.

Klemen Breznikar

Headline photo: Steven Hanner

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Darryl Jenifer Instagram / Bandcamp
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