Nothing did more to further the cause of Alternative Nation-building than 120 Minutes, MTV’s Sunday-night video showcase of non-mainstream acts. For nearly two decades, the program spanned musical eras from ’80s college rock to ’00s indie, with grunge, Britpop, punk, industrial, electronica and more in between. MAGNET raids the vaults to resurrect our 120 favorite and unjustly forgotten videos from the show’s classic era.
#25: Rollins Band “Low Self Opinion”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o28dyt7w3As&feature=related
Henry Rollins’ D.C. pals in Fugazi get a lot of credit/blame for being punk-rock guidance counselors, but Rollins had a consistent thread of apolitical self-help songs running through his catalog. (His cover of “Do It” by U.K. ’70s psych-rock band Pink Fairies also counts—it’s currently the motivational theme for listeners of The Best Show On WFMU.) As Rollins’ post-Black Flag career went on, his Rollins Band releases got more and more polished; ranging from lunkheaded rock in the late ’80s to 1994’s too-tepid Weight and everything after it. 1991’s The End Of Silence struck the perfect balance between dumb metal and jazz metal, between the preachiness and self-pity that made Rollins a compelling frontman (well, at least for adolescent boys and junior weightlifters).
