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Before Bad Brains, the Sex Pistols or even the Ramones, there was a band called Death.
Punk before punk existed, three teenage brothers in the early '70s formed a band in their spare bedroom, began playing a few local gigs and even pressed a single in the hopes of getting signed. But this was the era of Motown and emerging disco. Record companies found Death’s music— and band name—too intimidating, and the group were never given a fair shot, disbanding before they even completed one album. Equal parts electrifying rockumentary and epic family love story, A Band Called Death chronicles the incredible fairy-tale journey of what happened almost three decades later, when a dusty 1974 demo tape made its way out of the attic and found an audience several generations younger. Playing music impossibly ahead of its time, Death is now being credited as the first black punk band (hell...the first punk band!), and are finally receiving their long overdue recognition as true rock pioneers.
http://drafthousefilms.com/film/a-band-called-death
Roger Ebert:
"This is the Ramones, but two years earlier." — Questlove of The Roots on Death
In the 1970s, three teenage brothers, David, Dannis and Bobby Hackney, formed a rock 'n roll band called Death. They grew up in Detroit, with loving supportive parents who gave them only one credo: "Back up your brother." Death never got very far, and their story is a fascinating one, told beautifully by Jeff Howlett and Mark Christopher Covino in their new music documentary "A Band Called Death."
...
"A Band Called Death" is a story of the burgeoning punk rock scene, of the exploding DIY energy in the 1970s, but it is also a sweet and touching family story. The filmmakers keep it simple, using floating black-and-white photos of the brothers jamming with their instruments, or, hauntingly, walking through a covered bridge in Vermont. Home movies of the boys playing in an upstairs room at their parents' house shiver with the excitement of their raw energy and self-belief.
... http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/a-band-called-death-2013
In the 1970s, three teenage brothers, David, Dannis and Bobby Hackney, formed a rock 'n roll band called Death. They grew up in Detroit, with loving supportive parents who gave them only one credo: "Back up your brother." Death never got very far, and their story is a fascinating one, told beautifully by Jeff Howlett and Mark Christopher Covino in their new music documentary "A Band Called Death."
...
"A Band Called Death" is a story of the burgeoning punk rock scene, of the exploding DIY energy in the 1970s, but it is also a sweet and touching family story. The filmmakers keep it simple, using floating black-and-white photos of the brothers jamming with their instruments, or, hauntingly, walking through a covered bridge in Vermont. Home movies of the boys playing in an upstairs room at their parents' house shiver with the excitement of their raw energy and self-belief.
... http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/a-band-called-death-2013
13 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
= new reply since forum marked as read
...haven't taken the trouble to get the Third Testament, since I used to have it on CD and liked it a lot less than the first two.
I do not have an original Death 7" (I do have the Drag City version of the LP though).
Been collecting for a while............... 
People aren't supposed to look like that at 70
