1. The Bags were one of the first generation of punk rock bands to emerge out of Los Angeles. Just to make matters more confusing: this band used both The Bags and Bags on their 7-inch sleeves.
The band was formed by Alice Armendariz and Patricia Rainone, who had met at an audition for Venus and the Razorblades, Kim Fowley's next attempt at creating a band after The Runaways had left him. Alice and Pat decided to form their own band and from this The Bags were born. They took the band's name and their stage names "Alice Bag" and "Pat Bag" from a gimmick that the band used during early performances where they would perform with grocery bags over their heads (the practice didn't last, in part due to an incident where Darby Crash of The Germs ran up on stage and ripped the bag off of Alice's head). Alice Bag was the vocalist and Pat Bag played bass. The band was rounded out by guitar players Craig Lee and Rob Ritter, and Terry Graham played drums.
The Bags played their first show at The Masque on September 10, 1977. The band's live shows soon became legendary. The concerts were riotous affairs including altercations with celebrities, such as one between singer Tom Waits and drummer Nickey Beat at The Troubadour.
By 1979, they had released their first record, a single called "Survive", backed with "Babylonian Gorgon", released by independent record label Dangerhouse Records. "We Don't Need The English" was included on the Yes L.A. punk compilation released by the same label.
After this, Patricia (at this time known as Patricia Morrison) left the band. In 1980 the group, minus Pat, was filmed by Penelope Spheeris for the seminal punk rock documentary film, The Decline of Western Civilization, which also featured The Germs, Black Flag, Catholic Discipline, X and other prominent L.A. punk bands. However, at the release of the film in 1981 the producers billed the group as Alice Bag Band to avoid any conflict with ex-member Pat. By then, however, the band had broken up.
Craig Lee also played with Catholic Discipline, and he and co-member Phranc would perform together occasionally when she embarked on her subsequent solo career. However, Craig is best known as a writer and critic for publications such as Flipside fanzine, among many others, and as co-author of the book Hardcore California: A History Of Punk And New Wave. He died, as a result of AIDS, in the 1980s.
Terry Graham went on to play drums for The Gun Club. Pat, now known as Patricia Morrison, also joined The Gun Club soon after. Once she left The Gun Club Pat joined The Sisters of Mercy and then The Damned, one of the original British punk bands (and the one that was often credited with sparking the LA scene), for which she plays bass. She would also go on to marry the Damned's lead singer, Dave Vanian.
Rob Ritter also joined The Gun Club, and appears on their first LP Fire Of Love, but left to change his name to Rob Graves and form the seminal death rock band 45 Grave, with Dinah Cancer, Don Bolles, previously of The Germs and Nervous Gender, Paul Roessler of The Screamers and Nervous Gender and Paul Cutler. 45 Grave was influential in the creation of goth rock. Rob Graves died in 1991 of a heroin overdose.
Alice Bag went on to join Castration Squad, which included Phranc and Dinah Cancer among its many members. In the 1990s she would form Cholita! with punk rock drag queen Vaginal Davis and the band released several videos. After this she performed with Las Tres and then formed Stay At Home Bomb, her most recent musical project. According to her official website, since the deaths of Lee and Ritter and her estrangement from Morrison, she considers the Bags to be permanently disbanded, and has refused to perform Bags songs in public.
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2. Jon Hardy, Jim Janota, and Crispin Wood - all hailing from Lexington MA - formed The Bags in the summer of 1985. They unleashed their unique blend of hard rock and punk on the Boston club scene in September of that year.
In 1987 they recorded and released their debut album Rock Starve. Charles M. Young wrote about Rock Starve in Playboy (March, 1988): "The Bags (from Boston) fall somewhere among the Ramones, Husker Du, and early Kiss. Their debut, Rock Starve (Restless), consists of thrilling guitar-bash riffs that pound like the sound of a herd of giant woolly mammoths going over a cliff, just enough melody rasping though shredded vocal chords and lyrics wholly unbesmirched by any panty-waist college-poetry influence."
The Bags toured the U.S. in 1988.
In 1989, The Bags released their first single on Stanton Park (I Know / Hide And Seek). They also took top honors by unanimous vote, winning the 11th Annual WBCN Rock 'n' Roll Rumble. Later on that year they released an album on Stanton Park under one of their many aliases, Swamp Oaf. Byron Coley wrote about Swamp Oaf in Spin (February 1990): "This Boston trio (perhaps best known for their non-thug work under the name the Bags) have a sense of compositional burl most redolent of early/mid period Blue Cheer. The guitar quick-switches between ass-puddle wah-boom and overblown zorch-flash with Leigh Stevens-oid flair, and these guys don't get even close to the Zep cliche path most of their "peers" are treading.
In 1990 The Bags released their eponymous LP The Bags, again on Stanton Park. David Fricke wrote about The Bags in the 1990 Yearbook edition of Rolling Stone: "With the grade-A snarl and swagger of their self-titled second album, the Boston raunchers the Bags (Stanton Park LP) are shoo-ins for Kings of Garageland 1990. At their best, the Bags rip it up like the Meat Puppets-meet-Motorhead, a marriage surely made in bar-band heaven."
In 1991 the band released two singles - one for Stanton Park (L. Frank Baum / Max Roach), the other for Italian label Helter Skelter (Dr. Lb. / Frilly Underwear). At the end of the year, after six and a half years of playing together, The Bags celebrated the release of their album Night of the Corn People (Stanton Park / Helter Skelter) by breaking up. The Bags left behind a large following and a reputation as a killer live band.
The Bags reunited once in 1996, headlining the Pipeline! Live Boston Rock on WMBR CD release party downstairs at the Middle East in Cambridge. Brett Milano said of the show in the Boston Phoenix (April 4 - 11, 1996): "In the end, however, the weekend belonged to one band. The Bags were one of six groups DuBrow approached for reunion sets (the others were the Zulus, the Cavedogs, Orangutang, Big Dipper, and Christmas, all of whom declined); on Saturday they played their first official gig (a one-shot, according to guitarist Crispin Wood) in five years. The Bags had a big influence on the current scene, reviving hard rock - not quite heavy metal, but hard, chunky, fist-wavin' Rock - and making it hip again. They also have something that a lot of their successors lack: a three-word phrase beginning with "sense" and ending with "humor." Although never a joke band, the Bags always had a tongue-in-cheek, Spinal Tap-informed sensibility - an undertone of "Yeah, we know this is ridiculous, but isn't it cool?"
In 2003 The Bags reformed and began writing and rehearsing songs. Their "debut" performance at the Middle East in February of 2004 sold out quickly and was a huge success. The following June they released a live 2 song CD on their new Oaf Records label and returned to the Middle East Downstairs for another sold out show. The band spent the summer and fall recording Sharpen Your Sticks, their first full-length album in 13 years. Sharpen Your Sticks delivers 15 tracks of meaty punk/hard rock guaranteed to leave a pleasant ringing sensation in both ears.
The song "Cavemen Rejoice" is featured in the Playstation2 game Guitar Hero.
Take It Or Leave It
The Bags Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
With the time that you’ve found
It’s the time that have,
If we waste it we drown
So we slow down
No more jewelry, rings
Necklaces-bling
The brand names you bought
Until we slow down
Burning through worth / It’s all just a fault
Burning through life / man, paying it off
Burning your time / When your time comes to bat
You can’t buy your way back
You’re at the scene of the crime
If your wasting your time
You’re only given so much
Use it up or resign
Or we slow down
We tend to bury the things
When they ain't got no strings
They aint making sense
But still, yet it still clings
So we slow down
Burning through worth / It’s all just a fault
Burning through life / man, paying it off
Burning your time / When your time comes to bat
You can’t buy your way back
Can’t take it with you when you go…
Can’t take it with you when you go…
Can’t take it with you when you go…
Give it to the young guy sleeping in the park
Give to blind girl living in the dark
Give it to the old man talkin’ to himself
If you’re not gonna use it, give it to someone else
They’re not fooling around
With the time that you’ve found
It’s the time that have,
If we waste it we drown
So we slow down
No more jewelry, rings
Necklaces-bling
The brand names you bought
Don’t mean a thing
Until we slow down
The lyrics to The Bags' song "Take it or Leave it" convey a powerful message about the value of time and the importance of making the most of it. The song starts by emphasizing the seriousness of the situation at hand, as the band sings, "They’re not fooling around, With the time that you’ve found, It’s the time that you have, If we waste it, we drown." These lines serve as a reminder that time is limited and precious, and if we squander it, we will suffer the consequences.
The lyrics then highlight the idea of slowing down and letting go of material possessions and societal pressures. The mention of jewelry, rings, and brand names signifies the superficiality and insignificance of such material goods in the grand scheme of things. The band suggests that until we slow down and reassess our priorities, these possessions and desires hold no true meaning.
The chorus of the song accentuates the notion that burning through life and time without thought or purpose is futile. It asserts that no amount of money or material wealth can buy back wasted time or reverse the consequences of careless living. The repetition of the line "Can’t take it with you when you go…" reinforces the idea that we should not cling to our possessions, but rather give them to those who need them more, such as the young man sleeping in the park, the blind girl living in the dark, or the old man talking to himself.
In summary, "Take it or Leave it" by The Bags serves as a poignant reminder to value and make the most of the time we have, to slow down and reassess our priorities, and to let go of material possessions that hold no true meaning.
Line by Line Meaning
They’re not fooling around
They are serious and not joking
With the time that you’ve found
With the limited time you have discovered in your life
It’s the time that have,
It's the precious time we possess
If we waste it we drown
If we squander it, we will suffer the consequences
So we slow down
Therefore, we should reduce our pace
No more jewelry, rings
No longer valuing material possessions like jewelry and rings
Necklaces-bling
Or superficial displays of wealth
The brand names you bought
The expensive branded items you purchased
Don’t mean a thing
Hold no significance or value
Until we slow down
Unless we take a step back and reassess our priorities
Burning through worth / It’s all just a fault
Rapidly depleting our value and it's all a mistake
Burning through life / man, paying it off
Exhausting our life by constantly trying to repay our debts
Burning your time / When your time comes to bat
Wasting your precious time when you have an opportunity to shine
You can’t buy your way back
You cannot regain lost time by purchasing anything
You’re at the scene of the crime
You are in the moment of wasting your life
If your wasting your time
If you are squandering your time
You’re only given so much
You have a limited amount of time given to you
Use it up or resign
Either utilize it fully or give up
We tend to bury the things
We often ignore or hide important aspects
When they ain't got no strings
When they don't have any attachment or significance
They aint making sense
They don't seem logical or meaningful
But still, yet it still clings
But somehow, they still hold onto us
Can’t take it with you when you go…
You cannot bring your possessions when you pass away
Give it to the young guy sleeping in the park
Instead, give it to someone less fortunate, like a homeless youth
Give to blind girl living in the dark
Donate to a visually impaired girl living in a difficult situation
Give it to the old man talkin’ to himself
Offer it to an elderly person who is isolated and lonely
If you’re not gonna use it, give it to someone else
If you have no intention of utilizing it, pass it on to someone who will
They’re not fooling around
They are serious and not joking
With the time that you’ve found
With the limited time you have discovered in your life
It’s the time that have,
It's the precious time we possess
If we waste it we drown
If we squander it, we will suffer the consequences
So we slow down
Therefore, we should reduce our pace
No more jewelry, rings
No longer valuing material possessions like jewelry and rings
Necklaces-bling
Or superficial displays of wealth
The brand names you bought
The expensive branded items you purchased
Don’t mean a thing
Hold no significance or value
Until we slow down
Unless we take a step back and reassess our priorities
Lyrics © O/B/O DistroKid
Written by: Robert Tait
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind