Badges (song)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| "Badges" | ||
|---|---|---|
 |
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| Single by The Minutemen | ||
| from the album The Politics of Time | ||
| Released | 1984 | |
| Format | LP, cassette and CD | |
| Recorded | 1980 | |
| Genre | Alternative/Punk | |
| Length | 3:57 | |
| Label | New Alliance / SST | |
| Producer(s) | Mike Watt | |
"Badges" is a song by American punk/alternative trio The Minutemen, which was composed by the band's bassist Mike Watt.
The song was inspired by the famous quote from the 1948 Humphrey Bogart movie The Treasure of the Sierra Madre, albeit by way of its often-mangled and more well-known variation of the line.
Although it is one of the band's best known songs, ironically (and sadly, due to guitarist D. Boon's untimely death in a December 1985 automobile accident) the Minutemen never recorded it in the studio, although the group were planning to do a live-in-the-studio recording of the song for a proposed half-studio, half-live three-record set, 3 Men, 6 Sides, All Live.
A demo recording of the song featuring only Watt playing bass and singing appears on the band's 1984 odds-and-sods album The Politics of Time, a rehearsal tape of the band playing the song appears on the posthumous live album Ballot Result (1987), and a live video of the group performing the song appears in the video documentary for The Tour, an SST Records videocassette release that was only in print briefly.
