90's Hit Parade #98

Fugazi - Great Cop

I saw Fugazi around 1993. I have never seen a band put more sweat, toil and tears into a performance. After the first song, Ian McKaye began to tell a little story. "Earlier today, I was hanging out with my friend Michael Stipe, and we were walking to this great little restaurant that I like to eat at whenever I'm in town, The Grit, it's a really great place, you should eat there, and we saw this little bird on the sidewalk, and..."


at this point someone in the crowd yelled something like "Shut up and play some fucking music!" If you've ever been to a Fugazi show, you can guess how that turned out. Ian started going off on the guy, "No, I will not shut up and play some fucking music! I am not some TV that you can just click the remote control at! You know, this is a perfect example of this whole MTV instant gratification mindset, in fact I'm going to dedicate this next song to you, it's called YOU'D! MAKE! A! GOOD! COP! YOU! FUCK! ING! PIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIG!!!!!!!!!!!!!" And then they just tore through this song.

I like Fugazi's albums, but after the first two EP's, they never really captured the sound and energy of their live show on record. So when I include this song on my hit parade, just understand that it's the live version I'm talking about. I think the SPIN review of In on the Kill Taker described "You'd make a great cop" as "the ultimate punk insult," which sounds about right.