Fugazi without exaggeration changed many people's lives, changed how people thought about music/punk, and changed what being an independent musician in America meant. Jesus Lizard were just a good rock band.

Fugazi

Wow. I voted Fugazi without reading any of the thread and made it 50 to 50.

My vote is for Fugazi, but only because I want to break a tie for a few minutes. I love The Jesus Lizard too.

I voted for Fugazi.

My criteria is two-fold:
1) Although I don't believe that their starting point was as high, they got better with each release.
2) As someone previously mentioned, they mastered several blends of sounds, whereas the Jesus Lizard mastered one.

Good poll - and I'm glad to see it's as even as it is.

I haven't seen either band live, and I'd probably rather see The Jesus Lizard if I had to choose, but I think End Hits & Red Medicine hold up to Goat & Liar as evenly as the split voting suggests (to say nothing of Fugazi's other above-average releases).

BadComrade wrote:Out of all the times I saw them live, Fugazi sucked all but once. A friend of mine fell asleep at a Fugazi show at the Congress once... that's how boring they could be sometimes.

Blasphemy!

Gotta go Fugazi.

Because of how much they changed the scene when they came out. Totally changed it for me.
$5 shows, you can stand up front and not get destroyed by some random boot to the face, their whole approach.
"Waiting Room", Margin Walker, so awesome. Fugazi was a goddamn inspiration. 1500 people in an alley behind the Silver Dollar Club in Phoenix.

That said, I'd rather see a Jesus Lizard live show (especially now, 16 years after I first heard Fugazi) for the pure, visceral joy that TJL brought me. Saw them live once playing with Girls Against Boys in Phoenix, and TJL just blew everyone's face off.

I still listen to Jesus Lizard ("Show" in particular), but hardly ever listen to Fugazi anymore.

Waffle factor x20.

jesus lizard. no contest.

Piasek wrote:

that damned fly wrote:
they were in fact awesome. "gong" is worth tracking down and the live boots of the "blue" stuff is worth looking for on youtube. "blue" i think had stronger songs than some of what was on "shot" and some of "down."c

whats with this "gong". i heard its bootleg from their last performance. is it official release or what?

aye, a bootleg from the last show. a very dynamite performance. very, very dynamite. good quality too. it was from an FM broadcast.

Marsupialized wrote:

BadComrade wrote:Out of all the times I saw them live, Fugazi sucked all but once. A friend of mine fell asleep at a Fugazi show at the Congress once... that's how boring they could be sometimes.

Blasphemy!

no, once you saw fugazi you saw 'em and after that first time it was never really as much fun. plus 3hour shows get old, especially when you know there's going to be some political ranting, some asshole audience member getting called out and checked by the band, and three hours of one band playing not all of their best stuff. that last line is particularly true about the time "the argument" came out. when you saw a fugazi show around that time, you got to hear all of "the argument" done live, and a few lackluster performances of older material. the band lost it by that point.

You are nuts. They were great till the very last show.

I saw Fugazi in 97..? Opened with the first two tracks from In On The Kill Taker.

AMAZING.