There's footage on YouTube of Bad Brains playing fabled New York punk dive CBGBs in 1982, and it looks like bedlam being unleashed. The bodies of crowd members fly back and forth as, somewhere in this frantic tide of flesh, the band are playing like their lives depend on it.

Onstage, frontman Paul 'H.R.' Hudson exudes a hyperactive energy, his skinny body convulsing and shuddering as he wails and gabbles at turbo speed. Then, just when it looks like it's going to spill over into violence, everything stops and he begins to croon a reggae tune. Now nobody knows what the hell they're supposed to do.

This was a typical scene for Bad Brains back then, and their ultra-kinetic live shows set the standard for punk and hardcore gigs in the late 70s/early 80s. They've even been credited with inventing a brand new phenomenon: moshing.

"The whole slamming shit... it was pogoing when I started!" says Bad Brains bassist Darryl Jenifer. "All that shit started with us. Because of the speed, I think those kids ended up bouncing into each other instead. Especially when we started adding those reggae parts, and kids were skanking like they'd come to see The Specials."

Five Black kids from "the wrong side" of Washington DC, Bad Brains took punk rock's sped-up approach and hyper-charged it, helping to kickstart the hardcore movement and change the shape of music. The list of bands and musicians who have cited them as an inspiration is long and diverse: Slayer, Dave Grohl, Beastie Boys, Killswitch Engage, Fever 333, Guns N' Roses, Clutch. Bad Brains transformed just about anyone who heard their records or saw them live.

"It wasn't until later in life I realised how lucky I was, having Bad Brains as the local band," says Clutch vocalist Neil Fallon, who grew up just outside Washington DC. "Like, 'Everybody has one of these, right?' No! I remember going to see them when I was 17, getting into the club, and H.R. did this backflip. Then they busted into [classic Bad Brains song] Banned In D.C. and I was just thrown, ejected to the back of the club by sheer force. It was the first time I realised music could be a spiritual energy."

A conversation with a member of Bad Brains, it turns out, is a lot like listening to Bad Brains. At 63, Darryl Jenifer is still a whirlwind of enthusiastic energy. Speaking to Hammer on the phone, the conversation dips, jumps and sometimes goes wildly off-tangent, only to suddenly race back in at the original point. He's thoughtful as he talks about music history, humble whenever the topic of Bad Brains' own legacy arises, and practically bouncing on the spot whenever musical theory and technique comes up.

But then, that's always been Bad Brains' secret weapon. They might have been a bunch of punks, but they could play just as well as any 80s shredder or virtuoso. They just happened to do so while inciting absolute anarchy,...