Flex Your Head is a sampler album featuring early hardcore punk bands from the Washington, D.C. area. It was originally released in January 1982 on Dischord Records, with a pressing of 4,000 copies on vinyl record that sold out within one week; an additional 3,000 copies were released shortly after. In 1982, a third pressing of 2,000 copies was released under license in the United Kingdom by Alternative Tentacles. Each of the first three pressings featured a different front cover. Background The compilation takes its title from the Minor Threat lyric shouted in the song "12XU", included on the album, originally by the English band Wire. Dischord assembled Flex Your Head as a way to record the many punk bands that had started up, and sometimes also ceased, in the previous years in the D.C. area. The album served as either a debut or sophomore release for every band on it except Minor Threat, for whom it was their third. At the time of the album's release not only had most of the bands on it already have broken up, but many had gone on to start other bands, some of those bands also appear on the album. The Teen Idles had broken up in late 1980 and by the time of the release of Flex Your Head members had already started Minor Threat and Youth Brigade. The Untouchables broke up in 1981 and with the former members joining a multitude of bands including The Faith, The Warmers, Rites of Spring, One Last Wish, Skewbald, Happy Go Licky, Youth Brigade, and The Meatmen. State of Alert had also folded in early 1981 as singer Henry Garfield had joined Black Flag. Minor Threat had disbanded (although they would reunite a few months after the album's release) and since then Ian MacKaye and Jeff Nelson had founded Skewbald while Lyle Preslar joined an early version of Big Black. Youth Brigade and Red C both existed solely during 1981, and both Artificial Peace and Deadline would break up within a few months of the release of Flex Your Head, aside from Youth Brigade these band's only recorded output is on the compilation, though from those bands would come the longer lasting Beefeater, Marginal Man and Fugazi. Only Government Issue and Iron Cross would survive past the next year. The songs "12XU" and "Steppin' Stone" were extremely popular covers in the D.C. punk scene.