When I think early ’80s American punk, the one band that comes to mind is the Dead Kennedys. If you were into punk/hxc back then, being familiar with DK was basically de rigueur – even if you were not a huge fan, you at least listened to them. Not so sure if this is still the case? Since they are a cornerstone of American punk, maybe a little review is in order.
See what they did with the ties? Stickin' it to the Man!!
Listening to them now, DK seem like a kind of extended Reagan era joke. (see: Church of the Subgenius) I can’t even imagine anyone under 35 listening to them without Wikipedia open to look up all the satirical jokes – they kind of remind me of reading political cartoons from the 1930s – I guess they are funny and have a point, but damned if I ‘get’ any of it.
Doubt many of you were born during the Reagan years...
Headed by ‘Jello Biafra’ (srs – anyone get that joke anymore?!?), they were pretty tr00 punk – hated just about everything about early ’80s America. They wrote songs comparing Jerry Brown being California’s governor to a new age Nazi takeover (wut??)
Yea, this looks about right…
Honestly, not all of their output is terrible, but they were wildly variable in their output. Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables was their initial debut, but I think only 3 or so songs are any good. The last track Viva Las Vegas is pretty typical of American alternative satire - re-purposing a mainstream ‘hit’ in a sneering way to ‘poke fun’ at what the song celebrates.
Pol Pot? Anyone even remember who that is?
In God We Trust also has about 3 good songs, and uses the same schtick as Fresh Fruit… at the end – this time with the song Rawhide.
Plastic Surgery Disasters is probably my favorite album of theirs, all songs pretty melodic and fairly hard hitting. If you want to get one album, make it this.
This song always made me laugh – Pick the Cocaine! (shits expensive!)
Not sure what’s up with punks adding the clips in front of the songs – typical tho… ‘giving context’ I’m sure.
Their last two albums Frankenchrist and Bedtime for Democracy are complete crap – skip ‘em.
To sum up – if you want to be a tr00 punk, listen to their first three albums, consult Wikipedia and you can drop ’80s era jokes/commentary like all tr00 oldz. (Fuckin’ Reagan screwed everything up, Reagan is the real cause of the financial crisis, etc, etc) If you want to ‘get your roots’, listen to the three songs I’ve posted here & get a DK patch for your jacket.
I grew up in the ’80′s, but unfortunately I heard Love Shack a long time before I heard Police Truck and even though I like some DK songs, Jello will always sound like the dude from the B-52s to me.
only less talented, clever, and likeable than Fred Schneider
At first I was going to get all butthurt, and then I was all “whoa”
Jello Biafra is probably the campest dude in punk rock.
Lux Interior, Gary Floyd and Glen Danzig would like a word with you.
Also, I think the DKs were the quintessential entry-level punk band of the Regan years, along with Black Flag, the Misfits, and Dead Milkmen
…and there’s nothing wrong with that.
Kids can just get the ‘Give me convenience…’ comp to get all the ‘hits’ in one nice package.
Pretty much this. Say what you will about em, DKs had some good songs. I actually got into them after hearing Holiday in Cambodia on Guitar Hero (srs).
This x1000. Was into all of these circa ’85 except DM. My brother liked them – I couldn’t get into ‘em.
I remember a friend of mine playing me “Give Me Convenience…” back in the day and thinking how DK sounded more like surf rock than hardcore punk.
Still, I do love “Forward To Death” a whole lot.
Almost any other of the “big” 80s hardcore/punk band I can think of is better…. They still made some good songs though, but after the first album they kind of lost it
aw cmon, the cover of take this job and shove it is pretty good. although after hearing the original, im pretty sure it is better.
My point more being that this is a pretty ‘stock’ method of American alternative satire – and they did it to death. Plays into Biafra’s gay/camp element too…
A few additional things (that I really should have included in the post)
Give Me Convenience… is probably their most heard album is a compilation of unreleased tracks – and it was released after the band broke up (AKA, I remember this being released…) An ok album, but some stinkers too.
The other members of the band sued Biafra to get back royalties and the right to perform as The Dead Kennedys without him. They won and got Brandon Cruz (child actor from some ’70s sitcom?!?) as a lead singer. Obviously, avoid at all costs – see The Misfits circa 1995.
Lol@ “initial debut.”
Pro level lulzy blogging – thanks for noticing!
I haven’t listened to the DKs in a couple years, and it’s really shocking how poorly they’ve aged in pretty much every respect. The music, as mentioned before, sounds more like B52s surf rock than it does hardcore (which is the genre they ostensibly belonged to) and the lyrics are so dated they barely even make sense- probably like how crabcore covers of top 40 pop songs will sound in 25 years will sound to our kids.
There’s a reason why the current generation of hardcore kids still worship Black Flag, Bad Brains, etc but the DKs are mostly forgotten: they were just not that good, and even during their occasional moments of brilliance, they’re really only relevant within the context of the Reagan era which was three fucking decades ago.
Nope. Nazi punks, police truck, man and his lawnmower, too drunk to fuck all depressingly relevant. Cali uber allies..not so much, but still rules.
Nazi punks??? Dude “nazis” haven’t been a problem at shows in at least 20 years
he means scene nazis bro
maybe where you roam, i just saw a shitload of them at a Proclamation show.
I still love the entire discography, but Plastic Surgery Disasters is definitely their best album.
I love Dead Kennedys. Fuck you all.
same here. i saw the videos and they made me want to listen to more!
this hit a little close to home. oh and sarge a lot of times kids in 2007-2008 found out about a lot of older bands like DK from guitar hero so they had a minor comeback but besides that i havent met anyone else who likes them
Just so happens my “tr00 punk” phase was right around then and everybody was asking me about why I like that Guitar Hero band.
Jello is the most irritating man on earth.
+1
They get popular every so often. Before guitar hero it was tony hawk’s pro skater that brought them back into the limelight.
I don’t know if I fairly speak for him, but I think both Sarge and I are interested in why some bands ‘cross the hump’ and become revered to today’s youth, while some very popular bands eventually wither away into obscurity – DK are a perfect example.. into the (very) early ’90s you could have worn a DK shirt to any show with confidence… now you would look like a dinosaur. Not to really date myself, but Jaime Hernandez in his ‘Locas’ comics would often draw someone wearing/spraypainting the BF bars or DK logo around – they were that intertwined in the punk culture.
The music hasn’t worn well – I love the comparison to the B-52s (really love their first 2 albums still) – the camp/gay element that Biafra flirted well worked much better for them. Again, I think the surf influence played into that camp/satire of the 50s/60s American ideas that Biafra lampooned – but it’s now so stuck in the Reagan years…
completely agree with all of this, as well as the comparison to the Subgenius stuff
most of DK’s best known songs were very timely (via being topical)
almost none of Black Flag’s songs were like that
(unless songs about depression, getting hassled by cops, sluts, drunks, and desperation are no longer relevant)
this
“riot” seems appropriate after what happened in london.
yes.
I feel this will happen to a lot of the “Bush Era” punk songs/bands.
For all I know DK may still be big with crusty punk types, but their leftist politics (really worn on the sleeve by Biafra) pretty much directly conflict with the ultra-conservative/libertarian political/ideological thinking put forth by most hardcore bands and fans.
Been meaning to write up a post on this.. hopefully not too srs for SYWH?!?
“ultra conservative”
hmmm… care to cite any bands that had ultra conservative lyrics? i definitely recall punk lyrics being more in the libertarian or liberaltarian ( i know thats not real but its the term i use to brand the lefter leaning libertarians, still into guns/freedom/drug legalization without subscribing to either conservative or liberal ideas). i know the scene back then is mostly considered, today, as very left leaning but i think bands were more into saying fuck you to any political party/affiliation just cuz that was punk and voting and civic duty are ghey and not punk. i could be confused but when i think ultra conservative i think reagan and as far as i know reagan was ultimately the scapegoat for anything according to 80s punx.
tl;dr
fggt/10
omg thx sarge :3
np <3 u brah
Most hardcore bands (esp. NYHC types) are quite conservative. Maybe they don’t write songs about economic policies, but the ‘blue class background’ gives them a very conservative standpoint. AF’s ‘Public Assistance’ is a great example.
Even coming from the suburbs, most later hardcore is stunningly socially conservative – Earth Crisis ‘Firestorm’ is like a Reagan era dystopian version of the War On Drugs america…
I’m saying one reason DK don’t get much love as *hardcore* pioneers (again, a genre they ostensibly were in) were due to their politics. Just an idea.
People that fears change, looks, gays, and development is ostensibly conservative to me… Modern Hardcore is basically retards given guitars by their sped teacher and told to play breakdowns so they can be friends with the ‘normal” kids
Prior to the 1970s gays were somewhat more aligned with the right wing than the left.
I think the Dead Kennedy’s are a pretty good band, but then I was a high school punk during the mid-eighties. I always figured that these guys were more art punks than hardcore dudes, just look at 75% of the other records on (the band’s) Alternative Tentacles label. And yeah shit about nuclear war and Reagan is pretty dated, but “Let’s Lynch the Landlord” remains a timeless statement. Great band logo too. I could draw it for hours at a time in detention.
You say that DK isn’t current and that you don’t get a lot of the references. But Afghanistan is still Afghanistan (remember 10 years ago?), Libya is still Libya (remember 6 months ago?), the war machine has recently been grinding its gears for oil (remember, for the last fucking decade?) and California Uber Alles is a song about the _CURRENT_ governor of California. But these days, we don’t give a shit about that kind of stuff, so we think it is not relevant.
Your article on DK inspired me to pull some out for a listen, and while most of it is trash, it does hit home that things in the world haven’t changed that much at all. I think there is about 8 – 10 decent tunes in their catalogue. Have to agree that it’s not a brilliant number for a band with their “reputation”
Good article anyway and some good comments. Keep this kind of stuff going.
Thanks for the great comment bro! Stuff like this keeps us stoked on writing more… (srs!)
Just to clarify – I think most young kids today won’t get the references – it’s just too dated. I pulled out the back catalog for a listen and lyrically it just sounds ancient. I think their best songs are the lyrically ‘timeless’ ones – mostly from Plastic Surgery Disasters. Government Flu, Terminal Yuppie, Well Paid Scientist, Forest Fire & Riot are musically and lyrically pretty spot on. However -Kepone Factory and Religious Vomit are just plain dated. And the satire/parody stuff – done to death by them…
no one ever gives Well Paid Scientist props, so props to you sir!
Listened to Well Paid Scientist just the other day – love the line: Driving past the low-life company bar…….. *great* stuff.
The five songs I listed are probably the only DK tunes I actually like now.
ALSO just noticed that the picture at the top was actually sid and johnny rotten (lol), why did no one mention this in the comments?
Advanced level details… not everyone gets it!
A late thought:
Surely “Life Sentance” and “Insight” would still hold some relevance with the youth. High-school alienation and friends geting boring are enternal topics I woulda thought.
Also they’re pretty thrashy and less of a pastiche that I agree hasn’t dated so well.
No sense of humor
But such good manners
Now you’re an adult
You’re boring
those are probably their two strongest songs IMO
DK is the best punk band to ever exist. Fuck you all.