Get The Performance Package 5.0 Ultra for 20% OFF + Free International Shipping this holiday season with promo code PUNKROCK at manscaped.com/punkrockmba #manscapedpartner #LM5Ultra
Me at 15: The Dead Kennedys are right about everything. Me at 21: Actually these issues are way more complex. Me at 30: But really it comes down to larger systemic issues. Me at 50: The Dead Kennedys were right about everything.
Idk if he would considering this guy is making his own product in a capitalist country as much as DK did. I don't get the ideology that selling sponsors is selling out you choose who can sponsor you in a free country jello was angry they were selling out to a clothes manufacturer that uses probably Cambodian children to sew their clothes... If u ban comercialing yourself you are then living in a communist country
Jello was a communist. In other news, REAL pumps don't trim, they SHAVE the balls...except a little strip down the center. Then ya bleach it THEN dye it neon green. Liz Vicious says so.
The Goth Kids from South Park said it best when they said "If you want to be a non-conformist, all you have to do is dress like us and listen to the same music we do"
I accidentally found the Dead Kennedys by finding my deceased brother’s record collection. He passed in 1987. I found the record “bedtime for democracy “ around 93. I’m 43 now and still consider the Dead Kennedys the best punk band ever. Maybe it’s the emotional part or maybe it’s just the fact that they changed music in the punk/surf side of underground music forever.
“Bedtime For Democracy” is awesome! ALL their albums are awesome! But especially “Plastic Surgery Disasters” and “In God We Trust” (even though that’s an EP!)
Hi Fin,fat old punk guy here. In 1985 Jello was doing his spoken word tour because they were not allowed to play music,due to the lawsuit. I went to see him at my local coffee shop and he signed the passenger door of my 66 bug. Later that week I went to see the Butthole Surfers in SF and he was there next to me in the pit. DK was definitely a part of my youth. Good times ❤
That was definitely the best time to see the Butthole Surfers. From roughly ‘84-‘87 nobody could touch them as a live band. As I’m sure you know, the intensity and insanity was off the charts back then. I’m 56, grew up in Texas, and saw the Surfers many, many times. Perhaps more than any other band I’ve seen. I watched them evolve over the years, and in that mid-to-late 80’s period they were just unbelievably good. Always an acid-drenched mind blowing experience. I also saw them with DK’s (and Circle Jerks) in ‘85, at a heavy metal club of all places in Southwest Houston, and it erupted into a full blown riot. They overbooked the show, had all these obnoxious roid-raging security goons antagonizing the punks, and then the a/c cut out right at the beginning of the DK’s set. This was summer in Texas. It was easily a hundred degrees with 60% humidity. The crowd just snapped. The cops were there in no time and were arresting anyone who left the building. I managed to sneak out the back and hop a fence into a drainage ditch without being seen. Insane night, great memories.
Saw Jello play with the Melvins and the entire set was Dead Kennedys. I would say that's better than seeing the Dead Kennedy's play with a different singer.
"Moon Over Marin" is one of my favorite songs, ever. Such a chill relaxing song about not a very relaxing topic. How we're destroying the only home we'll ever know.
I was scrolling specifically for this comment. It's one of my favorite songs... Ever. The post-apoco feel is subtle but really dark, the music is nostalgic and chill. In the video he didn't have much to say and I've never really hear anyone else talk about this song.
I squish dead fish between my toes try not to pick up any bones I turn around go home on my beach at night bathe in my moonlight ❤ there will always be a moon over marin
I grew up in SF graduating high school in 89. I went to a lot of shows back in the day and Moon Over Marin always stood out to me and I would have never guessed it back then, but I’m writing this comment from Marin. I can confirm the moon is still here
I saw Jello while he was on one of his spoken word tours in 2003. While he was on stage, someone from backstage came up to him and spoke in his ear. Jello informed all of us that the U.S. had officially invaded Iraq...again. Up to that moment, everyone in that room had been protesting and fighting against the invasion. The entire crowd collectively shared an inevitable horror that finally became real. That will stick with me forever.
Their lyrics just let you know this shit has been going on for decades. People pretending like all this is “new”, either don’t have a clue, or are part of the machine themselves.
I really like the fact it takes exactly one member to be missing to make it a tribute band. Really shows just how important Jello and the way he sees the world is what makes the band what is. There's always room for Jello.
It all depends on which member is missing. In the case of the DK’s, it *DEFINITELY* ceased to be the genuine article without Jello. I have nothing against, let’s say… Klaus, but if it had been him instead of Jello they could have carried on with a new bass player and would have still been able to call themselves “Dead Kennedys” and mean it. That’s just not possible in Jello’s absence. Plus, the guy they replaced him with? Brandon Cruz? Seriously? It felt at the time like we were being trolled.
@@kevincostelloe4006 And even if they had, it still wouldn’t be the DK’s in my opinion. The only reason they didn’t change the name of the band was because there’s $$$ to be made off that name. That’s literally *ALL* it is. A money machine. A cash cow. I don’t mean to dismiss the others’ talents, which are/were definitely notable, but Jello was without question the heart and soul of the Dead Kennedys, love him or hate him. It’s really as simple as that. No Jello, no DK’s. End of.
54 yrs old and still believe punk is a mental and social statement . its a way of viewing things. Love the band and all they did for a lot of people . thanks for the great vid.
Conformist was and is my favorite song by them. It stands out because it calls out the conformity that had become the norm in other bands, and it also becomes reflective at the end by including the Dead Kenendys themselves. He realizes that he was a part of the problem as part of the "punk leadership.'"
As I get older (I'm 48) and my political views skew and shift with my life experiences, I realize more and more how incredible their songs were. The were not "political" per-se but rather anti-establishment and outrage at the status-quo of disenfranchisement of any opposition to the ruling class (regardless of who is ruling). Their songs fit with being dissatisfied, angry and frustrated with the world around us, and I think this is the punk ethos.
Too bad Jello become what he always hated once COVID came around and scared everyone. Suddenly he was in favor of pushing the jab on everyone in the name of “public safety.” He really lost me there. In that moment, the veil came down and it was clear that he wasn’t anti-establishment, just another power-hungry leftist who cries victim until he sees an opportunity to seize and wield power.
@@noahpauley Political as in endorsing a specific ideology/political party. I understand things very well, but it is a pity people can't have a civil discussion without ad hominem tactics.
I am 70 year old retired drummer. In the late 70’s they stopped in Boulder, Colorado where I was student at music conservatory. They called my percussion prof at university and said they needed drummer. They were on the way to NYC. So I met with them and jammed for a while. I didn’t know who they were, but they were okay. They liked my playing and offered me gig. I turned them down and maybe have regrets. After they reached a certain amount of fame, that I was reading about them in rolling stone magazine. I thought, man I should have took that gig and would have maybe chance of hooking up with Debbie Harry. 😂 My teacher was pissed for turning down a job that could have been a paying gig. After all, that’s what I was there for. Making money playing drums. Oh well.
@Jeeiff My guess is that as a percussion major he looked down on a lowly punk rock band. I'm pretty sure if it had been a small jazz band of some repute he would have taken the gig. I have seen it before. When you are in music school you are a better musician than 95% of the other musicans in the world and you are constantly being told how good you are because you really are. When you are that young you dont have the experience to keep your head from inflating and when a bunch of punk rockers come into town they aren't good enough for you. His professor knew the value of paying gigs though because he has just been around longer. He knows you don't throw away good food you eat it. I had a gig once at a fraternity house one summer. Just a 3 piece rock band. The drummer couldn't make it and we didn't know what to do. We were walking through the music building and there practicing was an absolute drumming legend. He was a teaching assistant for the percussio section of the marching band and was working on a masters.in performance. I knew him pretty well and I figured there was no way he'd want to do a gig with my crappy little band. As soon as I mentioned $50 and free beer for 2 hours at a party he said Yeah I can do it. I didn't even want him to do a rehearsal with us but he insisted. I thought that an experienced musician. Not throwing shade I have just seen it before, it's a music schools syndrome that passes when you graduate and have to start earning money.
Good vid - I'm 52 and I found the Kennedy's at 14 when I was a skater...I bought Give Me Convenience or Give Me Death at the local skate shop and it blew my mind....I had just begun playing guitar and writing poetry and Jello's lyrics were a *huge* influence on me...this guy is the real deal - his writing was about as truthful as it gets and lord knows we need some of that now...thanks for the video 👍
My cool punk rock story is that I met Jello at a record store in st pete Fla after his gig with his other band guantanamo school. He was super cool and hung out a lil bit. And then bout a week later i met the dead Kennedys with new lead singer before their show in Tampa! Always awesome meeting punk legends!
I had a friend who has into DK back then and he had all the info on them. This was prior to the Internet and it was amazing that he knew so much about this band from California. The music was eye opening for sure and started me on my journey to punk music appreciation.
The records came with an address where you could send I believe a dollar and they would mail you like a zine that had all sorts of additional information and context about the songs. Jello was a marketing genius before that was the norm.
@@ThePunkRockMBA late 90's and the beginning of the 2000's were also awful and elitist, gotta say that the best i ever felt in the subculture is now, happened a lot, and fore the better if you ask me
@@nickmaatjes5611 Quite honestly, that shit survived in pockets into the later 2000s and 2010s. It's a much better scene now for sure, but you still get a handful of older guys who still feel the need to gatekeep the shit out of rolling around on a plank of wood with wheels because they know what "real" skating is.
You did a good job on this, gave a hard pill to swallow on the many gate keepers, punk is an elitist social club, DK took aim at hypocrisy, jello was often ridiculed in the scene and was beaten up couple times for those lyrics which cut too close to bone, good job thank you, many blessings
I always read the lyrics to Holliday in Cambodia as a critique of naive, self proclaimed Marxists on college campuses . Almost a “you think communism is such a great idea? Why don’t you head on down there and check it out?” 🤷🏻♂️ but what do I know
Yeah, same here. And the lyrics seem to suggest this as well : "Now you can go where people are one, now you can go where they get things done" Sounds like how a sympathizer would describe the regime.
I think it's more complex, since Pol Pot denounced Marxism himself, and was supported by the west. It's more of a criticism of privileged kids who like the aesthetic of progressivism while living in the epicentre of imperialism and enjoying its benefits
Massive fan since the 80s here. I dont mind the rest of the band playing without Jello, they cant resolve their differences a lot of musicians cant actually make a decent living doing music outside of the band that made them famous, enough to continue to tour and give millions of people that weren’t around in the early days the thrill of seeing the songs being played live. Jello continues to write and tour playing DKs songs with other musicians, they are all still making a living from the DK’s legacy. I love them all.
I’m messing with you Finn. I absolutely love your videos and have been a subscriber for years. I find your videos to be very informative and entertaining. You are one of my favourite creators
Big fan of DK. I have them tattooed on me. They helped shape my politics at a young age. I discovered actual anarchist political theory as opposed to whatever lawless hellhole most punks think anarchism is. Their lyrics also inspired me to do activism and community outreach
My older brother listened to the DK's non stop, and went to see them in their heyday. So I got to know all their music pretty well. We went together to see the recent line up. Still pretty cool. The music stands up.
Used to love punk rock in the 90s when I had no real responsibilities and virtually no life experience outside of opinions, criticism and angst. Definitely a soundtrack to biased ignorance, looking back. DK is one of the few bands I loved at the time and still dig to this day. They really were more cognizant than most others in the scene about the ideological hypocrisy and the slippery slope of things to come when the idealistic concepts being promoted as “progressive” play out in reality. Guess I’ll stop there.
For me their influence definitely influenced my early interest in politics and causes. Course I was growing up on them in the 80’s when I was in high school. I also think you should have mentioned “Police Truck” since prior to rap, especially the West Coast rap scene, no one ever wanted to talk about police brutality and the seemingly limitless immunity law enforcement had.
DK is still hugely popular in Britain. Fresh Fruit and Give Me Convenience...are platinum certified here. I love the fact that Too Drunk to Fuck was a Top 40 hit here. But like many people, I caught up with them much later.
Give Me Convenience and Strangelways Here We Come were the first two CDs I ever bought. Mostly I had their albums on cassette thought and probably still do in that drawer won't open! 😅
Probably the most popular (in the UK) of all the American punk bands. Possibly the Ramones as well, at least in the early days. The Dickies also seemed to do pretty well over there as I recall. Strange how certain bands do better overseas than others, and that works both ways. The Damned did fairly well for themselves in America, at least in terms of concert attendance (the radio won’t touch ‘em here).
@@slayerofthebuzz1 nope but if it were written today and the band were based in some uni town in Blighty, yeah, I can imagine it would have an less offensive and very dull title.
Pleaaaase do a video on NoMeansNo, super underrated punk band that pioneered the sound, esp for mathy music and punk etc. They even have a whole album with Jello.
If you haven't already, go check out the newly released book on them called From Obscurity to Oblivions, by Jason Lamb & Paul Prescott. It's on PM Press. It's an oral history featuring literally hundreds of interviews plus tons from the band themselves. And photos from their entire existence (including some I took in the mid 2000s, which I'm thrilled are in print). and yes, this channel needs to cover them.
Thanks for this, @FinnMckentyPRMBA! I have to admit feeling a little vindication. :) So glad you came around on the philosophy behind the DKs. You were right, they didn't propose solutions as much - "I'm not telling you, i'm asking you!". Instead of force feeding their audience what they should think, their message was to get people thinking, and use the diverse thought of the many rebels to reform/remake a better world. Great video.
I love this band and their music so much. Jellos lyrics spoke to me as a 15 year old, and by then these songs where 20 years old. I love punk, but very early on I had a big appreciation for the artits that called out the bullshit in all camps, including their own. I couldn't even understand everything he said and how it could be interpreted, since English isn't my first language, but his delivery was so captivating, I wanted to find out as much as I could about it. Jello wasn't just influential to my taste of music, he was influential to my whole outlook on life and society.
punk has let itself become a tool of the government narrative. I wasn't a DK fan for whatever reason growing up, I honestly couldn't say why, but this video has given me reason to revisit and think about the lyrics through the lens of the last few years. thanks @thepunkrockmba!
It happens all the time... The initial "counter-culture" gets swallowed by both mainstream fashion and big institutions (corporations, colleges, the government, churches etc.). It happened to bikers, to hippies, to rappers, to punks, to metalheads, etc.
@@ryanjacobson2508 I don’t disagree but I’m not sure any other 1st world subculture was more proudly anti conformist, and that was what drew me to it years ago. Imagine going back in time and telling some bands in their hey day that 20-30yrs from now they would ghost band members for not conforming?
Thank you for covering this band and topic. The music scene has been overan by chickenshit conformists who’s sole identity is amplifying the message of the state and legacy media.
At the end of the day, even punk rock stars had to fill in their tax return, given they're self employed and all. A lot of your music faves are selling you a vision they don't live in.
I grew up in Poland in the early 80's, left (with parents) as a 15 year old, and I think your thought process is spot on. Dead Kennedys were super popular in Poland back then by the way.
The Give Me Convenience record was a mainstay for me in high school. And later in my early and mid 20s, I remember really connecting to those lyrics in a personal way. When I was at university and studying history and international relations theory, it was really easy to take the view point that you thought your professors wanted to hear because you wanted to be a mainstream person who could have doors open to him in grad school and beyond. Your politics matters when you're studying that stuff because it's not like other social sciences where you're free to pretend you're a radical leftist and play weekend warrior. Sociology departments may have been dominated by middle class self styled communists and radicals (who are only ever in reality just liberals of various stripes) but that's not the case in economics and political science departments. Believe it or not, calling yourself a Marxist, for instance, in an economics program isn't actually going to open a lot of career doors for you. It's still that way today, but it was even more true when I was in school. I always used to think about that song Man With the Dogs, which I always interpreted as a song about the cognitive dissonance we feel when we're doing what's expected of us but sense that it's wrong. That music gave me confidence to not sell my soul and try to retain my intellectual (and moral) integrity, basically.
I grew up listening to DK and Jello's philosophy really influenced my world view. Even though they weren't Gen X, they really captured the spirit of my generation.
Same...his preaching wrenched me from being Reagan youth (not the band) to prog left. He told us shit that we would find to be true about our lying gov't years later. Jello moulded my political awareness...even if I may disagree with him today.
I only had one friend that even went to a college never mind on to a university after that. We all just got factory jobs or jobs in shops when we turned sixteen. I'd been booted out of school aged fifteen and once you're sixteen you have to pay your parents housekeeping money for food and bills. My mate was from a better background though and his mum was a primary (elementary) school teacher and they owned their own home and all that stuff. I like DKs lyrics cos they can be quite biting about middle-class people. Hehehe. Viva Jello!
"I'm not telling you, I'm asking you." is a powerful sentiment. I've had many people argue with me after I asked questions. Arguing with questions? How does that work? I don't think punks want anarchy. I think punks want chaos. And they have that. It's a controlled and more or less safe chaos at shows. But real anarchy is not sustainable. It will turn into something. And the easiest things for societies to slip into are not good scenarios. Someone will decide that they'd be able to amass wealth and power by cornering this resource or taking control of this business, whatever it is. It might be corporate people or organized crime people or religious or spiritual people. Anarchy collapses upon itself. It has to.
They continued in the tradition of Mad Magazine and Frank Zappa for me, even though I listened to the DKs first. They let everyone have it and had the crazy visual art work that I go along with. Be into stuff like that meant entering a world and it was a world of critical thinking
First heard DK in '86 when I house sitting for my 8th grade art teacher over Christmas break. He and I always talked music, and he told me to leaf thru his album collection while I was there. I was already into Suicidal at the time, so he suggested I listen to the Kennedys. "Fresh Fruit" was the one I grabbed and I was in, lol. He also got me into DRI, so I should look the dude up and thank him 🤘
Shit dude! same thing with me! First thing I heard was Government flu and I was hooked. I went from all the skate bands like descendents, black flag to suicidal, slayer and the mighty DRI! Played with DRI two times so thats a highlight
@@zeikerd no worries about your vocals, people like Mick Jones, the late Joe Strummer (The Clash) the late Ian Curtis (Joy Division) and Johnny Rotten would have all been the first ones to tell they suck at singing.
A friend of mine once drove Jello home after a show four hours in his Volkswagen beetle. We were so jealous of him the day after that he should have took me along too! Being critical of punk is the most punk of all. Love the Dead Kennedys.
My fave song and lyric off Frankenchrist is This Could Be Anywhere/Everywhere. Powerful social storytelling and uniquely poetic. "No amount of neon jazz could hide the oozing vibes of death"
Niiiiiiice. I need to check out the lyrics again as it's been a minute. Jello has GREAT lyrics on that album. A growing boy needs his lunch always stuck w me, but I have to check out that song again. I always loved that breakdown in This could be anywhere
@@agrowaxI’ve always loved that one line in “Growing Boy…” - “liquor filled statues of Elvis Presley, screw his head off and dtink like a vampire”. Just the imagery in that alone is so great. I love Frankenchrist. Great album.
I wouldn’t say Viva Las Vegas is just a fun little cover. He recontextualized the whole song to make it more about how the whole idea of Las Vegas is extremely toxic and materialistic, which to me is extremely genius. If you didn’t know Elvis wrote this song it would fit perfectly on the album because of how sarcastic the lyrics sound just like the rest of the album
In the early 80s as an impressionable young kid I discovered the punk scene. Las Vegas had a strong an active punk scene (shoutout to the LVHC) and I loved that even though I was a nerdy kid from a religious household I was usually accepted around these misfits of society. They really just were all about non-conformity and doing what you wanted. I fell in with that crowd, and even though I mostly existed on the outskirts of the scene I always felt at home there. By the year I graduated high school, 1986, I had seen it turn into something different. Punk was becoming trendy and more of a fashion statement than a lifestyle. There were even stores in the malls popping up devoted to the punk rock fashion. It was at this time the DKs 'Bedtime for Democracy' dropped. This album floored me. It was as if Jello had encapsulated everything I felt at the time about the punk scene and society in general and put it in an album. I knew it was OK for me to feel the way I did about the scene that I loved. I no longer had to defend punk rock or take offense when people called it trendy or passe, because I knew it was true. More importantly one of my favorite punk bands knew it was true. The music has never left my life. And I've continued to have mixed emotions over the past decades about the scene as I've watched it evolve and morph. But I am glad I was there at the beginning to witness its birth and be a part of it, even if just as a quiet observer on the fringes. And thanks to Jello and that amazing album for making me understand that it was OK to call out the hypocrisy that existed, even among the things that I loved.
Mate, Frankenchrist was their best album. I must’ve listen to that album a thousand times. Stars and Stripes of corruption was their epic crowning glory. Lyrically, it was so ahead of its time and relevant to many events in recent times. They weren’t scared to call out the corrupt politicians and phoney celebrities of the day. One of my favourite bands ever.
It’s a great album, no doubt… but their “best”? That’s *REALLY* debatable. Why not just say it’s your favorite, and leave it at that? Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely love Frankenchrist, and I have ever since it came out back in ‘85. I think it’s a masterpiece of an album, but every album they had made up to that point was equally astounding in its own way. As a longtime fan since 1980, I can’t really say that there’s a “best” album. Just several really great ones.
finn, you missed an opportunity with the manscaped ad read. jello was well known for shaving upside down crosses and barber poles into his body hair for live shows as his way of parodying punk culture. could have said something like "look at this picture of jello biafra with a cross shaved into his chest, it's not very clean but if he had the manscaped clippers, it could have been much better"
As an 1970s older punk rocker from Los Angeles, punk rockers today, and even most everyone I knew then all became what we were agaisnt. They won't admit it, but they are.
Chickenshit conformist indeed. I’m in my 40s now and I’ve been involved in my local punk scene since I was teenager and I mostly stopped going to shows in the last few years. The SJWs started ruining my scene starting back around 2010, by 2016 it had become pretty damn unbearable. A lot of people were driven out or intimidated into complacency. Haven’t really bothered with the local scene at all since covid. I still go out when the big bands like Bad Religion or Pennywise come to town, but I stay clear of the small shows for the most part now because the culture is so poisonous.
I hate to break it to you, but this new socio-cultural climate of woke identity politics and sjw virtue signalling (the religion of the modern left, btw), many of the founding fathers of alternative, metal, punk and hardcore have since themselves fallen in line with it's dictations, including jello biafra, henry rollins, fat mike from nofx, green day, offspring, bad religion, al jourgenson, napalm death, rage against the machine, flea from rhcp, eddie vedder, thurston moore, etc. have all "sold out" via the aforementioned sjw authoritarian agenda or encouraging and promoting the covid vax (and in some cases enforcing a such policy at their shows). It's a complete 180 from what the scene started out as.
I remember in 1990 the older punks were trying to run the local alt rock scene that had sprung up after them and we sent them on their way! We were like “we make music, you just dress up in costumes and do nothing.”
My GF copied the lyrics to : Forward to Death on her notebook cover in High School 1984. She was suspended and sent home without notice to her parents. She found the school's response ironic, in that they cited concerns of her possibly committing suicide.... and sent her home unsupervised
Saw the DKs in 1985 in Morgantown, WV. Still remember Jello at the beginning of the show asking people not to kick the mic into his face when they jumped off the stage. One of the best bands ever!
Shame how jello went on to do so many 180s with regards to what he used to preach and is now just another establishment pawn masquerading as a rebel. Like so many of the rest of his punk rock peers.
Biafra attacked the liberal governor because he was thinking through a libertarian socialist ("anarchist") framework. They weren't on the "same team" in any sense. To an anarchist, bourgeois liberalism (what we commonly refer to as liberalism these days) is fundamentally right-wing. It would be nice if people bothered to look into and recognize the significant fissures within broader political traditions. Biafra is not a "liberal," so it's not at all bewildering to see or hear him speaking against a liberal governor.
The 90's didn't have a legit punk scene. What passed as punk in the 90's were a bunch of trendies hopping on the band wagon of what was popular at the time.
My sister was a Freshman in 79 in Southern California, so Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables was one of the first punk rock records I heard. I was 11 and that's how I learned about Pol Pot and the Killing Fields. Also, can't go to an amusement park without thinking "But someone sabotaged the rollercoaster last night".😅
I saw that lineup without jello. Would’ve preferred to see jello Biafra BUT I also didn’t go exclusively to see them. It was a Huge 3 day festival they happened to be on. For a few minutes after they took the stage the crowd refused to allow them to begin just chanting “Jello, JELLO, JELLO…”
Post-Dead Kennedys Jello Biafra did some great spoken word albums and appeared on several albums with other artists/bands including "Shut up, Be Happy" on Ice-T's album 'Freedom of speech, just watch what you say". I got to see him live with Ministry and Pigface.
I saw Jell-O play with the Melvins back in 2005. I wouldn’t know for certain, but I would wager that it was better than any Dead Kennedys concert without.
I never understood why some DK fans don't like Bedtime For Democracy. It's a very weird album but it has some great lyrics and lyrical themes, and it feels like a proper final album for a great band. And the mentality that punk is not a uniform absolutely needs to come back, not just in punk but every genre that wants to stay relevant and innovative.
The first time i had ever heard of or saw the Dead Kennedys was at a Rock against Reagan rally in Delores Park in SF in the fall of 1983 and was immediately in love. They blew my mind
Got to see Jello perform Police Truck with Agent Orange and California Uber Alles with The Dillinger Escape Plan a couple weeks ago. Way better than seeing the new Dead Kennedys without him!
So punk rock wasn't about "non-comformity" its about nihilism, hedonism, and anarchy. This is why punk n politics is satire not paradox. Its not supposed to be taken seriously or analyzed. Its cynicism and humorous. The irony is only missed by those who don't get it
My first exposure to the DKs was as a teen when In God We Trust Inc. was just released. Picked it up and gave it a listen. Changed my life. I immediately bought all versions of all previous releases and scooped up new releases as they came out. Love that band... but confess to being more of a Jello follower than the reincarnated version of DKs
Did Jello rip off his bandmates? I've always wondered this. When I was a kid, I just assumed he ripped off his bandmates since he did lose the court case, and it made me have very mixed feelings about the music. For me, they were THE most influential band in my life. There is such a huge contrast with the horrifying lyrics and Jello's cheerful singing style. Ray's surf-style guitar can either be happy and cheerful to contrast with the horror (like in "Moon over Marin," a song about an oil spill obliterating wildlife) or be piercing and shrieking to add to the tension ("Cesspools in Eden," a song about toxic waste dumps killing people, which reminds me about the movie Erin Brockovich)
You touched all the bases on what made the band more intellectually honest and stand the test of time more than virtually any of their contemporaries. I wish Tommi Stumpff could have seen this. He reflexively hated them because he had disavowed punk and moved on way back in 1980. But he never knew the nuances of Jello's lyrics.
Get The Performance Package 5.0 Ultra for 20% OFF + Free International Shipping this holiday season with promo code PUNKROCK at manscaped.com/punkrockmba #manscapedpartner #LM5Ultra
should do one on how Henry Rollins' career so closely mimicked Jello's - like a budget dumb guy version
BAD BRAINS
FEAR
Hey I remember you asking what we wanted to see next and DK was one but please tell you’re gonna do a video on Coheed & Cambria
@@dalelane1948 same CIA script
The irony of "before we talk about the Dead Kenedys, let's hear from our sponsors". 😂
Ironic, yes. But they real funny thing is it's an ad about trimming your junk.
gotta pay the bills
@@toecutter well, they gotta advertise something that appeals to the viewers.
I noticed that.
@@chryssoraidy9838crusty punks need one
Me at 15: The Dead Kennedys are right about everything.
Me at 21: Actually these issues are way more complex.
Me at 30: But really it comes down to larger systemic issues.
Me at 50: The Dead Kennedys were right about everything.
I am living this too!
The fact that the songs still hit because as society haven't progressed is sad. Riot is an ever relevant song. So many others come to mind too.
Underrated comment
Goofy
I saw them on their last british tour,and saw jello do a spoken word gig a few years back and he spoke for hours..
I think jello Biafra would get a kick out of the guy selling a ball trimming kit before starting a biography about the DKs
Would have appreciated a demo 😂🤣😂
Idk if he would considering this guy is making his own product in a capitalist country as much as DK did. I don't get the ideology that selling sponsors is selling out you choose who can sponsor you in a free country jello was angry they were selling out to a clothes manufacturer that uses probably Cambodian children to sew their clothes... If u ban comercialing yourself you are then living in a communist country
Jello was a communist.
In other news, REAL pumps don't trim, they SHAVE the balls...except a little strip down the center. Then ya bleach it THEN dye it neon green. Liz Vicious says so.
Ok this guy just won the comment section haha!!!
The Goth Kids from South Park said it best when they said "If you want to be a non-conformist, all you have to do is dress like us and listen to the same music we do"
In other words conform to not comforming lol
I was a Goth kid for a while, we all wanted to be different just like everyone else.
Per se
I have said that for 30+ years!
@@TraciEaston-hs5xe Greatest show ever, one of the best episodes. Incidentally, I have Easton in my family on my mothers side.
I accidentally found the Dead Kennedys by finding my deceased brother’s record collection. He passed in 1987. I found the record “bedtime for democracy “ around 93. I’m 43 now and still consider the Dead Kennedys the best punk band ever. Maybe it’s the emotional part or maybe it’s just the fact that they changed music in the punk/surf side of underground music forever.
I’m 42. Same…
“Bedtime For Democracy” is awesome!
ALL their albums are awesome!
But especially “Plastic Surgery Disasters” and “In God We Trust” (even though that’s an EP!)
@@terrypussypower the cd has both on it. It stays in rotation!
I also love de Dead Kennedy's, but I find The Fall the best Punk band. Some say The Fall is post-punk though, I'm not sure about that.
Crap way to find a great band
I remember hearing someone sing Holiday In Cambodia during a karaoke night, and they thought the lyrics were 'cold, hot' instead of Pol Pot
This is the funniest thing I've ever heard
@@DrMetPhD ikr 🤣🤣🤣
😂😂
We had a song called Coldcock and swear had never heard of them at the time but the ‘chorus’started out exactly the same.
I'm guilty of that. Now I know😂😂
Was driving with my 18 yr old son, he was playing stuff on the radio, puts on Soup is good Food, I was so proud
Hi Fin,fat old punk guy here. In 1985 Jello was doing his spoken word tour because they were not allowed to play music,due to the lawsuit. I went to see him at my local coffee shop and he signed the passenger door of my 66 bug. Later that week I went to see the Butthole Surfers in SF and he was there next to me in the pit. DK was definitely a part of my youth. Good times ❤
I would kill to be able to have seen the Surfers in the mid 80s
That was definitely the best time to see the Butthole Surfers. From roughly ‘84-‘87 nobody could touch them as a live band. As I’m sure you know, the intensity and insanity was off the charts back then. I’m 56, grew up in Texas, and saw the Surfers many, many times. Perhaps more than any other band I’ve seen. I watched them evolve over the years, and in that mid-to-late 80’s period they were just unbelievably good. Always an acid-drenched mind blowing experience.
I also saw them with DK’s (and Circle Jerks) in ‘85, at a heavy metal club of all places in Southwest Houston, and it erupted into a full blown riot. They overbooked the show, had all these obnoxious roid-raging security goons antagonizing the punks, and then the a/c cut out right at the beginning of the DK’s set. This was summer in Texas. It was easily a hundred degrees with 60% humidity. The crowd just snapped. The cops were there in no time and were arresting anyone who left the building. I managed to sneak out the back and hop a fence into a drainage ditch without being seen. Insane night, great memories.
Saw them loads of times,got smashed over the head by gibby with a microphone (he thought,wrongly,that I'd spat on him)
They came to Australia (late 80s) and we're absolutely awesome.
@@Shikta-poobah67was that at Cardis?
Saw Jello play with the Melvins and the entire set was Dead Kennedys. I would say that's better than seeing the Dead Kennedy's play with a different singer.
Yeah I saw that too, I was pretty fucked up for that show but I do remember it was fuckin great
Whatever...
Back when punk rock was anti - establishment and rebellious, 79-82 was the golden era
I'd like to add 76,77 and 78😂
I love the Dead Kennedys. The manscapped ad made this really hard to start.
guess the dude got get paid ..he does pretty good job
No one cares
Thank goodness for RUclips chapters for that reason tbh!
Nothing wrong with keeping the nuts shaved though unless you trying to go natural 😂
man's gotta pay his bills
"Moon Over Marin" is one of my favorite songs, ever.
Such a chill relaxing song about not a very relaxing topic.
How we're destroying the only home we'll ever know.
Lol😂. That's their worst song in my opinion
Actually a really good song.
I was scrolling specifically for this comment. It's one of my favorite songs... Ever. The post-apoco feel is subtle but really dark, the music is nostalgic and chill. In the video he didn't have much to say and I've never really hear anyone else talk about this song.
I squish dead fish between my toes try not to pick up any bones I turn around go home on my beach at night bathe in my moonlight ❤ there will always be a moon over marin
I grew up in SF graduating high school in 89. I went to a lot of shows back in the day and Moon Over Marin always stood out to me and I would have never guessed it back then, but I’m writing this comment from Marin. I can confirm the moon is still here
I saw Jello while he was on one of his spoken word tours in 2003. While he was on stage, someone from backstage came up to him and spoke in his ear. Jello informed all of us that the U.S. had officially invaded Iraq...again. Up to that moment, everyone in that room had been protesting and fighting against the invasion. The entire crowd collectively shared an inevitable horror that finally became real. That will stick with me forever.
Sure Thst wasn’t George busy? lol
Now jello sold out to the very establishment he was against
Now he endorses Joe Biden, oh how the mighty have fallen
@@Wheels36H3WM the left loves war now.
There is no statute of limitations on war crimes.
They will be remembered forever more as such, first and foremost.
Their lyrics just let you know this shit has been going on for decades. People pretending like all this is “new”, either don’t have a clue, or are part of the machine themselves.
Interesting story, bit ironic when dude mentions it's about punk turning mainstream then immediately launches into a sponsor ad😅
the ads are the point of this guy's thing: it's all clickbait for pennies: packaged up facts and images scammed from online under a grabby title.
punk is when no money - karl marx
I really like the fact it takes exactly one member to be missing to make it a tribute band. Really shows just how important Jello and the way he sees the world is what makes the band what is. There's always room for Jello.
It all depends on which member is missing. In the case of the DK’s, it *DEFINITELY* ceased to be the genuine article without Jello. I have nothing against, let’s say… Klaus, but if it had been him instead of Jello they could have carried on with a new bass player and would have still been able to call themselves “Dead Kennedys” and mean it. That’s just not possible in Jello’s absence. Plus, the guy they replaced him with? Brandon Cruz? Seriously? It felt at the time like we were being trolled.
To me, it's not the Dead Kennedy's without Jello Biafra. Sorry, i'm just saying.
Jello and east bay ray and it would still be legit aka not a tribute band. But imagine op ivy or rancid trying to tour with out tim Armstrong.
The proof of it not being the dk's without Jello is the fact that the remaining members haven't written any new material.
@@kevincostelloe4006 And even if they had, it still wouldn’t be the DK’s in my opinion. The only reason they didn’t change the name of the band was because there’s $$$ to be made off that name. That’s literally *ALL* it is. A money machine. A cash cow. I don’t mean to dismiss the others’ talents, which are/were definitely notable, but Jello was without question the heart and soul of the Dead Kennedys, love him or hate him. It’s really as simple as that. No Jello, no DK’s. End of.
54 yrs old and still believe punk is a mental and social statement . its a way of viewing things. Love the band and all they did for a lot of people . thanks for the great vid.
Spot on! DK was beyond anarchism. It wasn’t even about counterculture. It was a sort of rebellious existentialism.
Good call.
Well spoken my friend!
True....
Anarchy is only ever a power vacuum anyways.
Well said.
Conformist was and is my favorite song by them. It stands out because it calls out the conformity that had become the norm in other bands, and it also becomes reflective at the end by including the Dead Kenendys themselves. He realizes that he was a part of the problem as part of the "punk leadership.'"
@13:35 that kid with the green mohawk was my best friend, a truly kind and devoted person, and is missed to this day. thank you for that moment.
As I get older (I'm 48) and my political views skew and shift with my life experiences, I realize more and more how incredible their songs were. The were not "political" per-se but rather anti-establishment and outrage at the status-quo of disenfranchisement of any opposition to the ruling class (regardless of who is ruling). Their songs fit with being dissatisfied, angry and frustrated with the world around us, and I think this is the punk ethos.
You'd think it'd be more common, especially in bands whose identity is based on rebellion and nonconformity but 🤷🏻♀️
They were explicitly political. Sorry that you can't pick up on that type of shit.
Too bad Jello become what he always hated once COVID came around and scared everyone. Suddenly he was in favor of pushing the jab on everyone in the name of “public safety.” He really lost me there. In that moment, the veil came down and it was clear that he wasn’t anti-establishment, just another power-hungry leftist who cries victim until he sees an opportunity to seize and wield power.
They were arguably the most political band until Rage
@@noahpauley Political as in endorsing a specific ideology/political party. I understand things very well, but it is a pity people can't have a civil discussion without ad hominem tactics.
I am 70 year old retired drummer. In the late 70’s they stopped in Boulder, Colorado where I was student at music conservatory. They called my percussion prof at university and said they needed drummer. They were on the way to NYC. So I met with them and jammed for a while. I didn’t know who they were, but they were okay. They liked my playing and offered me gig. I turned them down and maybe have regrets. After they reached a certain amount of fame, that I was reading about them in rolling stone magazine. I thought, man I should have took that gig and would have maybe chance of hooking up with Debbie Harry. 😂 My teacher was pissed for turning down a job that could have been a paying gig. After all, that’s what I was there for. Making money playing drums. Oh well.
Everything for a reason, sir. That's a great story, though. (And it is a shame Debbie missed out.)
cool story bro except i'm not being sarcastic, that's actually a cool story
I am pissed you turned down that gig and I don't even know you!
Wow...that's tragic. Why on earth would you pass that up...knowing them or not. Oh well.
@Jeeiff My guess is that as a percussion major he looked down on a lowly punk rock band. I'm pretty sure if it had been a small jazz band of some repute he would have taken the gig. I have seen it before. When you are in music school you are a better musician than 95% of the other musicans in the world and you are constantly being told how good you are because you really are. When you are that young you dont have the experience to keep your head from inflating and when a bunch of punk rockers come into town they aren't good enough for you. His professor knew the value of paying gigs though because he has just been around longer. He knows you don't throw away good food you eat it.
I had a gig once at a fraternity house one summer. Just a 3 piece rock band. The drummer couldn't make it and we didn't know what to do. We were walking through the music building and there practicing was an absolute drumming legend. He was a teaching assistant for the percussio section of the marching band and was working on a masters.in performance. I knew him pretty well and I figured there was no way he'd want to do a gig with my crappy little band. As soon as I mentioned $50 and free beer for 2 hours at a party he said Yeah I can do it. I didn't even want him to do a rehearsal with us but he insisted. I thought that an experienced musician.
Not throwing shade I have just seen it before, it's a music schools syndrome that passes when you graduate and have to start earning money.
Good vid - I'm 52 and I found the Kennedy's at 14 when I was a skater...I bought Give Me Convenience or Give Me Death at the local skate shop and it blew my mind....I had just begun playing guitar and writing poetry and Jello's lyrics were a *huge* influence on me...this guy is the real deal - his writing was about as truthful as it gets and lord knows we need some of that now...thanks for the video 👍
I’m a bit younger than you but same, bro same. ❤skating and DK on boombox.
Same age, same story. Except I got Plastic Surgery Disasters.
My cool punk rock story is that I met Jello at a record store in st pete Fla after his gig with his other band guantanamo school. He was super cool and hung out a lil bit. And then bout a week later i met the dead Kennedys with new lead singer before their show in Tampa! Always awesome meeting punk legends!
I had a friend who has into DK back then and he had all the info on them. This was prior to the Internet and it was amazing that he knew so much about this band from California. The music was eye opening for sure and started me on my journey to punk music appreciation.
Back in the day of cassette tape exchanges and home made fanzines made on photocopiers.
The records came with an address where you could send I believe a dollar and they would mail you like a zine that had all sorts of additional information and context about the songs. Jello was a marketing genius before that was the norm.
@@CasaNowhereAlternative Tentacles 🖤☠️🖤
Skateboarding popped in the 90s and started gatekeeping super hard as well, hand in hand with what was happening with punk
Early 90s skateboarding was one of the most toxic, awful scenes I’ve ever been around
@@ThePunkRockMBA late 90's and the beginning of the 2000's were also awful and elitist, gotta say that the best i ever felt in the subculture is now, happened a lot, and fore the better if you ask me
@@nickmaatjes5611 Quite honestly, that shit survived in pockets into the later 2000s and 2010s. It's a much better scene now for sure, but you still get a handful of older guys who still feel the need to gatekeep the shit out of rolling around on a plank of wood with wheels because they know what "real" skating is.
@@ThePunkRockMBAyou're obviously meant to exploit scenes you shouldn't be a part of
Good point.
"Shaking babies and kissing hands" 🤣
Priceless !
R.I.P. D.H. Peligro
You did a good job on this, gave a hard pill to swallow on the many gate keepers, punk is an elitist social club, DK took aim at hypocrisy, jello was often ridiculed in the scene and was beaten up couple times for those lyrics which cut too close to bone, good job thank you, many blessings
I always read the lyrics to Holliday in Cambodia as a critique of naive, self proclaimed Marxists on college campuses . Almost a “you think communism is such a great idea? Why don’t you head on down there and check it out?” 🤷🏻♂️ but what do I know
Yeah, same here. And the lyrics seem to suggest this as well : "Now you can go where people are one, now you can go where they get things done"
Sounds like how a sympathizer would describe the regime.
I think it's more complex, since Pol Pot denounced Marxism himself, and was supported by the west. It's more of a criticism of privileged kids who like the aesthetic of progressivism while living in the epicentre of imperialism and enjoying its benefits
@@aprofondir nail on the head
And also of Noam Chomsky and his followers, because he was an avid defender of the Khmer Rouge, downplaying the stories coming out of there as lies.
Massive fan since the 80s here. I dont mind the rest of the band playing without Jello, they cant resolve their differences a lot of musicians cant actually make a decent living doing music outside of the band that made them famous, enough to continue to tour and give millions of people that weren’t around in the early days the thrill of seeing the songs being played live. Jello continues to write and tour playing DKs songs with other musicians, they are all still making a living from the DK’s legacy. I love them all.
East Bay Ray is one of punk's best guitarists, bar none.
Holy crap. A punk rock video on the Punk Rock MBA. It’s a Festivus miracle
I’ve made dozens of punk videos! Or are you one of the people whose definition of punk stops in 1983?
I’m messing with you Finn. I absolutely love your videos and have been a subscriber for years. I find your videos to be very informative and entertaining. You are one of my favourite creators
@@ThePunkRockMBAbru, it’s a joke.
@@ThePunkRockMBA Oof 😖
🙄@@ThePunkRockMBA
Gavin Neusome is the full incarnation of California Uber Alis
I will always love THPS for turning me on to these guys
One of the greatest bands of all time. No one sounds like them.
Big fan of DK. I have them tattooed on me. They helped shape my politics at a young age. I discovered actual anarchist political theory as opposed to whatever lawless hellhole most punks think anarchism is. Their lyrics also inspired me to do activism and community outreach
My older brother listened to the DK's non stop, and went to see them in their heyday. So I got to know all their music pretty well. We went together to see the recent line up. Still pretty cool. The music stands up.
Manscaping and starting with Franenchrist. Most of us started with Fast Records/Cherry Red California and Holiday!!.
Used to love punk rock in the 90s when I had no real responsibilities and virtually no life experience outside of opinions, criticism and angst. Definitely a soundtrack to biased ignorance, looking back.
DK is one of the few bands I loved at the time and still dig to this day. They really were more cognizant than most others in the scene about the ideological hypocrisy and the slippery slope of things to come when the idealistic concepts being promoted as “progressive” play out in reality.
Guess I’ll stop there.
Exactly. They WERE. Then along came a lil ol' thing called the passage of time.
For me their influence definitely influenced my early interest in politics and causes. Course I was growing up on them in the 80’s when I was in high school. I also think you should have mentioned “Police Truck” since prior to rap, especially the West Coast rap scene, no one ever wanted to talk about police brutality and the seemingly limitless immunity law enforcement had.
DK is still hugely popular in Britain. Fresh Fruit and Give Me Convenience...are platinum certified here. I love the fact that Too Drunk to Fuck was a Top 40 hit here. But like many people, I caught up with them much later.
Give Me Convenience and Strangelways Here We Come were the first two CDs I ever bought. Mostly I had their albums on cassette thought and probably still do in that drawer won't open! 😅
Probably the most popular (in the UK) of all the American punk bands. Possibly the Ramones as well, at least in the early days. The Dickies also seemed to do pretty well over there as I recall. Strange how certain bands do better overseas than others, and that works both ways. The Damned did fairly well for themselves in America, at least in terms of concert attendance (the radio won’t touch ‘em here).
Isn't the alternate title of "Too Drunk to Fuck" in the UK "Just your Average Thursday"? ;)
@@slayerofthebuzz1 nope but if it were written today and the band were based in some uni town in Blighty, yeah, I can imagine it would have an less offensive and very dull title.
@@MosherBearcan't imagine the BBC allowing that song on...😊
Jello was really the whole point. Well, him and the Playtex gloves.
Pleaaaase do a video on NoMeansNo, super underrated punk band that pioneered the sound, esp for mathy music and punk etc. They even have a whole album with Jello.
If you haven't already, go check out the newly released book on them called From Obscurity to Oblivions, by Jason Lamb & Paul Prescott. It's on PM Press. It's an oral history featuring literally hundreds of interviews plus tons from the band themselves. And photos from their entire existence (including some I took in the mid 2000s, which I'm thrilled are in print).
and yes, this channel needs to cover them.
Yes please.
Yes please.
Yes please.
Dead Bob on tour this March.
@@MarkWilson-ij9jd wait fr
Thanks for this, @FinnMckentyPRMBA! I have to admit feeling a little vindication. :) So glad you came around on the philosophy behind the DKs. You were right, they didn't propose solutions as much - "I'm not telling you, i'm asking you!". Instead of force feeding their audience what they should think, their message was to get people thinking, and use the diverse thought of the many rebels to reform/remake a better world. Great video.
I would’ve brought a sign saying there’s always room for jello to their comeback tour lmao
Frankenchrist was my first DK as well. and so the descent into DK rabbit hole began
I love this band and their music so much. Jellos lyrics spoke to me as a 15 year old, and by then these songs where 20 years old. I love punk, but very early on I had a big appreciation for the artits that called out the bullshit in all camps, including their own. I couldn't even understand everything he said and how it could be interpreted, since English isn't my first language, but his delivery was so captivating, I wanted to find out as much as I could about it. Jello wasn't just influential to my taste of music, he was influential to my whole outlook on life and society.
punk has let itself become a tool of the government narrative.
I wasn't a DK fan for whatever reason growing up, I honestly couldn't say why, but this video has given me reason to revisit and think about the lyrics through the lens of the last few years. thanks @thepunkrockmba!
It happens all the time... The initial "counter-culture" gets swallowed by both mainstream fashion and big institutions (corporations, colleges, the government, churches etc.). It happened to bikers, to hippies, to rappers, to punks, to metalheads, etc.
@@ryanjacobson2508 I don’t disagree but I’m not sure any other 1st world subculture was more proudly anti conformist, and that was what drew me to it years ago. Imagine going back in time and telling some bands in their hey day that 20-30yrs from now they would ghost band members for not conforming?
Thank you for covering this band and topic. The music scene has been overan by chickenshit conformists who’s sole identity is amplifying the message of the state and legacy media.
Jello has gone on to do exactly this in recent years. As have most of his peers in punk rock.
At the end of the day, even punk rock stars had to fill in their tax return, given they're self employed and all. A lot of your music faves are selling you a vision they don't live in.
I think you think that DK are right wing lol. They most definitely are not.
what's more punk than not leaving home because the government said so?
@@LeviBulger still thinking in terms of "left/right" eh? Maybe time to not.
I grew up in Poland in the early 80's, left (with parents) as a 15 year old, and I think your thought process is spot on. Dead Kennedys were super popular in Poland back then by the way.
Here in New Zealand the vinyl copy of Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables was the import pressing from Poland - thanks!
The Give Me Convenience record was a mainstay for me in high school. And later in my early and mid 20s, I remember really connecting to those lyrics in a personal way. When I was at university and studying history and international relations theory, it was really easy to take the view point that you thought your professors wanted to hear because you wanted to be a mainstream person who could have doors open to him in grad school and beyond. Your politics matters when you're studying that stuff because it's not like other social sciences where you're free to pretend you're a radical leftist and play weekend warrior. Sociology departments may have been dominated by middle class self styled communists and radicals (who are only ever in reality just liberals of various stripes) but that's not the case in economics and political science departments. Believe it or not, calling yourself a Marxist, for instance, in an economics program isn't actually going to open a lot of career doors for you. It's still that way today, but it was even more true when I was in school. I always used to think about that song Man With the Dogs, which I always interpreted as a song about the cognitive dissonance we feel when we're doing what's expected of us but sense that it's wrong. That music gave me confidence to not sell my soul and try to retain my intellectual (and moral) integrity, basically.
I grew up listening to DK and Jello's philosophy really influenced my world view. Even though they weren't Gen X, they really captured the spirit of my generation.
Same...his preaching wrenched me from being Reagan youth (not the band) to prog left. He told us shit that we would find to be true about our lying gov't years later. Jello moulded my political awareness...even if I may disagree with him today.
I only had one friend that even went to a college never mind on to a university after that. We all just got factory jobs or jobs in shops when we turned sixteen. I'd been booted out of school aged fifteen and once you're sixteen you have to pay your parents housekeeping money for food and bills. My mate was from a better background though and his mum was a primary (elementary) school teacher and they owned their own home and all that stuff. I like DKs lyrics cos they can be quite biting about middle-class people. Hehehe. Viva Jello!
@@Jeeiff Yes, ol' Jello is now quite the cranky old man!
The "Moon over Marin" lyrics are timeless. I visualize the Exxon Valdez oil tanker environmental catastrophe in 1989.
"I'm not telling you, I'm asking you." is a powerful sentiment. I've had many people argue with me after I asked questions. Arguing with questions? How does that work? I don't think punks want anarchy. I think punks want chaos. And they have that. It's a controlled and more or less safe chaos at shows. But real anarchy is not sustainable. It will turn into something. And the easiest things for societies to slip into are not good scenarios. Someone will decide that they'd be able to amass wealth and power by cornering this resource or taking control of this business, whatever it is. It might be corporate people or organized crime people or religious or spiritual people. Anarchy collapses upon itself. It has to.
They continued in the tradition of Mad Magazine and Frank Zappa for me, even though I listened to the DKs first. They let everyone have it and had the crazy visual art work that I go along with. Be into stuff like that meant entering a world and it was a world of critical thinking
I saw Jello in concert about 10 years ago. He was still complaining about Reagan and Thatcher, while ignoring then current POTUS Obama.
It was silly.
I guess at that time it was more about getting a paycheck than stickin it to the man.
Those lyrics take no prisoners. Doesn't pick a side, doesn't offer solutions, only asks appropriate questions. He is a true cynic.
Hypocrites beware.
First heard DK in '86 when I house sitting for my 8th grade art teacher over Christmas break. He and I always talked music, and he told me to leaf thru his album collection while I was there. I was already into Suicidal at the time, so he suggested I listen to the Kennedys. "Fresh Fruit" was the one I grabbed and I was in, lol. He also got me into DRI, so I should look the dude up and thank him 🤘
Shit dude! same thing with me! First thing I heard was Government flu and I was hooked. I went from all the skate bands like descendents, black flag to suicidal, slayer and the mighty DRI! Played with DRI two times so thats a highlight
@@zeikerd shit dude, that's awesome! What instrument do you play?
@@spddiesel I do vocals (pretty average) in two bands.
@@zeikerd no worries about your vocals, people like Mick Jones, the late Joe Strummer (The Clash) the late Ian Curtis (Joy Division) and Johnny Rotten would have all been the first ones to tell they suck at singing.
@@sawtooth808 I still pumped out over a 100 songs on like, eight or nine albums and EPs, so shitty vocals are okay by me
A friend of mine once drove Jello home after a show four hours in his Volkswagen beetle. We were so jealous of him the day after that he should have took me along too! Being critical of punk is the most punk of all. Love the Dead Kennedys.
My fave song and lyric off Frankenchrist is This Could Be Anywhere/Everywhere. Powerful social storytelling and uniquely poetic. "No amount of neon jazz could hide the oozing vibes of death"
Niiiiiiice. I need to check out the lyrics again as it's been a minute. Jello has GREAT lyrics on that album. A growing boy needs his lunch always stuck w me, but I have to check out that song again. I always loved that breakdown in This could be anywhere
@@agrowaxI’ve always loved that one line in “Growing Boy…” - “liquor filled statues of Elvis Presley, screw his head off and dtink like a vampire”. Just the imagery in that alone is so great. I love Frankenchrist. Great album.
I wouldn’t say Viva Las Vegas is just a fun little cover. He recontextualized the whole song to make it more about how the whole idea of Las Vegas is extremely toxic and materialistic, which to me is extremely genius. If you didn’t know Elvis wrote this song it would fit perfectly on the album because of how sarcastic the lyrics sound just like the rest of the album
In the early 80s as an impressionable young kid I discovered the punk scene. Las Vegas had a strong an active punk scene (shoutout to the LVHC) and I loved that even though I was a nerdy kid from a religious household I was usually accepted around these misfits of society. They really just were all about non-conformity and doing what you wanted. I fell in with that crowd, and even though I mostly existed on the outskirts of the scene I always felt at home there.
By the year I graduated high school, 1986, I had seen it turn into something different. Punk was becoming trendy and more of a fashion statement than a lifestyle. There were even stores in the malls popping up devoted to the punk rock fashion. It was at this time the DKs 'Bedtime for Democracy' dropped. This album floored me. It was as if Jello had encapsulated everything I felt at the time about the punk scene and society in general and put it in an album. I knew it was OK for me to feel the way I did about the scene that I loved. I no longer had to defend punk rock or take offense when people called it trendy or passe, because I knew it was true. More importantly one of my favorite punk bands knew it was true.
The music has never left my life. And I've continued to have mixed emotions over the past decades about the scene as I've watched it evolve and morph. But I am glad I was there at the beginning to witness its birth and be a part of it, even if just as a quiet observer on the fringes. And thanks to Jello and that amazing album for making me understand that it was OK to call out the hypocrisy that existed, even among the things that I loved.
Mate, Frankenchrist was their best album. I must’ve listen to that album a thousand times. Stars and Stripes of corruption was their epic crowning glory. Lyrically, it was so ahead of its time and relevant to many events in recent times. They weren’t scared to call out the corrupt politicians and phoney celebrities of the day. One of my favourite bands ever.
It’s a great album, no doubt… but their “best”? That’s *REALLY* debatable. Why not just say it’s your favorite, and leave it at that? Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely love Frankenchrist, and I have ever since it came out back in ‘85. I think it’s a masterpiece of an album, but every album they had made up to that point was equally astounding in its own way.
As a longtime fan since 1980, I can’t really say that there’s a “best” album. Just several really great ones.
finn, you missed an opportunity with the manscaped ad read. jello was well known for shaving upside down crosses and barber poles into his body hair for live shows as his way of parodying punk culture. could have said something like "look at this picture of jello biafra with a cross shaved into his chest, it's not very clean but if he had the manscaped clippers, it could have been much better"
One things for sure... punx never sold out by marketing 'manscaping' products.
I think it’s funny that you launched right into your Dead Kennedys‘s history punk rock right after a two minute ball shaving commercial….
As an 1970s older punk rocker from Los Angeles, punk rockers today, and even most everyone I knew then all became what we were agaisnt. They won't admit it, but they are.
Chickenshit conformist indeed. I’m in my 40s now and I’ve been involved in my local punk scene since I was teenager and I mostly stopped going to shows in the last few years.
The SJWs started ruining my scene starting back around 2010, by 2016 it had become pretty damn unbearable. A lot of people were driven out or intimidated into complacency. Haven’t really bothered with the local scene at all since covid.
I still go out when the big bands like Bad Religion or Pennywise come to town, but I stay clear of the small shows for the most part now because the culture is so poisonous.
I hate to break it to you, but this new socio-cultural climate of woke identity politics and sjw virtue signalling (the religion of the modern left, btw), many of the founding fathers of alternative, metal, punk and hardcore have since themselves fallen in line with it's dictations, including jello biafra, henry rollins, fat mike from nofx, green day, offspring, bad religion, al jourgenson, napalm death, rage against the machine, flea from rhcp, eddie vedder, thurston moore, etc. have all "sold out" via the aforementioned sjw authoritarian agenda or encouraging and promoting the covid vax (and in some cases enforcing a such policy at their shows). It's a complete 180 from what the scene started out as.
@@chrispollard341 how are you going to say this and still call him rollins
It's Henry Garfield
Yeah, they don't care. If you're looking for some kind of OG respect you should forget about it. It's by the kids for the kids
I remember in 1990 the older punks were trying to run the local alt rock scene that had sprung up after them and we sent them on their way! We were like “we make music, you just dress up in costumes and do nothing.”
My GF copied the lyrics to : Forward to Death on her notebook cover in High School 1984. She was suspended and sent home without notice to her parents. She found the school's response ironic, in that they cited concerns of her possibly committing suicide.... and sent her home unsupervised
Manscape sponsored this video. We're through the looking glass. Unbelievable.
Always a great day when Finn drops a new video! I appreciate you for teaching me so much about Alt. Music!
Dead Kennedys have always been one of my favorite bands
Saw the DKs in 1985 in Morgantown, WV. Still remember Jello at the beginning of the show asking people not to kick the mic into his face when they jumped off the stage. One of the best bands ever!
"Soup is Good Food" always reminded me of the Dead Milkmen
Shame how jello went on to do so many 180s with regards to what he used to preach and is now just another establishment pawn masquerading as a rebel. Like so many of the rest of his punk rock peers.
Preach
Right wingers discovering that being a contrarian doesn’t make you a free thinker but a tool
Now jello IS the establishment he once was against
I see this dumb sentiment being passed around. Why?
@@anactualkingpeople are mad because of vaccines or something
Got to see the Dead Kennedys live in Houston about 1981-82.
It was awesome.
Biafra attacked the liberal governor because he was thinking through a libertarian socialist ("anarchist") framework. They weren't on the "same team" in any sense. To an anarchist, bourgeois liberalism (what we commonly refer to as liberalism these days) is fundamentally right-wing.
It would be nice if people bothered to look into and recognize the significant fissures within broader political traditions. Biafra is not a "liberal," so it's not at all bewildering to see or hear him speaking against a liberal governor.
The 90's didn't have a legit punk scene. What passed as punk in the 90's were a bunch of trendies hopping on the band wagon of what was popular at the time.
My sister was a Freshman in 79 in Southern California, so Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables was one of the first punk rock records I heard. I was 11 and that's how I learned about Pol Pot and the Killing Fields. Also, can't go to an amusement park without thinking "But someone sabotaged the rollercoaster last night".😅
I saw that lineup without jello. Would’ve preferred to see jello Biafra BUT I also didn’t go exclusively to see them. It was a Huge 3 day festival they happened to be on. For a few minutes after they took the stage the crowd refused to allow them to begin just chanting “Jello, JELLO, JELLO…”
Post-Dead Kennedys Jello Biafra did some great spoken word albums and appeared on several albums with other artists/bands including "Shut up, Be Happy" on Ice-T's album 'Freedom of speech, just watch what you say". I got to see him live with Ministry and Pigface.
I saw Jell-O play with the Melvins back in 2005. I wouldn’t know for certain, but I would wager that it was better than any Dead Kennedys concert without.
"Punk aint no religious cult. Punk means thinking for yourself" Jello Biafra - NPFO
I never understood why some DK fans don't like Bedtime For Democracy. It's a very weird album but it has some great lyrics and lyrical themes, and it feels like a proper final album for a great band. And the mentality that punk is not a uniform absolutely needs to come back, not just in punk but every genre that wants to stay relevant and innovative.
The first time i had ever heard of or saw the Dead Kennedys was at a Rock against Reagan rally in Delores Park in SF in the fall of 1983 and was immediately in love. They blew my mind
Jello summed it up when new metal came along . He said the jocks at school learnt guitar and the result was new metal .
And now Jello has TDS.
Got to see Jello perform Police Truck with Agent Orange and California Uber Alles with The Dillinger Escape Plan a couple weeks ago. Way better than seeing the new Dead Kennedys without him!
So punk rock wasn't about "non-comformity" its about nihilism, hedonism, and anarchy.
This is why punk n politics is satire not paradox. Its not supposed to be taken seriously or analyzed. Its cynicism and humorous. The irony is only missed by those who don't get it
from an era where speaking out against certain parties and topics would get u on fbi watch list
These days I can’t imagine a prosecutor admitting wrongdoing. Especially in places like LA or newyork
Terrible band. Terrible fans.
My first exposure to the DKs was as a teen when In God We Trust Inc. was just released. Picked it up and gave it a listen. Changed my life. I immediately bought all versions of all previous releases and scooped up new releases as they came out. Love that band... but confess to being more of a Jello follower than the reincarnated version of DKs
Did Jello rip off his bandmates? I've always wondered this. When I was a kid, I just assumed he ripped off his bandmates since he did lose the court case, and it made me have very mixed feelings about the music. For me, they were THE most influential band in my life. There is such a huge contrast with the horrifying lyrics and Jello's cheerful singing style. Ray's surf-style guitar can either be happy and cheerful to contrast with the horror (like in "Moon over Marin," a song about an oil spill obliterating wildlife) or be piercing and shrieking to add to the tension ("Cesspools in Eden," a song about toxic waste dumps killing people, which reminds me about the movie Erin Brockovich)
Bro, your're a bit young to opine on punk pre-88. Sorry. If you weren't there, it's tough to have an opinion.
You touched all the bases on what made the band more intellectually honest and stand the test of time more than virtually any of their contemporaries. I wish Tommi Stumpff could have seen this. He reflexively hated them because he had disavowed punk and moved on way back in 1980. But he never knew the nuances of Jello's lyrics.