- Oct 26, 2017

Ode to Camelot: Favorite Dead Kennedy Songs

Since today marks the day that the National Archives will open the long awaited "Kennedy Files" that hold thousands of documents that may or may not put to rest many conspiracy theorists thoughts on supposed alternative theories on who shot President John F. Kennedy, I felt no better blog to slam together than that of the most famous punk band paying homage to one of the greatest, most famous presidents of all time, The Dead Kennedys.

I can't say that I'm a GIANT old school punk rock fan and that I'm a huge DK fan but I do love at least a good bit of what lead singer Jello Baifra and his crew have to say. Mind you, some of these MAY OR MAY NOT be covers...

Holiday In Cambodia

This one you may remember from that Guitar Hero game. It's not my favorite because I hated playing it repeatedly on that fucking game. I gotta include it though because it was my first introduction to the band.

This version is particularly bad ass because Uncle Dave Grohl and his merry band of men from the Foo Fighters plus Serj Tankian from System of a Down rip this one to shreds. Serj's voice is PERFECT!

MTV Get Off The Air

Ironic that MTV is still "on the air" but there isn't any music that plays on it anymore like it did before. The actual music video for this was creepy as FUCK if anyone has ever seen it. The "video DJ" was a fucking puppet that they made. The puppet was bug eyed and weird as fuck. And it showed a bunch of flashy propaganda shit really fast while the band went off ranting in the back. Ya, seizure city. (Clockwork Orange-ish).

Nazi Punks Fuck Off

It's pretty fucking sad that this song was recorded in 1981 and it's still resonating hard as shit in 2017. (Marty we're going back to 1975.)

Halloween

I know what you're thinking, the same thing that I was, "it's not that fucking Misfits song." I thought the same thing like 4-5 some odd years ago when I found the Misfits song and stumbled across theirs. None-the-less, I like the shit out of it.

I Fought The Law

My first introduction to this band had to be unknowingly with this song. The band that I had with my dad covered "I fought the law" and everyone went ape tits about "Freddy Got Fingered" at the time so this cover wasn't bad...naturally my dad hated it, and a few years later I was reintroduced to The Dead Kennedys formally.

Too Drunk To Fuck

Jello broke loose from the band, yet in a democracy they got royalties and decided to use that to their advantage. They used this song in the film Grindhouse which was covered by Nouvelle Vague. CHECK THEIR VERSION OUT HERE!

Dear Abby

This one is fucked and I love it. It's about a guy who's feeding people to his family to survive the fucked up economy. It reminds me of the concept for the Coheed and Cambria video Feathers.

Police Truck

Last but not least I can't forget the first song that I ever heard by Dead Kennedys way back when the first Tony Hawk's Pro Skater came out. My first reaction was "holy shit this is fast and he sings weird." in my little small minded town that was pre 9/11 and pre-YouTube. I gave them no thought outside of that one song until many years later when punk blew up.

Though not Dead Kennedys associated...it is well, JFK related. And yesterday's blog related. There's a pretty sick Misfits album all the way down to the album art called Bullet by Misfits.

Do you like the list?

Any DK songs you like?

Any other old skool punk bands you want me to cover?

Fuck me?

Well fuck you...

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