The Dead Kennedys made an indelible mark on punk rock with their debut single California Über Alles in the summer of 1979.
I’m posting this today after hearing the news that Jello Biafra, the Johnny Rotten of US punk, has suffered a stroke; and sending him good vibes across the divide.
My oldest and best friend Ben became his friend when he set off for America on his own in 1979 and pitched up in San Francisco. In fact he used to house-sit Biafra’s apartment when he was on tour.
The Dead Kennedys were America’s punk royalty: a hybrid of the Pistols’ rudimentary rock music and The Clash’s politicised protest.
They released their first single California Über Alles in June 1979 and later recorded a faster version for their memorably titled debut album, Fresh Fruit For Rotting Vegetables.
Biafra and John Greenway originally wrote the lyrics, satirising the German national anthem, for their previous band The Healers in Biafra’s hometown of Boulder, Colorado. Their very different (and terrible) version later appeared on a Colorado punk compilation called Rocky Mountain Low.
The song is a pointed attack on Reagan’s successor as governor of California, Jerry Brown, and resonates more than ever today.
Sung from the politician’s own viewpoint, it imagines him as future president of a hippie-fascist America where secret police round up the population and place them in camps, to be killed in “organic poison gas” chambers.
As with much of their music, the song blends surf rock and heavy rock with a martial drum beat and ominous bass riff setting the tone before Biafra’s sneering vocal comes in.
It swiftly became the signature song of The Dead Kennedys – vocalist Jello Biafra, guitarist East Bay Ray, bassist Klaus Flouride and Ted on drums – along with their infrequently-broadcast classic Too Drunk To Fuck.
On their later EP In God We Trust Inc., they recorded an updated version of the song, titled “We’ve Got a Bigger Problem Now”, about then-president Reagan, with a lounge-jazz introduction and different lyrics.
After the election of Arnold Schwarzenegger as governor of California in 2003, Biafra commented wryly: “California Über Alles indeed” – although Arnie proved to be a pioneer of green politics in San Francisco and Biafra is a prominent member of the US Green Party and once ran for their presidential nomination.
Despite that, Biafra played an updated version about Arnie called Kali-Fornia Über Alles 21st Century while touring with The Melvins in 2004 to support their collaborative album.
Another updated version of the song was by Michael Franti’s hip hop group Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy, this time turning its satirical attack on a new California governor, Pete Brown.
Trivia fact: It’s a popular chant of fans of Dulwich Hamlet FC, with the team’s name replacing ‘California’.