Dead Kennedy’s -The Gov – Tuesday 6 November 2018
Words Geoff Jenke
Warning! The following review contains rude words, it is The Dead Kennedys after all.
The Dead Kennedys formed in San Francisco in 1978, taking their political punk rock to the world. After four albums, the band dissolved in 1986 before three of the original members reformed the band in 2001 without lead singer Jello Biafra. Current lead singer, Ron “Skip” Greer has been with the band since 2008 so the line up has remained pretty constant for the last ten years.
In its day, the band’s level of outrage surpassed even that of the Sex Pistols resulting in many stores around the world refusing to stock their albums. On this night, forty years after their formation we are once again allowed to witness some of the great songs that came from the band.
The Gov was totally packed with over 700 black wearing fans for this sold out gig. The hair may have been a bit less or slightly grey but the enthusiasm for the band remained.
The band hit the stage running with Forward to Death from the debut album Fresh Fruit and Rotting Vegetables, followed by Winnebago Warrior from the second album Plastic Surgery Disasters. To the audience delight, most tracks tonight came from these two classic albums.
Vocalist Ron “Skip” Greer spent a lot of time talking to the crowd between songs, often playing the villain and threatening to leave the stage. He was not afraid to comment on Australian politics (“time for ScoMo to go”) and also comments about “that” horse race which was held this day. “I tried to find a sports bar but all they had on was a horse race. Horse racing is not a sport” He was also extremely critical, rightly so, on the way a horse that was put down, after the cup.
Police Truck, a 1978 demo was given an airing followed by Buzzbomb and Let’s Lynch the Landlord. Guitarists East Bay Ray and Klaus Flouride provided a great sonic boom to the music and drummer D.H. Peligro filled the room with a solid beat during the entire show.
Ron accused us all of killing the music industry before launching into a rewritten version of MTV Get Off The Air called MP3 Get Off The Web. There was a nice tidy guitar and drum finish to the song from the three musicians behind Ron.
Too Drunk To F^@k had Ron pushing the microphone into the audience for them to sing along to the chorus. Ron applied the same during the song Nazi Punks F^2k Off as well, with people only to willing to scream out the words.
During the encore they played the Elvis song Viva Las Vegas, Ron doing a suitable Elvis voice impression and then during Holiday in Cambodia the crowd surfing, which hadn’t abated all evening, reached peak levels.
But wait there was more. A second encore of Chemical Warfare had the entire crowd singing out the words “Crazy” and “Chemical Warfare” during its performance.
A short, by modern day standards, set of only seventy minutes, but it was seventy minutes of pure joy.
The “Fun Gig” of the year.
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