Dead KennedysFresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables (1980)Alternative Tentacles
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At this point, as any regular reader of my half-assed reviews will recall, I'll drop into a diatribe about how I discovered this particular record, with plenty of melancholy, and assorted bitter humour. Well, not to disappoint, here I go
To really get an idea of what the Dead Kennedy's mean to me, you have to look back awhile. In fact, the seeds of what peaked my interest in punk were set long before I was old enough to have a tape player, let alone this album.
I spent a part of my formative years (i.e. 0-12) in a small town, on the East coast of Canada. My parents, recent immigrants, were struggling to get by, and while I didn't see my dad much, I have to say they tried to get me into a good school. Or so they thought I suppose. So, in this small town, there were two schools. I honestly don't remember the names, as this particular memory comes from primary school. Anyway, the good school in this small town was a hardline Catholic school run by nuns. Ironically (or perhaps not so ironically) this was the place that led to my rather serious animosity towards those who deem themselves the voices of god.
My parents weren't Catholic. Not in the slightest. So you can imagine that a hardline catholic school was hardly a place for me, but as I mentioned, they were new immigrants, I was in the first grade, and there weren't a lot of options. It's strange how you can remember things so vividly when they happened such a long time ago, but I guess some things are memorable, even if you prefer not to remember.
Myself, I was a painfully shy kid. Probably still am, hence I write this instead of talking about it. (I hope you all feel special, I don't talk to anyone about this) Anyway, for the first few months of school, there was slow but steady diet of insults, negativity and general meaness from the staff at the school. It was well known that I wasn't "of the faith" and like two other kids, we were sent out of the classroom whenever religious matters were occured; of course, that means, every morning, every lunchtime, every afternoon, and especially during religious occaisons (i.e. Ash Wednesday, Christmas, Easter, etc.) So on a daily basis, this ogre of a teacher would send me from the room, muttering, well, yelling, that I was a hell-bound little heathen.
Fun stuff when you've still got a lot less than ten years on life.
So I used to come home crying, (don't laugh, I was seven or eight here) and terrified about going to hell, and afraid to tell anyone, especially my over-stressed, under-sympathetic parents. (To be fair, they had little time to be sympathetic, I suppose they could have used some sympathy in those early years themselves) But this continued for months. It was pretty painful. Of course, I was hardly prepared for what happened next.
One morning, as we were sitting, being lectured about something or other, I had the misfortune of letting my pencil drop off my desk. Oblivious, I kept reading through the book. Of course, this was until the teacher stopped talking and walked over to me. She glanced down at the pencil, and yelled, asking if I had noticed the pencil drop. Of course I had, but before I had a chance to speak, she hit me in the face, sending my glasses flying across the room. I tried to pick up the pencil, but she hit me again, this time on the cheek. While she did this, she continued to yell about my hellbound future, my disregard for catholic decency, and then, as I went to pick up my glasses, she held the pencil a few inches from my nose, shaking it at me, and demanding to know if I needed my glasses to hear what she was saying.
At that point, I was no longer upset, just violently angry. I slammed my fist on the desk (not very threatening coming from an eight year old, I admit) and stormed out of the classroom, until I collapsed in the hallway, completely unsure of what to do.
In any case, I had learned a few things. Apparently, these catholics followed something called the "Bible" and it explained right and wrong, and what people were permitted to do. I went home at the end of the day, and asked my mother to buy me a bible; I supposed that it would somehow explain the actions of this "Sister of the Lord" to a helpless kid. So, in grade two, I had finished reading the bible, cover to cover, and I came up empty. Where did it justify this? What kind of god would have a teacher humiliate and physically hurt a child?
I suppose at this point, you're wondering where the Dead Kennedy's come in.
A friend lended me a cassette of Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables, when I was a little older. And somehow, it all made sense. My distrust of authority, my anger, my hate for people like that teacher. I wasn't the only one. I don't doubt that Mr.Biafra went through something like me; probably something worse. But it probably helped me through something. It still does to this day. I still have a distrust of people who claim to speak for god, but seem to really just use it as an excuse to push their own bigotry, their own cruelty, and their own lack of fucking intelligence.
So I guess I skipped over the review a little. Let me say this. If you haven't heard the surf-infected, hardcore-styled music of the Dead Kennedy's, you have no business aligning yourself with punk. Without exception, almost every punk, ska and hardcore band owes them a debt. Without Kill the Poor, there could be no NOFX; without Let's Lynch the Landlord, no Operation Ivy; without Nazi Punks Fuck Off, no Lifetime. It goes on and on. But for me, it's more than just a debt that punk owes them, it's a debt I owe them. Or maybe I just owe that teacher. Sometimes, I think about going back to that little school, in that little town, and finding that person. But what would I do then? React violently? Tell her off? No. I can rest assured that if there is a hell, she's spending a lot of time there. Sometimes the most negative thoughts can give you peace. Funny, that.
