dead kennedys

Jello-less since 2001, the Dead Kennedys are bringing their brand of seminal punk back to Australian audiences, 25 years since they first hit our shores and th first time since 2014. 

The band - these days that's East Bay Ray, D.H. Peligro, Klaus Flouride and singer Skip McSkipster - is doing a quick hit-and-run of four shows in a week.  

The Dead Kennedys had a huge impact in Australia in the 1980s. Their albums - “Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables”, “In God We Trust, Inc”, “Plastic Surgery Disasters”, “Frankenchrist”  and “Bedtime for Democracy” – sold by the thousand at a time when punk had yet to break into the mainstream, and kept selling big numbers for decades.

Live Paris 1999 – Les Thugs (Nineteen Something)

The first overseas signing for soon-to-be famous label Sub Pop, championed by Jello Biafra and Greg Shaw, and one of the few French bands to tour relentlessly around the USA, Les Thugs deserved to be more than a blip on the world’s music radar. 

You could go broke collecting the back catalogue of Les Thugs. It’s all out of print and the rarest of it fetches biggish money on eBay. The band lasted from 1983-99 and bounced around on various labels. This album is their 10^th and  documents a show on their farewell tour of their homeland.

The sound of Les Thugs – named for the 12^th Century Indian brotherhood of the ThuggeeThuggee who used to kill the rich for their money, not your standard bovver boys - is a few steps removed from their punk rock beginnings when they were formed, DIY-style, by brothers Eric and Christophe Sourice. It’s dense and intense, two guitars with enveloping harmonics and textured bass-lines.

It's 50 years since the MC5 recorded their seminal "Kick Out The Jams" album. While Wayne Kramer's celebratory MC50 project is on the road in Europe and the USA and is not showing any signs of coming to Australia, That's why Sydney's SC5 are having a party of their own on September 8.

I-94 Bar is presenting the KOTJ 50th Anniversary show at Marrickville Bowling Club, featuring the SC5 playing "KOTJ" in its entirety. It's 30 years since the SC5 - an inner-city super group of sorts aka the Sydney City Five - first gathered to play the music of the MC5. Members have included personnel from the New Christs, The Eastern Dark and Daredevil, with Radio Birdman's Deniz Tek sitting in. 

Support will come from Turbobelco (paying homage to Turbonegro) and Australis Uber Alles (in tribute to the Dead Kennedys) and tickets are on sale here.