— By Kevin Montgomery (@kevinmonty) |
Jello Biafra, the pudgy 50-something San Francisco punk rocker-turned-politician-turned-old-punk rocker famous for starting the Dead Kennedys some thirty years ago, is still hella bummed out about the late-90s gentrification in the Mission and rich people living in SF. Why? Because dot com yuppies are pushing artists and workers out of the city, turning “Kook City” into a “Dot com Monte Carlo.” Sure, he might be right, but the lyrics to the first track on Jello Biafra and the Guantanamo School of Medicine's upcoming EP are particularly amusing, if not downright crazy:
Where did they come from Why are they here? Hi-tech piranhas With Bluetooth barnacle ears
Living breathing biohazards
Spit their money in everyone's face
Worship all these shitty indie-pop bands
Babies in cigar bars
Trying to play GatsbyThey want us gone
Dot com Monte Carlo
Close the clubs
We might disturb their lofts
Dot com Monte CarloWhere's the gangs in the Mission
Never knew geeks
When you need em?
How 'bout some yuppie drive-bys
For a change?
Could be so damn mean
Artists and workers
Bulldozed out by the thousands
Can't afford to be black
Or teach school in this town
My vet had to relocate
To his garageWhere can we go
Dot com Monte Carlo
Oakland, then the Portland, then L.A.?
Their Gold Rush immolated like Pompeii
But they're back!
Yuppie San Francisco
Nowhere left to go
We got news for youKook City
Valet parking signs on Valencia
Proud of it
You and Nancy Pelosi
Can go straight to hell
Wanna chase those twits
Down the street with a chainsaw
Trespass their restaurants
Swipe the food off their plates
Til' they hit me
Then smear them with honey
And release thousands of beesLook at the giant middle finger
Timber
They put up by the Bay Bridge
50 floors of luxury condos
Just for them
They're trying to put up more and more
On slippery landfill
So when the big quake comes
We'll drink a toast
Dance in the streets
And watch it all fall down
Timber
Timber… Die!
Having Mission gangs murder yuppies? Chasing down twits who use valet parking on Valencia Street (sidenote: is there any valet parking on Valencia?) with a chainsaw before smothering them in honey and releasing a swam of bees on them? Who does Jello think he is? Inspectah Deck?
Anyway, Ian S. Port of the SF Weekly notes this song is nothing new:
“Dot Com Monte Carlo” has been in the band's live show for a bit now, but its first recorded release will be on the new Enhanced Methods of Questioning EP, due out on Alternative Tentacles May 31 (available earlier online). Check out a visual sample [embedded above], and note the utterly creepy way in which Jello nods to the crowd at the end.
Sadly, there hasn't been any sightings of an old white dude weezing his way through The Summit with a chainsaw, so despite Jello's crazy eyes, don't count on a holocaust of Range patrons happening anytime soon.
Comments (21)
Limon has valet. Just sayin’
Awesome!
Jello Biafra- born in Colorado, came out west to go to college, moved to SF to pursue a career. Sounds pretty much identical to the “yuppies” he hates so much.
The only difference being that after moving to SF he became involved in the punk scene and has rocked for three decades. You moved to SF to work for Twitter. Jello’s “career” was punk rock, yours was to develop game apps. Big difference.
You’re leaving out the part where he left his studies of acting and history. Hardly the yuppies he hates so much.
Awesome! I endorse Jello’s message.
Cynicism is an unpleasant way of saying the truth.
Just one entitled assh*le complaining about another.
YES!!!!!
I really don’t get the whole “punk” thing. Seems like it’s mostly about people arguing who’s more “punk” than who, with kids trashing venues and brushing their teeth with gasoline, when in reality the entire thing was created by a record company executive and force-fed to British teenagers the same way the Backstreet Boys were in the 90’s.
Well that’s not true.
You just think that because you’re not half as punk as I am.
Uh, have you seen his house? It is at the top of a hill and has a freakin’ turret at the top. Not exactly slummin’ it with the peoples.
Hey you kids, get off my lawn!
From one old man to another, Jello, really, come visit the Mish sometime. Prop. 13 has kept the same miserable townies in their parents’ homes up and down my street for over 30 years, and rent control has kept everyone else staying put. Gentrification is a myth, at least in my piss-aroma’d, mariachi-blasting corner of the Mission. Are there fancy restaurants on Valencia? Yes. But they “displaced” vacant storefronts (of which we still have many). People moaned and wailed about gentrification with the first dot-com era, but the only things ever displaced were *businesses*. The people never left. I don’t waste a lot of compassion on businesses, though I’m sorry to hear about your (apparently hip and underground) vet.
Mr. Biafra’s record label, Alternative Tentacles, accepts Paypal. In other words, every copy of “Dot com Monte Carlo” sold brings another yuppie that much closer to being able to afford his or her dream house on Valencia.
Jello Biafra is still alive??
The planning department did a study of actual displacement and the results between 1999 and 2005 were almost nil. They buried that study faster than a cholera victim. The displacement myth is just that.
I guess I’m an old foggy at 35. Gentrification is repulsive, I embrace the geograpgical segragation between the rich and poor. I love graffiti, debauchery and vice, and believe these youngins are a bunch of cupcakes who worship consumerism and celebrate generic music and mediocrity, they are void of any funk. I mourn the fall of NYC.
I love it! Its nice o see some people are still passionate about such grave injustices like gentrification.
I embrace geographical segregation between the rich and poor.
I appreciate graffiti, debauchery, vice and raw, nasty fucking. I believe these youngins are a bunch of cupcakes who worship consumerism and celebrate generic music and mediocrity, they are void of any funk.
My first punk rock record was “fresh fruit for rotting vegetables” DKs, and marked the end of mindless, stoner, complacent corporate rock for me. Jello’s lyrics touched on subjects absolutely unacceptable: vietnam genocide, govt and corporate corruption and religious propoganda. Couple this with raw, under-produced punk rock riffs and there was no turning back.
In contrast to many of the other bands i grew to love back then - black flag, saccharine trust, minir threat etc, i cannot listen to much DKs as it literaly makes my ears bleed. Jello represented an intellectual emergence in music that i’d argue was as rare then as it is now. His relevance is not so questionable as his “choir’s” ; its more that there seems to be a vacuum of contemporary constituents.
I think jello’s arguably sophomoric angst (read, shenanigans) serves to discredit his message, thus rendreding his efforts almost in-vain as a result. Maybe time for a country act Jello?