How I learned to distrust the system
The year was 1983, and most of my music collection consisted of hair bands and assorted pop. Growing up in a small town meant limited access to music outside of the norm, but the budding little punk in me was always looking for something different. In the import section of a locally owned music store in Eden, NC I found exactly what I had been looking for, Dead Kennedys - In God We Trust, Inc.
I’d heard Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables, but I didn’t own a copy, and even though Plastic Surgery Disaster was out, I didn’t know it. Like I said, small town America before the internet. Luckily, there was no PMRC yet, and no Parental Advisory labels, so with my $7 in hand, I bought a copy of In God We Trust, Inc. on cassette. I really wasn’t prepared for what I was about to hear. You have to remember that this is the height of the Reagan era. If you didn’t live through the Reagan era, then the Dead Kennedys just don’t have the same social relevance for you. It’s like listening to early Dylan, you can still enjoy it, but the importance and social relevance of the period is lost on you, and me for that matter.
I got in car, and popped the cassette into my Walkman, my parents none the wiser to the social and political onslaught taking place in the back of the car. The first track, Religious Vomit, hit me like a fist. Forcing me to really question how organized religion worked. To this day, I believe Jello and his lyrics started me down the path of becoming a philosophy major. The next track, Moral Majority, hit a bit closer to home. Growing up in VA meant that Jerry Farewell was a driving force in political discourse, along with Jesse Helms from NC. Both of those political/social leaders were directly attacked and questioned in this song, forcing me to start rethinking what I was being force feed by the local media coverage. You have to remember, it was a slightly different age, CNN was still a struggling start up, and local news really did control a lot of what people found out and knew about the world. The next three tracks, Hyperactive Child, Kepone Factory and Dog Bite were lost on me. I just didn’t have the background or perspective to really understand these songs yet. Nazi Punks Fuck Off was a fun song, and still is one of my favorite early DK songs. I really hadn’t met any true skinheads at this point, I wouldn’t have any real run ins with Skins until several years later. We’ve Got A Bigger Problem Now summed up exactly how I felt about so much of society. It seemed like 1984 was right around the corner, figuratively and literally, and the constant threat of nuclear annihilation loomed around my every thought. That’s a lot for a 13 year old to handle on a daily basis. In some respects, the Cold War was more terrifying to me than any real war since. The era of fear, made worse during the Reagan era by his rhetoric and bravado, dominated so much of my formative years, that it makes it really difficult to look back on the 80s with any objectivity.
The next installment of music that changed my life, Miles Davis - The Birth of the Cool.
