A punk rock tragedy

Yes, I know its' been quite awhile since I blogged last. Various lame excuses are to blame. I will try to avoid that in the future, but offer no guarantees.
This posting will differ somewhat as I will instead pontificate upon a controversy less well known than the ones I had touched upon prior. It is though a subject closer to my heart...and therefore more sad: the Jello Biafra vs. the rest of the Dead Kennedys conflict. I will decline to re-state ad nauseaum the chronology and facts of the case. A visit to the parties respective web sites: www.deadkennedys.com & www.alternativetentacles.com, will provide plenty of grist. For outside comment, merely google "Dead Kennedys lawsuit." All this blog entry will be is my take on the whole thing.
Flash back to March 1986: the Dead Kennedys are headlining a bill at the Olympic Auditorium (just south of Downtown LA, across the street from LA Trade Tech). Its' what will be the band's last appearance ever in Los Angeles. It does not take a shrink to see that the band is ready to implode. Jello is so angry that he takes to reading passages out of the Bible, screaming "Bullshit", then ripping it out. Meanwhile, the band plays on with studied indifference (especially East Bay Ray...who would later become the main actor driving the suit versus Jello). Two months later, the band announces its' dissolution.
Time passes by and the internet becomes the creature it is. Eventually, both Jello and DK's discussion groups pop up. This blogger subscribes to both. Interested parties (friends & employess of Jello, etc.) begin to read. Inspired by the example of the Grateful Dead (who periodically release the best of their archieves for their audience to consume), I started several discussions urging Alternative Tentacles release the best of what is in their live show archive (Dead Kennedys made it a practice to record every live show off the sound board once they reached a certain point)for two reasons. One was for the fans who had been lucky enough to see those shows to relive the excitement (i.e., nostalgia), two was for those who had not seen the band themselves to get a taste of what a great live band they truly were. What was extant, the Target Video documentary of the closing of the On Broadway, was it and the set list was omitted quite a few faves: "Holiday in Cambodia","Chemical Warfare", & "This Could be Everywhere", amongst others. If a fan wanted to acquire a live recording other than the aforementioned, they were prey to what was on offer from bootleggers (always an unsavory option in more ways than one).
I admit to the Quixotic quest of badgering Alternative Tentacles to release the best of what was in their Dead Kennedys archive, but they would decline. The reason offered would be familiar to anyone who has seen Jello: anti-nostalgia punk rock dogmatism ("...don't be nostalgic, create something of your own"). Unfortunately, that arguement assumes those supplicating for the releases are all of a certain younger age...which was not the case. Nostalgia also afflicts those who were lucky enough to be at the Dead Kennedys show back in the day. Thus, the legacy of the Dead Kennedys was one mostly of fading memory. That was until the filing of the lawsuit in 1998.
The uggliness begins and gets worse as both sides trade charges that would merely be tiresome to repeat now. In the end, and due to better lawyers, the ex-Dead Kennedys win possession of all the band's recordings & begin to tour. Reading interviews with all involved during the case, one could not avoid the impression that the three ex-members were partially motivated by revenge. During the band's heyday, Jello was the undeniable star of the show. Though the band made music that was certainly several cuts above run-of-the-mill punk rock, it was Jello's showmanship that put them into punk rock's elite. That he came up with the majority of the band's song ideas only cemented that state of affairs (the altering of song writing credits after the court case notwithstanding). Their resentment was close to the surface.
The "incident" that ignited the lawsuit, the lost Levi's Ad opportunity, was about the band's legacy. Jello has stated repeatedly that the others have cheapened the band's legacy for money...and Jello is right on that score. The ex-Dead Kennedys have cheapened and damaged the band's legacy almost beyond any repair: mostly through their inept handling of the band's catalogue & archives. The first sign of this was the release of an album of live material, "Mutiny on the Bay." Initially, I was heartened by this. Finally, live shows would see the light of day. Then the details came into the play. The aforementioned collection spanned four years and at least five different shows...a truly bad sign.
The ex-Dead Kennedys had failed to recognize an intergral part of what had made them great: context. When the Dead Kennedys played your town, they knew where they were. A strong part of the show would be Jello's commentary on what was going on at the moment, connecting events with the band's songs. During these interludes, the band would play creepy backing music that would build to a crescendo when the song began. The "Mutiny" release ignored this part of the band's act entirely (not too surprising considering their attitude towards Jello), and accomplished something difficult, lurching the Dead Kennedys towards mediocrity.
Making the whole thing even worse was seeing this travesty live at the Palace (now the Avalon) in Hollywood, with Brandon Cruz (who later quit) singing. Those who had seen the original (and better) Dead Kennedys were few and far between, but were greatly disappointed. Almost everything that Jello said they would be was correct.
Where Jello was wrong was in his dogmatic and amatuerish handling of the Dead Kennedys catalogue. He was too swept up in punk rock purity to realize some basic facts of a musician's life: very few are ever lucky enough to get involved with something that became something like the Dead Kennedys. Most of them do their "music thing," then move on to drab lives where making ends meet is a struggle. For the lucky, the "music thing" of their youth becomes an annuity. As any competant financial advisor will tell you...never mess with someone's annuity. The ex-Dead Kennedys felt their annuity was messed with...and they were able to win the point in court.
So DK's fans from back in the day now have the tawdry spectacle of the band playing around like a bad karaoke act; emphasizing every time they play this absolute truism...there is no Dead Kennedys without Jello Biafra singing. If there are any readers of this blog out there who are contemplating seeing the current version of the Dead Kennedys...DON'T! You're better off buying pre-lawsuit records & any good bootlegs out there.