When you get Jello Biafra’s answering machine, there’s no, “I’m not here right now” or “You’ve reached Jello” – not even an introductory “Hey.”
Fitting with Biafra’s personality, it starts right in with, “Right after spineless Democrats can’t even come up with a filibuster to keep a neo-Nazi off the Supreme Court comes the lovely news that Halliburton subsidiary KBR just got a $385 million contract on Jan. 24 from the Department of Homeland Security for construction of temporary detention facilities inside the United States. …”
More than 60 seconds later, it ends with, “Sieg heil, baby! The corporate Reich is here!”
Biafra is a punk-rock legend, the former frontman of the Dead Kennedys and the owner of Alternative Tentacles Records. Biafra, who remains steadfast in his extremist politics, will present a spoken-word show at the Boulder Theater Thursday with Sonic Youth frontman Thurston Moore and beat poet Anne Waldman. It’s a homecoming for the punk icon, who was born and raised Eric Boucher in Boulder.
“I remember a principal (at Baseline Middle School) who cornered me and another long-haired freak kid in the school and yelled and screamed and ranted and raved at us about how God wants us to do better in gym class,” Biafra said by phone from his San Francisco home.
“I thought, ‘My God, this guy is out of his mind. And he’s the one in power here. How many more are out there? Oh, there they are; they’re in Congress.”‘
Biafra’s personality, intellectual proclivities and political leanings make him an ideal spoken-word artist. He first entered the realm 20 years ago, eight years after the Dead Kennedys formed, at the urging of his friend Harvey Kubernik. It was an immediate, natural fit for Biafra, and the first audiences “connected most with my warped sense of humor and all the buried information I’d weave into the stories,” he said.
“I like starting fires,” said Biafra, who focuses much of his current attention on President Bush, whom he refers to as “the Clown Prince” and “King George II.” “From Day One, I never wanted my songs or words to be subtle. I like whacking people over the head and nailing them between the eyes. I very rarely use anything abstract that people have to sit down and figure out the meaning of. That might make you a brilliant poet in some circles, but what I want to do is communicate a very blunt message.
“I don’t spend a lot of time intellectually or academically analyzing my own work. I just make the stuff. And boy am I grateful somebody out there is still interested. It means that I can make something of a living off my big mouth and bad attitude instead of being the drunk crank at the end of the bar that everybody wishes would shut up and leave.”
Biafra expanded on Chuck D.’s claim that thoughtful, progressive artists are the “new CNN” with his own mantra: “Don’t hate the media. Become the media.” He urges his audiences, “Don’t just question authority, question me.” It’s a sense of truth and honesty he learned as a child from his parents, who still live in Boulder, “six blocks from Jon Benét’s place,” as he often points out.
“I noticed in my late 20s that people I grew up and went to school with had no tangible personal memories of Vietnam or even Watergate, which went down when (I was) 16,” Biafra said. “They remembered more about ‘Brady Bunch’ episodes than they did of their own childhood, and the reason for that is that, unlike some of these folks, my parents chose to not hide reality from their kids.
“If there was a race riot on the news, they’d explain to me at age 5 or 6 what was going on and why racism is wrong.”
Biafra, 47, still has intimate connections to Colorado. He is one of the most dedicated, vocal supporters of the Colorado music scene, as his Alternative Tentacles – home to the Dead Kennedys, Blowfly, Pansy Division and the late Wesley Willis – has released records from Denver bands Slim Cessna’s Auto Club, Sixteen Horsepower, Munly & the Lee Lewis Harlots and Tarantella.
But Colorado, which has come to symbolize extreme conservatism, also breaks Biafra’s heart from time to time.
“All the years I was growing up, Colorado Springs was an enchanting place because it meant Grandma’s house, Garden of the Gods, Pikes Peak, Patsy’s Popcorn, whatever,” he said. “Later on, somebody as a prank put me on Focus on the Family’s mailing list.
But Biafra started getting bulletins, one of which he paraphrases in his own inimitable style: “It says, ‘We’ve loaded up over 100 semis with everything we own and we’re leaving Pomona (Calif.) and we’re pouncing on Colorado Springs,” he said. “‘Why? Cheap real estate! We can take this place over! Please, come one, come all. Join us to build a new bigot utopia!’
“And people did.”
Pop music critic Ricardo Baca can be reached at 303-820-1394 or rbaca@denverpost.com.
