Jello Biafra and The Guantanamo School of Medicine

What can you say about Jello Biafra the outspoken former lead singer of the Dead Kennedys... well in terms of Alternative music he is sat at the top of the tree.

Everyone who claims to be an Alternative music fan MUST own at least one Kennedys album. Now 30 years after Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables Jello is back with the elaborately named Jello Biafra and The Guantanamo School of Medicine.

I saw these live in September it was a brilliant show, but could it be carried over onto an album, or was the fact that it was Jello singing Holiday in Cambodia, Moon over Marin and other Kennedys songs the reason it was so good.

I guess these days I am everything Jello sings about I go to work in a shirt and Tie, a salaried job 40hrs a week, drive a car, play XBOX and so on would this just be a rant about people like me? I'm no longer a rebel I'm a slave to the man as they say but that's life

From the opening track The Terror of Tinytown
you can see how the albums going to go almost from the start it kicks in with a seriously heavy Guitar riff along the lines of Helmet with Jellos Snarling vocals. Clean as a Thistle is another riff heavy political song with lyrics like:

Peek-a-boo and wretch
Republican buttocks
Flapping skyward in the wind
Lie to start a war
Killing millions
Ain’t impeachable
Like wayward weenie moistening
That’s why I love it
Yeh eh eh Yeh eh eh
I love it
Yeh eh eh Yeh eh eh

It's obvious even at the age of 51 he is still as angry with the world and writing songs about what he believes in which you have to admire. I don't think anyone is better at writing Humorous lyrics with a serious meaning than Jello Biafra.

Moving onto Electric Plantation a song with a bass intro and sound that could almost be a Kennedys song but is he talking about me again? with lyrics like:

Factory or PhD
You are all termites now
Laptop is your ball and chain
Til we downsize you away
Shop at home
Is your reward
Your best friend is a mouse

The album has some of the best lyrics I have heard in a while the songs are fast and heavy, but does this album have a lasting appeal? I'm not sure, if you need a Jello fix first call will obviously be a DK's album, no matter what he does or where he plays people are always going to want to hear the Kennedys songs.

Musically this is a very tight album, to me it sounds as close to a new Kennedys record as you could get.

Key Track: Electronic Plantation