Latest news with #JelloBiafra
Yahoo
07-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
East Bay Ray on why the Dead Kennedys' chemistry hit its peak on Fresh Fruit For Rotting Vegetables– and why it fell apart
Yahoo is using AI to generate takeaways from this article. This means the info may not always match what's in the article. Reporting mistakes helps us improve the experience. Yahoo is using AI to generate takeaways from this article. This means the info may not always match what's in the article. Reporting mistakes helps us improve the experience. Yahoo is using AI to generate takeaways from this article. This means the info may not always match what's in the article. Reporting mistakes helps us improve the experience. Generate Key Takeaways When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. Credit: Getty Images When California punks Dead Kennedys released their debut album, 1980's Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables, they'd already scored a hit single in the U.K. the previous year with California Über Alles. Riding high on the optimism that overseas success had brought them, the band was determined to capitalize on its momentum, putting in hours of pre-production time in rehearsals prior to going into the studio. Their labors were rewarded, with Fresh Fruit… garnering favorable reviews in the press and charting around the world, though not in the U.S., which was always more resistant to the charms of the early punk bands. The band split in 1986, with always controversial singer, Jello Biafra, going on to release a number of spoken-word albums and popping up on talk shows espousing his left-of-center political beliefs. The remaining band members – guitarist East Bay Ray, bass player Klaus Flouride and drummer D.H. Peligro – reformed with a new singer, Brandon Cruz, in 2001. Cruz left after a couple of years, but the band has continued to tour up to the present day, with a number of different singers. Nowadays, Ray and Flouride are the only remaining original members. Ray is proud of the band's legacy, and is ready to look back over one of American punk's seminal albums. Were you already playing the songs from Fresh Fruit… live before going into the studio, and did they change much during the recording process? That overdubbed track would be the main guitar, and the original one would be a little less prominent, to help thicken the sound 'Yes, but we did pre-production rehearsals. As I was essentially producing, I had sheets with info about where overdubs would go and what was supposed to happen in certain places. So we knew what we were going to do when we got into the studio, which meant it was a fairly quick process to make the record. We did the whole album, including the mixing, for $6,000.' What was your process in terms of layering guitar parts? 'We were on a very limited budget. We recorded on 16 tracks. What happened was I'd record a guitar track with the bass and drums and then I'd usually overdub a second guitar, hopefully playing it with a few less mistakes. [Laughs] 'That overdubbed track would be the main guitar, and the original one would be a little less prominent, to help thicken the sound, as I'd essentially be attempting to play both parts identically. Some of the solos would be overdubbed as well, of course.' What guitars and amps did you use? 'My main guitar was a pawn shop Telecaster-style guitar that was made in Japan. I hot rodded it and put in a brass Schecter bridge and a Seymour Duncan PAF pickup at the bridge. I kept the single coil at the neck. For the amp, I was using a '60s Fender Super Reverb, 40 watts with four 10-inch speakers. 'However, I'm a bit of a science nerd, and I modified it and essentially turned it into a Marshall by wiring one tube into another like the Marshall master-volume style or the early Mesa Boogies. The original Marshall was actually modeled on the Fender Bassman anyway, so I was kind of replicating that approach. [Laughs]' California Über Alles and Holiday in Cambodia have become classics. Did you have any idea they were going to be special when you recorded them? 'At the time, we were just writing songs and didn't think any were more significant than others. The original single of Cambodia came out in England in 1979. When we re-recorded it for the album, it ended up being a lot longer, with a lot of stuff we just improvised as we were laying it down. That was how we played our songs live – extending and improvising. Hey, we were a jam band like the Grateful Dead. [Laughs]' What was the writing process? Was Jello bringing in the songs fully formed? 'We actually wrote as a band, where in effect, due to the chemistry between us, it was a case of two and two equaling five, you know? None of us has had a solo career that was bigger than Dead Kennedys, which, to me, shows the power of a bunch of talented people getting together and creating something that was far greater than the sum of its parts. Jello didn't bring in the songs. I know he's created the myth that he wrote them all, but the question here is that if he did, why didn't he ever do anything significant after leaving the band 'Jello didn't bring in the songs. I know he's created the myth that he wrote them all, but the question here is that if he did, why didn't he ever do anything significant after leaving the band? 'Iggy left the Stooges and had a career; ditto Lou Reed with the Velvet Underground or Morrissey with the Smiths. Where's Biafra's solo career with a bunch of great songs? The songs were written in numerous different ways. Cambodia started as a jam in the rehearsal studio. 'Other times, I'd have ideas for riffs that I'd put on cassettes and Biafra would find lyrics in his notebook. Klaus was important, too, in that he was the most trained musician in the band, and he was good at putting things together. Very few songs were written by one person.' What got you into playing? 'When I was growing up, my dad was into big band jazz, but he was also into Delta blues players. He took my brother and me to see Lightnin' Hopkins. After that, the Stones got everybody into Chicago blues, which my dad didn't like so much, but I did. I never listened to Top 40, but I discovered The Sun Sessions by Elvis Presley. I loved Scotty Moore's playing with the echo unit. 'I also discovered the first Pink Floyd album with Syd Barrett [1967's The Piper at the Gates of Dawn]. Anyway, between Scotty and Syd, I decided I had to get an echo unit. I bought a Maestro Echoplex, which I still have. I started experimenting with it and really loved the sound.' Scotty Moore and Syd Barrett are a long way from Dead Kennedys. What turned you toward punk? 'In the sense that rock 'n' roll in the mid '50s and '60s was a new sound, punk was an extension of that. I saw the Weirdos at a club in L.A. in 1978, and the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end. I just thought, 'This is it, this is rock 'n' roll.' I put the band together soon after that. 'There didn't seem to be any particular magic in the air when we started rehearsing, but when we started doing shows, something changed. There seemed to be a whole new energy. I think we got confidence. The whole 'unknowable chemistry' thing kicked in.' What did you think of Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables when it came out? We didn't know what we were doing when we made the album, so it was a chance to put things right for me. I feel like the remix is like going from 2D to 3D 'It was an amazing feeling to have the record in our hands back then. [Mix engineer] Chris Lord-Alge and I went back into the studio to remix it in 2022, and it was very interesting to listen to those songs after all those years and hear the details. 'After you're done making a record, you don't really listen to it again, so I'd never paid much attention to what it sounded like over the years. The remix is much better than the original release, which sounds kinda boxy to me. 'I know people will always love the original and have no time for remixed versions, and I get that. It's almost like it's a part of their DNA. That's the reason we have two versions now – the original and the remix. We didn't know what we were doing when we made the album, so it was a chance to put things right for me. I feel like the remix is like going from 2D to 3D.' Has too much happened with Jello to ever think you could work together again in the future? It's Biafra that turns down any offers for us to do something; we don't have any problem. He got caught with his hands in the till and wants to blame us for getting caught 'It's not an issue for me or Klaus. It's Biafra that turns down any offers for us to do something; we don't have any problem. He got caught with his hands in the till and wants to blame us for getting caught, but he should never have put his hands in there in the first place. [The band brought a lawsuit in 2000 accusing Jello Biafra of withholding royalties. Biafra lost and had to pay the band outstanding royalties and punitive damages.]' What's going on with the band at the moment? 'Klaus and I have decided to wind things down a bit. We're reducing the number of shows, and we won't be doing long tours. We're not 20 anymore, and we don't play the kind of music that you can sit down to play. [Laughs]'
CBC
01-04-2025
- Entertainment
- CBC
Long considered an American rock anthem, 'Born to Be Wild' has a Canadian backstory
Released in 1968, the song Born to Be Wild is a classic — you'll hear it in commercials, in movies and on television, at birthday parties, weddings and corporate events. The song transcends generations. Its energy, raw defiance and that iconic guitar line have made it one of rock's most powerful anthems. "Born to Be Wild, it's one of the best songs any rock band ever made," says musician Jello Biafra who played with the Dead Kennedys. The song is the signature hit of the band Steppenwolf but also represents a turning point in music history. It was a time when flower power was beginning to wilt and the world was turning dark; it was the era of the Vietnam war, assassinations, protests, and social unrest. Made famous by the cult-classic film Easy Rider, it was iconic Americana. Yet, four out of five band members were Canadian, and two of those, John Kay and Nick St. Nicholas, were German immigrants. Their story is told in the new documentary Born to Be Wild: The Story of Steppenwolf now streaming on CBC Gem. Behind the rebellious roar of Born to Be Wild is a surprising origin story that is as much about cultural upheaval as it is about the musicians who created it. Watch | Musicians Alice Cooper, Jello Biafra and others talk about Born to Be Wild Musicians Alice Cooper, Cameron Crowe, Jello Biafra and others talk about Born to Be Wild 13 days ago Duration 1:55 Steppenwolf's roots were in Toronto's Yorkville neighbourhood Born Joachim Krauledat in 1944 in East Prussia, where his father was killed at war before his birth, John Kay and his mother were refugees who escaped to West Germany and eventually moved to Canada in the late '50s, landing in Toronto. To add to their struggles, John was diagnosed at an early age with a severe visual impairment, achromatopsia, a rare condition that causes limited vision, sensitivity to light, and colour blindness. He is legally blind. The dark sunglasses he wore on stage were worn because he had a severe aversion to light, not because he was trying to be cool. Around the same time, Nick St. Nicholas, born Klaus Kassbaum, came to Canada with his family from post-war Germany. They both came of age in the blossoming music scene of Toronto in the early '60s – now known as the Haight Ashbury or Greenwich Village of the North. John was honing his blues-influenced guitar and singing skills, and as a solo artist, he played in the coffeehouses of Yorkville. Previously a sleepy residential neighbourhood, in those years Yorkville was coming alive with a burgeoning hippie folk music scene: "It was a magnet for those that just felt out of place in the regular neighbourhoods," remembers Kay in Born to Be Wild: The Story of Steppenwolf. These coffeehouses were the venues that became the meeting grounds for musicians, artists and intellectuals. Figures like Neil Young, Joni Mitchell, Gordon Lightfoot and David Clayton-Thomas all made their mark here. The scene in Yorkville mirrored the larger global movements, where music was no longer just entertainment —it became a powerful tool for social and political change. A few streets away, Yonge Street venues were blasting out rock and roll and R&B, to the likes of Ronnie Hawkins and the Hawks – with a young Robbie Robertson on guitar. The two music scenes collided as a breeding ground for young musicians like John and Nick. "Toronto was the nexus of American music and British music," says Canadian music producer Bob Ezrin in Born to Be Wild. "If you take it on a per capita basis, the people coming out of Toronto, we're punching way above our weight class." Through a mutual friend, John was introduced to Nick, who was playing in clubs with fellow Oshawa musicians in a band called Jack London and the Sparrows. Just around that time, the band was separating from singer Jack London and were looking for a replacement. John and Nick connected over their love of music and shared background. John started jamming with them and eventually was invited to join the band, renamed The Sparrows: Nick St. Nicholas on bass, Jerry Edmonton on drums, his brother Dennis (later known as Mars Bonfire) on guitar, and Goldy McJohn on keyboards. This was the foundation of what became Steppenwolf. The story of an iconic song: Born to Be Wild The Sparrows first went to New York and then travelled to Los Angeles in search of success. Nick, who was the only one with a driver's license, drove the band across the continent. "Los Angeles at that time, this was a gritty town," says John Kay's daughter, Shawn. "Coming out of the ashes and being tough. And that's where hard rock came from." The scene in Los Angeles would also influence their sound. In L.A. they played alongside bands like the Doors, but it was San Francisco where, by the late 1960s, the city's counterculture was in full swing. The band went north and it was there that they first attracted a cult audience, including a biker crowd that started to converge on their shows. In San Francisco, the band eventually parted ways over creative differences. They scattered, went back to L.A., forging their way alone, or with new bands. Eventually, John brought most of the band back together to form Steppenwolf. Dennis Edmonton (aka Mars Bonfire) departed from the band to pursue a solo career shortly after, but left them with a demo of the first version of the band's breakout hit. Living in a small apartment in L.A. where he couldn't use an amplifier, he recorded an unplugged, almost whispered version of Born to Be Wild. John Kay and Steppenwolf – with new guitarist Michael Monarch — would take this recording to a whole new level that would become the iconic anthem we know today. The lyrics were a call for adventure: "Get your motor runnin' / Head out on the highway." It echoed with the biker subculture and exemplified everything that they stood for: riding, rebellion and freedom. It was no coincidence that Born to be Wild was featured in the film Easy Rider, an indie movie starring Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper who play two bikers on an epic road trip. The film became a huge mainstream success and solidified Steppenwolf's reputation as a biker band. Both the film and the song embodied the rebellion of the 1960s — a rebellion against conformity, authority, and societal norms. Watch | Members of Steppenwolf talk about the impact of Born to Be Wild Members of Steppenwolf talk about the impact of Born to Be Wild 13 days ago Duration 1:30 Written and directed by German filmmaker Oliver Schwehm, Born to Be Wild: The Story of Steppenwolf is a refreshing and unexpected story of a song that is ubiquitous in pop culture all over the world. Weaving the story through interviews and live scenes with surviving band members, their families, and artists like Alice Cooper, Taj Mahal, Cameron Crowe (Almost Famous), Klaus Meine (The Scorpions), Jello Biafra (Dead Kennedys), Dale Grover (The Melvins), Bob Ezrin (Producer: Kiss, Pink Floyd, Taylor Swift, among others). It also features incredible archival footage and photos, including never-before-seen 8-mm film from Nick St. Nicholas' vault. The film brings to light an endearing new Canadian perspective on what was long considered to be an American music story. These days, John and Nick live about an hour's drive from each other in southern California. They hadn't been together for over 50 years, until this documentary reunited them at the premiere in Munich in July 2024. They were arm-in-arm on stage presenting the film. Says Rolling Stone music critic Cameron Crowe, "There's a lot of love for Steppenwolf out there and I think why their music remains present … It's authentic. It's not a toy band with toy emotions. They're actually sincere." Watch Born to Be Wild: The Story of Steppenwolf now streaming on CBC Gem.
CBC
19-03-2025
- Entertainment
- CBC
'Born to Be Wild, it's one of the best songs any rock band has ever made'
When you hear the opening riff of Born to Be Wild, you're instantly transported to a different time. The energy, raw defiance and that iconic guitar line have made it one of rock's most powerful anthems. But behind its rebellious roar is a story that's as much about cultural upheaval as it is about the musicians who created it. " Born to Be Wild, it's one of the best songs any rock band ever made," says musician Jello Biafra. Watch | Musicians Alice Cooper, Cameron Crowe, Jello Biafra and others talk about Born to Be Wild Musicians Alice Cooper, Cameron Crowe, Jello Biafra and others talk about Born to Be Wild 1 hour ago Duration 1:55 It was the signature hit of the band, Steppenwolf, written by lead singer John Kay, a German-Canadian musician with a taste for hard-edged rock and Canadian-born Mars Bonfire, Steppenwolf's primary songwriter (and Kay's brother-in-law). Their story is told in the new documentary Born to Be Wild: The Story of Steppenwolf now streaming on CBC Gem. Steppenwolf's roots were in Toronto's Yorkville neighbourhood Born Joachim Krauledat in 1944, Kay moved with his family from post-war Germany to Canada in the late '50s, landing in Toronto. Years later, he was swept up into the electric environment of Yorkville, a quiet residential neighbourhood that had transformed into the beating heart of Toronto's counterculture. "It was a magnet for those that just felt out of place in the regular neighbourhoods," remembers Kay in Born to Be Wild: The Story of Steppenwolf. Coffeehouses, folk clubs, and intimate venues became the meeting grounds for musicians, artists and intellectuals. Figures like Neil Young, Joni Mitchell, Gordon Lightfoot and David Clayton-Thomas all made their mark here. Initially dominated by folk music, Yorkville's soundscape quickly expanded to embrace rock, blues and psychedelia. "Toronto was the nexus of American music and British music," says Canadian music producer Bob Ezrin in Born to Be Wild. "If you take it on a per capita basis, the people coming out of Toronto, we're punching way above our weight class." The scene in Yorkville mirrored the larger global movements, where music was no longer just entertainment; it became a powerful tool for social and political change. It was here that Kay refined his songwriter skills and crossed paths with musicians Jerry Edmonton and his brother Dennis (later known as Mars Bonfire). Kay became the lead singer of their band, The Sparrows, a vital predecessor to Steppenwolf. As the world grappled with the social upheaval of the 1960s, Kay found his voice in the raw power of electric rock — mirroring his desire to break free from convention and explore uncharted musical territory. Drawing on a mix of psychedelia, blues and a growing political consciousness, they created a sound that was both fresh and revolutionary. The story of an iconic song, born in the California desert Kay and several other Toronto musicians who would come together to form Steppenwolf moved south to Los Angeles in search of greater success. By the late 1960s, the city's counterculture was in full swing, and the band's raw, powerful sound — a mix of blues and psychedelic rock — captured the mood of the time. That's where Bonfire initially wrote the track that would become an anthem. The lyrics spoke to the universal desire for freedom: "Get your motor runnin' / Head out on the highway." Its lyrics weren't just about hitting the road, they were about rejecting the restrictions of the mainstream and embracing self-expression. Kay, who had always wrestled with authority, saw the song as a personal expression of defiance. Born to be Wild was featured in the film Easy Rider, an indie movie starring Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper who plays two bikers on an epic road trip. The film became a huge mainstream success and solidified Steppenwolf's reputation as a biker band. Both the film and the song embodied the rebellion of the 1960s — a rebellion against conformity, authority, and societal norms. Watch | Members of Steppenwolf talk about the impact of Born to Be Wild Members of Steppenwolf talk about the impact of Born to Be Wild 1 hour ago Duration 1:30 As Steppenwolf grew in fame, John Kay faced serious health problems Beneath the legendary status and electric performances of Steffenwolf, Kay faced a personal battle that few knew about. As a child, he was diagnosed with retinitis pigmentosa, a degenerative disease that attacks the retina and leads to gradual vision loss. It was the reason he was nearly always seen wearing dark sunglasses. For someone whose identity was tied to the stage — where every performance demanded precision and presence — the diagnosis felt like a cruel twist of fate. Hiding his condition was initially a way of protecting the band's image. He feared that admitting to his failing eyesight might tarnish Steppenwolf's legacy or diminish his place in rock history. Says his wife Jutta Kay, "For most musicians during that time, it was all fun and going wild and doing all sorts of stuff. For John, because of his eyesight, it was more of a livelihood. And he was very, very focused on making this happen. I mean, John was kind of the lead guy there because that's just his nature. you know, to take command." Kay found new ways to continue writing lyrics, composing music and performing. He and the band Steppenwolf concluded their touring activities with a final performance on October 14, 2018, in Baxter Springs, Kansas. Since then, the band has not scheduled any further concerts. Kay continues to be active in music. He has embarked on solo projects, including his recent podcast series Rockstar to Wildlife Advocate, which chronicles his journey from rock musician to champion of wildlife. The podcast is available to stream on platforms like YouTube and Spotify. While Steppenwolf as a band is no longer touring, their legacy continues through their music and the ongoing endeavours of John Kay. Says music lover and filmmaker Cameron Crowe, "There's a lot of love for Steppenwolf out there and I think why their music remains present … it's authentic. It's not a toy band with toy emotions. They're actually sincere." Now streaming on CBC Gem.
