Jello Biafra and the Guantanamo School of Medicine recently zipped through Philly’s Trocadero Theatre with local support by The Ray Gradys, Honah Lee, and Thee Nosebleeds with Blow The Scene on hand capture the event in photos per usual.
The Guantanamo School of Medicine is Jello Biafra’s first full-time band since the breakup of punk rock staples, The Dead Kennedys, in the mid 80s. Inspired by Iggy Pop‘s 60th birthday gig at the Warfield in San Francisco, Biafra would later assemble the Guantanamo School of Medicine in 2009 and has since dropped a handful of releases, including 2011’s Enhanced Methods of Questioning EP which hit streets via Biafra’s own label imprint, Alternative Tentacles.
The band retains motifs synonymous with the spaced-out surf-punk or “spy-music-on-meth chaos” of Dead Kennedys and will surely speak to the fans of old. Drenched in political commentary and satire that often blurs the line between searing and humorous, Jello Biafra and the Guantanamo School of Medicine pack a live show befitting of the aura that surrounds one punk music’s most notorious figures.
Always inspiring and thought provoking with laser-like political commentary, Biafra quickly got the crowd’s head in the game as he and his band mates tore through a set of new original material and Dead Kennedys classics like “Nazi Punks Fuck Off,” “Holiday In Cambodia,” “Too Drunk To Fuck,” “Kill the Poor”, and a handful of others.
Earlier this year, Jello Biafra and the Guantanamo School of Medicine released two versions of their new song “Shock-U-Py!” as a pay-what-you-want digital download. Biafra explained: “Better late than never, here’s our tribute inspired by the Occupy movement. Not just ‘occupy’ — Shock-You-Py! — since my favorite kind of resistance can have theater, pranks and other creative sabotage — non-violent, of course!”
“Shock-U-Py!” will be featured on the band’s forthcoming LP/CD, White People And The Damage Done, slated for a 2013 release. We’ll be keeping up with Jello and the Alternative Tentacles camp, so check back for updates on the forthcoming release.
We know you are here for the photos, so without further ado..
All photos by Blow The Scene Senior Staff Photographer, Dante Torrieri (Useless Rebel Imaging)
Jello Biafra and the Guantanamo School of Medicine
