Pull My Strings

Pull My Strings was a song by the Dead Kennedys, written by DK lead singer Jello Biafra and drummer Ted specifically for the 1980 Bay Area Music Awards. The song would not find its way onto a record until 1987's "Give Me Convenience or Give Me Death".

The song, recorded live at the awards show, begins with the band playing the opening chords to "California Über Alles", one of their more famous songs. After the first few bars, Biafra yells out "Hold it!" and sarcastically tells the audience that they're becoming a New Wave band because they "need to prove (they're) adults now". Klaus Fluoride begins to play another bass line, and a new song begins.

Biafra begins singing about his not being able to afford a car thanks to his self respect, and decides to sell out to the record companies to make some money ("I'm tired of self respect, I can't afford a car, I wanna be a pre-fab superstar"). He decides to become one of the cookie cutter new wave acts breaking into pop music at the time. The chorus implies that the musicians in the new wave bands need to be dumb and have a large penis, and are able to be pulled by strings like a puppet because they've sold their souls to the record labels, who basically can now mold them in whatever they (the labels) want them to be.

One of the targets of the Dead Kennedys in the song appears to be The Knack, who hit big around that same time with "My Sharona". Twice in the course of the song, in its middle and at its end, a bridge is played to the tune of "My Sharona", with Biafra singing the word "drool" to the tune of it and replacing "My Sharona" with "my payola". Biafra also makes a sarcastic reference to the hypocrisy and drug abuse of the American bourgeoisie, referencing famous comedian Bob Hope with the line "And when I'm rich and meet Bob Hope, we'll shoot some golf and shoot some dope".

The song was written because the band was invited to play at the 1980 Bay Area Music Awards (or Bammies), to play their hit California Über Alles. However, they instead wrote this song solely for the show, and were never invited back. Also, this was the only time they ever played the song, despite its popularity.

During their performance, the Dead Kennedys wore white shirts with the letter S painted on the front. On the recording of the song, once Pull My Strings begins the audience can be heard cheering in response to the band members pulling their black neckties from behind their backs in front of them, making a dollar sign.