Song of the Day 4/13: Dead Kennedys, “I Fought the Law (And I Won)”

You think you know the original, but you don’t.

I keep running across old songs that would need very little retrofitting to apply to Donald Trump. Today’s example: Jello Biafra’s snide repurposing of the Sonny Curtis classic to fit the Dan White fiasco.

For those with spotty memories or too few gray hairs, Dan White was the San Francisco city councilman who murdered Mayor George Mosconi and Councilman Harvey Milk and got away with it by claiming diminished capacity — the infamous “Twinkie Defense.” The entire world was outraged, but only the former Eric Boucher had the nerve to cast himself as White and crow about his successful ruse. It would take about 15 seconds to amend a couple of lines to make it fit Trump like a glove.

Drinkin’ beer in the hot sun
I fought the law and I won
I fought the law and I won

I needed sex and I got mine
I fought the law and I won
I fought the law and I won

The law don’t mean shit
If you got the right friends
That’s how this county’s run
Twinkies are the best friend I ever had
I fought the law and I won
I fought the law and I won

I blew George and Harvey’s brains out with my
Six gun!
I fought the law and I won
I fought the law and I won

Gonna write my book and make a million
I fought the law and I won
I fought the law and I won

I’m the new folk hero of the Ku Klux Klan
My cop friend thinks it’s fun
You can get away with murder if you got a badge
I fought the law and I won
I fought the law and I won
I fought the law and I won
I AM the law so I won

The song itself has an interesting history. It was written by Sonny Curtis, a teenage friend of Buddy Holly who replaced him in the Crickets after Holly’s death “the day the music died.” The band recorded it a few months after the plane crash. It was released on 45 as a B-side the next year but gained no attention.

It was next covered in 1962 by a Milwaukee band called the Royal Lancers, featuring the unique vocal stylings of one Paul Stefan. It was a local hit but didn’t break out of the market.

Texas rockabilly veteran Sammy Masters took a crack at it in early 1964 with a booming-reverb country version featuring a loping beat and a vaguely moralistic tone.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3AOAWshOcIg

But it was Bobby Fuller who put it on the map, first as a regional hit in 1964 (when he robbed people with a shotgun rather than a six-gun) …

…then as a national Top 10 hit the next year.

And so it stood until 1979, when Joe Strummer and Mick Jones dropped by the Automatt Studios in San Francisco and heard the Bobby Fuller single on a jukebox there. They learned it before they got back to London and recorded it soon after.

As with all their covers, they turned it into a Clash song, so much so that no version since — and every Springsteen-Mellencamp roots rocker has given it a shot — has made much of an impression. I had even forgotten the Dead Kennedys cover, from 1987, until running across it last night.