Pull My Strings

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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 says to the audience that the band needs to prove they're adults, and they're becoming a new wave band (although they're not really going to become a new wave band).

Afterwards, 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. 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 have no minds, large endowments, 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 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 piece 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", possibly implying that the band had paid to get its songs on the air.