Give Me Convenience or Give Me Death is an essential collection of odds, sods, classic singles and non-album rarities from the Dead Kennedys. Heavily socio-political punk forerunners of the 1980's US Hardcore scene, San Francisco's notorious anarcho-satirists The Dead Kennedys were probably the most comic and influential troupe of insurrectionists in the history of American popular music--just ask the pro-censorship lobby. As evidenced by such songs as "Holiday In Cambodia" and "California Uber Alles"--both included here--nobody could beat them for shock value. And although it all ended in tears--and in court, several times--the righteously rabid diatribes of singer Jello Biafra still continue to pack a punch. For anyone unfamiliar as to why certain institutions kept files on them (the DK's were no friends of organised religion, big business, racial intolerance and American high school sports coaches) well, it's all right here. For sheer prescience, for example, how about the early LAPD inspired b-side "Police Truck" (all together now, "Going downtown gonna beat up drunks") which tackled the subject of lawlessly thuggish, baton-happy cops years before the controversy--and riots--surrounding the Rodney King incident. --Kevin Maidment