The former frontman of the punk band Dead Kennedys, Jellop Biafra, is not happy that the Fidesz-supporting Civil Solidarity Forum (CÖF) has snubbed him their iconic photo for its latest poster campaign – it is clear from the letter sent by publicist László Seres announced on his blog.
The Dead Kennedys heist the 444 noticed shortly following the posters depicting opposition politicians in dollar shirts appeared on the streets, referring to the most popular government slogan of recent times, the dollar left. László Seres contacted Jello Biafra, the singer of the punk band, regarding the CÖF-promoted photo. The publicist was curious as to whether the Hungarian government had asked for permission to use the original image, or whether the band’s rights had been violated by using the photo (the posters were not put up by the government anyway, so if anyone, then the CÖF had to should have asked for permission, but let’s ignore that for now).
László Seres recently received a reply from Biafra, who wrote (translated by Seres):
“Thank you for bringing this to my attention! NO, we absolutely did not give permission for this ghastly wannabe dictator Orbán or his party to use this!!! Why on earth would any of us support his armchair fascist regime in any way? Yes, the copyrights of both DK and renowned new wave/early punk photographer FStop Fitzgerald were most definitely infringed.”
So Biafra says in the letter that their copyrights are infringed, but he did not indicate that they are preparing to take legal action in the matter, unlike Warner did it, for example, following CÖF used Austin Powers for its campaign posters. By the way, Biafra is sensitive to the fact that the name of the band does not get into a political context that he might not support. The last time one of his former bandmates thanked US Republican Mitt Romney on behalf of the Dead Kennedys’ Twitter, he was totally freaked out.
