Jello Biafra with NoMeansNo

The Sky is Falling and I Want My Mommy (1991)

Sean Crawford

I’ve been working on a list of critically underappreciated classic records The Sky is Falling and I Want My Mommy is damn close to the top. This may be somewhat of a controversial statement, but I truly believe that NoMeansNo rivals Dead Kennedys for the best chemistry Jello Biafra has ever had with a given group, and that, if they had continued to work together, they just might have become just as iconic.

Production-wise, The Sky is Falling and I Want My Mommy perfectly walked the line between brutal sonic bashings and extraordinary musicianship. The brittle guitar tones and booming metallic bass balanced each other out to create a sound used by many of the formative 80s post hardcore acts such as Big Black and Scratch Acid. Such production choices allowed for early post hardcore to have that larger than life feel without sacrificing any of the rawness that gave their sound such an edge.

NoMeansNo was more prone to play around with their songs on a compositional level, than some of their early post hardcore counterparts, especially in terms of stylistic choices. This is evident on tracks like “Chew”, which fades in and out of a jazz inspired instrumental for Jello to lay his imagery of modern society as a post apocalyptic wasteland atop of.

But The Sky is Falling and I Want My Mommy wasn't just pretentious display of technical skill; there's quite a few straightforward hardcore punk cuts sprinkled in as well. This record fell into a happy medium between diversity and cohesivity, with direct punk cuts like “Jesus Was a Terrorist” and “Ride The Flume” alongside cuts like the title track and “Sharks in the Gene Pool”.

In addition to his dynamic vocal deliveries, crucial to the NoMeansNo sound, Jello was able to bring his signature yelp-like quality to the mix, which added additional tension to an untamable sonic backdrop. The result was the beautiful chaos that is The Sky is Falling and I Want My Mommy. This record is critically underrated and is an essential for all fans of Jello, NoMeansNo, post hardcore, noise rock, and punk in general.