More than perhaps any other American band, the Dead Kennedys acted out punk's initial promise: Fronted by the frog-voiced loudmouth Jello Biafra, they were political hotheads, furious rockers and potent songwriters. Virus 100 – sixteen covers of DK songs by other artists – essentially functions as a tribute album by drawing attention to the DKs' significance amid the cesspool of Eighties pop. It also performs its larger purpose of showing how that heritage has been carried on by the postpunk subculture – for better and worse.

As its title indicates, Virus 100 is the 100th release by Alternative Tentacles, the San Francisco label Biafra founded as an anticorporate home for the DKs. AT has released records by a slew of international left-of-punk artists, from Hungary's Galloping Coroners to Michigan's Crucifucks and San Francisco's Beatnigs. Virus features a few AT artists – notably France's Les Thugs in a shimmering version of "Moon Over Marin." But, as the liner notes put it, the album is not so much a label showcase or even a salute to its founding father as "a tribute to music born in the spirit of independence." Virus features a cross-sampling of indie-rock groups (L7, Faith No More, Sister Double Happiness and Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy are the major-label success stories) with a typically AT predilection for squalling, noise-core boy bands.

Virus works best as a representation of how punk rock has matured musically since the DKs wrapped all their songs around a louder, faster 4/4 beat. Bands like Didjits, Alice Donut, Napalm Death and Sepultura play by reflex grooves the DKs sweated over, and in their hands the music has a surprising elasticity. The problem is – and this is a parable for the state of the indie nation – they have no sense of purpose. Too many of the artists squander their talents on either rote raves or well-rehearsed jokes (Faith No More's bluesy "Let's Lynch the Landlord" and NoMeansNo's a cappella "Forward to Death"). Virus is all fury and no fire.

Well, there are a few flames. Didjits' "Police Truck" is appropriately menacing (and sadly ironic: San Francisco police hauled off an audience member involved in a fight with singer Rick Didjit at the release party for Virus after Rick called the audience "a bunch of fags"). Napalm Death and Steel Pole Bath Tub play "Nazi Punks Fuck Off" and "Chemical Warfare" fast and straight and true. But only Hiphoprisy takes the music out of its original confines, updating "California Uber Alles" in an indictment of current Golden State governor Pete Wilson. That could be proof of what pundits have been saying: Rap is the true heir to the punk-rock throne.

Virus 100 is available from Alternative Tentacles Records, P.O. Box 424756, San Francisco, CA 94142. (RS 639)

EVELYN MCDONNELL