THE CRAMPS - Off the bone

THE CRAMPS Off the bone cd 1987 320 kbps

Human fly* / The way I walk* / Domino* / Surfin' bird* / Lonesome town* / Garbage man* / Fever* / Drug train* / Love me* / I can't hardly stand it* / Goo goo muck° / She said° / The crusher° / Save it° / New kind of kick°/ Uranium rock° / Good taste (live)°.

*Produced by Alex Chilton - °Produced by The Cramps.

The Cramps : Lux Interior : vocals / Poison Ivy : guitar / Bryan Gregory : guitar / Kid Congo Powers : guitar / Nick Knox : drums.

Conjuring a fiendish witches' brew of primal rockabilly, grease-stained '60s garage rock, vintage monster movies, perverse and glistening sex, and the detritus and effluvia of 50 years of American pop culture, the Cramps are a truly American creation much in the manner of the Cadillac, the White Castle hamburger, the Fender Stratocaster, and Jayne Mansfield. Often imitated, but never with the same psychic resonance as the original, the Cramps celebrate all that is dirty and gaudy with a perverse joy that draws in listeners with its fleshy decadence, not unlike an enchanted gingerbread house on the Las Vegas strip. The entire psychobilly scene would be unthinkable without them, and their prescient celebration of the echoey menace of first-generation rock & roll had a primal (if little acknowledged) influence on the rockabilly revival and the later roots rock movement.

The saga of the Cramps begins in 1972 in Sacramento, CA, when LSD enthusiast and Alice Cooper fan Erick Purkhiser picked up a hitchhiker, a woman with a highly evolved rock & roll fashion sense named Kristy Wallace. The two quickly took note of one another, but major sparks didn't began to fly until a few weeks later, when they discovered they were both enrolled in a course on "Art and Shamanism" at Sacramento City College. These two lovebirds were soon sharing both an apartment and their collective enthusiasm for the stranger and more obscure sounds of rock's first era, as well as the more flamboyant music of the day. Their passion for music led them to the conclusion that they should form a band, and Kristy picked up a guitar and adopted the stage name Poison Ivy Rorschach, while future vocalist Erick became Lux Interior, after short spells as Raven Beauty and Vip Vop. Ivy and Lux hit the road for Ohio, and after living frugally in Akron for a year and a half, they made their way to New York City in 1975 in search of stardom. While working at a record store, Interior made the acquaintance of fellow employee Greg Beckerleg, who had recently arrived from Detroit and also wanted to form a band. Beckerleg transformed himself into primal noise guitarist Bryan Gregory, and even persuaded his sister to join the nascent combo as a drummer. However, Pam Beckerleg didn't work out on traps, and so Miriam Linna (the Zantees & co-found frantic cultural journal Kicks Magazine and exemplary reissue label Norton Records ), an Ohio transplant who had gotten to know Lux and Ivy during their sojourn in the Buckeye State, finalized the first proper lineup of the band they called the Cramps. Between Ivy's twangy single-note leads, Bryan's shower-of-sparks reports of noise, Lux's demented banshee howling, and Miriam's primitive stomp, the Cramps didn't sound like anyone else on the budding New York punk scene, and the foursome soon began attracting both crowds and buzz with their shows at CBGB's and Max's Kansas City. After about a year of gigging in and around New York, Linna left the group, and another former Ohioan, Nick Stephanoff (known to his fans as Nick Knox and previously a member of infamous Cleveland noise terrorists the Electric Eels) took over behind the drums, and this version of the Cramps released the group's first recordings, a pair of 7" singles recorded in Memphis with Alex Chilton as producer and issued by the band's own Vengeance Records label. In 1979, Miles Copeland signed the band to his fledgling new wave label I.R.S. Records, and their first 12" release was an EP featuring the material from their self-released singles, entitled "Gravest Hits". That same year, the band traveled to Europe for the first time, playing as opening act for the Police and stealing the show from the peroxide-addled pop stars many nights. The Cramps returned to Memphis with Chilton to record their first full-length album, 1980's masterful "Songs the Lord Taught Us", but what should have been a triumphant U.S. tour following its release was scuttled when Gregory unceremoniously quit the band by leaving unannounced with a van full of their equipment; at the time, a story circulated that Gregory left the Cramps to pursue an interest in Satanism, though in later interviews Lux and Ivy said there was no truth to these rumors and his actions were more likely the result of his addiction to heroin. Lux, Ivy, and Nick opted to move the band to Hollywood, CA, and recruited Gun Club guitarist Kid Congo Powers to take over as second guitarist in time to record their second long-player, "Psychedelic Jungle". val and the later roots rock movement... Allmusic

A Cramps compilation : "Gravest Hits" which is two singles and a bonus track, material from both the Bryan Gregory and Kid Congo Powers lineups. Kid plays on “Goo Goo Muck” and “The Crusher” from "Psychedelic Jungle", “Save It” and “New Kind of Kick” from "The Crusher" 12 EP, the unreleased versions of “She Said,” “Uranium Rock,” and a pre-Smell of Female live version of “You Got Good Taste.”

The 3D cover version ... did you always have your glasses ?