The Cramps
The Cramps are a band whose only permanent members have been Lux Interior (Erick Purkhiser) and Poison Ivy (Kristy Wallace), the lead singer and lead guitarist respectively. Their musical style is rockabilly, mostly in twelve bar blues form, played at varying, (though usually fast) tempos, with a very minimal drumkit. An integral part of the early Cramps sound is dual guitars, without a bassist. The content of their songs and image is sleaze, trashy Americana (much in the style of filmmaker John Waters), sexual fetishism, clever bad jokes, and cheap, horror B-movie cliches.
Their sound was heavily influenced by early rockabilly and proto-rock'n'roll like Link Wray and Hasil Adkins, 1960s surf music acts such as The Ventures and Dick Dale, 1960s garage rock artists like The Standells, The Gants, The Trashmen, and The Sonics, as well as the post-glam/early punk scene from which they emerged. They also were influenced to a degree by The Ramones and Screamin' Jay Hawkins, who is often credited for having pioneered their style of theatrical horror-blues.
In turn, they have strongly influenced subsequent punk and rockabilly revival bands, even creating a genre in their wake. "Psychobilly," a style played by bands like The Meteors and the Sharks, is a term coined by the Cramps, although Lux Interior maintains that the term does not describe their own style. [1] The Cramps also influenced or anticipated acts like The White Stripes, The Gun Club, The Fuzztones, James Chance and the Contortions, The Birthday Party, Tav Falco's Panther Burns, and Queen Adreena.
Brief biography
Lux Interior and Poison Ivy met in Sacramento, California in 1972. Due to their common artistic interests and shared devotion to record collecting, they decided to form The Cramps. Lux took his stage name from a car ad, and Ivy claimed to have received hers in a dream (she was first Poison Ivy Rorschach, taking her last name from that of the inventor of the Rorschach test). In 1973, they moved to Akron, Ohio, and then to New York in 1975, soon entering into CBGB's early punk scene with other emerging acts like The Ramones, Patti Smith, and Television. The lineup in 1976 was Poison Ivy Rorschach, Lux Interior, fellow-record collector Bryan Gregory (guitar) and his sister Pam "Ballam" (drums).
In a short period of time, the Cramps changed drummers twice; Miriam Linna (later of Nervous Rex, the Zantees, and the A-Bones) replaced Pam Ballam, and Nick Knox (Nicholas Stephanoff, formerly with the Electric Eels) replaced Linna in September 1977. In the late 1970s, the Cramps briefly shared a rehearsal space with The Fleshtones, and performed regularly in New York at places like CBGB's and Max's Kansas City, releasing two indie singles produced by Alex Chilton at Ardent Studios in Memphis in 1977 before being signed by Miles Copeland to the young I.R.S. Records label. In June of 1978 they gave a free concert for patients at the California State Mental Hospital in Napa, recorded on a Sony Portapak video camera by the San Francisco collective Target Video and later released as Live at Napa State Mental Hospital. They released the two singles again on their 1979 Gravest Hits EP, before Chilton brought them back that year to Memphis to record their first full length album, Songs The Lord Taught Us, at Phillips Recording, operated by former Sun Records label owner Sam Phillips.
After relocating to Los Angeles, Kid Congo Powers of The Gun Club joined the Cramps on guitar. But while recording their second LP, Psychedelic Jungle, the band and Miles Copeland began to dispute royalties and creative rights. The ensuing court case prevented them from releasing anything until 1983, when they recorded Smell of Female live at New York's Peppermint Lounge; Kid Congo Powers subsequently departed. Mike Metoff of The Pagans and Click Mort were the final second guitarists - albeit only live - of the Cramps' pre-bassist era.
In 1985 the Cramps recorded a one-off track for the horror movie "The Return of the Living Dead" called "Surfin' Dead", on which Ivy played bass as well as guitar. With the release of 1986's A Date With Elvis, the Cramps permanently added a bass guitar to the mix, but had trouble finding a suitable player, so Ivy temporarily filled in as the band's bassist.. The album featured an increased focus on sexual double entendre, and met with differing fates on either side of the Atlantic: in Europe, it sold over 250,000 copies, while in the U.S. the band had major problems finding a record company prepared to release it.
It was not until 1987 that the Cramps found a suitable permanent bass player: Candy Del Mar, who made her recorded debut on the raw live album ROCKINNREELININAUCKLANDNEWZEALANDXXX, which was followed by the studio album Stay Sick in 1990. The Cramps hit the top 40 singles chart on both sides of the Atlantic for the first and only time with "Bikini Girls with Machine Guns"; Ivy posed as such both on the cover of the single and in the promotional video for the song. The Cramps went on to record many more albums and singles through the 1990's and 2000's, for various labels and with varying degrees of success.
Personnel
The Cramps have had several lineups over the years. The current lineup includes Buster Bateman, the original drummer in The Blasters, on drums and Chopper Franklin, formerly of the Mau Maus, on bass and guitar.
Current members
Former members
- Bryan Gregory – guitar, March 1976 - May 1980
- Pam Ballam – drums, June 1976 - August 1976
- Miriam Linna – drums, September 1976 - August 1977
- Nick Knox – drums, September 1977 - May 1991
- Julien Griensnatch – guitar, July 1980 - September 1980
- Kid Congo Powers – guitar, December 1980 - September 1983
- Terry Graham – drums, October 1982
- Mike Metoff (as Ike Knox) – guitar, October 1983 - November 1983; January 1984 - July 1984
- Click Mort – guitar, December 1983
- Touch Hazard (Tim Maag / The Mechanics) – bass, 1985
- Fur Dixon – bass, March 1986 - June 1986
- Candy del Mar – bass, July 1986 - May 1991
- Jim Sclavunos – drums, June 1991 - September 1991
- Nickey "Beat" Alexander – drums, October 1991 - December 1993
- Harry Drumdini – drums, January 1994 - August 2003
- Jungle Jim – drums, September 2003 - July 2004
- Bill "Buster" Bateman – drums, July 2004
- Chopper Franklin – bass & guitar, 2000
- Sugarpie Jones – bass
- Slim Chance – bass
- Dave Stuckey – bass
Discography
Albums
- Gravest Hits (1979)
- Songs the Lord Taught Us (1980)
- Psychedelic Jungle (1981)
- Smell of Female (1983)
- Off The Bone (1983)
- Bad Music for Bad People (1984)
- A Date With Elvis (1986)
- ROCKINREELINAUKLANDNEWZEALAND (1987)
- Stay Sick (1989)
- Look Mom No Head (1991)
- Flame Job (1994)
- Big Beat From Badsville (1997)
- Fiends of Dope Island (2003)
- How to Make a Monster (2004)
Other albums credited to The Cramps
- Songs The Cramps Taught Us (2002)
- Songs The Cramps Taught Us, Vol. 2 (2002)
- Songs The Cramps Taught Us, Vol. 3 (2003)
The Songs The Cramps Taught Us series is a set of compilation albums of rock, rockabilly, and surf songs that The Cramps have found particularly influential.
Singles
| Year | Title | Chart positions | Album | |||
| US Hot 100 | US Modern Rock | US Mainstream Rock | UK | |||
| 1978 | "The Way I Walk" (US) | - | - | - | - | Gravest Hits, Off The Bone |
| 1978 | "Human Fly" (US) | - | - | - | - | Gravest Hits, Off The Bone |
| 1980 | "Fever" (UK) | - | - | - | - | Songs The Lord Taught Us, Off The Bone |
| 1980 | "Garbageman" (US) | - | - | - | - | Songs The Lord Taught Us, Off The Bone |
| 1980 | "Drug Train" | - | - | - | - | Off The Bone |
| 1981 | "Goo Goo Muck" | - | - | - | - | Psychedelic Jungle, Off The Bone |
| 1981 | "The Crusher" | - | - | - | - | Psychedelic Jungle, Off The Bone |
| 1984 | "Faster Pussycat" | - | - | - | - | Smell Of Female |
| 1984 | "I Ain't Nuthin' But a Gorehound" | - | - | - | - | Smell Of Female |
| 1985 | "Can Your Pussy Do the Dog?" | - | - | - | #68 | A Date With Elvis |
| 1986 | "What's Inside a Girl?" | - | - | - | - | A Date With Elvis |
| 1986 | "Kizmiaz" | - | - | - | - | A Date With Elvis |
| 1986 | "Get Off The Road" (Sweden) | - | - | - | - | - |
| 1990 | "Bikini Girls With Machine Guns" | - | #10 | - | #35 | Stay Sick! |
| 1990 | "All Women Are Bad" | - | - | - | - | Stay Sick! |
| 1990 | "The Creature From the Black Leather Lagoon" | - | - | - | - | Stay Sick! |
| 1991 | "Eyeball In My Martini" | - | - | - | - | Look Mom, No Head! |
References
- The Cramps Discography, Biography and Links at Mr Bill's I.R.S. Records Corner Retrieved Nov. 23, 2004.
- Deming, Mark. Allmusic.com Biography on The Cramps Retrieved Nov. 23, 2004.
- The Wild Wild World of the Cramps by Ian Johnston, 1990, Omnibus Press, ISBN 0711923507