13 Reasons “She Said” The Cramps
1. Lux Interior in his growling, yowling, screaming, microphone sucking, high heel wearing glory was the ultimate macho fey and the Pied Piper of kink. No longer would I want just a rocker, I’d want a freaky, sleazy, degenerate rocker who could holler Hasil Adkins, borrow your pumps and quite possibly make out with both your sister and your brother when you weren’t looking.
2. Poison Ivy remains one of my rock goddess Idols. The quintessence of too-cool-for-school, she’d stalk across the stage like a disinterested kitty cat -- slinky, sexy, unapproachable, perfect.
3. The Cramps blasted rockabilly out of the tired retro affectations of the perfectly coiffed, Eisenhower youth, rock-and-roll-at-the-hop-hop-hop-hop tedium. They knew Link Wray was a bad-ass. They worshipped crazy man Hasil Adkins. They dug the Sonics, Screamin’ Jay Hawkins, The Ventures and they brought bump and grind to Jimmie Rogers. Fuck Fonzie. Long live Lux.
4. Poison Ivy got me into her idol, Bo Diddley’s brilliant The Duchess. I bow down to her for this.
5. I didn’t need to take drugs or get drunk to get high at a Cramps show (though that's fun too). They were also the perfect first date show. My longest relationship (now kaput) was aided by The Cramps (with Famous Monsters). A night of a new kind of kick indeed.
6. For some reason, The Cramps always make me think of what Christmas should really be like. I always wanted to spend Christmas with The Cramps.
7. Poison Ivy inspired one of the greatest songs by one of my favorite bands, The Gun Club, aptly titled, “For the Love of Ivy.” It features the sublimely violent erotic line: “I’m gonna buy me a gun just as long as my arm.”
8. Lux and Ivy actually make marriage seem like a good idea. They were the surprisingly clean living Charles and Morticia Adams of rock.
9. “Bend over, I'll drive, bend over I'll drive. Is this the way Ernie Kovacs died? Bend over, I'll drive."
10. The Cramps had great taste. Lux found rockabilly singers like Charlie Feathers, Sonny Burgess and Malcolm Yelvington as kindred spirits to his other major influence: the Surrealists. In an interview Lux stated: “Marcel Duchamp is quite an inspiration... Because he kind of single-handedly demolished all that had gone before, and made a brand-new art. Man Ray was great too… We're just people who remain ever-curious. We're just attracted to whatever comes in handy. Again, like the Surrealists, anything you run across is actually beautiful; within a single city block, you find miraculous things. It's a good planet -- and good things can happen." Beautiful.
11. Garage Punk, Psychobilly, whatever-the-hell. They were The Cramps.
12. The Cramps make you believe that sexy almost always has to be sleazy.
13. Lux Interior was Louis Prima to Poison Ivy’s Keely Smith. He was speed to her heroin. The living to her dead. They were sickness, health, young and old. He’s can’t possibly be gone...
Great tribute and I love the photos you've dug up.
Posted by: Eric Reanimator | February 04, 2009 at 09:14 PM
This is a thing of beauty, Kim. I could not imagine a more genuine, heartfelt, loving tribute coming anyplace else. I'll no doubt be hearing a lot of Cramps over the next few weeks, and I'll certainly think of this piece whenever I do.
Posted by: Matthew Kiernan | February 05, 2009 at 12:25 AM
smashing photos. Mr L was a top frontman, to be sure.
Posted by: Pau Brazill | February 05, 2009 at 01:50 AM
thank you, great tribute. I feel the same way.
Posted by: Larry | February 05, 2009 at 05:34 AM
Beautiful piece, just beautiful. The Cramps, along with The Stooges, were my first proper grown-up band, the band I lived my teenage years listening to - and losing Ron Asheton and Lux in the same month seems horribly wrong, like the end of fun. But I keep reminding myself how lucky we were to have them around, and how they never wore out their welcome by making their opinions known on world issues or whatever (one of my favourite possessions is a local area TV broadcast from Memphis, 1978, interviewing the Bryan Gregory-era band and showing them perform live in Sun, and their stoned immaculate hipness shines out as Nick Knox says, poker-faced, "Ayatollah? I don't even know what that is.") Thanks, Lux and Ivy, for making rock and roll the most important thing in existence.
Posted by: Paul Duane | February 05, 2009 at 01:06 PM
A great tribute from a fan for a great band that were/are in a class of one.With the confimation of the passing of Lux,something I read about last night,I'd just like to say that I feel really f*****g low tonight.Thoughts and condolences to Ivy.
Posted by: Ian Burns | February 05, 2009 at 01:13 PM
That's from "Urgh! A Music War" isn't it? I used to own a VHS copy of that. It needs a DVD relwease.
Posted by: Richard J. Doyle | February 05, 2009 at 04:44 PM
What a fantastic tribute to the Man and the Band, and I couldn't agree with #12 more. The Cramps were my trashrock tour guides when I was a teenager trapped in the frustratingly-banal confines of Orange County, California - between strong doses of Lux and John Waters, I survived. Viva Lux!
Posted by: Dave Ehrlich | February 06, 2009 at 04:11 PM
What a beautiful post and an awesome tribute to one of our true greats. Thank you.
Fun fact: I still have the gold lame glove he wore but discarded into the audience at the end of the concert promoting A Date With Elvis. It made up for every baseball that I never caught!
Posted by: eroslane | February 07, 2009 at 10:56 PM
Thank you Kim for wonderful memorial! I saw the Cramps several times over the years and they *always* delivered. They were indeed a great date show!
Posted by: Will E. | February 11, 2009 at 05:35 PM