The Italian Job II

The Cramps: il rock'n'roll come terapia
From "Be Nice To Mommy," an Italian "punkzine," 2003

http://www.benicetomommy.com/cramps_inter.html

Cinquantasette anni lui, cinquanta lei. Ed una disperata voglia di andare ancora in giro a far casino. Sempre così, un po' da perdenti, nonostante un nome ed una carriera che autorizzerebbero a pensare a ben altri successi e ben altri palcoscenici. E invece eccoli di nuovo qui a farsi insultare dal pubblico del solito gruppo "molto" punk californiano appena sbarcato su major (ma finiscono tutti così? C'è un copione già scritto?) sullo stage più sbagliato del momento, almeno per loro. Una sorta di deja-vu per chi ebbe l'occasione di vederli più di vent'anni fa aprire i concerti (e beccarsi raffiche di sputi) per i Police in una delle accoppiate più bizzarre della storia. Sting e soci, nel frattempo, sono molto invecchiati e giocano a fare i musicisti seri, fra jazz, tarantelle e comparsate pseudo-sociali, che non so perché, ma quando le fanno i miliardari mi viene sempre l'orticaria. Magari succederà anche ai Rancid, chissà. I Cramps no, i Cramps sono sempre gli stessi e sono tornati.
Rispolverata la loro Vengeance Records, hanno dato alle stampe un nuovo album, "Fiends of Dope Island", e sono partiti per un tour europeo che in Italia, purtroppo, ha toccato solo Bologna all'Indipendent festival. Di scandalo, non ci si crede, ne continuano a dare. Basta farsi un giro per le message board delle decine di webzine o siti "punk" per incontrare un fiorir di commenti di bambini spaventati: "Il cantante è frocio", "Era strafatto", "Cantava malissimo", "Cazzo... si è addirittura spogliato!". Le movenze di Lux Interior sul palco e l'ossessivo psycho-billy della loro musica hanno squarciato il velo di una "scena" un po' omofobica (tanto per cambiare) e degna del circolo delle Suore Benedettine. Chi lo avrebbe mai detto, da due vecchiacci così?

Ma com'è stato tornare in sala dopo tanti anni?
"Come una terapia intensiva", mi rispondono Lux e Ivy, contattati per un rapido scambio di mail prima della loro partenza per il tour. "C'è tanta gente che in studio ci passa la vita, per noi è sempre stato un po' come entrare in ospedale. Beh, insomma... vai lì per farti curare e poi ti senti meglio. Ma non c'è niente di divertente".
Come mai avete riesumato il marchio Vengeance dopo 25 anni e come si è chiusa la vostra esperienza con la Epitaph?
"La Epitaph in America fa schifo. E questo ci è sembrato un ottimo modo per non avere più a che fare con etichette che fanno schifo. Inoltre siamo rientrati in possesso dei diritto dei titoli precedenti".
Nel frattempo ci sono state novità anche nella formazione.
"Beh", risponde Lux, "Drumdini non è nuovo! E' con noi da più di dieci anni, ormai. Quello nuovo è il bassista, Chopper Franlin. Li abbiamo scelti entrambi perché sono dei pericolosi sbandati che sanno cos'è il rock'n'roll. Del resto, il rock'n'roll è sempre stato una cosa pericolosa".

La carriera di Erick Purkisher e Kristy Wallace, i veri nomi di Lux e Ivy, è iniziata piuttosto tardi e prima del sodalizio musicale ci fu senza dubbio quello sessuale. La storia vuole che i due si incontrino nel '72 in California, quando lui dà un passaggio a lei. Ancora insieme, oltre trent'anni dopo. E' più facile stare in una band quando si fa coppia anche nella vita? E' più facile trovare ispirazione per scrivere canzoni?
"Più facile? Più facile di cosa? E' solo facile. Le nostre canzoni possono nascere in milioni di modi diversi e comunque noi siamo sempre stati una coppia rock'n'roll, anche prima di formare una band".
E come vi è venuto in mente il nome del gruppo?
"Cramp è una parola che in slang significa erezione. Ci piaceva qualche cosa che avesse risvolti sessuali, ma in realtà volevamo un nome che assomigliasse a The Kinks".
La svolta arriva con la scena newyorchese e il Cbgb che a quel tempo ospitava i Ramones, ma anche i Television, piuttosto che i Talking Heads e i Blondie. Ai nostri sembrò un'idea vincente proporre il rockabilly nella Grande Mela, dove in effetti questo genere non aveva di sicuro lo stesso appeal che invece mostrava nella provincia. Ed è li che esordiscono, con due chitarristi e... niente basso. Oggi sembra quasi una moda. E i Cramps da parecchio tempo non adottano più questa soluzione un po' radicale. Meglio una band col basso o senza?
"Meglio i Cramps. Noi abbiamo sempre dettato il ritmo. Gli altri sono solo venuti dietro".

Qui in Italia vedervi suonare senza basso di spalla ai Police fu uno shock. E vi siete presi un sacco di insulti. Come fu la tournee?
"Per noi fu una grande esperienza. Ma non abbiamo niente di divertente da raccontare. Sono passati anche troppi anni".
Da parecchio tempo, tuttavia, Lux e Ivy, hanno lasciato New York per far ritorno in California. Come mai questa scelta?
"Volevamo diventare minatori! No... in realtà siamo persone a cui piace starsene per i fatti loro e New York non era semplicemente il posto giusto".
Siete sempre stati innamorati dei vecchi dischi ed avete contribuito alla riscoperta di tanti artisti del passato. Ma c'è qualche gruppo attuale che vi piace ascoltare?
"Possiamo dirti i dischi che abbiamo acquistato di recente: Dexter Romwebber, Hank Williams 3 e Johnny Cash".
Com'è vivere negli Usa al giorno d'oggi? Un sacco di musicisti esprimono parecchio sdegno per l'amministrazione Bush...
"Un sacco di musicisti farebbero meglio a concentrarsi di più sul rock'n'roll".
E i vostri progetti futuri?
"Causare problemi e divertirci... per ancora molto tempo".

Be Nice to Mommy - ottobre 2003
(Le foto dei Cramps all'Indipendent sono di Luigi Bagatella per Pogopop)

The Way He Walked (Bryan Gregory RIP/WTF)

The Way He Walked
by Jonny Whiteside
http://www.laweekly.com/2001-01-25/music/the-way-he-walked/

Published on January 25, 2001

Underworld fuzz guitarist Bryan Gregory died Wednesday, January 10, at Anaheim Memorial Hospital. The 49-year-old Detroit native had recently suffered a heart attack, and while the hospital won’t release the cause of death, Gregory had reportedly been ill for several weeks. He was best known for a spectacular stint with the Cramps, where his drawn, acne-scarred visage, framed by a trademark shock of long, skunk-striped hair, and a penchant for distortion and feedback earned him a reputation as one of the punk-rock era’s most distinctive practitioners.

From their 1976 start together in NYC, the Cramps’ dark, dirty rockabilly blitz was an at-the-time unparalleled sound, and Gregory’s bizarre image, juxtaposed against singer Lux Interior’s towering elasticity and guitarist Poison Ivy’s deadpan cool, made for an unforgettable frontline. His 1980 split from the Cramps, concurrent with the band’s litigious departure from IRS Records, generated a tsunami of fan gossip and resentment. Gregory resurfaced in 1982 with Beast, a death-rock quartet fronted by singer Andrella Christopher; heavy on candle-lit atmospherics and midtempo dirges, Beast released one full-length album and undertook U.S. and European tours, but disbanded by 1984. In 1992, Gregory’s band the Dials performed a handful of shows, and at the time of his death he’d formed a new outfit, Shiver. Contrary to cult-propelled rumor, Gregory patched things up with Lux and Ivy in 1991, and this bittersweet recollection (see below) from Poison Ivy should reconcile much of the confusion surrounding one of rock & roll’s most lurid triumvirates.

—Jonny Whiteside

Sadly, after 20 years of misinformation and misquotes regarding the Bryan Gregory chapter of the Cramps, here’s my one and only chance to directly express my feelings. While it’s true that Bryan didn’t actually play on some of the seminal recordings that are attributed to him (he wasn’t always present for Songs the Lord Taught Us), he could be a truly charismatic live performer when the spirit moved him — particularly in the CBGB/Max’s Kansas City days, when spirit was everywhere in the air.

He wasn’t anything like the myth promoted by his record company and subsequently the press; the real Bryan had a kooky charm the public doesn’t even know about — the truth was far stranger than fiction. He and I shared a birthday, and we met on our mutual birthday on February 20, 1976. We were almost the same size and could fit into each other’s pants and shoes. We understood each other because we weren’t the boygirl next door, and we’d both already been through a lot and knew how to hustle tooth and nail to survive. We could be our scary selves without horrifying each other. My fondest memory is of tripping on acid together in Central Park that summer. We were never quite able to sustain that high.

Bryan’s creative forte was more visual than sonic — when we met him, he had just moved to New York to pursue a graphic-arts career. He loved art, jewelry making, decorating — I think it was the visual aspects of the Cramps that appealed to him most. Lux and I had come to New York in 1975 with a mess of songs and crude home demos and a plan to take over the world, but I think it was mostly our exotic looks and Flying V guitar that lured Bryan to join us. When we gave the guitar to him, he immediately decorated it with polka-dot price stickers and painted our name in fancy script on the case, and you know what? It looked hot!

Bryan was more enigmatic and incongruous than imagination would allow. Once, in a packed coffee shop, he pulled a switchblade on a boothful of square businessmen who were snickering about him, but on another occasion he whined that he couldn’t leave his apartment because the neighborhood teen toughs followed him down the street teasingly singing “Sweet Child in the City.” A sense of adventure led him to let Lux dangle him upside down by his ankles from a 17th-floor high-rise window “just to see what it’s like,” yet he despised touring because of his fear and hatred of “foreigners.” He thought rockabilly was “goofy” but said we made it work for us “’cuz you’re so weird.” We had a brief, intense relationship, and I don’t think any of us knew what hit us. At one time we all wanted to be in a band that people were afraid of offstage. He was a true DMF — Detroit Motherfucker.

On a soul level, the affair was over by 1979, after we started touring and recording regularly. Without a passion for and understanding of the fundamental forces influencing the Cramps, a combination of too much hard work, chemical haze and backstage leeches drove him to the next bright, shiny object in his path and a pursuit of so-called social relevance. I’ll always remember the high-flyin’ Bryan that few people had the privilege to know, before he stopped being a rocker and became a “rock star” . . . the way he walked, the way he talked, the way he rocked.

—Poison Ivy

He appeared on two Cramps records, 1979's 'Gravest Hits', produced by Alex Chilton, and 'Songs The Lord Taught Us' in 1980, after which he left the band suddenly. He performed from 1980 to 1984 with the band Beast, and The Dials from 1992 to 1995. He had also formed a band called Shiver.

Gypsies, Dopes and Fiends

THE FIEND OF DOPE ISLAND (1961)

With The Yugoslavian Bombshell

Tania Velia

REVIEW FROM DVD VERDICT
http://www.dvdverdict.com/reviews/paganfiend.php#

Reviewed by Judge Bill Gibron
Indiana Jones' drunken, psychotic third cousin, twice removed, rules over his Trinidad but not quite Tobago island paradise like Lash LaRue with an anger management problem. Cracking the leather across the backs of his mostly drunken associates, he fancies himself a charismatic totalitarian despot, a friend to the native and the riding crop equally. In reality, he's just the incredibly sweaty drug running/gun smuggling Fiend of Dope Island. When a mail order lounge singer arrives to provide the one bit of spice on this otherwise mushy plantain of a paradise, it's not long before our overheated male is smitten, with a whip. It's up to the lacerated locals and the social outcastaways surrounding him to teach the Sensimilla selling sadist that there's more to life (and love) than a quick flick of the wrist.

Meanwhile, William Stanton experiences what numerous writers to Penthouse Forum have only daydreamed of, untold computer geeks have fan fictioned over, and numerous teenage surfer dudes have prayed for when he ends up shipwrecked on Pagan Island, a tropical paradise filled with topless beauties. With names right out of Disney's Polynesian Village Hotel Conference Center, our hero is at first feared, then befriended, then feared again, then almost sacrificed, then coddled, then feared, then…well that's about it. Oh, and while scuba diving for buried Sea God treasure, he is molested by a giant mollusk, AKA a clam. Seems he's irresistible to all species. Both Fiend of Dope Island and Pagan Island sound like promising exploitation experiences. Fiend portends to offer a salacious look at the life of a dictator-like drug dealer on an exotic island that just screams naked hula dancers. Pagan is every middle-aged World War II vet's nice Hawaiian punch. Combined, it should make for one fantastic fantasy inlet delight. But both movies are King Kamayamaya disappointing.

Fiend does indeed present the incredibly heinous Charlie Davis, a man whose interpersonal interaction skills can best be described as oriented around the cat o' nine tails and a voluptuous Volga boatwoman in Glory La Verne. But otherwise, the movie is as odiferous as a Durian daiquiri. This is supposed to be a film about the dangerous life of drug running, not the hazards and hardships of private island ownership. All the actors have been directed to deliver their lines in a rapid fire gulp of air, like their about ready to belch up some conch salad. Actor Bruce Bennett is the worst. This ex-Tarzan speaks so fast without moving his lips more than a centimeter in any direction (up, down or sidewise) that his dialogue simply becomes a series of sonic blurts. It sounds like he's been working with David Byrne in the experimental art of lyric writing via phonetics. There are a couple of fun moments, like Glory's mad Bulgarian samba that has Charlie pounding on the conga drum like a spastic Gene Krupa or the climactic shark attack which combines horrible overacting and hyper-kinetic kiddy pool splashing with intercut stock footage from episodes of Flipper. But with only one split second shot of a breast and hardly anything else going for it except Charlie's miscreant mood swings, this Fiend is a flop.

Pagan Island also starts with possibilities. This premise just seems ripe for some ribald revelry. Stud muffin sailor splashes down on a seemingly deserted island, does the Robinson Crusoe "thang" and just when it looks like he'll starve to death, a group of lei wearing topless tomatoes stumble across his path and offer their ample assistance like a Luau La Leche League. But instead of a steamy sex farce or wanton display of ample island flesh, nothing happens. A native girl dances around a tropical gift shop version of Domino's Noid, our poop deck deviant spends countless hours trying to decipher the Ungawa language (and various European accents) the ladies use as secret sensual code, and the audience wonders if the body tape holding those flower necklaces close to the vest will ever come loose. If it weren't for that tacky Trader Vic's corporate logo standing in the middle of the grass hut grotto where these ladies live, there would be very little sculpted figure to look at. True, this is a movie that features women sans Bikini Island tops. But when Wilson, Tom Hanks' volleyball lover in Cast Away, has more sex appeal and emotional range than the naïve natives offered here, it's time to consider this male fantasy flaccid. The underwater treasure cove caper seems pasted in as an afterthought and there is an attack by a burly bunch of backlot stage hands in wool diapers that just hurts in its unintentional hilarity. Perhaps in 1960 this seemed like racy, soon to be banned brazenness. But viewed along other titles in the SWV catalog, Pagan Island is all cutie with very little nudie, as well as very little excitement. Visually, the black and white prints of Fiend and Pagan are near pristine, if overly soft. The monochrome seems geared more toward the gray than ebony. Even the trailers and alternate title sequence for Fiend (under the moniker Whiplash) look brand new. With movies this unfulfilling, Something Weird Video must step in and offers some decidedly different extra content sacrifices to the Gods of personal entertainment in hopes that they will be appeased. And they are, for the most part. First, we learn more than we ever wanted to know about the customs and creepiness of Bali and its clothing optional residents. We then get to see some hula girls and various other examples of tropical tomfoolery. There's even a truncated (read: without explicit sex) bit of pseudo porn that finds a rough trade looking merchant marine bedding the most hideous island girl (make that matron) in the history of backroom smoker cinema. About the only bright spot is the colorful feature starring Lewis Van Dercar. While supposedly an insight into the artistic temperament, it's really a first person narrative about a young woman's decision to totally give in to the world of nekkid artists modeling for elderly beatnik types. Add another great gallery of lost exploitation advertisement and the supplements outshine the rather tame movies offered. But all the pearl polishing in China couldn't remove the humid, overheated ho-humness of these titles. While this DVD package would certainly be the answer to a shipwrecked castaways daily doldrums, most landlubbers will have difficulty finding their South Sea legs.

Feeling Pissy

The following has got to be one of the worst articles about the Cramps, or indeed about anything, that I have ever read. I normally do not run things with no attribution, but in this case, it's a mercy. I will say that this masterwork appeared, not in some middle-schooler's blog, but on the website of a national magazine. The infinite monkey theorem states that a monkey hitting keys at random on a typewriter keyboard for an infinite amount of time will eventually type any given text, such as the complete works of William Shakespeare. Give him 20 minutes, and he will do this:

In 1973 during the start of the punk movement came The Cramps, an act initially formed out of the lovebird duo of Poison Ivy Rorshach and Lux Interior. Urban legends still depict the duo meeting as Lux had picked Ivy up as hitchhiker on his way to NYC. Being one of the key New York bands in the CBGB scene, the act received huge attention by combining blues and surf rock with horrific yet campy lyrics and sleazy sex appeal. While not as aggressively bombastic as many of the early punk acts, The Cramps continued their own sexual revolution live on stage to every pierced punk’s pleasure.

Lux Interior and Poison Ivy were known for challenging gender barriers, challenging status quo, and all-the-while pushing each stage show even more over-the-top than the last. It seemed in every show from the bands inception to their most recent tour in November of 2008 that nothing was “going too far” or off-limits for them. Whether in leopard print Speedos or leather pants, Lux sweated and screamed out blues riffs with horrific themes that would delight even the most staunch horror fan. The band burned up the stage (often literally) with sexual energy and wicked wit. (Since there are no recorded instances of them ever actually setting a stage on fire, we must assume that the author doesn't literally mean literally-- they only figuratively literally burned up stages. Similarly, I don't think Lux Interior or anyone else has ever "screamed out" a blues riff. That would be similar to playing a guitar a cappella.)

Early on in my experience with the goth scene I remember picking up the albums STAY SICK and BAD MUSIC FOR BAD PEOPLE. It was easy to find the act compelling as a goth, and I had to have the later releases of LOOK MOM, NO HEAD and FLAME JOB. Their natural appeal to zombie fans and their appearance in movies like RETURN OF THE LIVING DEAD quickly made them a deathrock staple for those newly initiated. (The Cramps did not actually appear in ROTLD, or even ROTFLMAO, much less any other movies "like" it. Also, I don't know what a "deathrock staple" is, but I'm pretty sure the Cramps weren't one.)

The sound of The Cramps could be described as early “pre-psychobilly”. (No, it really couldn't.) It combined the best of Chuck Berry (First I've heard of this!) and Dick Dale guitar grooves with lyrics that seemed ripped straight from a Hammer horror film. (Yes, I'll never forget Peter Cushing in "Two-Headed Sex Change," or Christopher Lee's fantastic performance in "Don't Eat Stuff Off the Sidewalk.") While the band itself denies having ever been part of the psychobilly scene, there is no doubt that almost every psycho act draws its inspiration from this lusty band. Indeed a great many early members of the goth movement found inspiration from the gender bending leopard print Speedo stage show that captivated us all. (I don't know that a pair of high heels constitutes gender bending. A gentle tweaking, perhaps.)

Recently however, Lux Interior made his last grand exit on February 4th, 2009. Passing at the age of 62 from a pre-existing heart condition, Lux leaves behind a legacy as one fantastic showman. The punk and goth scene mourns his passing as news continues to be reported about his life and his history. (History is history, not news.) What we do know, is that like the great “man in black” Johnny Cash before him, Lux and Ivy’s legacy as The Cramps will continue to live on well after Lux’s passing. (I guess that's true, but how did Johnny Cash wind up in there?)