A man of good taste sadly took his last bow this week. Lux Interior, frontman of cult band The Cramps opened the door to the magic 1950’s for the late-born, from raunchy burlesque to rabid Rockabilly. Read on for the Top 10 Songs Lux taught us.
Lux once wrote a song called ‘I’ve Got Good Taste’ - Too right. Nobody has done more to tip off generations of musicians and music heads alike to the most outrageous Fifties Rockabilly and Sixties Garage Punk. Below you’ll find the Tuneraker’s selection of the Top 10 Songs That Lux Taught Us.
Known as Erick Lee Purkhiser to his parents, Lux preached the gospel of vintage delights for 36 years with his band. He founded The Cramps with his wife Poison Ivy Rorschach (aka Kristy Wallace) in 1973 to spread the news about the music they both loved.
Drawn by rumours about the nascent Punk scene on New York’s bum mile, The Bowery, Lux and Ivy moved from industrial Cleveland to New York in 1976. They established themselves at Punk’s headquarters, the CBGBs bar on the Bowery. Folklore has it, that in the early days Ivy’s income as a dominatrix spanking Wall Street bankers’ bottoms put the bread on the table.
Their Fifties retro vibe fit right in with the Punks of the first hour. After all, Punk was a trouser revolution - Straight leg, Fifties Levis replacing the omnipresent flares of the Seventies.
That Punk’s first regular gigging band, The Ramones, had a Sixties revival thing going on must have helped as well. Both bands’ tastes met over Sixties Surf band The Trashmen. Both The Ramones and The Cramps played the Trashmen’s immortal ‘Surfin’ Bird’ as a perennial live favourite.
It was mainly The Cramps’ choice of covers, mixed in with the band’s original songs, that brought many classic songs and artists back from the brink of obscurity. Dave ‘Diddle’ Ray’s sublime hymn to a hooker, ‘Blue Moon Baby’, and Jerry ‘The Phantom’ Lott’s deranged cry for attention, ‘Love Me’, would likely never have caused a stir on the dancefloor if it wouldn’t have been for The Cramps covering these timeless Punk treasures.
Top 10 Songs That Lux Taught Us
‘Domino’ - Roy Orbison
‘Love Me’ - The Phantom
‘Save It’ - Mel Robbins
‘Blue Moon Baby’ - Dave ‘Diddle’ Ray
‘Sunglasses After Dark’ - Dwight ‘Whitey’ Pullen
‘Strychnine’ - The Sonics
‘The Crusher’ - The Novas
‘Uranium Rock’ - Warren Smith
‘The Goo Goo Muck’ - Ronnie Cook & The Gaylads
‘Fever’ - Little Willie John, Elvis, Peggy Lee
Lux never fell into the trap of loving songs for their rarety value alone. No, The Cramps, also championed the adventurous side of big name acts like Roy Orbison. Their menacing, razor sharp cover of ‘Domino’ made me look up Orbison’s ‘Rock House’ album for Sun Records and discover a primeval rocker prowling the studio rather than the smooth Pop balladeer of ‘Pretty Woman’ and ‘Only The Lonely’ fame.
Watch The Cramps Play ‘Good Taste’ Plus A 1984 Interview With Lux & Ivy
The list of introductions to long forgotten Fifties performers that The Cramps made is pretty hefty. Ronnie ‘Blond Bomber’ Dawson, Wanda Jackson, Glen Glen, Warren Smith - and that’s only the tip of the iceberg. Once Lux and Ivy slipped you the name of a singer or a band, you got hooked and snooped around for more. Jack Earls, Howard Serrat - Jeesus, once you get started there’s no end of amazing music out there - And that’s just the Fifties, starting with The Sonics and The Novas you’re bound to discover literally hundreds of bands in the early Sixties that delivered raw goodies.
The Cramps also brought one of the great Rock ‘n’ Roll producers of all time back into the limelight. Alex Chilton started his career at 16 with The Box Tops in the mid -1960’s and shortly after founded Southern Rock legend Big Star. His career had hit a rocky spot when The Cramps picked Chilton to produce their early recordings.
Listen to that first guitar chord coming in from nowhere on ‘Human Fly’ and your jaw will drop 30-something years later. Nobody sounds that good, period. Once introduced to a Punk audience, Chilton had a deserved revival in the late Seventies and early Eighties.
I still remember digging out the Cramps ‘Off The Bone’ singles compilation from a bargain bin on a cold and grey February day 25 years ago. How could I leave this album behind with its 3-D cover of slasher horror ghouls? The music still gets me. ‘Human Fly’, ‘The Way I Walk’, ‘Love Me’, ‘Domino’, ‘Garbage Man’ and ‘Save It’ - All classics in their own right. The Cramps even outstripped Elvis with their horny performance of ‘Little’ Willie John’s ‘Fever’.
As a singer, Lux brought the Rockabilly tradition to its logical climax. You see, the best Rockabilly singers regularly sounded like they were overwhelmed by the meaning of their lines, breaking down into a stutter or seeking refuge in a shrieking falsetto. Lux in full flight was practically reduced to grunts and shrieks as Ivy would egg him on with more primitive yet powerful single-note picking on her guitar.
Lux live was a vision to behold. Witnessing The Cramps live in the Eighties are some of my most memorable concert experiences ever. Lux lived Rock ‘n’ Roll. The whole writhing, sweating, painful yet exuberant lot of it. You’ll be sorely missed.
Watch Lux ‘Tear It Up’ Live
Lux Interior died on 4th Febuary, aged 62, in Los Angeles of a heart condition. He is survived by Poison Ivy, his wife for 37 years.
