The Cramps

Adam und Eve in „Only Lovers Left Alive“ von Jim Jarmusch wären mein Traumpaar #1, wäre dieser Rang nicht seit Anbeginn der Zeit vergeben an Poison Ivy und Lux Interior – The Cramps.

„We have been accused of being sexist. They don’t comment on our music at all, or the fact that maybe what I play is unique and I’m not mimicking some male guitarist — that this is original. I co-write the very sexual ones. All I see is our songs have to do with, from the male point of view, being intrigued by the power and mystery of females.

I think it’s a great tradition in blues songs and I think we’re in a good tradition there, too. He [the protagonist] is loving being overpowered by women and turned on. And a lot of people just confuse being turned on with being sexist — like it’s not OK to be flat-out horny over someone else. That’s really pitiful, but that happens to be the way things are right now. It’s a fear of sex in general, sex and power.“ – Poison Ivy

What’s inside a girl?
Something’s telling me there’s a whole ’nother world
You got a pointy bra, a ten-inch waist
Long black stockings all over the place
Boots, buckles, belts outside
Watcha got in there you’re trying to hide

„I’m the Queen of Rock ’n‘ Roll, and for this to not be recognized is pure sexism.“ – Poison Ivy

„A Bikini Girl with Machine Gun is just a scary, powerful female image, that’s not misogynist.“ – Poison Ivy

„There’s no more feminist band in the world than The Cramps.“ – Lux Interior

„What outrages me is that people can be so satisfied and half asleep. I don’t want to go back to the 50s or something, but I do remember a time when cars looked like rocket ships, and people wanted to have a wild time and dress sexy and dance sexy and try new, crazy things. It seems like these days there’s an abundance of boringness and timidity, and that’s the kind of thing that outrages me, you know? Boring people, that’s nothing new, but the numbers are growing rather than going down. It’s not a good sign.“ – Lux Interior [COSMIC DEBRIS – OCT 1997]

The Cramps. Poison Ivy, Lux Interior, Candy Del Mar, Nick Knox.

Zwei denkwürdige Soireen. Heilige Nächte für uns.

The Cramps, Konzert Tickets Hamburg Docks.

The Cramps – Docks. Review von Jörg Burger, 03/90

Spielte der Teufel Gitarre, er täte es bei den Cramps. Ihre Musik ist böse, ihre Auftritte sind schmutziger Sex (…) Am Dienstag war das Docks ihr Höllenpfuhl. Sänger Lux Interior keuchte im engen Plastikdress wie ein schwarzer Engel der Lust, die Gitarre klingelte metallen, das Schlagzeug stieß monoton: ein musikalischer Geschlechtsakt, Rock ’n‘ Roll aus dem Rotlichtbezirk. Aber die Cramps – und das ist ihr Geheimnis – sind nicht nur ein physischer Genuß. Die Cramps sind auch Amerikas Antwort auf Plastik-Pop und Kleenex-Sex. Im Schmutz glänzt da die Wahrheit, unter dem Bösen lauert das Gute. Teuflisch schön.

Now I just can’t identify
With this world, so I don’t try

Interior, from Cleveland, met Ivy in California in 1972. „It is very romantic,“ she said of their life together. „“It’s like a living myth.“ [*]

Onstage, there was chaos, confrontation, destruction of equipment, bare flesh, and that dangerous, subversive-sounding psychobilly. Rebellion and reliability were mashed together, which is to say the Cramps flirted with disaster but always came through with an A-level show.

A Cramps gig was one of barely controlled chaos. The Cramps took rockabilly – that most stable of forms – and warped it. The Cramps embraced trash rock (…) as glorious rediscovery, investing it with a thick forest of crazed psychedelia and primitive, pounding drum beats. (…) From the voodoo rhythm a danceable, dark, entrancing beauty arose. [*]

Mad? You call me mad?
I who have the secret of eternal love?
You call me mad?
Yeah, I can teach you how to read the book of life
But you can just look at the pictures if you like

„I’ve always thought of us as surrealists right from the very beginning. I think anytime anybody gets too comfortable or decides to cleverly pigeonhole ‚the way things should be‘, an artist is going to come along and turn the whole thing upside down. That’s always healthy. That means people are thinking; they’re not just doing what they’re told. It means they’re being moved by a spirit. Gauguin said there are two types of artists: revolutionaries and plagiarists. We’re revolutionaries.“ – Lux Interior [*]

Die schönste, schnellste, langsamste, unabhängigste, reinste und beste Rock’n’Roll-Band der Welt [**]

„Wir umgeben uns eigentlich nicht gern mit anderen Menschen.“ (Lux Interior)
Wie man sich amüsiert, das wissen die Cramps. Auch die Cover der letzten drei Cramps-Platten sollen bewußt machen, daß Sex & Amüsement eine entscheidende Rolle spielen: Poison Ivy, die Göttliche, ist zu sehen als Revue-Strip-Girl (auf dem Live-Album SMELL OF FEMALE), als fauchende Tigerkatze in Netzstrümpfen (auf der Maxi „Can Your Pussy Do The Dog“) und in der Pose des sexhungrigen Satanweibs mit Glamour-Girl-Touch (auf A DATE WITH ELVIS).
Lux: „A DATE WITH ELVIS dreht sich nur um das eine: um die Frau und das Verlangen. (…) In den jüngsten Kritiken hat man uns als Frauen-Hasser und Anti-Feministen angeklagt – für mich ist diese Person, die uns Frauen-Hasser und Sexisten nennt, selbst sexistisch. Wir sind eine der wenigen Bands, in der zwei Frauen den größten Teil der Musik machen (…)“
Lux: „Elvis steht für mich als Symbol für eine Rockabilly-Ethik, für eine bestimmte Lebensphilosophie, nach der man sich seine eigene magische Welt aufbaut und darin leidenschaftlich lebt.“
(Artikel / Interview Harald InHülsen 1986)

„Wir haben uns nie entwickeln müssen“, sagt Lux Interior. „Wir waren gut von Anfang an.“ [**]

I’m glidin‘ thru this friction
Like some science fiction thrill
Gettin‘ off in these dimensions
Where time itself stands still
Flowin‘ thru a whirlpool to
A she-feast wrapped in silk

„Es ist schwierig, zu bestimmen, ob wir zeitgenössisch sind“, sagt Poison Ivy. „Wir haben keine Zeitgenossen.“ [**]

„Wir haben keinen Apparat um uns herum. Keinen Manager, keinen Rechtsanwalt oder sowas. Wir machen alles alleine. Es ist seltsam, aber wenn du zu einem Konzert der Cramps gehst und Eintritt bezahlst, bekommen zuerst einmal wir das Geld. Kein Geldschwamm ist dazwischen. Das macht das Leben natürlich etwas leichter.“
Und die Umwelt? Welches Jahr ist heute, Lux?
„Das ist im Grunde egal.“
(Lars Freisberg, SPEX, 1990)

Now, if you’ll remember, the last episode in our series showed The Cramps signing a contract with Enigma over Bela Lugosi’s grave two Halloweens ago. This gave them major label distribution and their only chart hit ever (the only fair „Bikini Girls With Machine Guns“). But Enigma folded, dumping our heroes back in the swampy indie backwaters where I guess they belong. They apparently lost their bassist, the luscious, pouting Candy Del Mar in the scuffle and replaced her with the leaner, meaner Slim Chance. Much more worrying is the absence of Nick Knox, The Cramps‘ drummer since roughly 29BC and, I am convinced, one of the undead. „Dames, Booze, Chains And Boots“ pretty much sets the tone, and demonstrates that the right concerns can be eternal. From then on, it’s every virgin for herself as Lux Interior gets persuasive … He’s the only singer alive who can actually sound cross-eyed with lust.
Above all, there is still something compelling about Lux and Ivy, the Romeo and Juliet of the trash world … Ivy, with her tinselly wig and witchy gloves, and Lux, sunken-eyed, pale as a wraith, but still with the cheekbones of a matinee idol, are supernovas. – Caren Myers, „Look Mom No Head!“ Review, 1991

Sie [Poison Ivy] und Lux Interior sind die ausgeglichensten Menschen der Welt. Eines der wichtigsten Rock ’n‘ Roll-Paare, weil gleichberechtigt und zusammenarbeitend, haben Lux und Ivy inzwischen einen gegenseitig sich verstärkenden Über-Charme entwickelt. […] Trotz aller Schwierigkeiten dieser komischen Subkultur-Karriere: 15 Jahre sind sie Könige der B-Kultur und Underdogs in der Mainstream-Kultur. Sie ziehen es vor, milde auf ihrem Terrain zu residieren, ohne zu resignieren. […] Und Ivy ist mit der gleichen Souveränität zu einem Interview mit dem führenden Gitarren-Spieler-Mag bereit wie dazu, als Sexdoll-Gummi-Kleider-Modell in „Skin Two“ zu fungieren.
Man höre sich nur diese Dinger auf „Look Mom No Head!“ an. Das sind kleine Leckereien von Songs. Petit Fours. Die durchknallen im rosa Marzipanbelag wie in „Eyeball In My Martini“ oder „Bend Over, I’ll Drive“, das Stück zum Sex im fahrenden Auto mit dem Refrain „Is this the way Jayne Mansfield died?“. – Jutta Koether, 1991

When The Cramps come over to Europe to play some gigs, they like to go shopping. Actually, they love to go shopping.
On their current world tour, to promote the latest album, ‚Stay Sick‘, they’ve been taking in a number of the more esoteric shopping experiences that Europe has to offer, including Paris‘ Scarabée d’Or bookshop, and our very own showroom in Ladbroke Grove. Sultry, flame haired lead guitarist Poison Ivy and tall, dark, ghoulishly handsome singer Lux Interior spent their time off in London stocking up on shiny black clothes and new high-heeled shoes for their outrageous stage show.
The Cramps‘ association with fetish clothing and imagery goes back a long way. (…) When they came over to the SKIN TWO showroom, we took the chance to pin them down (…)
IVY: I think I picked it up from old magazines really, just wanting to live in another world, you know, and circles I fell into.
SKIN TWO: Are you serious collectors of fetish imagery too?
LUX: We have boxes stacked up…
SKIN TWO: Who are your favourite artists, among the Stantons and the Irving Klaws of this world?
LUX: Actually we named our cat Torchy, after Torchy by Bill Ward. We have quite a bunch of his original art on our wall – from the ’50s when he was drawing real good stuff.
IVY: I think my favourite one is the Outer Space story in Bizarre. It’s about one man in outer space, who lands on a planet of women and they have a huge fight and blow up the spaceship. The final frame of it is all these high-heel shoes floating through space like satellites!
(SKIN TWO Issue No. 10)

It’s an attitude otherwise known as Ultimate Glamour, a knowing sexual charisma pre-pubescent Kylies worldwide would kill to possess.
If that enviable edge has a name, it’s Poison Ivy Rorschach. Lead killer vamp, co-founder, and probable prime mover of the band, she’s flashed out the Cramps‘ jagged strobe-lit world of sex ’n‘ horror with Looks To Die For. (…) She’s outcamped camp in the process, mercilessly subjecting sexual stereotypes to a wry sker-reem of consciousness that confuses the f**k out’ve teenage cockrockers because it’s on her terms, not theirs.
(?, 1991)

„I bumped into him at the liquor store next to the studio, and talked him into doing ‚Miniskirt Blues‘. It was a real thrill – we’ve always been big Iggy fans; we’ve got his first record ‚Mona‘ by the Iguanas, which cost us a lot of money to get, but it’s really great.“ – Lux Interior 1991

I’m kinda surprised you’re not hassled by Moral Majority groups in the States (…)
Lux: „These are the kind of people you really gotta spell things out to, blatantly mention Satan every other word. But they treat us like black music in the 50’s, something really underground that’s better left alone. In a way that’s kept us from being targets – they’re afraid of us and don’t understand what we’re talking about. It’d need half a brain, and they don’t even have that much!“ (1991)

Ivy: „I think there’s something mainly in our titles that grabs people’s attention because of what they think it may be about. But the content… It’s not sexist to say that women can be bewildering to men. Or that women can be bad … Dangerous, scary, powerful, terrifying, destructive, these are things that can be true, and that’s not sexist at all.“
They’ve also been called sexist because of the way they advertise themselves (…), with Ivy posing as a stripper outside a porn movie house on the cover of „Smell Of Female“, or „Stay Sick!“ Ivy flashes her tiara scornfully. She’s the Queen of trash glamour, and that’s the way she likes it.
„There’s different ways for people to express themselves visually. I love the way I look, I worship women, we buy a lot of these old pin-up magazines from the Fifties. There was even a culture that doesn’t exist now of strippers and showgirls who could live being just that, their pure visual physical existence was enough. That to me is like being a goddess, that’s like getting to do whatever you want. I think a totally free world for women would be to be able to do whatever you want. Freedom doesn’t mean you have to imitate men, who may be full of shit too.“
Certainly, within The Cramps, women don’t seem to be the weaker. Ivy quite obviously runs the show, producing the records, dealing with the business side. Onstage, Lux’s exhibitionism and orgasmic yelps end up making him seem more vulnerable than predatory, more „I wanna be your dog“ than „I’m gonna give you every inch of my love.“
I mean, I, uh, assume you have no whips at home.
„I wouldn’t assume anything,“ says Ivy darkly.
The Cramps, like all the best stories, is also a great romance. Was it love at first sight?
„Oh, yes!“ they chorus, glowing.
And is Ivy still the most beautiful woman in the world?
„Oh yeah,“ he beams. „And I’m more madly in love with her now than then. Every day more. It seems really natural.“
Ivy: „I think we kinda brought each other up, we’ve been together so long. We’re both romantic people, which helps. Getting together made us think of things to do, being partners in crime.“
[Caren Myers, Melody Maker, March 3 1990]

„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.“ (Lux Interior)

„This thing we call ‚Stay Sick!‘ is not so much about staying sick as staying well, when everybody else on earth is really kinda f—ed up. ‚Stay Sick!‘ to me means ‚Stay Alive!'“ (Lux Interior)

„Our world will continue when everybody else’s has fallen apart.“ (Poison Ivy)

Nicholas Barber interview, 1998

Ivy:

„We’re not married. I don’t know what you’d call what we are. We’re deeply in love and feel like we’ve been together for more than this lifetime, but we’re not aware of any particular ritual that would consecrate it in a way that makes sense to us. We sure don’t need to make it any kind of institutionalised situation. Nature upholds our bond.
There’s not anything that we deny each other. I’ll always hear somebody say, ‚Oh, I’d like to buy that but my wife would kill me‘, or vice versa, and I’m like, ‚God, what is that?‘ We don’t feel that either one of us has any right to say anything about the other’s needs. We just have to trust that person and what that person is entitled to. Fortunately, we happen to like a lot of the same things, but even if we didn’t, that shouldn’t matter. We’re both real free thinkers. We’re nice to each other. There’s all those reasons why we’re together, but I think it’s also karmic. We’re karmically entwined.

He’s easy to love. He’s someone I can get crazy with, I knew that about him right away. I thought: ‚Oh boy, what’s gonna happen now? Something exciting!‘ It’s still happening.“

Lux:

„She’s incredibly beautiful, that was the first thing I noticed. And then when I talked to her she was incredibly smart, too. We just had a bond. A week and a half, maybe two weeks later we started living together. We just couldn’t hardly stand to be away from each other. People would even tell us: ‚That’s not right, it’s not healthy, you guys shouldn’t be spending all your time together.‘ And they tell us that to this day.

It was a while on before the group actually happened. All my life I’d been to see rock ’n’roll bands, but I’d never quite been in one myself until I met her. I remember her saying, ‚Well, we should do that‘, and I’d say, ‚Well, yeah, I guess we could do that‘, and she’d go, ‚Of course we could do it!‘ I think we just talked each other into it.

This is our dream-child or something, this is something that we make and we do together, and we’re real protective of it. And we’re also appreciative of the fact that we invented this thing called The Cramps, and from that has sprung a subculture of people all over the world, and we feel we’re representative of them. We take that real seriously.

I tend to fly off the handle and go crazy and start screaming and she tends to be a bit wiser and calmer and more patient than I am – before she starts going wild, too. I think she’s a lot classier than I am, but I think I’ve gained a lot of class from her. It’s hard to figure out how we’re different because we’re together all the time and we always do everything together. In a way it’s kind of one thing, me and her, but she’s also very much an individual and very strong. She grows like a tree. She’s faceted like a diamond. There’s a million sides to Ivy and I just love all of them.“

She’s the Queen of the Psychedelic Jungle, Punkabilly Rebel, and Garage Goddess. And was The Cramps‘ leader, though the planet hardly acknowledged it.
Lux Interior might have been the face of The Cramps, the walking, screaming obscenity that grabbed all the headlines. He defined the term „unpredictable,“ writhing around like — as disciples The Gun Club once described him — „an Elvis from Hell“.
But make no mistake – Poison Ivy was the fuel that powered that engine of sonic depravity. Her guitar work was a perfect storm – the raw, snotty edge of punk fused with the raw, untamed spirit of rockabilly. It was like taking a shot of cheap whiskey and snorting a line of razor blades – pure, uncut adrenaline, filtered through thick fuzz, reverb and tremolo.
Why evolve when you’ve achieved perfection? Their phantasmic punkabilly (…) drove eight studio albums with nary a weak moment, as well as powering countless world tours. They quietly retired after stealthily playing their final gig November 4, 2006 at Tempe, Arizona’s Marquee Theater. Three years later, on February 4, 2009, Lux Interior unexpectedly passed away at Glendale Memorial Hospital due to an aortic dissection. Initial reports suggested that he had a pre-existing condition, but this was later disputed. It felt like a tall, thin, PVC-clad hole had been ripped out of the heart of the universe. We would never see the likes of The Cramps again.

Certainly, Poison Ivy Rorschach has not been seen again. Kristy Wallace laid her creation to rest alongside her lifelong soulmate Lux Interior, as Erick Lee Purkhiser’s crypt was sealed. She continues living a private life, and why not? She gave everything to rock ’n‘ roll as Poison Ivy. It’s enough. She was a goddamned revolutionary, a sonic architect who built a world where horror movie soundtracks collided with ’50s rock ’n‘ roll freakouts, and then with a burlesque show. The Cramps were the antithesis of everything that was polished and palatable in the music scene (…) Poison Ivy redefined rock ’n‘ roll guitar and left a scorch mark on the face of music history. Let her reign as the heroine she was, the phantom menace behind one of the greatest bands to emerge from the punk rock gutter. Hail Poison Ivy! God save the queen!

[Tim Napalm Stegall, Substack, May 02, 2024)

Bikini Girls With Machine Guns – Video