Night of the Living Cramps

This entry was posted on Monday, October 18th, 2004 by Josh

The Cramps/Gore Gore Girls @ Irving Plaza, NYC: October 18, 2004

“If you follow the Cramps, you’ll end up in jail. It’s not so bad”

On October 17 + 18, rockabilly stalwarts The Cramps returned home to New York City for a two day stint at the Irving Plaza. The staff of www.lifeinabungalo.com was there, and our collective lives will never be the same. Due to the city of New York’s construction plans, we were stuck in traffic for two hours, causing us to miss the first opening act. Luckily, we arrived just in time to see the Gore Gore Girls. Their gimmick was that they dressed in 1960’s go-go boots and white patent leather dresses. They were damn good to look at. Listening to them was another problem. They seemed to play good 60’s fuzzy garage rock, but I can’t honestly say that because the sound was so bad, it just sounded like a blender.

Luckily, all sound issues were resolved by the time The Cramps took stage. Their set was packed with tons of Cramps originals, but they threw in a bunch of 50’s covers for fun. I’ve gotta say, hearing them cover Ricky Nelson’s “Lonesome Town” was the highlight of the night for me. The band was solid. Poison Ivy nailed every note without showing the slightest sign of effort. The closest thing she came to emotion was when she cracked a smile while using the heel of her shoe as a slide. Lux Interior was all over the place. He was crawling on the stage, jumping on the speaker stacks and sometimes just making small talk with the fans in the front. This guy is 58 and had more energy and charisma than a lot of frontmen half his age.

During the course of the show he managed to break (but still use) two microphone stands. He ranted like a schizophrenic between songs. He led into “TV Set” was to read to the crowd all the TV shows they were missing by coming to the show. He tried to convince an audience member that it was a good idea to steal the sound man’s “stereo ipod” but unfortunately, that plan never came to fruition. The whole band was great, but the unsung hero of the band was bass player Scott “Chopper” Franklin. With his pinup girl tattoos and leather vest, he looked the part perfectly. But his bass playing was just amazing. He played that thing like it was a guitar, playing chords, and using an array of fuzz pedals. I didn’t get to hear “Bop Pills” or “Bikini Girls with Machine Guns”, but I didn’t miss them one bit during their whole two-hour show.

The Cramps have been playing together since 1976 and show no signs of stopping. Next time they come around to your neck of the woods, check them out.

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