The Cramps_._A Date With Elvis (1986)(Full Album) February 4, 2009, Glendale, California. This is where Elvis dies for the second time, his heart burned out from too much rock 'n' roll. Lux Interior dies, and with him, all the concept of cannibal rock 'n' roll, far from the glittery iconography of the 50s bad boys and instead populated by pornography, necrophilic obsessions, vulgar pin-ups, and B-grade music. I like to imagine him surrounded by the loving attention of the corpses of serial killers and motel whores whose torments he sang about for thirty long years. But it’s a distorted image, refusing to bend to the pain of losing one of the last true rock 'n' roll heroes who stomped a stage and still feeds on that apologia of bad taste that the Cramps championed. In reality, we don’t know what’s on the other side, crossing the threshold of the afterlife. And everyone is free to find whatever they want there: Buddha with his collection of chill-out records, Beelzebub having fun with the spirits of porn stars, Vishnu pissing in the milk of Adissescien, or Paolo Bonolis sipping his coffee while debating the Festival with Saint Peter. What is certain is that we will stop checking for updates on the Cramps' website, in desperate hope of yet another act of madness to be consumed under a stage or in those moments of extravagant, intimate, domestic madness that we experience in our home, when we indulge in the illusion that life can take the form of Poison Ivy and that we will die in a coffin shaped like a guitar, as they carry our casket through the old alleys of the city, accompanied by a procession of zombies dancing the twist on those porous bones like latex foam.
What remains, then, are the records. Or rather, something more, if it can console us: not just the records but The Records of the Cramps. They stand in a category all their own. The Cramps that brought everyone together: garagers, rockers, darks, rockabillies. The Cramps that caused disagreement among everyone: purists, Catholics, moralists, do-gooders, censors, sophists, fundamentalists, orthodox, animal rights activists, and fans of the Police.
I like to think that Lux descended (or ascended, depending on the elevator he uses, NdLYS) to shake Elvis's hand. To celebrate A Date with Elvis, the greatest rock 'n' roll record ever conceived by the human mind. An album that opens with a vibrato that shakes the earth like an earthquake of unrestrained lust and closes with the languid cover of It’s Just That Song by Charlie Feathers. Between the two is the usual bacchanal of Cramps-themed obscenities rich in references to old bad songs from the 50s.
… to be continued - The Reverend