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November 22, 2004
The Cramps
"We set out to become a patchwork hybrid with a life of it's own ó a rock'n'roll Bride of Frankenstein . . . " [from Liner notes to How to Make a Monster]
Monsters have always been a part of The Cramps. The album I was going to put on here was their first one 'Songs The Lord Taught Us', specifically for the song on it 'I Was A Teenage Werewolf', but I just came across this in Galaxy today and thought 'whoa, shit'!
The liner notes are interesting in that they are by Lux Interior and Poisin Ivy and they talk about the evolution and development of the band, or more specifically about their intentional development of a hybrid form beginning from a nostalgic impulse. The Cramps' songs are heavily loaded with references from rare, old, and obscure 45s and 78s from the 50s and 60s that Lux has collected.
"Nothing we do is meant to be a parody or campy joke . . . Humour and jive talk are undeniable aspects of our lives and subsequently our music, but we're deadly serious about everything we do. "
ñ This is interesting in relation to the John Spencer Blues Explosion . . . same thing? Kinda' sounds like they're taking the piss ñ but they're not. They are "deadly serious". Pastiche as a strategy with which to explore a genre, or convention.
"Our intention . . . is to continue in the bigger-than-life tradition of Howlin' Wolf and Bo Diddley, who notoriously used exaggeration to intensify the truth."
ñ Is this where the monster appears? In the exaggeration? The border between fact and fiction (the uncanny)?
"If we mention monsters, we're talking about real monsters, meaning ourselves."
Posted by Luke Wood at November 22, 2004 01:18 PM