Wednesday, February 04, 2009

Elvis F**king Christ Has Left the Building

I'm utterly baffled by the news that Lux Interior, lead singer of the Cramps, has died. This is inconceivable to me. I understand that people are mortal. I can accept the passing of Joey Ramone, Joe Strummer, and millions of others who have gone before their time or well past their sell by date. But Lux struck me as, well, inhuman. He regularly produced gallons of sweat while performing, without any evidence of dehydration. (John Doe still earns my nomination for sweatiest man in rock, though, because he does it in natural fibers while Lux favored sweat-causing synthetics.) More impressively, he threw up on the stage in the middle of performance at the Reading Festival in 1991, understatedly announced, "I feel much better" and just kept on singing. If nothing else, I thought that level of commitment would keep him going forever, but he had a preexisting heart condition.

I'm currently consoling myself listening to Tim Napalm's tribute on Woody Radio, but I'll need to fire up Fiends from Dope Island tomorrow if Tim doesn't get to it before I fall asleep, just to hear "Elvis Fucking Christ."