Interview
Interview
Stage Times: The Damned
Supporting the Sex Pistols, playing in a crypt, and recruiting Lemmy: The Damned’s Rat Scabies talks us through the gigs that made the band
A snotty disposition, pigheadedness, boundless self-belief and a penchant for profanity are the kinds of characteristics you’d typically associate with the anarchic punk rock bands of yesteryear. Needless to say, they’re also attributes that often make for difficult interpersonal relationships in bands – bands that frequently, and swiftly, combust.
One band of anarchists that know all about implosion are punk rock progenitors The Damned. Throughout their near-fifty year tenure, the band have welcomed a total of 20 official players – without mentioning touring members – in a revolving door policy where only singer Dave Vanian has remained in the band amid various bust-ups. Nowadays, hatchets have been firmly buried, with the classic 80s line-up reuniting for the first time since 1989. Vanian, guitarist Captain Sensible, and bassist Paul Gray announced that founding drummer Rat Scabies would rejoin the group on a permanent basis ahead of a North American tour earlier this year, in what many long-standing fans of theirs believe to be the definitive line-up.
So far so good: as it stands, The Damned have lasted longer than their notorious one-gig reunion in 1984, when this very line-up got back together for a performance of ‘Nasty’ on countercultural cult comedy The Young Ones, before disbanding on sour terms once again. Speaking to the mischievous, pyromaniacal Scabies over the phone from his home in West London, he was quick to debunk that line-ups’ short-lived stint however. “There’s a story that’s been floating around online that’s wildly inaccurate about that whole thing. Basically, we did the show. We just sort of got together, then did the Naz Nomad and The Nightmares record after that. But, yeah, I don’t remember it too well.”
After all, being in a punk rock band must be quite the blur. The ego clashes, the excess, and the media outrage was all part and parcel of being an essential cog in London’s early punk scene. But The Damned were one of the originals that stuck around, and whose music has played a major part in influencing everything from the birth of goth rock to West Coast hardcore. Scabies promised that the upcoming shows will be just as riotous: “They wouldn’t be worth doing otherwise.”
As the history-making punks prepare to tour once again in the UK – including two homecoming shows at London’s Roundhouse, a significant venue in The Damned’s career – Rat Scabies talked us through the gigs that made the band.
The gig that made you want to become a musician
I always wanted to be a drummer. It wasn’t like I needed pushing in that direction. But the first, most influential gig I went to was Dr. Feelgood at the Marquee Club. They were totally different. I did go and see other bands. Now I come to think of it, seeing Family play at the Lyceum [Theatre], and Caravan. Family were a big wake up for me. I suppose, the Isle of Wight Festival too when [Jimi] Hendrix played in 1970. I was there, about 25 rows from the front when The Who were playing, and Miles Davis, Tiny Tim. I just got there in time for when Emerson, Lake & Palmer were firing their cannons. I didn’t actually see them, I was just wandering around whilst these cannons were going off.
Did you pay for a ticket?
Yeah! I found it quite interesting on a style level actually, the French anarchists pulling down the fences. They weren’t hippies. They all wore leather jackets, Ray-Bans, drain pipes and winkle pickers. I realised much later on that they were a much bigger fashion influence than we maybe give them credit for. But yeah, I was there for Hendrix.
The first
When we supported the Sex Pistols at the 100 Club. 6 July, 1976. Everybody thinks that a few punk bands formed then took the world by storm. But it wasn’t like that at all. That gig was really quite empty. There weren’t a lot of people. It hadn’t really started, the punk thing. There was the Bromley Contingent and a few others. I mostly remember the 100 Club being empty. But that didn’t matter. It’s your first gig, and out of that gig it taught us that it didn’t matter how big the audience was, what really mattered was to have fun with it and enjoy playing. Making it work. That’s basically always been the essence of, well, whatever a Damned show is. It’s very difficult to choreograph!
Do you remember everything kicking off after the release of ‘New Rose’?
Gradually, yeah. It was the younger generation that picked up on it. The younger brothers that didn’t like Emerson, Lake & Palmer very much, or their siblings’ record collection. They had something of their own. One of the most influential gigs we did was at the Roundhouse. It’s an iconic building anyway, and just to be playing there – you only wish you can when you’re watching a band, then you’re up there yourself. We did a few shows there that were great for The Damned. In ’76, we opened up the bill with The Troggs and The Pirates, or something. Then we did it again three months later – which shows you how quickly things change – where we headlined with Mötörhead and The Adverts opening.
Was it around that time you managed to convince Lemmy to play with the band for ‘The Doomed’ shows?
Not really. But we knew who Lemmy was because we used to drink in the same pub in Portobello Road. Though we daren’t talk to him or anything. Because he cited MC5 it made him very cool. Nobody really knew about MC5 – I only knew one song until I met Brian James. He wasn’t really a hippie. The best bands, I thought, were the ones riding on the hippie coattails when punk broke. But Lemmy wasn’t that at all. We got to know him eventually, and plucked up the courage to talk to him. It turned out we had quite a lot in common. We got to become quite good friends.
The smallest
Photo by Erica Echenberg/Redferns
The Hope & Anchor. That was in Islington. The Roxy wasn’t very big either. It was about the same size. They were small. They were ’76, ’77, after ‘New Rose’ came out and people were coming to see us. Not everyone was a punk, but there was a lot of curiosity. I remember those shows at the Hope & Anchor and The Roxy as being incredibly sweaty. Airless, underground boxes. The quintessential punk shows, I guess.
The biggest
Our biggest headline set must’ve been at the Milton Keynes Bowl for Amnesty International [Festival Of Youth] in 1988, with Big Audio Dynamite. I remember it very, very well because the audience was great. They all lit fires, it was like a medieval camp in there. But Joey Ramone came up with us, and we did a Ramones song. I was a big fan of his. It was a great day. I don’t know if it’s the biggest one we’ve played, but Milton Keynes Bowl always sticks out.
The weirdest
In the 80s, it was in France when we were touring. I can’t remember exactly where it was, and I’m kind of relieved to be honest. It was down in this church crypt. It was one of the strangest gigs I’ve ever played. Everything we did or everything we normally played, felt totally out of sync. Which is a strange way of putting it. But it was different, and wrong. We played a good show, we didn’t mess up the songs. It was like watching another band playing us, but being in the other band? An out of body experience. But not as much fun as that. More like we’d been taken over by four AI clones. That was kind of how it felt. We never played there again.
The worst
A memory of the worst gig? God no. The early days were hectic. It quite often kicked off. One of the worst ones was when there was this riot, and someone turned on the fire hose, which they used to have in old buildings. It was mayhem – there were fights, no security, all the lights were on, all the gear was getting absolutely f*cked because of the water. Then we got off stage, and four police officers were drinking our rider. They came to arrest us for an incident the night before. Then they arrested us. Throwing my mind back, none of the band were actually involved. It was our tour manager. When we got to the hotel after the show they wouldn’t let him in because he kicked a door in. It wasn’t a major drama, but there was an anti-punk rock campaign at that time.
Did you face a lot of pressure from the police in those days?
Yeah, they made a point of letting us know that we’d never be able to book a hotel in that area ever again, or if we played there again they’d make life difficult. I’m not going to say where it was, as we’ll inevitably have to go back there soon.
The best
This is always the most difficult question to answer… We’ve done some amazing shows at some amazing places. Glasgow Apollo first comes to mind though. It must’ve been the Strawberries line-up. I just remember we played and the place was heaving. Everyone was up for having a good time. The audience was kind of one big happy… thing. I remember doing our song ‘Looking At You’, and we’d always take it down real quiet in the middle part. Bit of drama and all that stuff. Every night you’d get someone shouting “go on, fookin’ get on with it”, because, there will always be one of those. But this particular night in Glasgow Apollo, the band and the audience were so in tune. There wasn’t a sound. Dave [Vanian] brought it down to complete silence, everyone was in it. That makes it one of my greatest gigs. Well, that’s the one I remember the best.
The Damned start their UK tour on 4 December. Find tickets here
