The Return of The Damned

Rip It Up, Issue 116, 1 March 1987, Page 12

The Return of The Damned

The cancellation of China Crisis’ planned appearance at Palmerston North’s Rheineck rock festival this month could have left the organisers in a nasty spot. But fortunately the Damned have stepped in to

headline the show, as well as playing one night at Auckland’s Galaxy.

The Damned haven’t played many festivals, but drummer Rat Scabies is looking forward to this one: “The good thing about doing festivals is that you get to see lots of other groups perform. We’ve just done a tour of Europe and there wasn’t any support bands as such and you get a bit of a taste for seeing other bands performing and seeing what’s going on. Especially it’ll be good cos in Europe you don’t get to hear much about bands in New Zealand.” One act he looks forward to seeing again is Australian band The Johnnys. “A swell bunch of guys. We

met them the last time we were in the Antipodes, they’re really good fun."

The Damned have just released their seventh album Anything and this year marks their tenth in the business. How do they explain the fact that a band born out of punk has far outlived its era?

“We never made lots of money so there’s always been that reason to carry on. Plus if we’d have stopped, all the critics, and the cynics and the people who said ‘Oh the Damned are just a joke band, they’ll never last’ would have been proved right. But also we never really saw a reason to stop. We were always busy having a good time and still are. As soon as it becomes boring, then we’ll give it up.” Last year’s rash of “ten years on” punk retrospectives had good reason to include the Damned, who were after all, the first punk band to record. Did looking back on those days engender any sort of nostalgic pride?

"In some ways. But what it really meant was that you used to end up having really long conversations at parties with people that didn’t really know what it was all about. So you used to have to spend a lot of time explaining that it wasn’t just people being sick at airports and making a noise, it was actually constructive.”

And what does someone who was there think of the controversial Sid and Nancy?

“I didn’t even bother to go and see it. I thought it was a cheap shot personally. But that’s what you’ve got to expect I suppose. People will always glorify a couple of junkies.” Then, the Damned’s stage act was known for its fast, furious and theatric pace. While the theatrics may remain, the pace had definitely slowed down when they performed here last year, so what can audiences expect this time round?

"We do as much as we can of everything. It’s a bit difficult when you’ve got 10 years behind you, there’s a lot of songs obviously that a lot of people want to hear, so you kind of pick and mix. We just tend to pick the songs that we enjoy playing the most rather than the crowd pleasers.” How did the Damned get on the latest Miami Vice soundtrack album?

“I dunno, somebody that puts the music together for Miami Vice likes the band, cos they’ve used two tracks for the show. I’m really quite pleased about it cos I think people should hear our records cos I think they’re good records, even if it is played at the back of Miami Vice" Play and be Damned, huh? Babs Baker