The Cramps - Bad Music for Bad People

By 1984 The Cramps had already spent the better part of a decade dragging rockabilly, B-movie horror and pure sleaze into the same shallow grave. Bad Music for Bad People is I.R.S. Records' summing-up of that first run, an eleven-track compilation pulling from the band's earliest singles and albums into what is arguably the best single-disc entry point anyone has ever assembled for them.

It opens with "Garbageman" and never lets the temperature drop. "Human Fly" buzzes and leers, "Goo Goo Muck" struts through the single mix that a certain Netflix dance sequence would turn into a generational obsession four decades later, "TV Set" is still one of the great pieces of American gothic ever set to a surf guitar, and "Drug Train" and "New Kind of Kick" tear through the back half with Lux Interior howling like a man possessed by every drive-in he ever snuck into.

Stephen Blickenstaff's cover art — that green-and-yellow leering skull creature — is as iconic as anything inside, a piece of imagery that has been screen-printed onto more jackets and t-shirts than most bands manage in a career. If you own one Cramps record, this is usually the one.

This is the current Capitol / I.R.S. reissue, remastered and distributed by UMe. A perfect starting point and a permanent psychobilly essential.