De-Lux

Lux Interior, co-founder and lead singer of the pioneering horror-punk band the Cramps, has died from a pre-existing heart condition. He was 60.

Interior — originally Erick Lee Purkhiser — met his future wife Kristy Wallace — who would later take the stage name Poison Ivy — in Sacramento in 1972. The pair moved to New York and started the Cramps with Interior on lead vocals and Ivy on guitar. The group was a part of the late `70s early punk scene centered at Manhattan clubs like CBGB, alongside acts like the Ramones and Patti Smith. Their unmistakable sound was a lo-fi synthesis of rockabilly and surf guitar staged with a deviant dose of midnight-movie camp. The Cramps are often acknowledged as one of the originators of "psychobilly" music.

The pale, tall, gaunt Interior appeared shirtless with black hair and tiny, low-slung black pants, looking part zombie, part Elvis Presley as he crawled, writhed and howled his way across the stage. The group had the raw intensity of punk, but took the music in new directions by incorporating theatrical elements, which were often horror-themed. The band made a notorious appearance at the Napa State Hospital in 1978, a punk-era echo of the Folsom Prison concert by Johnny Cash.

Interior was widely rumored in 1987 to have died from a heroin overdose, and his wife received flowers and funeral wreaths. "At first I thought it was kind of funny," he said. "But then it started to give me a creepy feeling." The Cramps' lineup changed often through the decades but Interior and Ivy remained the center. Their bluesy, trebly sound — the group didn't have a bass guitarist — resonates in modern minimalist groups like the White Stripes and the Black Lips.