In 1977, The Cramps were on the lookout for a new drummer. With guitarist Poison Ivy wrkingv as an in-demand dominatrix, the task of interviewing prospective candidates - not that the band were overwhelmed with interest in the vacancy - fell to frontman Lux Interior and guitarist Bryan Gregory, who met with fellow Ohio transplant Nick Knox (aka Nick Stephanoff) at a New York restaurant on the recommendation of a friend. Knox barely spoke a word during this interview, focussing instead upon shovelling slice after slice of a dessert pie topped with scoops of ice cream down his neck.
Thoroughly weirded out by the guy, both Cramps members decided that opportunity would not knock for Knox, but agreed to tell the drummer that he had failed to land an audition for the group only because his hair was too long. Later that same day, Lux ran into the drummer at legendary New York nightspot Max's Kansas City, and noticed that Knox had cut his hair. "Now will you give me an audition?" he asked. Impressed by this dedication to the cause, the singer told Knox he could try out for the band.
"Good," the drummer answered, "because if you said, No, I was gonna punch your face in."
This story is included here to illustrate the fact that The Cramps were never like other bands.
"We thought of ourselves as pretty dangerous," Poison Ivy told MOJO magazine in 2003. "And here's this guy who's not really like us, but he was enough of a misfit to totally fit into this band of misfits."
