THE DAMNED
Captain Sensible bass, Rat Scabies drums, Dave Vanian vocals and Brian James guitar
THE DAMNED RECOMMENDED LISTENING
DAMNED DAMNED DAMNED (1977)
The first album. No fillers, only great songs on this one. This is the line-up pictured above. Play it at your sister.
MUSIC FOR PLEASURE (1977)
I actually like this album, or most of it anyway, but the band and a lot of fans don't. Check it out. Could have had a better production.
MACHINE GUN ETIQUETTE (1979)
The first LP with the Captain on guitar. There's the odd filler track but the rest is great. Probably the one I play the most.
THE BLACK ALBUM (1980)
DLP. The instant hits on this one are included on The Best Of but there's a lot more as well even if it's a bit uneven. Reissued without Curtain Call and the poorly mixed Side D live songs on a single album in 1982.
THE BEST OF THE DAMNED (1981)
The obvious choise if you're only gonna buy one album. But once you get it you'll want more.
FRIDAY THE 13TH EP (1981)
A 7'' (and a rarer 12'') with 4 tracks. I used to play this a lot so I included it here. Think I'll give it a spin now.
STRAWBERRIES (1982)
Kinda poppy. A few great songs like Stranger On The Town and Ignite. Find an original and you'll get the strawberry smelling lyric sheet.
LIVE AT SHEPERTON 1980 (1982)
There's lots of Damned live albums - this one is the best. Fast versions of all the hits with a great sound quality. Up there with No Sleep 'Till Hammersmith and It's Alive.
NOT THE CAPTAINS BIRTHDAY (1986)
First released as The Captains Birthday (with one less song) but it isn't. Good live recording of the 1977 line-up when it included Lu Edmunds, who's not mentioned on the cover.
LIVE AT THE LYCEUM 1981 (1987)
Not as good as Sheperton but Captain has his moments on this one. Great big tits.

Most of the above albums have been reissued several times and are available on CD and MC too.
There's a 1987 DLP Light At The End Of The Tunnel that includes most of The Best Of, some rare re-mixes and a few good 80's songs but too much of their gothic MCA crap. Then there's The Long lost Weekend, Damned But Not Forgotten and several Peel sessions with demos, unreleased studio recordings and rare tracks. One of their many ''last'' shows was released in 1988 on the album Final Damnation (also available on Video). You'll find additional greatest hits and singles collection CDs.
There's lots of bootlegs and a few hundred singles but for a complete listing check out these sites:

The Official Damned Site
Totally Damned
The Eighth Day
Second Time Around
The Limit Club
Discography

The Damned were an original band of individuals for years and years, then the Captain left and someone decided that they would sell more records if they were all Dave Vanians and played goff. That was successful for about 10 minutes then they died, reunited, changed line-ups and did only the good stuff live since only the punk fans were loyal enough to go and see them. Their new one - Grave Disorder - is selling very well in the US, so at the moment they're not doing much of the old songs live. The Damned are a bunch of bastards and should be shot but here I am singing their praise.

The picture above was taken from the highly recommended official biography
- The Light At The End Of The Tunnel (1987) by Carol Clerk -

GO TO DAMNED GRAVE DISORDER CD REVIEWS
The Damned - Grave Disorder CD review
GO TO RAT SCABIES INTERVIEW

GO TO INDEX OF REVIEWS

 GO BACK TO SUMMER OF HATE  INDEX PAGE GO TO ANARCHY IN SWEDEN SEX PISTOLS INDEX PAGE