I was a young punk rocker when I first heard the Cramps, and yet I hated them. Their extreme retro style (heavy echo, no bass, minimalist song structure) and obsession with b-movie imagery was too much for my pop-bred tastes. Hell, the Cramps made the Ramones sound (and look) like Shaun Cassidy. Over the years I began to appreciate where they were coming from, in part because the production values of their later records were marginally more mainstream, but mainly because I discovered the true roots of their sound - unhinged 50's rockabilly and crazed 60's garage rock. So, those early Cramps records - the ones that sound like they were recorded in a gymnasium - are definitive. Gravest Hits (1979) and Psychedelic Jungle (1981) are now on one CD, and Songs The Lord Taught Us (1980) is available separately. Bad Music For Bad People (1984) is a good sampler and has some non-LP material. They really haven't cut a bad record, but my interest ends with the live Smell Of Female (1983) and A Date With Elvis (1986), which contains the priceless "Can Your Pussy Do The Dog."