Thurs. Oct. 20 

The Damned, forever led by singer Dave Vanian and guitarist Captain Sensible  (in photo), were the first English punk band to make it to record: In 1976 they released the double-A side “Neat Neat Neat” / “New Rose.” A volatile group – they used to scam opening gigs at shows by telling promoters they played folk, or heavy rock, anything but punk – they’ve gone through numerous players over the years. Styles, too: Goth, Pyschedelic, garage rock, even pseudo-cabaret.  Now it's the 35 anniversary tour ... They're at the Middle East Downstairs Thursday Oct. 20. They'll be playing their two best known albums, their thrashing debut, "Damned Damned Damned" and their neo-psychedelic "The Black Album."

    I've  talked to Sensible several times over the years. We exchanged e-mails this summer. I aksed what they were up to. "I believe Mr Vanian is on his summer holiday," emailed the Captain. "and I will be away camping for a week or so too. It all sounds frightfully civilised doesn't it..... the Damned off on vacation, etc. I suppose we should really be getting up to no good like the bad old days? I'll see what I can manage though - maybe when I get to the caravan park I'll attempt to steal a choc ice or something."Once, at the Channel, after the show – somewhere in the ‘80s – I asked him about the Damned’s longevity, implying it was sort of amazing. “What else can I do?” he responded. “Clean toilets?” I asked him about that quote and found out, well, that is what he did pre-Damned (along with playing in the band Johnny Moped and an Oasis, not the one you know).

     “Heh, heh,” Sensible laughed, when it's recalled. “I have no talents whatsoever. The funny thing was I worked for the local council cleaning 14 toilets a day and when I left to join the Damned, they said they’d hold the job open for me if it ever fell through, which was pretty nice of them. I must have been pretty good at my job. We were in a big concert hall, local council’s own place. It had three floors, ten toilets out front and four backstage. When the show’s on in the evening, they’re not being used, so you finish by ten o’clock and practice guitar for the rest of the day. So practice doesn’t necessarily make perfect in my case, but it helped.”

I do critic's tips for WBUR's Radio Boston show every three weeks. Here's the recent one. Yes, the Damned gig is done, but the other tips are pertinent.

http://www.wbur.org/media-player?source=radioboston&url=http://radioboston.wbur.org/2011/10/20/weekend-arts-picks-8/&title=Weekend+Arts+Picks%3A+Pompeii+and+Punk&segment=weekend-arts-picks-8&pubdate=2011-10-20

Mon. Oct. 17

 Listen to Blue October's "Foiled," CD and you'll hear "Into the Ocean," with singer Justin Furstenfeld looking forward to a walk into the ocean as a solution. Look up Blue October on the allmusic.com site and you'll find their moods listed as "angst-ridden," "tense/anxious" and "wintry," among others. Ask drummer Jeremy Furstenfeld about the sound and ethos of the Texas quintet - which plays House of Blues Monday Oct. 17 - and he says, "I think to a lot of people some songs are deep and sad and more honest than they should be. Some people think we're sad guys who like to sing about sad stuff all the time, and it's definitely not true. But it's cool to sing this way. You have a drug adddicton or you wrestle with mental illneses, we're trying to make it where somebody can talk about it. Justin puts it out there. He uses that term 'open book' - one of his lines is 'I'm an open book' - and sometimes we go, 'Hey dude, sure you wanna talk about that?' You're kind of tearing us up a little bit."
   Well, there is a lot of self-recrimination and there's a lot of pain amidst the sound, which can be infused with a certain grandeur. "Justin has his way of dealing with stuff," his brother Jeremy continues. "He paints. The music is therapy and the crowd is therapy and talking to people is therapy. Whatever anxiety we're dealing with isn't as bad. We're just normal people. We started from nothing and learned to deal with problems."

Monday Oct. 17

 Kim Kardashian. Ashley Judd. Snooki. Keith Richards. Star Jones. Writers all. The world is awash with celebrities and their memoirs.
    And these are the books that provide grist for the comic mill of the award-winning performance series “Celebrity Autobiography.”
     The ever-evolving 90-minute show, created by Eugene Packcq and co-developed with his wife Dayle Reyfel, began in Los Angeles in 1998, and has been at the Triad Theatre off-Broadway for more than three years. “Celebrity Autobiography,” which has traveled to more than 30 cities, makes its Boston debut Monday Oct. 17 at the Lyric Stage.
     Six actors  – the star being former “Saturday Night Live” comic Rachel Dratch - will tackle about a dozen celebrity vignettes. Pack and Reyfel, actors as well, will join Lyric Stage regulars Larry Coen, Kathy St. George and Timothy John Smith. They’ll read directly from the texts as written. They’re not doing impersonations, but interpretations. Pack and Reyfel will choose the passages to be read. 
    “The ones they pick are usually ones where the author has taken themselves way too seriously,” said Dratch, on the phone from New York. “It’s the theme that runs throughout that makes it so funny.”
   Deep thoughts that, perhaps, aren’t so deep.

Sat. Oct. 15 

 Suicide. It's a lot of things, including the moniker taken by one of my favorite avant-rock bands, a duo consisting of Alan Vega and Martin Rev. I asked Vega about the name choice once and he said it was anything but negative - by raising the spectre of suicide and choosing to carry on day after day you're making a positive choice. But suicide has touched us all. There was Randy Kwasniewski, the CEO of the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas. Shot himself in the head.  There was internationally known fashion designer Alexander McQueen. COD, undetermined. There was Marie Osmond's son, Michael Blosil, a jumper.There was the brilliant writer David Foster Wallace who hanged himself, at 46. And his name goes up on the grim wall with Hemingway, Plath and Hunter S. Thompson. In my rock world, the biggest loss was Joy Division singer Ian Curtis, the subject of last year's biopic "Control." Curtis, not yet 23, took his life in 1980. Joy Division's music - sad, gorgeous, gnashing - has stood the test of time. The Killers are the latest band to cover Joy Division. A lot of the latest new wave bands, like Interpol, owe a debt. Bono was proud to call Curtis a friend and called him the best front man in rock 'n' roll. U2 wrote "A Day Without Me" about him.