Not Like Everybody Else

As much as they were key instigators of punk’s year-zero ethos, The Damned were never shy about paying respects to their ’60s forebears—after all, the band’s epochal 1976 single “New Rose” featured a cover of The Beatles’ “Help!” on the B-side. In that same spirit, surviving members Dave Vanian, Captain Sensible and Rat Scabies are celebrating The Damned’s 50th anniversary—and commemorating the 2025 death of founding guitarist Brian James—by revisiting the records that first inspired them to form the band. <i>Not Like Everybody Else</i> sees these ever-vital veterans running roughshod over familiar garage-rock classics by The Creation (“Making Time”) and the Stones (“The Last Time”). But it’s also a testament to The Damned’s long-standing refusal to be boxed in: It’s hard to imagine another first-wave punk group reverentially embracing The Lovin’ Spoonful’s hippy-dippy anthem “Summer in the City”, while a cinematic, keyboard-smeared rendition of The Stooges’ “Gimme Danger” showcases the melodramatic theatricality that made Vanian a goth icon.