More than two decades after leaving The Damned, drummer Rat Scabies — co-founder of that legendary punk group — this week releases his debut solo album, a 12-track set called P.H.D. (Prison, Hospital, Debt) that includes the track we’re delighted to premiere today: “Floating.”
The self-produced album is due out Friday via Cleopatra Records on CD, red or white vinyl, and in digital formats. It includes 11 original songs by Scabies, plus a cover of Louis Prima’s “Sing, Sing, Sing.”
Since leaving The Damned, Scabies — who wrote “Stab Your Back” on that band’s classic 1977 debut Damned Damned Damned — has played with a host of other musicians, and recorded other projects, but P.H.D. is his first true solo album, featuring songs written over the intervening years.
Scabies says of the record:
“Like Charlie Watts said, it’s five years work and 25 years hanging around, well during the hanging around periods I always had the itch to learn how music and recording studios worked so I would sit down and plonk on a guitar or a piano until it sounded like music, I carried on with the process over the years and eventually graduated into having my own recording studio and a bunch of songs which for one reason or another had never seen the light of day.”
Below, you can hear one of the tracks off Scabies’ new album ahead of its release: “Floating,” a rhythmic, multi-instrumental sound collage that incorporates audio samples and other effects.
Check it out:
PREVIOUSLY ON SLICING UP EYEBALLS
- The Damned return with 1st new album in a decade — hear ‘Standing on the Edge of Tomorrow’
- The Damned headed into the studio with Tony Visconti as bassist Paul Gray rejoins band
- Video: The Damned rehearses 1980’s ‘Black Album’ for this fall’s 35th anniversary tour
- Damned playing ‘Damned Damned Damned,’ ‘Black Album’ on 35th anniversary tour
