Originally planned for 1985 to join in the onslaught of Elvisʼs 50th Anniversary commemorative reissues, A Date With Elvis came out in early 1986 in Europe only, where it went on to sell more than 200,000 copies. The only album featuring The Cramps as a three-piece band (Poison Ivy doubled on bass), it careens from the sociopathic advice of “People Ainʼt No Good” (later covered by Nick Cave) to mind-on-vacation odes like “Aloha From Hell” and “Kizmiaz” (where The Cramps prove they were exotic when exotic wasnʼt cool), in the process offing more P.T.P. than you can shake a snake at and fittingly finishing off with a soulful lovesick cover of the Charlie Feathers’s “Itʼs Just That Song.” “Can Your Pussy Do The Dog” was voted single of the year for 1986 in Playboyʼs annual music issue!

Continuing in the tortured tradition of stark rockabilly ballads, three of the bonus tracks—“Blue Moon Baby,” “Georgia Lee Brown” and Andy Starrʼs frighteningly horny “Give Me A Woman”—were originally available only as rare B-sides. “Get Off the Road” (theme song from the Herschell Gordon Lewis Z-movie She-Devils on Wheels) was the only time Ivy (publicly) sang a song to satisfy Lux Interiorʼs fetish request (what did he have to do in return?) and in an attempt to create a realistic sound effect, one of their biker pals almost turned a peel-out on his Harley into a wipe-out in the studio parking lot.