Years fly by, hairstyles change, whatever passes for the latest offshoot of "punk" comes and goes, and the Vibrators pretty much stay the same. The original punk warriors first came together in 1976 and have been going pretty much continuously since then, save for a little break back in '82. Of course, in the ensuing three-and-a-half decades, there has been a byzantine series of lineup changes.
The Vibrators' backbone through it all, though, has been Ian "Knox" Carnarchan, the band's singer and guitarist. This past September, he turned the official U.S. retirement age, but he still charges along putting the youngsters to shame. When he's not busy painting placid oil landscapes or cubist pastels on paper, he's taking his band on the road.
And while the punk crew has a number of classic staples from early albums like 1977's Pure Mania or 1978's V2, the set list itself is always unpredictable. Rather than play behind the moldy oldies, the Vibes have continued to record studio albums at a regular clip; the 19th, Under the Radar, came out last year. The hopeless romantic recessed in your cold punk heart shouldn't fret, though. The band's most famous song, the almost-syrupy garage-rock ballad "Baby, Baby," is a requisite selection at every performance.
