Review: The Undead

The Undead
“First, Worst & Cursed”
(Dionysus)

This is not the punk group that featured one-time Misfit Bobby Steele. This punk group sports the same B-movie styled punk with a greater sense of humor and preceded the later Steele ensemble by a decade. The group began releasing singles in 1977 and this compendium draws from the prolific period. Past of the Masque scene, this album is not only interesting as the groups earliest material, but as a window into the one of the manifold faces of West Coast punk during the fertile period of the late ’70s when such varied and dedicated groups sprouted up. The thin recordings roll past in short songs of varying levels but each horror-schlock ditty is simple, catchy and stylized to fit the quartet of Sid Terror, Bond Cobby, Elmer Dud and Joe Dirt.