A previously unknown and undocumented Cramps silkscreen print made in 1980 by artist Cindy Marsh, who created the highly collectible Songs The Lord Taught Us IRS Records promotional poster.

This is not the poster, but instead one of 25 signed and numbered fine art silkscreen prints Marsh made at the same time.  Her use of gold metallic ink and the split fountain printing technique make this far brighter and much more impressive than the poster.

As Marsh details in her accompanying letter of authenticity:

IRS Records originally hired me to create a promotional poster for the band’s 1980 debut album Songs The Lord Taught Us. Then I got a last-minute call from IRS, asking if I could make them 500 silkscreen prints of the artwork over the weekend, with white space at the bottom where tour dates could be added. I remember being paid very little—something like $800 for the whole job. Apparently, all of this work was for nothing, as I understand none of these prints with tour dates have ever surfaced.

As the overworked/underpaid artist, I pulled an extra edition of 25 copies to give friends / record executives / art directors. I recall at the time the band had gotten some questionable press, so I never did anything with these, or the few artists proofs I made.

This is one of these prints, which I have kept since 1980.

As we could find no information about this print, we contacted major Cramps collectors and co-founders of The Cramps Inc. Henry Rollins and Larry Hardy, of In the Red Records.

Neither knew anything about it, though Hardy had heard about two copies from the edition of 500 surfacing circa 1980 at a Southern California record store–though we know of no others that have emerged in the 46 years since.  They noted that Lux and Ivy’s own extensive poster collection didn’t include a copy.  We were happy to place the first examples of this rare print in Henry and Larry’s collections.

Our collective best guess is that The Cramps, who even then had a very specific image they wanted to project, weren’t fans of the artwork, and IRS junked the prints.

These are split-fountain prints, meaning no two are identical*

This example is numbered  II  15/25, dated 1980 and signed in pencil by Cindy Marsh  (her roman numeral II indicates this was part of her edition, made immediately after the 500 unused ones.)

17 ½” x 22 ½”. In Mint condition.

Accompanied by a copy of Cindy Marsh’s letter of authenticity and Recordmecca’s written lifetime guarantee of authenticity.

* Split fountain is a screenprinting technique where two or more ink colors are loaded into the same squeegee pass at once, rather than pulled separately — the colors blend and bleed into one another across the sheet, producing the soft, hand-blended gradient rather than a flat, single-color field.