The Damned Give The Lovin' Spoonful's 'Summer in the City' A Punk Makeover

Official Announcement | Published: Jan 17, 2026 11:39 AM EST

(HGM) With the final single from their forthcoming covers album, punk legends The Damned deliver a gritty and soulful reinterpretation of The Lovin' Spoonful's classic "Summer in the City". With driving guitars and raw, energetic delivery, the cover heightens the song's urban edge and captures the heat and restless pulse of city life through a distinctly Damned lens.

The Damned's new covers album, NOT LIKE EVERYBODY ELSE, is dedicated to the memory of Brian James, the band's founding guitarist, who passed away in 2025. The album is out next week on January 23rd via earMUSIC, distributed by BFD/The Orchard in North America. Every song on the album has been carefully curated by the band and is a tribute to their late guitarist and his influences. The offering was recorded in a blistering five days of emotion and creative fire at Revolver Studio in Los Angeles.

NOT LIKE EVERYBODY ELSE finds The Damned - Dave Vanian on vocals, Captain Sensible on guitar, Rat Scabies on drums, Paul Gray on bass and joined by longtime keyboardist Monty Oxymoron - reconnecting with the raw energy that started it all. The album marks the first time in 40 years that Rat Scabies has returned to the studio with the band.

In other news, 2026 marks 50 years of The Damned. 50 years of The Damned also means 50 years of punk, with the 1976 explosion hitting a half century ago. The band jump-started the revolution, releasing the first UK punk single, "New Rose," and album, DAMNED DAMNED DAMNED. Brian James wrote that debut single and was lead songwriter on the album. He left the group after the release of their second album, MUSIC FOR PLEASURE, in 1977.

Ground-breaking rock band The Damned exploded on to the British music scene more than forty-five years ago. Following their formation in 1976, The Damned became the first UK band in the punk rock genre to release a single ("New Rose") and then an album (DAMNED, DAMNED, DAMNED). Initially associated with the British punk rock movement and then gothic rock, the band went on to release ten studio albums and several UK-charting singles which ran the gamut from punk rock to gothic to even the pop genre. They have legions of hardcore fans worldwide and have firmly established themselves as one of most powerful and theatrical live bands in the world.

The Damned NOT LIKE EVERYBODY ELSE track listing:

There's A Ghost In My House (R. Dean Taylor)
Summer In The City (The Lovin' Spoonful)
Making Time (The Creation)
Gimme Danger (Iggy & The Stooges)
See Emily Play (Pink Floyd)
I'm Not Like Everybody Else (The Kinks)
Heart Full Of Soul (The Yardbirds)
You Must Be A Witch (The Lollipop Shoppe)
When I Was Young (The Animals)
The Last Time (The Rolling Stones)