"We were in Europe earlier in the year, and we're getting ready to do Canada in a couple of days.

"We're getting fairly ancient, so we've got to do it now," says unstoppable U.K. punk rocker Chris (Knox) Carnochan of The Vibrators.

"We hope to see lots of people when we get to Winnipeg. We're playing that hotel place (the Royal Albert). It's sorta run down, but that's OK. It's probably in better shape than I am."

The Vibrators are one of the longest-lasting groups from the first wave of British punk that swept the U.K. and especially strangled the European press during the mid-'70s. The Vibes were contemporaries with the notorious Sex Pistols, The Clash, Chelsea/Generation X, Slaughter & the Dogs, Eater, Motörhead and The Stranglers.

"I had bands before The Vibrators," Knox says of those long-gone pre-punk days. "They were outside London and heavier. The songs Whips & Furs and Dance to the Music are from those days. That's 33-34 years ago. I had a band called Despair that was pretty full-on, very heavy. The name was inspired by a comic book by R. Crumb.

"If you heard some of those bands now, they were a mix of Black Sabbath and Nirvana, sort of metal that fizzled out. Then my friend Eddy said, 'Let's start a band.' We initially still played bar songs. Then in about a week we started playing original material."

The long-haired Vibrators were much older and more musically experienced than the average buzz-cut London street punk pundit in 1976. Because of this, the Vibes were heralded in the influential U.K. underground press as 'charlatans' and 'R&B players' turned punk rockers.

The Vibrators played the infamous 100 Club in London early on, impressing Sex Pistols producer/pub rocker Chris Spedding, who hired The Vibrators to be his backing band. Like their comrades, the Vibrators eventually released their debut album - a mix of pub rock, punk squawk and rollin' rock titled Pure Mania - on CBS Records in 1977.

Unlike debut albums from the Sex Pistols or The Clash, Pure Mania was released in Canada when it originally came out, which might help to explain why The Vibrators have a strong - but small and still growing - following over here.

"We have about 15 studio albums and loads of live/demos and extra stuff, plus DVDs. There's so much it kind of rolls over anything new that we try to do," Knox laughs. "The latest album is a punk covers album. It's called Punk: The Early Years, and it's out on Cleopatra Records.

"It's actually quite good. It has us doing Beat on the Brat by The Ramones, Sham 69 - Borstal Breakout. That's a strange one. Nasty, Nasty by 999. We also do Vibrator by Motörhead. At the last minute Lemmy couldn't do it, so we got Leonard from The Dickies. He's a very nice guy and he did a good job.

"Wayne Kramer (MC5) also appears on the album. He kind of put me in my place. Wayne's No. 1, I'm No. 2. That's all right, you think?"

Given the Vibes' current cover-song focus, you'd figure it would be logical for The Wind Ups to be added to the Albert bill on June 27. The gig will be the Vibrators' third at the Albert in as many years, and their fourth Albert appearance overall. They're back on the attack with original powerhouse drummer Eddy and bassist Pete.

"Pete's been in the band for four years. He's also been in the UK Subs, and he has a band called No Direction," Knox says of the fiery bass player. "People really like this lineup because Pete jumps about. He's very animated.

"After our tour of Canada we're playing a big festival in Blackpool, then in September we're off to the States for about five weeks.

"We hope to be making our next album in the next year or two. For now we've been playing Ramones and White Riot by The Clash.

"It's all part of making the scene more friendly."