The Dead Boys are alive again

“Sonic Reducer” was written prior to the Dead Boys when they were in Rocket From the Tombs, formed in Cleveland in 1974. That band split into two parts, with Thomas and Peter Laughner forming Pere Ubu, and Chrome and drummer Johnny Blitz forming the Dead Boys with singer Stiv Bators. The song appeared on the Dead Boys’ 1977 debut album, “Young Loud and Snotty,” released a year after the band moved to New York City (which is how Mr. Bourdain would have known them so well).

They were accepted in that burgeoning NYC punk scene, “for the most part,” Chrome says. “We got called Johnny-comelatelys a lot, that we were jumping on the bandwagon and we weren’t from New York, blah blah blah. Mostly, the bands were very supportive of us. The Ramones helped us a lot. We were also good friends with the Dictators and The Heartbreakers, Blondie. But there was no fancy plan or anything like that.”

After a second album, 1978’s “We Have Come for Your Children,” the Dead Boys split in 1979, with Bators going on to form supergroup Lords of the New Church. He died in 1990 after being hit by a taxi in France. Since then, Chrome has led Cheetah Chrome and the Casualties and has taken part in various Dead Boys and Rocket reunions.

To celebrate the 40th anniversary of the debut album last year, they planned a boxed set, but that fell through. When Chrome needed a bassist for a solo gig at the Whiskey Au Go Go in LA — which would include Blitz and guitarist Jason Kottwitz — they reached out to bassist Ricky Rat, who had been part of a Halloween tribute band called TheUndead Boys.

“I said, ‘Can we get the singer, too? It can help us celebrate the 40th anniversary and get me off the mic stand.’ ”

They recruited Jake Hout, who looks and sounds like Bators, and “Once he got up there,” Chrome says, “it was so obvious he belonged there, we kept it.”

They’ve given the debut album a sonic upgrade, titled “Still Snotty: Young, Loud and Snotty at 40,” and are working on a new album.

“As far as me and Johnny are concerned, this is Dead Boys, Part Two,” Chrome says.

Will the new stuff sound like the ’70s stuff?

“Naaah,” he says, “why would we do that? We are what we are, and the ’70s are kinda long gone, but there will be stuff revisited, for sure.”