THE RAMONES COME HOME:
Their First Four Albums Re-Released on CD (Finally)
by Peter Gorman
It's not farfetched to claim that under slightly different circumstances the Ramones story would be as familiar as that of Elvis, or the Beatles and the Stones. Their music was immediately accessible, and only sounded better with repeated listenings. For a few years in the late 70s they seemed a mere day away from superstardom, but tomorrow never came. The band inspired fanaticism among their small band of followers, and that was as far as it got, i.e., cult band. It got so bad that their first four albums were no longer available on CD. If it took their singer's death to put their classic albums back in print, file it under cruel irony.
Some basic facts, then, in case you don' t already know the story. In 1974 four young losers from Queens decided to start a band. They all changed their names to Ramone, and the eventual line-up for the first album was Joey on lead vocals (originally the drummer), Dee Dee 
on bass, Johnny on guitar, Tommy on drums. The mid-70s rock scene was bloated; bands with plodding beats and artsy pretensions filled arenas, sensitive singer/songwriters did the same. The Ramones decided to strip rock music down to its essentials. They started with a small but dedicated fan base in New York City, where they regularly played 30-minute sets of 18 or so songs at CBGBs. Their fan-base expanded to the U.K. in 1976, where a burgeoning punk scene saw them as heroes. They went on to records over a dozen albums and tour the world many times, yet failed to ever make it big in the U.S. They broke up after more than 20 years together. Joey, the once and future Ramone, died of cancer in April of 2001 at the age of 49.
Listening to their first four albums today (recently re-released on CD by Rhino Records) it still amazes me that they never made it big. After Sire Records president Seymour Stein saw them live, he signed them to a record deal because he kept hearing potential hit singles. What Stein got in the end was a piece of rock and roll history, if not money back on his investment, though it wasn't for lack of trying on the Ramones part. Contrary to the punk ideology that followed them, they wanted to be big-time rock stars, albeit on their own terms (ripped jeans and t-shirt, no frills). It's a sign of their lack of pretension that they wanted to play for kids, though they got the art crowd instead. But they should have gotten everyone, metalheads and popsters and trendsetters alike. In the end they probably did realize a fairly amorphous demographic, though their overall audience remained cult-sized and kept them playing clubs in the U.S. until the end.
From the start the Ramones were determined to keep it simple: two or three chords all harmonically-related, no solos, song lengths that on occasion exceeded two minutes but never three. They played fast even on the "slow" songs, strumming power chords in strict straight time. The bass followed the guitar, so that if the guitarist played an E chord the bassist played an E note over and over until the guitarist switched to an A chord, at which time the bassist switched to playing an A note over and over, and so on. The drumming was equally rudimentary. As for the lyrics, well, the Ramones were also determined to keep it stupid.
You're a loudmouth baby
You better shut it up
I'm gonna beat you up
`Cause you're a loudmouth babe.
(The entire lyrics to "Loudmouth," from the Ramones debut album)
The lyrics were about fighting, getting high, axe murderers, boy liking girl, boy stopping liking girl, being an idiot, being misunderstood, and general variations on those themes plus a weird (kindest word I can think of) fixation on Nazi imagery. Yet it hardly mattered what they were singing about, for the music pummeled the words anyway, and Joey's vocal style never varied; a plea for shock treatment sounded no different from a homage to glue sniffing or a warning about a psycho killer in the basement. His vocals were intense but never threatening. He put his whole body into his singing, but as for nuance – forget it.
The Ramones' formula remained essentially unchanged on their early
records. I wouldn't go so far as to say that their albums are interchangeable, but it is likely that however you respond to one of their first four albums, you will have the same response to the other three. Their self-titled debut album (1976) is the edgiest of the lot, the most roughly played and produced. Their influences were immediately evident, from 60s pop rock through the Stooges and the Dolls. The Ramones = 14 memorable songs in 28 minutes, recorded for less than $7,000. The entire album was louder, faster and shorter than anything playing on rock and roll radio at the time. It was as if rock and roll bombast had never happened.
The songs on Leave Home (1977) were all written before their first album was recorded, though the Ramones deliberately held back these songs because all were written after the first batch, and this way they could show a progression in song structure from their first to second album. Good luck finding it.
They do their best, they do what they can
They get them ready for Viet Nam
From old Hanoi to East Berlin
Commando - involved again
First rule is: The laws of Germany
Second rule is: Be nice to mommy
Third rule is: Don't talk to commies
Fourth rule is: Eat kosher salamies
(The entire lyrics to "Commando," from Leave Home)
Tommy Ramone (drummer, later mixing board guy) called Leave Home "more melodic" and "less arty" than the debut album (less arty?!?), but the differences are slight enough to go unnoticed. Leave Home is cut from the same pair of ripped jeans as the first album, and what could be wrong with that? In fact the Ramones' earliest records are so ridiculously consistent in quality that compilations based on their early years make no sense. If you pony up for the greatest "hits" in lieu of the original albums, you lose. There simply are no wasted songs on The Ramones or Leave Home, and (though it probably goes without saying) no wasted notes.
After the release of their debut album the Ramones traveled to London for their first shows in the U.K., which took place during the bicentennial weekend of 1976 (and how perfect is that?), shows that along with their first record probably did more to jump start the punk movement than anything else. John Lydon, the Clash and Chrissie Hynde were all in attendance.The re-released Leave Home CD comes with a live show from that summer, a performance that includes songs from both of the first two albums, 30 or so minutes of intense fun. It's easy to hear how the Ramones energy and enthusiasm had such a rousing effect on the disaffected youth of England. As a live act the Ramones were as explosive as they were on record.
Or it might be more accurate to say that the Ramones captured their explosive live act in the studio. Rocket to Russia (1977) was every bit as "live" sounding as its predecessors, even with a slightly cleaner production sound and some basic augmentations to their musical style. The Ramones said they got better on their instruments with each record, though it hardly matters one way or another. Gone at least are the songs about psycho killers (take it away, Mr. Byrne), though the idiot themes and references to Germany remain.
I don't care
I don't care
I don't care
About this world
I don't care
About that girl
I don't care
I don't care
I don't care
About these words
I don't care.
(the entire lyrics to "I Don't Care" from Rocket to Russia)
Well that sums it up pretty well, doesn't it? Maybe it's just that I'm frustrated at having to write about the music without being able to reference the lyrics for help. Even for music as simply constructed as the Ramones, I'm sure I could write about tonics and subdominants and mixolydian modes, but it's likely that neither of us speak that language. You want a tonic? Listen to Rocket to Russia straight up. The Ramones cover "Do You Wanna Dance" and make it rock.They cover the novelty hit "Surfer Bird" and make it swing in a way the original never did. For the Ramones all that ever mattered was the music. "Gabba gabba hey" was their signature statement, which was another way of saying "A wop bop a loop bop a wop bam boom." `Nuff said.
1978's Road to Ruin found the Ramones ever-so-slightly stepping into new territory, with some near-ballads that still move along at a quick pace. There's also an acoustic guitar in there somewhere, and a couple songs even sound like they have guitar overdubs (all of which brought them accusations of selling out, natch). Otherwise it's the same old song and dance, thankfully. Marky replaced Tommy behind the drums, but only drummers might notice the difference. The band was such a tight unit; listen to the "Needles and Pins" cover, which demonstrates how good the Ramones were as a band, somehow transforming a humdrum song into a minor classic. Road to Ruin also includes "I Wanna Be Sedated" which may be their greatest song, and one that should have topped the charts (except that it was only released as a "B" side of a single that went nowhere). "Sedated" is as essential a rock song as "Satisfaction" or "Smells Like Teen Spirit," a song so catchy I expect to still be humming it when I'm dead (plus the sentiment hits home with me). Of course the album sold poorly, but when art and commerce come together in a satisfactory way it's a happy accident. Success in the music business is like success elsewhere in life, due mostly to marketing, luck and sleeping with the right people. The Ramones career was nothing more than an ongoing car wreck.
The Ramones soldiered on past their first four albums and into the 80s and 90s, but they eventually (probably inevitably) lost some of their charm. In 1979-80 they hooked up with the producer Phil Spector, who added nothing of consequence to their songs (listen to the original version of "Rock and Roll High School" sans Spector, included as a bonus track on Road to Ruin.) They still recorded some great songs, and regardless of the criticism I consider "Do You Remember Rock and Roll Radio" and "Rock and Roll High School" to be in the same league as any of their earlier songs, and I hear 1984's "Howling At the Moon" as the band's finest mo
ment. But their later albums were inconsistent, a charge that could never be made against their first four. It had seemed to come easy for them, and maybe it did, but it was something special, and then it slipped away. While their continuing cult status helped them maintain their street cred, the band's failure to ever find commercial success meant they had to stay on the road to survive, sometimes playing as many as 300 shows a year. Despair set in; the band members traveled in a van year after year without speaking to each other, forced to continue as the Ramones because it was the only way they could make a living without hating themselves. Their survival was both triumphant and sad.
One could easily make the case that the Ramones were never as good as the Sex Pistols or the Clash, or 80s power trios such as Husker Du and the Minutemen, but it's also beside the point. If power pop was what you wanted to hear, the Ramones delivered. As simple as the music and the concept was, there have been so few who have managed to pull it off. The Ramones only made it look easy.
Joey Ramone, R.I.P.
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