We're Not Who You Think We Are
Album: Rocket to Russia
Year: 1977
LOBOTOMY!
LOBOTOMY!
LOBOTOMY!
LOBOTOMY!
That’s how side two of Rocket to Russia started: Joey shouting “LOBOTOMY!” over Tommy weird-ass snare/tom pattern, joined after the third one by Dee Dee’s throbbing bass and after the fourth one by Johnny’s snarling guitar, the whole band crashing and bashing for a bit until Joey starts singing.
[Read more…] about Certain Songs #1794: Ramones – “Teenage Lobotomy”
Album: Rocket to Russia
Year: 1977
. . .
One of the things I truly loved about Rocket to Russia was just how funny it was. Song after song described ridiculous situations — opening with “there’s no stopping the cretins from hoppin'” and closing with “now she’s lying in a bottle of formaldehyde” — made even more ridiculous by the contrast between Danny Fields’ iconic cover shot of four dour young men standing a brick wall and John Holmstrolm’s ridiculous drawings on the inner sleeve, and especially the back cover.
Years later, I would learn that the dourest of those four young men, Johnny, pretty much conceptualized that back cover, which might account for the now-problematic caricatures in the drawing.
[Read more…] about Certain Songs #1793: Ramones – “We’re a Happy Family”
Album: Rocket to Russia
Year: 1977
Recorded and released as a single in between Leave Home and Rocket to Russia and great enough to end up on both albums after the whole “Carbona Not Glue” fiasco, Joey’s tale of the urbanization of Sheena, Queen of the Jungle is a absolutely classic teenage rebellion tale.
[Read more…] about Certain Songs #1792: Ramones – “Sheena is a Punk Rocker”
Album: Rocket To Russia
Year: 1977
The first of a five song run in the middle of Rocket to Russia that is as good as five-song run on any album that you might care to name, “I Don’t Care” packs a big wallop in a short amount of time, opening with its call-and-response chorus, Joey sounding haughty and Dee Dee sounding, well, like Dee Dee.
[Read more…] about Certain Songs #1791: Ramones – “I Don’t Care”
Album: Rocket to Russia
Year: 1977
Well, where do you even start with Rocket to Russia?
As their third album in 18 months, and their final album with Tommy in the drummer’s throne, Rocket to Russia is a quantum leap ahead of Leave Home, and is pretty much acknowledged as the peak of their art, and one of the greatest albums in rock and roll history. And one of the peaks is the highest-charting U.S. pop single they ever did, “Rockaway Beach.”
[Read more…] about Certain Songs #1790: Ramones – “Rockaway Beach”
Album: Leave Home
Year: 1977
. . .
Gabba gabba hey!
Gabba gabba hey!
One of the many things the early Ramones were great at was opening their songs with shouted chants — I mean the first thing we hear out of Joey’s mouth was “Hey! Ho! Let’s go!” — and perhaps their greatest was the one they famously stole from Tod Browning’s 1932 film, Freaks, during which the titular freaks chant “we accept you, one of us, gooble gobble” over and over.
It’s as joyful as it is disturbing, which the Ramones capture perfectly in “Pinhead,” where they — either with a sensitivity to copyright that they didn’t show on “Carbona Not Glue,” or the desire to make it more musical — open the song with a reverse-echoed twisting of that chant:
Album: Leave Home
Year: 1977
. . .
On their first album, the Ramones chanted how they wanted to sniff some glue (which I’ll discuss more when I get to the utterly ferocious It’s Alive! version), but as it turns out, sniffing glue wasn’t nearly enough. In fact, there was a whole array of household products to ingest! That is, unless mommy and daddy intervene.
And over a supercharged surf riff, Joey explains his dilemma.
[Read more…] about Certain Songs #1788: Ramones – “Carbona Not Glue”
Album: Leave Home
Year: 1977
. . .
One of the things I really like about Leave Home (and Rocket to Russia, for that matter) is the big sound that Tommy got for the band. Johnnys guitar sounds utterly massive, like — for lack of a better term — a wall of sound.
Combining Johnnys ever-present roar with Dee Dee and Tommy both mastering their instruments, and you can hear them level up, especially on a song like “Gimme Gimme Shock Treatment”, in which Joey crams a whole bunch of words into an ever-dwindling space.
[Read more…] about Certain Songs #1787: Ramones – “Gimme Gimme Shock Treatment”
Album: Leave Home
Year: 1977
. . .
The second album by the Ramones, Leave Home, came out a mere nine months after their debut, and while it wasn’t quite of a world-changer as their debut — how could it be? — it might actually be a better record.
With Tommy in the producers chair, they ditched the trope of sticking Johnny’s guitar in one channel and Dee Dee’s bass in the other channel, making the sound sound more powerful and punchier. Also, I think the lyrics are sharper and funnier, as they started writing about mental health and those, less, um, fortunate than them, as well. That said, Leave Home was close enough to the debut that people could dismiss them as a one-trick pony. Perhaps, but what a trick!
[Read more…] about Certain Songs #1786: Ramones – “Glad To See You Go”
Album: Ramones
Year: 1976
I have a very controversial take on “I Don’t Wanna Walk Around With You.” In my reading of it, it’s the epic story of a man who certain of one thing in an otherwise uncertain world: he doesn’t wanna walk around with you. And at the same time he also poses an existential question for the ages: why you wanna walk around with me?”
I know, I know, don’t @me about this, but I think if you listen to the lyrics really closely, it’s all right there.
[Read more…] about Certain Songs #1785: Ramones – “I Don’t Wanna Walk Around With You”