Perhaps if KC had become one of Burt Bacharach’s muses, instead of her brother’s Trilby, she’d be alive today.
Tieing it all back to the OP: Richard Carpenter proves that just as much as safety & sugariness, (and bienville’s excellent observation above notwithstanding) technical proficiency and musicianship can dull the edges of Rock after a certain point, past which your’e listening to Yacht Rock. To their credit the Ramones never went anywhere near there, even when Phil Spector threatened them at gunpoint.
A misleading list. Top 40 was reviled by most rock fans in 1974; it was for preteens. Once you reached high school, the album and college radio was what people were listening to. At that point, theserious music fan listened to the Who, Led Zeppelin, the Allman Brothers Band, Bruce Springsteen, Alice Cooper, and the Rolling Stones.
This doesn’t take away from the Ramones, who wrote good, funny songs that defined garage band as a genre (it existed, but wasn’t classified as a type of music)
All of whom sucked by 1975, with the exception of Springsteen who had just released Born To Run. And he quickly disappeared from most playlists because legal issues prevented him from releasing new albums.
The OP may think The Ramones sound like any other garage rock band, but garage rock bands hadn’t sounded like that for a decade. They were all either pop bands with a singer/songwriter frontman or overblown glam-metal. I enter Aerosmith as evidence, your honor.
I was there on the front lines. I managed the bands, I played the radio, AM and FM. I saw the Ramones before they had an album or had a reputation outside of CBGB’s. We thought they sucked so bad we wanted to jump them in the parking lot. They ran through all their songs so fast that they had to repeat them in order to play a second set. But a week later, the riffs were still going through my head and I realized that we were wrong and had witnessed rock being seized back from those West Coast wimps.
I think as a sound and zeitgeist you really can’t seperate Black Sabbath, Deep Purple, The Ramones, and perhaps their most kindred rock brethren AC/DC, as well as Led Zeppelin from this mix and sonically charged time in grunge and reach to roots. Peterpan Speedrock vs. Zeke.
They sounded like they were fom the 90’s in the 70’s. Maybe they set it all off, that to come…
I would have thought surely someone who once contemplated swallowing a “magic-grow” octopus for science would “get” The Ramones.
Foe me personally, it was the scene in “Rock ‘n’ Roll High School” where he sings “I Want You Around.” It was one of the hottest things I’ve ever seen! (And also “I Just Want To Have Something To Do.”) I came out of the theater no longer a hippie. Thank God!
That scene is so hot, that even though she is either clothed or wrapped in a towel for the whole scene, my revisionist memory had me convinced that she bared her breasts. When I saw the movie again, I believed I was seeing an edited version and took it upon myself to seek out the “real” version where you actually see her breasts. Nope. The bare breasts version never existed- it’s just that the scene was powerful enough to make me believe I saw something I hadn’t seen.
Really? I’m willing to admit that I must have been standing way, way under the irony, because I walked out of Rock and Roll High School. They could have made the same movie with the Bay City Rollers, since almost any band could claim that somebody’s parents, somewhere, were threatented by them. But again, maybe that was just me (who had rooted for the Ducky Boys in The Wanderers).
I had to wait for Repo Man before I saw a movie that “got” punk.
Slithy Tove, yes it could have been any band- but having it be the Ramones made it awesome!!!
[QUOTE=from IMDB] link Originally, Todd Rundgren was to star as the musical act, but both sides could not come to an agreement. Next, Cheap Trick was contacted, but a similar situation happened. After that, talks were conducted with Warner Bros. Records, where Allan Arkush had a connection, to decide on which band they should use in the film. The first suggestion was Devo, but Arkush decided that they had too much of their own concept. Another band considered for the movie was Van Halen, but Warner execs warned Arkush that they were raucous and would be difficult to handle. Finally, an exec name-dropped the Ramones, who recorded for Sire Records, a subsidiary of Warner Bros. Records. Arkush, being a huge fan of the band, agreed. To this day, Rundgren regrets passing up the role he was offered.
[/QUOTE]
Bolding of Bo’s post is mine
Motörhead started in 1975. The Ramones started in '74. So I’m going to call bullshit on the “No Ramones, no Motörhead” unless you have a direct quote from Lemmy stating that they were aware of and were influenced by what Joey and co were doing at the time. Also, I love Snowboarder Bo’s posts, and I think hes (or shes?) amazingly knowledgeable about music and music history, but I am also going to call bullshit on “metal might not have ever quite come about without the Ramones”. Heavy Metal was well on its way by '74, and I can probably think of 10-15 bands off the top of my head that did more to shape heavy metal than The Ramones did. Hell I’d even argue that the Beatles laid down the foundation and thus had more influence. Of course this is all my own opinion of something that can’t be objectively measured.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not putting the Ramones down or denying they had a powerful influence, especially on punk, and they inspired a lot people to say “hey, if they can do it, I can do it”. I think punk would be substantially different without them (but would definitely still exist). But to claim that heavy metal would not exist or would be very different without them, er…no…just, no.
Here’s just a handful of bands who, in my opinion, had way more influence on heavy metal music than The Ramones. I could go back further to The Beatles, Hawkwind, Yardbirds, etc, but this’ll do for now: The Who - formed in '64. Destroyed instruments on stage and sang “hope I die before I get old”. Who was saying rock lost its edge? Jimi Hendrix - started playing in the late 50’s, his guitar playing is widely credited with being “the” main influence and shaper of heavy metal. Alice Cooper - formed in '68 and influenced countless rock/metal bands. Black Sabbath - formed in '69. Now if you want to argue about one band who shaped metal the most I’d put Sabbath as my nominee, and I don’t think I’d get too many disagreements. Motörhead - formed in '75. If Black Sabbath were the founding fathers of Heavy Metal (as some claim), Motörhead can be viewed as the founders of Thrash Metal. Van Halen - formed in '72 Led Zepplin - formed in '68 (if you go back to when they were the New Yardbirds). Kiss formed in '73, and their spectacular stage shows and outrageous costumes have been a huge influence on rock and metal bands the world over.
What’s even more amazing is that these two all-time great bands were conceived after their future members attended a single Ramones concert in England!
Richie is kind of a grey area. He left the band because he never got any money for the merch sales and as far as Johnny was concerned he was just a paid musician. He was tight with Joey and Dee Dee tho, and did make that cool speech at the Grammys last year, tho.
C.J. I left out because I try and forget most of the albums he played on. Not because his playing is bad, but because the albums themselves were of so little note.
But you’re correct, they were Ramones and they are still alive. I was incomplete.
