CBGB

"CB's"
The front facade of CBGB, ca. 2005
Address	315 Bowery
Location	Manhattan, New York
Coordinates	40°43′31″N 73°59′31″W / 40.72528°N 73.99194°W / 40.72528; -73.99194Coordinates: 40°43′31″N 73°59′31″W / 40.72528°N 73.99194°W / 40.72528; -73.99194
Type	Music venue
Genre(s)	Punk rock, bluegrass, blues, country
Opened	1973
Closed	2006
Owner	Hilly Kristal
Website	www.cbgb.com

CBGB (Country, BlueGrass, and Blues) was a music club at 315 Bowery at Bleecker Street in the borough of Manhattan in New York City.

Founded by Hilly Kristal in 1973, it was originally intended to feature its namesake musical styles, but became a forum for American punk and New Wave bands like Ramones, Misfits, Television, the Patti Smith Group, Mink DeVille, The Dead Boys, The Dictators, The Fleshtones, The Voidoids, The Cramps, Blondie, The Shirts, and Talking Heads. In later years, it would mainly become known for Hardcore punk with bands such as U.S. Chaos, Agnostic Front, Murphy's Law, Cro-Mags, Warzone, Gorilla Biscuits, Sick of It All, and Youth of Today becoming synonymous with the club.

The storefront and large space next door to the club served as the "CBGB Record Canteen" (record shop and cafe) for many years. Eventually, in the late eighties, the record store was closed and replaced with a second performance space and art gallery, named "CB's 313 Gallery". The gallery went on to showcase many popular bands and singer-songwriters who played in a musical style more akin to acoustic rock, folk, jazz, or experimental music, such as Dadadah, Toshi Reagon, and The Shells, while the original club continued to present mainly hardcore bands and post-punk, metal, and alternative rock acts.^[1][2]

The club closed in October 2006. The final concert was performed by Patti Smith on October 15.^[3] CBGB Fashions (the CBGB store, wholesale department, and online store) stayed open until October 31 at 315 Bowery. On November 1, 2006, CBGB Fashions moved to 19-23 St. Mark's Place, but it subsequently closed in the summer of 2008.

CBGB Radio launched on the iheartradio platform in 2010 and a music festival in 2012.^[4]

Founding[link]

CBGB, a then-little-known rock club, was founded in December 1973, on the site of Kristal's earlier bar, Hilly's on the Bowery, which he ran from 1969 to 1972. Originally, Kristal had focused on his more profitable West Village nightspot, Hilly's, but complaints from the bar's neighbors forced Hilly's to close, leading its owner to concentrate on the Bowery club. The full name is CBGB & OMFUG which stands for "Country Bluegrass Blues and Other Music For Uplifting Gormandizers"*. Gormandizer (gourmand) usually means a ravenous eater of food, but according to Kristal here it means "a voracious eater of ... music".^[5] The club was also affectionately called simply "CB's". As its name implied, Kristal intended the bar to feature country, bluegrass, and blues music (along with poetry readings), but it became famous as the birthplace of the American punk movement. Perhaps most notably, the punk rock pioneers The Ramones had their first shows there.

1970s[link]

In 1973, before Hilly's on the Bowery became CBGB, two locals, Bill Page and Rusty McKenna, convinced Kristal to allow them to book concerts. Although the term "punk rock" was not applied to these acts, Kristal's son believes they helped lay the musical foundation for the bands that followed.^[6] After the Mercer Arts Center collapsed in August 1973, there were few locations in New York where unsigned bands could play original music, and some of the Mercer refugees, including Suicide, The Fast,^[7] Wayne County and the Magic Tramps all played in the very early days of CBGB.

Marky Ramone of the Ramones and Debbie Harry of Blondie attend a screening of Burning Down the House, a 2009 documentary about CBGB's heyday.

At the third Television gig on April 14, 1974, Patti Smith and Lenny Kaye from the Patti Smith Group were in the audience. The band went on to make its own CBGB debut on February 14, 1975. Other early performers included The Stillettos, featuring Deborah Harry, Elda Gentile and Amanda Jones on vocals, and Chris Stein on guitar), who supported Television on May 5, 1974. The newly-formed Blondie (under its original name of Angel & the Snake) and the Ramones both arrived in August 1974. Mink DeVille, Talking Heads, The Shirts, The Heartbreakers, The Fleshtones and many other bands followed in quick succession.

CBGB had only one rule for a band to follow in order to play at the venue: they had to play primarily original music. No cover bands were booked to play there. However, most of the regular bands played one or two covers during their sets. Kristal's son claims the policy was meant to help the club avoid paying ASCAP royalties for the compositions being performed.^[6]

As CBGB's reputation grew, it began to draw more acts from outside New York City. The club hosted the first American gigs by The Police, on October 20 and 21, 1978.

Hardcore punk[link]

Though CBGB was utilized as a hot spot for touring bands to hit when they came through New York, the scene that kept the bar alive during the 1980s was New York's underground hardcore punk scene. Sunday at CBGB was matinee day (also named "thrash day" in a documentary about hardcore).^{[citation needed]} Every Sunday, a handful of hardcore bands took the stage in the afternoon to dinnertime hours, usually for cheap. Bands made famous by matinees include Reagan Youth, Bad Brains, Beastie Boys, Agnostic Front, Murphy's Law, Cro-Mags, Leeway, Warzone, Gorilla Biscuits, Sick of It All, The Misfits, Straight Ahead, and Youth of Today.

Over the years, CBGB's matinee became an institution. In 1990, violence both inside and outside of the venue caused Kristal to refuse to book hardcore shows. However, CBGB later brought hardcore back at various times, and for the last several years of its existence, had no rules about what genres could and could not be featured.

Closing[link]

CBGB after it closed

CBGB the day after

In 2005, a dispute arose between CBGB and the Bowery Residents' Committee.^[8] The Committee billed Kristal $91,000 in back rent, while Kristal claimed he had not been informed of increases in his $19,000 monthly rent.^[9][10] After the lease expired, they reached an agreement for the club to remain for 14 more months while Kristal dropped his legal battles and his attempts to get historic landmark status for the club.

Kristal planned to move the club far from its roots with a new CBGB in Las Vegas, Nevada. The owner planned to strip the current club down to the bare walls, bringing as much of it to Nevada as possible.

"We're going to take the urinals," he said. "I'll take whatever I can. The movers said, 'You ought to take everything, and auction off what you don't want on eBay.' Why not? Somebody will."^[11]

The club finally closed on October 15, 2006. The last week featured multi-night stands by Bad Brains and The Dictators, along with an acoustic set by Blondie. More contemporary acts, such as Avail and The Bouncing Souls, opened shows throughout the week.

The final concert was performed by Patti Smith and broadcast live on Sirius Satellite Radio. Flea of the Red Hot Chili Peppers attended the show and even performed on a handful of songs with Smith and her band. Television's Richard Lloyd also guested on a few songs, including a reworked version of "Marquee Moon". Toward the end of their set, Smith and her band played "Gloria", paying tribute to the Ramones during the chorus by alternating between the original lyrics and the "Hey! Ho! Let's go!" of "Blitzkrieg Bop". In her final encore, the song "Elegie", Smith read from a list of musicians who had died since they last played at CBGB.

Hilly Kristal died from complications from lung cancer on August 28, 2007. In early October 2007, Kristal's family and friends hosted a private memorial service in the YMCA near the village. Soon after, there was a public memorial where CBGB staff and others paid tribute.

After Kristal's death, his ex-wife, Karen Kristal, and daughter, Lisa Kristal Burgman, engaged in a legal battle over the purported $3 million CBGB estate, settling in June 2009 with Burgman receiving "most" of the money that did not go to creditors and estate taxes.^[12]

The ex CBGB now

Building[link]

On November 2, 2007, it was announced that high-end men's fashion designer John Varvatos would open a store at CBGB's former space at 315 Bowery in early 2008.^[13] Varvatos expressed a desire to "do justice" to CBGB's legacy.^[14] Much of the graffiti covering the toilets was preserved, along with some playbills from the club's 10th anniversary shows in 1983 that were discovered behind a wall.^[15] The store opened in April 2008.^[16]

In February 2008, it was announced that Morrison Hotel, a SoHo art gallery dedicated to music photography, would open a second location in the former CBGB Gallery space next door.^[15] However, in June 2009, it was announced that the Morrison Hotel gallery would close.^[17]

It was also announced that the alley behind the club, officially known as "Extra Place," would be turned into a pedestrian mall. The New York Post quotes Cheetah Chrome of The Dead Boys as saying "If that alley could talk, it's seen it all," and "All of Manhattan has lost its soul to money lords."^[18]

The awning from CBGB can be found in the lobby of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland.

In popular culture[link]

• Most prominently, CBGB featured in a promotional ad during the bid for New York City to host the Olympic games in 2012.^[19]
• CBGB is featured as the only non-fictional venue in the 2010 rhythm game Guitar Hero: Warriors of Rock. A replica of the club was opened for one night only at Paramount Studios for the game's launch party.^[20]
• Talking Heads, who had strong ties to the area, account for perhaps the most famous lyrical mention of CBGB with the song "Life During Wartime", in the verse "this ain't no Mudd Club or CBGB...". Much later, in a related effort, the club played an overtly prominent role in the song "Punk Lolita" by The Heads, a 1996 collaboration of three former Talking Heads members with various guest vocalists.
• In Bandslam, CBGB is a favorite place of central character William Burton.
• A central character in Spike Lee's 1999 movie, Summer of Sam, Richie, becomes a regular CBGB patron after becoming a punk rocker.
• CBGB is also featured in The Simpsons episode Love, Springfieldian Style, named "Comic Book Guy's Bar".
• In Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist, Nick and Norah breaks in to the by then closed CBGB.
• In Gilmore Girls, Rory Gilmore's friend Lane Kim's band, Hep Alien, gets booked for a gig at CBGB.

References[link]

Sources[link]

• Beeber, Steven. The Heebie-Jeebies at CBGB's: A Secret History of Jewish Punk. Chicago: Chicago Review Press, 2006. ISBN 978-1-55652-613-8.
• Brazis, Tamar (ed.). CBGB & OMFUG: Thirty Years from the Home of Underground Rock (1st ed.). New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., Publishers, 2005. ISBN 0-8109-5786-8.
• Heylin, Clinton. From the Velvets to the Voidoids (2nd ed.). Eastbourne, East Sussex: Gardners Books, 2005. ISBN 1-905139-04-7.
• Kozak, Roman. This Ain't No Disco: The Story of CBGB. Boston: Faber and Faber, 1988. ISBN 0-571-12956-0.

External links[link]

This article's use of external links may not follow Wikipedia's policies or guidelines. Please improve this article by removing excessive or inappropriate external links, and converting useful links where appropriate into footnote references. (September 2010)

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: CBGB

• Official site
• Concerts held at CBGB's
• Rekindling the Punk Flame - shanatinglipton.com article
• The End of an Era antimusic.com article
• Las Vegas Herald story on club's move
• The Heebie Jeebies at CBGB's - Book
• Between Punk Rock and a Hard Place New York Magazine
• Rock ‘n’ Roll High School NY Times op-ed from Richard Hell
• CBGB Takes Final Bow Before Eviction WCBS TV
• CBGB's Last Hours 2006-11-06 MTV News article about the dismantling of the club
• Glide Magazine: Notable Acts that have played CBGB Glide Magazine
• Punk's had its day at CBGB opentomusic.co.uk
• Varvatos opening party- illustrated report
• CBGB at Tribeca Jarrod Dicker
• CBGB – Virtual tour in 3D

Syd Straw @ Heartwreck 2004

Syd Straw is an American rock singer and songwriter. The daughter of actor Jack Straw (The Pajama Game), she began her career singing backup for Pat Benatar, then took her distinct voice to the indie/alternative scene and joined the Golden Palominos (also including Michael Stipe, Matthew Sweet, and Anton Fier). She released her first album, Surprise, in 1989; it featured contributions by Stipe, Fier, Richard Thompson, Jody Harris, Peter Blegvad, and a number of other well-known musicians. A second album, War and Peace, appeared in 1996. Recorded with a relatively obscure Midwest rock group called the Skeletons, it chronicled a brief and unhappy romance. In 2008, she released a new album, entitled Pink Velour, on her own label, Earnester Records. According to an earlier interview, the title track “is about my family moving back and forth between the east and the west, and my being kidnapped by my mother on Valentine's Day in 1969, and about not seeing my dad for almost seven years.”

A frequent backup singer and contributor to duets with other musicians, Straw has also maintained an intermittent acting career, appearing on the television shows The Adventures of Pete & Pete and Tales of the City. Syd Straw can be heard singing harmony and backing vocals on the Rickie Lee Jones albums Traffic From Paradise and The Evening of My Best Day. She is also featured on Leo Kottke's Peculiaroso, which Jones produced. Straw appears on "What Am I Worth" from the Dave Alvin album King of California. For a number of years she has given an annual "Heartwreck" live performance on Valentine's Day.

In 1994, Straw teamed up with Wilco to contribute the song "The T.B. Is Whipping Me" to the AIDS benefit album Red Hot + Country produced by the Red Hot Organization.

Discography[link]

• Surprise (1989)
• War and Peace (1996)
• Live at the Triple Crown (2001) (with The Adventures Of...)
• Whole Wide World (2005)
• Pink Velour (2008)

Compilation Albums[link]

• "Blue Shadows On The Trail" on Stay Awake: Various Interpretations of Music from Vintage Disney Films, 1988 (one of Various Artists)
• "Meeting Across The River" on The Songs of Bruce Springsteen, 2000

References[link]

• Not The Last Straw (2004 interview)

External links[link]

• Discography: Syd Straw
• Syd Straw Group Fan mailing list
• LAist Interview
• PUNKCAST#397 Video from St Ann's Warehouse, Brooklyn - Feb 14 2004
• PUNKCAST#670 Video from Tonic, NYC - Feb 14 2005

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Ramones
Left to right: Johnny, Dee Dee, and Joey Ramone in 1980
Background information
Origin	Forest Hills, Queens, New York, United States
Genres	Punk rock
Years active	1974–1996
Labels	Sire, Philips, Beggars Banquet, Radioactive, Chrysalis
Associated acts	Tangerine Puppets, Sniper, Bad Chopper, Los Gusanos, Dust, The Voidoids, Blondie, Uncle Monk, Misfits, Osaka Popstar
Past members
Dee Dee Ramone Johnny Ramone Joey Ramone Tommy Ramone Marky Ramone Richie Ramone Elvis Ramone (Clem Burke) C. J. Ramone

The Ramones were an American rock band that formed in the New York City neighborhood of Forest Hills, Queens, in 1974. They are often cited as the first punk rock group.^[1][2] Despite achieving only limited commercial success, the band was a major influence on the punk rock movement both in the United States and the United Kingdom.

All of the band members adopted pseudonyms ending with the surname "Ramone", though none of them were related. They performed 2,263 concerts, touring virtually nonstop for 22 years.^[2] In 1996, after a tour with the Lollapalooza music festival, the band played a farewell concert and disbanded.^[3] Little more than eight years after the breakup, the band's three founding members—lead singer Joey Ramone, guitarist Johnny Ramone, and bassist Dee Dee Ramone—had died.^[4][5][6]

Their only record with enough U.S. sales to be certified gold was the compilation album Ramones Mania.^[7] However, recognition of the band's importance built over the years, and they are now cited in many assessments of all-time great rock music, such as the Rolling Stone list of the 50 Greatest Artists of All Time^[8] and VH1's 100 Greatest Artists of Hard Rock.^[9] In 2002, the Ramones were ranked the second-greatest band of all time by Spin magazine, trailing only The Beatles.^[10] On March 18, 2002, the Ramones—including the three founders and drummers Tommy and Marky Ramone—were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.^[2][11] In 2011, the group was awarded a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.^[12][13]

History[link]

Formation: 1974–75[link]

Forest Hills High School, attended by the four original members of the Ramones

The original members of the band met in and around the middle-class neighborhood of Forest Hills in the New York City borough of Queens. John Cummings and Thomas Erdelyi had both been in a high-school garage band from 1966 to 1967 known as the Tangerine Puppets.^[14] They became friends with Douglas Colvin, who had recently moved to the area from Germany,^[15] and Jeffry Hyman, who was the initial lead singer of the glam rock band Sniper, founded in 1972.^[16][17]

The Ramones began taking shape in early 1974, when Cummings and Colvin invited Hyman to join them in a band. The initial lineup featured Colvin on lead vocals and rhythm guitar, Cummings on lead guitar, and Hyman on drums. Colvin, who soon switched from rhythm guitar to bass, was the first to adopt the name "Ramone", calling himself Dee Dee Ramone. He was inspired by Paul McCartney's use of the pseudonym Paul Ramon during his Silver Beatles days.^[18][19] Dee Dee convinced the other members to take on the name and came up with the idea of calling the band the Ramones.^[20] Hyman and Cummings became Joey Ramone and Johnny Ramone, respectively.^[20]

A friend of the band, Monte A. Melnick (later their tour manager), helped to arrange rehearsal time for them at Manhattan's Performance Studios, where he worked. Johnny's former bandmate Erdelyi was set to become their manager. Soon after the band was formed, Dee Dee realized that he could not sing and play his bass guitar simultaneously; with Erdelyi's encouragement, Joey became the band's new lead singer.^[18] Dee Dee would continue, however, to count off each song's tempo with his signature rapid-fire shout of "1-2-3-4!" Joey soon similarly realized that he could not sing and play drums simultaneously and left the position of drummer. While auditioning prospective replacements, Erdelyi would often take to the drums and demonstrate how to play the songs. It became apparent that he was able to perform the group's music better than anyone else, and he joined the band as Tommy Ramone.^[21]

The Ramones played before an audience for the first time on March 30, 1974, at Performance Studios.^[2] The songs they played were very fast and very short; most clocked in at under two minutes. Around this time, a new music scene was emerging in New York centered around two clubs in downtown Manhattan—Max's Kansas City and, more famously, CBGB (usually referred to as CBGB's). The Ramones made their CBGB debut on August 16. Legs McNeil, who cofounded Punk magazine the following year, later described the impact of that performance: "They were all wearing these black leather jackets. And they counted off this song...and it was just this wall of noise.... They looked so striking. These guys were not hippies. This was something completely new."^[22]

The band swiftly became regulars at the club, playing there seventy-four times by the end of the year. After garnering considerable attention for their performances—which averaged about seventeen minutes from beginning to end—the group was signed to a recording contract in late 1975 by Seymour Stein of Sire Records. Stein's wife, Linda Stein, had seen the band play at CBGB; she would later co-manage them along with Danny Fields.^[23] By this time, the Ramones were recognized as leaders of the new scene that was increasingly being referred to as "punk".^[24][25] The group's unusual frontman had a lot to do with their impact. As Dee Dee explained, "All the other singers [in New York] were copying David Johansen [of The New York Dolls], who was copying Mick Jagger.... But Joey was unique, totally unique."^[26]

Spearheading punk: 1976–77[link]

	"Blitzkrieg Bop" noicon The title of the Ramones' debut single, writes critic Steve Huey, is a "nice encapsulation of the group's aesthetic: simple, bouncy, pre-British Invasion rock & roll played at top volume and twice the speed. Blaring the same three chords for most of its duration, the song was rock at its most basic".[27]
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The Ramones recorded their debut album, Ramones, in February 1976. Of the fourteen songs on the album, the longest, "I Don't Wanna Go Down to the Basement", barely surpassed two-and-a-half minutes. While the songwriting credits were shared by the entire band, Dee Dee was the primary writer. Ramones was produced by Sire's Craig Leon, with Tommy as associate producer, on an extremely low budget of about $6,400 and released in April.^[30] The now iconic front cover photograph of the band was taken by Roberta Bayley, a photographer for Punk magazine.^[31] Punk, which was largely responsible for codifying the term for the scene emerging around CBGB, ran a cover story on the Ramones in its third issue, the same month as the record's release.^[32][28]

The Ramones' debut LP was greeted by rock critics with glowing reviews. The Village Voice's Robert Christgau wrote, "I love this record—love it—even though I know these boys flirt with images of brutality (Nazi especially).... For me, it blows everything else off the radio".^[33] In Rolling Stone, Paul Nelson described it as "constructed almost entirely of rhythm tracks of an exhilarating intensity rock & roll has not experienced since its earliest days." Characterizing the band as "authentic American primitives whose work has to be heard to be understood", he declared, "It is time popular music followed the other arts in honoring its primitives."^[34] Newsday's Wayne Robbins simply anointed the Ramones as "the best young rock 'n' roll band in the known universe."^[35]

However, despite Sire's high hopes for it,^[36] Ramones was not a commercial success, reaching only number 111 on the Billboard album chart. The two singles issued from the album, "Blitzkrieg Bop" and "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend", failed to chart at all. At the band's first major performance outside of New York, a June date in Youngstown, Ohio, approximately ten people showed up.^[37] It wasn't until they made a brief tour of England that they began to see the fruits of their labor; a performance at The Roundhouse in London on July 4, 1976 (second-billed to the Flamin' Groovies), organized by Linda Stein, was a resounding success.^[38] Their Roundhouse appearance and a club date the following night—where the band met members of the Sex Pistols and The Clash—helped galvanize the burgeoning UK punk rock scene.^[4] The Flamin' Groovies/Ramones double bill was successfully reprised at The Roxy in Los Angeles the following month, fueling the punk scene there as well. The Ramones were becoming an increasingly popular live act—a Toronto performance in September energized yet another growing punk scene.^[39]

Their next two albums, Leave Home and Rocket to Russia, were released in 1977. Both were coproduced by Tommy and Tony Bongiovi, the second cousin of Jon Bon Jovi.^[40] Leave Home met with even less chart success than Ramones, though it did include "Pinhead", which became one of the band's signature songs with its chanted refrain of "Gabba gabba hey!" Rocket to Russia was the band's highest-charting album to date, reaching number 49 on the Billboard 200.^[41] In Rolling Stone, critic Dave Marsh called it "the best American rock & roll of the year".^[42] The album also featured the first Ramones single to enter the Billboard charts (albeit only as high as number 81): "Sheena Is a Punk Rocker". The follow-up single, "Rockaway Beach", reached number 66—the highest any Ramones single would ever reach in America. On December 31, 1977, the Ramones recorded It's Alive, a live concert double album, at the Rainbow Theatre, London, which was released in April 1979 (the title is a reference to the 1974 horror film of the same name).^[43]

Recordings turn more pop: 1978–83[link]

Tommy, tired of touring, left the band in early 1978. He continued as the Ramones' record producer under his birth name of Erdelyi. His position as drummer was filled by Marc Bell, who had been a member of the early 1970s hard rock band Dust, Wayne County and the Backstreet Boys,^[44] and the pioneering punk group Richard Hell & The Voidoids.^[45] Bell became Marky Ramone. Later that year, the band released their fourth studio album, and first with Marky, Road to Ruin. The album, co-produced by Tommy with Ed Stasium, included some new sounds such as acoustic guitar, several ballads, and the band's first two recorded songs longer than three minutes. It failed to reach the Billboard Top 100. However, "I Wanna Be Sedated", which appeared both on the album and as a single, would become one of the band's best-known songs.^[46] The artwork on the album's cover was done by Punk magazine cofounder John Holmstrom.^[47]

After the band's movie debut in Roger Corman's Rock 'n' Roll High School (1979), renowned producer Phil Spector became interested in the Ramones and produced their 1980 album End of the Century. During the recording sessions in Los Angeles, Spector held Dee Dee at gunpoint, forcing him to repeatedly play a riff.^[48] Though it was to be the highest-charting album in the band's history—reaching number 44 in the United States and number 14 in Great Britain—Johnny made clear that he favored the band's more aggressive punk material: "End of the Century was just watered-down Ramones. It's not the real Ramones."^[49] This stance was also conveyed by the title and track selection of the compilation album Johnny later oversaw, Loud, Fast Ramones: Their Toughest Hits. Despite these reservations, Johnny did concede that some of Spector's work with the band had merit, saying "It really worked when he got to a slower song like 'Danny Says'—the production really worked tremendously. 'Rock 'N' Roll Radio' is really good. For the harder stuff, it didn't work as well."^[50] The syrupy, string-laden Ronettes cover "Baby, I Love You" released as a single, became the band's biggest hit in Great Britain, reaching number 8 on the charts.^[51]

Joey and Dee Dee Ramone in concert, 1983

Pleasant Dreams, the band's sixth album, was released in 1981. It continued the trend established by End of the Century, taking the band further from the raw punk sound of its early records. As described by Trouser Press, the album, produced by Graham Gouldman of UK pop act 10cc, moved the Ramones "away from their pioneering minimalism into heavy metal territory".^[52] Johnny would contend in retrospect that this direction was a record company decision, a continued futile attempt to get airplay on American radio.^[1][50] While Pleasant Dreams reached number 58 on the U.S. chart, its two singles failed to register at all.^[53]

Subterranean Jungle, produced by Ritchie Cordell and Glen Kolotkin, was released in 1983.^[54] According to Trouser Press, it brought the band "back to where they once belonged: junky '60s pop adjusted for current tastes", which among other things meant "easing off the breakneck rhythm that was once Ramones dogma."^[52] Billy Rogers, who had performed with Johnny Thunders and The Heartbreakers, played drums on the album's second single, a cover of The Chambers Brothers' "Time Has Come Today".^[55] Subterranean Jungle peaked at number 83 in the United States—it would be the last album by the band to crack the Billboard Top 100.^[56][57]

Shuffling members: 1983–89[link]

After the release of Subterranean Jungle, Marky was fired from the band due to his alcoholism.^[58] He was replaced by Richard Reinhardt, who adopted the name Richie Ramone. The first album the Ramones recorded with Richie was Too Tough to Die in 1984, with Tommy Erdelyi and Ed Stasium returning as producers. The album marked a shift to something like the band's original sound. In the description of Allmusic's Stephen Thomas Erlewine, the "rhythms are back up to jackhammer speed and the songs are down to short, terse statements."^[59]

	"Bonzo Goes To Bitburg" noicon Over a "power-pop beat and melodic hooks galore", writes David Corn, Joey "snarls" the beginning of the refrain—"Bonzo goes to Bitburg/then goes out for a cup of tea/As I watched it on TV/somehow it really bothered me".[60] In contrast, Salon.com arts editor Bill Wyman writes of "Joey's pained, pleading voice".[61]
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The band's main release of 1985 was the British single "Bonzo Goes to Bitburg"; though it was available in the United States only as an import, it was played widely on American college radio.^[62] The song was written, primarily by Joey, in protest of Ronald Reagan's visit to a German military cemetery where SS members were buried.^[63] Retitled "My Brain Is Hanging Upside Down (Bonzo Goes to Bitburg)", the song appeared on the band's ninth studio album, Animal Boy (1986). Produced by Jean Beauvoir, formerly a member of the Plasmatics, the album was characterized by a Rolling Stone reviewer as "nonstop primal fuzz pop".^[64] Making it his pick for "album of the week", New York Times critic Jon Pareles wrote that the Ramones "speak up for outcasts and disturbed individuals".^[65]

The following year the band recorded their last album with Richie, Halfway to Sanity, produced by Daniel Rey. Richie left in August 1987, upset that after being in the band for four years, the other members would still not give him a share of the money they made selling T-shirts.^[66] Richie was replaced by Clem Burke from Blondie, which was disbanded at the time. According to Johnny, the performances with Burke—who adopted the name Elvis Ramone—were a disaster. He was fired after two performances because his drumming could not keep up with the rest of the band.^[66] Marky, now clean and sober, returned.^[20]

Dee Dee left the band after the recording of their eleventh studio album, 1989's Brain Drain, co-produced by Beauvoir, Rey, and Bill Laswell.^[67] He was replaced by Christopher Joseph Ward (C.J. Ramone), who performed with the band until they disbanded. Dee Dee initially pursued a brief career as a rapper under the name Dee Dee King. He quickly returned to punk rock and formed several bands, in much the same vein as the Ramones, for whom he also continued to write songs.^[67]

Final years: 1990–96[link]

After more than a decade and a half at Sire Records, the Ramones moved to a new label, Radioactive Records. Their first album for the label was 1992's Mondo Bizarro, which reunited them with producer Ed Stasium.^[68] Acid Eaters, consisting entirely of cover songs, came out the following year.^[69] In 1993 the Ramones were featured in the animated television series The Simpsons, providing music and voices for animated versions of themselves in the episode "Rosebud".^[70]

In 1995, the Ramones released ¡Adios Amigos!, their fourteenth studio album, and announced that they planned to disband if it was not successful.^[71][72] Its sales were unremarkable, garnering it just two weeks on the lower end of the Billboard chart.^[73] The band spent late 1995 on what was promoted as a farewell tour. However, they accepted an offer to appear in the sixth Lollapalooza festival, which toured around the United States during the following summer.^[74] After the Lollapalooza tour's conclusion, the Ramones played their final show on August 6, 1996, at the Palace in Hollywood. A recording of the concert was later released on video and CD as We're Outta Here! In addition to a reappearance by Dee Dee, the show featured several guests including Motörhead's Lemmy, Pearl Jam's Eddie Vedder, Soundgarden's Chris Cornell, and Rancid's Tim Armstrong and Lars Frederiksen.^[3]

Aftermath and deaths[link]

Marky Ramone at the 2009 premiere of the documentary Burning Down the House: The Story of CBGB

On July 20, 1999, Dee Dee, Johnny, Joey, Tommy, Marky, and C.J. appeared together at the Virgin Megastore in New York City for an autograph signing. This was the last occasion on which the original four members of the group appeared together. Joey, who had been diagnosed with lymphoma in 1995, died of the illness on April 15, 2001, in New York.^[4][75]

In 2002, the Ramones were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, which specifically named Dee Dee, Johnny, Joey, Tommy, and Marky. At the ceremony, the surviving inductees spoke on behalf of the band. Tommy spoke first, saying how honored the band felt, but how much it would have meant for Joey. Johnny thanked the band's fans and blessed George W. Bush and his presidency, Dee Dee humorously congratulated and thanked himself, while Marky thanked Tommy for influencing his drum style. Green Day played "Teenage Lobotomy" and "Blitzkrieg Bop" as a tribute, demonstrating the Ramones' continuing influence on later rock musicians. The ceremony was one of Dee Dee's last public appearances: on June 5, 2002, two months later, he was found at his Hollywood home, dead from a heroin overdose.^[5]

On November 30, 2003, New York City unveiled a sign designating East 2nd Street at the corner of Bowery as Joey Ramone Place. The singer lived on East 2nd for a time, and the sign is near the former Bowery site of CBGB.^[76] The documentary film End of the Century: The Story of the Ramones came out in 2004. Johnny, who had been privately battling prostate cancer, died on September 15, 2004, in Los Angeles, shortly after the film's release.^[6] On the same day as Johnny's death, the world's first Ramones Museum opened its doors to the public. Located in Berlin, Germany, the museum features more than 300 items of memorabilia, including a pair of stage-worn jeans from Johnny, a stage-worn glove from Joey, Marky's sneakers, and C.J.'s stage-worn bass strap.^[77]

The Ramones were inducted into the Long Island Music Hall of Fame in 2007.^[78] That October saw the release of a DVD set containing concert footage of the band: It's Alive 1974-1996 includes 118 songs from 33 performances over the span of the group's career.^[79] In February 2011, the group was honored with a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. Drummers Tommy, Marky, and Richie attended the ceremony.^[12][13] Marky declared, "This is amazing. I never expected this. I'm sure Johnny, Joey, and Dee Dee would never have expected this."^[12] Richie noted that it was the first time ever that all three drummers were under the same roof, and mused that he couldn't "help thinking that [Joey] is watching us right now with a little smile on his face behind his rose-colored glasses."^[13]

Conflicts between members[link]

Tensions between Joey and Johnny colored much of the Ramones' career. The pair were politically antagonistic, Joey being a liberal and Johnny a conservative. Their personalities also clashed: Johnny, who spent two years in military school, lived by a code of self-discipline,^[80] while Joey struggled with obsessive-compulsive disorder.^[81] Johnny, who was fascinated by the Nazis and Adolf Hitler, would sometimes torment Joey (who was Jewish) with anti-Semitic remarks.^[82] In the early 1980s, Johnny "stole" Joey's girlfriend Linda, whom he later married. As a consequence, despite performing together for years afterward, Joey and Johnny stopped speaking to each other.^[6] Johnny did not call Joey before the latter's death in 2001, but said in the documentary End of the Century that he was depressed for "the whole week" after the singer died.^[66]

Aside from this central conflict, Dee Dee's bipolar disorder and repeated relapses into drug addiction also caused significant strains.^[83] Tommy left the band partly in reaction to being "physically threatened by Johnny, treated with contempt by Dee Dee, and all but ignored by Joey".^[82] As new members joined, payment methods and image representation became matters of serious dispute.^[84] In 1997, Marky and Joey got into a fight about their respective drinking habits on the Howard Stern radio show.^[85]

Style[link]

Musical style[link]

	"Sheena Is a Punk Rocker" noicon Cultural critic Anders Johannsson uses this 1977 single as an example of how most Ramones songs "work in the same way: the same hammering on the drums, the same distorted guitars, the same howling of an extremely short text, in a simple tune with an even simpler chorus".[86]
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The Ramones' loud, fast, straightforward musical style was influenced by pop music that the band members grew up listening to in the 1950s and 1960s, including classic rock groups such as The Beach Boys, The Beatles, The Kinks, and The Rolling Stones; bubblegum acts like the 1910 Fruitgum Company and Ohio Express; and girl groups such as The Ronettes and The Shangri-Las. They also drew on the harder rock sound of The Stooges and the New York Dolls, both now known as seminal protopunk bands.^[87] The Ramones' style was in part a reaction against the heavily produced, often bombastic music that dominated the pop charts in the 1970s. "We decided to start our own group because we were bored with everything we heard," Joey once explained. "In 1974 everything was tenth-generation Led Zeppelin, tenth-generation Elton John, or overproduced, or just junk. Everything was long jams, long guitar solos.... We missed music like it used to be."^[88] Ira Robbins and Scott Isler of Trouser Press describe the result:

With just four chords and one manic tempo, New York's Ramones blasted open the clogged arteries of mid-'70s rock, reanimating the music. Their genius was to recapture the short/simple aesthetic from which pop had strayed, adding a caustic sense of trash-culture humor and minimalist rhythm guitar sound.^[89]

As leaders in the punk rock scene, the Ramones' music has usually been identified with that label,^[1] while some have defined their characteristic style more specifically as pop punk^[90] and others as power pop.^[91] In the 1980s, the band sometimes veered into hardcore punk territory, as can be heard on Too Tough to Die.^[89]

On stage, the band adopted a focused approach directly intended to increase the audience's concert experience. Johnny's instructions to C.J. when preparing for his first live performances with the group were to play facing the audience, to stand with the bass slung low between spread legs, and to walk forward to the front of stage at the same time as he did. Johnny was not a fan of guitarists who performed facing their drummer, amplifier, or other band members.^[92]

Visual imagery[link]

The Ramones' art and visual imagery complemented the themes of their music and performance. The band members adopted a uniform look of long hair, leather jackets, T-shirts, torn jeans, and sneakers. This fashion emphasized minimalism, which was a powerful influence on the New York punk scene of the 1970s and reflected the band's short, simple songs.^[93] Tommy Ramone recalled that, both musically and visually, "we were influenced by comic books, movies, the Andy Warhol scene, and avant-garde films. I was a big Mad Magazine fan myself."^[93]

The band's logo was created by New York City artist Arturo Vega, a longtime friend who had allowed Joey and Dee Dee to move into his loft.^[94] Vega produced the band's T-shirts, their main source of income, basing most of the images on a black-and-white self-portrait photograph he had taken of his American bald eagle belt buckle which had appeared on the back sleeve of the Ramones' first album.^[95] He was inspired to create the band's logo after a trip to Washington, D.C.:

I saw them as the ultimate all-American band. To me, they reflected the American character in general—an almost childish innocent aggression.... I thought, 'The Great Seal of the President of the United States' would be perfect for the Ramones, with the eagle holding arrows—to symbolize strength and the aggression that would be used against whomever dares to attack us—and an olive branch, offered to those who want to be friendly. But we decided to change it a little bit. Instead of the olive branch, we had an apple tree branch, since the Ramones were American as apple pie. And since Johnny was such a baseball fanatic, we had the eagle hold a baseball bat instead of the [Great Seal]'s arrows.^[95]

The scroll in the eagle's beak originally read "Look out below", but this was soon changed to "Hey ho let's go" after the opening lyrics of the band's first single, "Blitzkrieg Bop". The arrowheads on the shield came from a design on a polyester shirt Vega had bought. The name "Ramones" was spelled out in block capitals above the logo using plastic stick-on letters.^[23] Where the presidential emblem read "Seal of the President of the United States" clockwise in the border around the eagle, Vega instead placed the pseudonyms of the four band members: Johnny, Joey, Dee Dee, and Tommy. Over the years the names in the border would change as the band's lineup fluctuated.^[96]

Influence[link]

Johnny Ramone in concert, 1977

The Ramones had a broad and lasting influence on the development of popular music. Music historian Jon Savage writes of their debut album that "it remains one of the few records that changed pop forever."^[97] As described by Allmusic critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine, "The band's first four albums set the blueprint for punk, especially American punk and hardcore, for the next two decades."^[98] Trouser Press's Robbins and Isler similarly write that the Ramones "not only spearheaded the original new wave/punk movement, but also drew the blueprint for subsequent hardcore punk bands".^[89] Punk journalist Phil Strongman writes, "In purely musical terms, The Ramones, in attempting to re-create the excitement of pre-Dolby rock, were to cast a huge shadow—they had fused a blueprint for much of the indie future."^[24] Writing for Slate in 2001, Douglas Wolk described the Ramones as "easily the most influential group of the last 30 years."^[99]

The Ramones' debut album had an outsized effect relative to its modest sales. According to Tony James, a member of several seminal British punk bands, "Everybody went up three gears the day they got that first Ramones album. Punk rock—that rama-lama super fast stuff—is totally down to the Ramones. Bands were just playing in an MC5 groove until then."^[100] The Ramones' two July 1976 shows, like their debut album, are seen as having a significant impact on the style of many of the newly formed British punk acts—as one observer put it, "instantly nearly every band speeded up".^[101] The Ramones' first British concert, at London's Roundhouse concert hall, was held on July 4, 1976, the United States Bicentennial. The Sex Pistols were playing in Sheffield that evening, supported by The Clash, making their public debut. The next night, members of both bands attended the Ramones' gig at the Dingwall's club. Ramones manager Danny Fields recalls a conversation between Johnny Ramone and Clash bassist Paul Simonon (which he mislocates at the Roundhouse): "Johnny asked him, 'What do you do? Are you in a band?' Paul said, 'Well, we just rehearse. We call ourselves the Clash but we're not good enough.' Johnny said, 'Wait till you see us—we stink, we're lousy, we can't play. Just get out there and do it.'"^[102] Another band whose members saw the Ramones perform, The Damned, played their first show two days later. The central fanzine of the early UK punk scene, Sniffin' Glue, was named after the song "Now I Wanna Sniff Some Glue", which appeared on the debut LP.^[103]

Ramones concerts and recordings influenced many musicians central to the development of California punk as well, including Greg Ginn of Black Flag,^[104] Jello Biafra of the Dead Kennedys,^[105] Mike Ness of Social Distortion,^[106] Brett Gurewitz of Bad Religion,^[107] and members of the Descendents.^[108] Canada's first major punk scenes—in Toronto and in British Columbia's Victoria and Vancouver—were also heavily influenced by the Ramones.^[39][109] In the late 1970s, many bands emerged with musical styles deeply indebted to the band's. There were The Lurkers from England,^[110] The Undertones from Ireland,^[111] Teenage Head from Canada,^[112] and The Zeros^[113] and The Dickies^[114] from southern California. The seminal hardcore band Bad Brains took its name from a Ramones song.^[115] The Riverdales, made up of former members of Screeching Weasel, have emulated the sound of the Ramones throughout their career.^[116] Green Day frontman Billie Joe Armstrong named his son Joey in homage to Joey Ramone, and drummer Tré Cool named his daughter Ramona.^[117]

The Ramones also influenced musicians associated with other genres, such as heavy metal. Metallica guitarist Kirk Hammett has described the importance of Johnny's rapid-fire guitar playing style to his own musical development.^[118] Motörhead lead singer Lemmy, a friend of the Ramones since the late 1970s, mixed the band's "Go Home Ann" in 1985. The members of Motörhead later composed the song "R.A.M.O.N.E.S." as a tribute, and Lemmy performed at the final Ramones concert in 1996.^[119] In the realm of alternative rock, the song "53rd and 3rd" lent its name to a British indie pop label cofounded by Stephen Pastel of the Scottish band The Pastels. Evan Dando of The Lemonheads,^[120] Dave Grohl of Nirvana and Foo Fighters,^[103] Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam^[121] (who introduced the band members at their Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction) and The Strokes^[122] are among the many alternative rock musicians who have credited the Ramones with inspiring them.^[123]

Tribute albums[link]

In April 2009, Spin writer Mark Prindle observed that the Ramones had to date "inspired a jaw-dropping 48 (at least!) full-length tribute records."^[124] The first Ramones tribute album featuring multiple performers was released in 1991: Gabba Gabba Hey: A Tribute to the Ramones includes tracks by such acts as The Flesh Eaters, L7, Mojo Nixon, and Bad Religion.^[123] In 2001, Dee Dee made a guest appearance on one track of Ramones Maniacs, a multi-artist cover of the entire Ramones Mania compilation album. The Song Ramones the Same, which came out the following year, includes performances by The Dictators, who were part of the early New York punk scene, and Wayne Kramer, guitarist for the influential protopunk band MC5. We're a Happy Family: A Tribute to Ramones, released in 2003, features performers such as Green Day, Metallica, Kiss, The Offspring, Red Hot Chili Peppers, U2, and Rob Zombie (who also did the album cover artwork).^[125]

Punk bands such as Screeching Weasel, The Vindictives, The Queers, The Mr. T Experience, Boris the Sprinkler, Beatnik Termites, Tip Toppers, Jon Cougar Concentration Camp, Shonen Knife and McRackins have recorded cover versions of entire Ramones albums—Ramones, Leave Home, Rocket to Russia, Road to Ruin, End of the Century, Pleasant Dreams, Subterranean Jungle, and (two times) Too Tough to Die, respectively.^[124] The Huntingtons' File Under Ramones consists of Ramones covers from across the band's history.^[126]

Band members[link]

• Dee Dee Ramone (Douglas Colvin) – bass guitar, vocals (1974–89)^[15]
• Johnny Ramone (John Cummings) – guitar (1974–96)^[15]
• Joey Ramone (Jeffry Hyman) – drums (1974), lead vocals (1974–96)^[15]
• Tommy Ramone (Thomas Erdelyi) – drums (1974–78)^[15]
• Marky Ramone (Marc Bell) – drums (1978–83, 1987–96)^[15]
• Richie Ramone (Richard Reinhardt) – drums, vocals (1983–87)^[15]
• Elvis Ramone (Clem Burke) – drums (1987)^[66]
• C. J. Ramone (Christopher Joseph Ward) – bass guitar, vocals (1989–96)^[15]

Discography[link]

Studio albums

• Ramones (1976)
• Leave Home (1977)
• Rocket to Russia (1977)
• Road to Ruin (1978)
• End of the Century (1980)
• Pleasant Dreams (1981)
• Subterranean Jungle (1983)
• Too Tough to Die (1984)
• Animal Boy (1986)
• Halfway to Sanity (1987)
• Brain Drain (1989)
• Mondo Bizarro (1992)
• Acid Eaters (1993)
• ¡Adios Amigos! (1995)

See also[link]

• List of Ramones concerts
• Gabba Gabba Hey

References[link]

Sources[link]

Notes[link]

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Ramones

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Ramones

• Ramones at the Open Directory Project