[guitarpro]

My favorite band next to SY they were a great band and I just felt the need to send em some love.

[Pookie]

There are three stages for the Ramones as far as I'm concerned.
1976-1977: Ramones, Rocket To Russia, Leave Home (the great years).

1978-1984: Road to Ruin, End of the Century, Pleasant Dreams, Subterranean Jungle, Too Tough To Die (the so-so years).

1985-1995: the truly fucking awful years: everything else they recorded.

If you concentrate on 1976/7, then I agree.

[gmku]

Great first 3-4 albums. I also want to pick up their Acid Eaters album someday.

[king_buzzo]

Ramones rule, what I dislike is that EVERYONE has a Ramones shirt.

[gmku]

I don't. But I'd like one.

[SynthethicalY]

Originally Posted by king_buzzo

Ramones rule, what I dislike is that EVERYONE has a Ramones shirt.

Be unique make your own t-shirt.

[guitarpro]

The early stuff is my favorite

[Pookie]

It's a testament to the greatness of the first three albums that they're held in such high regard despite the majority of their output being so poor.

[MellySingsDoom]

Joey R: Serious OCD sufferer
Johnny R: Serious thug turned serious right-winger and (alleged!) woman-batterer.
Dee-Dee R: Longterm heroin user and sociopath.

How these three managed to stay in the same band for five minutes, let alone bang out one of the classic LPs of any genre in the 1970's, is truly a miracle.

[hey alex]

i've worn my ramones shirt since like freshman-- and i only wear like 5 now.

Been listening to them a lot lateyl, which has been great for my fun perscription.

[Everyneurotic]

massively overrated and i never use the "o" word, this time it's called for.

the stooges > ramones

[RdTv]

Agreeing with Everyneurotic here, I DO like the ramones, well at least the first two or three albums, but I do believe they are overrated and get a lot more praise than they are worthy of. Its intersting how many people claim them as the best, only because they (the people) haven't fully explored that era of music.

[Everyneurotic]

and my favorite ramones albums are it's alive and live loco, i don't think i need much more from them.

[Dead-Air]

Originally Posted by RdTv

Agreeing with Everyneurotic here, I DO like the ramones, well at least the first two or three albums, but I do believe they are overrated and get a lot more praise than they are worthy of. Its intersting how many people claim them as the best, only because they (the people) haven't fully explored that era of music.

That's quite an assumptive claim.

We are talking here about the band who went and played a tour in England that inspired members of the Pistols, the Clash, the Buzzcocks, the Damned, and Siouxsie and the Banshees to start their own groups. The same band that the Bad Brains took their name from one of their songs, and Black Flag and the Dead Kennedys both invoke as their major influence. I'm sure there are a few kids out there who fit the description you imply, but there are also plenty of people that know that the Backstreet Boys were Wayne County's band and still think of the Ramones as the best because they fucking started it all.

For me personally, Suicide, Television, and Rocket from the Tombs/Pere Ubu have all had a bigger influence on my life and my music, but that doesn't mean that I don't still think of the Ramones as the archetype for pure unbridled punk rock 'n roll from that era or any since. You can't strip down to the essence of rock 'n roll music further than "Beat On the Brat" or "Now I Wanna Sniff Some Glue". The three groups to come the closest before were probably the Stooges (a bit too free jazz influenced), the New York Dolls (a bit too glam) and the Dictators (a bit too stand up comedy), but due to their other elements none of them achieved what the Ramones did - what Tom Verlaine summed up as creating the first pure white urban rock 'n roll without copping any old blues riffs.

I'd question how anyone could have "fully explored that era of music" as you say and not realized that it was the Ramones who Hilly Krystal first booked at CBGBs forever changing rock music as we understand it and creating the NYC scene that Sonic Youth would later rise to the top of in their day (though they of course incorporated the downtown avant garde and No Wave scenes in their rise as well.)

[RdTv]

Originally Posted by Dead-Air

That's quite an assumptive claim.

We are talking here about the band who went and played a tour in England that inspired members of the Pistols, the Clash, the Buzzcocks, the Damned, and Siouxsie and the Banshees to start their own groups. The same band that the Bad Brains took their name from one of their songs, and Black Flag and the Dead Kennedys both invoke as their major influence. I'm sure there are a few kids out there who fit the description you imply, but there are also plenty of people that know that the Backstreet Boys were Wayne County's band and still think of the Ramones as the best because they fucking started it all.

For me personally, Suicide, Television, and Rocket from the Tombs/Pere Ubu have all had a bigger influence on my life and my music, but that doesn't mean that I don't still think of the Ramones as the archetype for pure unbridled punk rock 'n roll from that era or any since. You can't strip down to the essence of rock 'n roll music further than "Beat On the Brat" or "Now I Wanna Sniff Some Glue". The three groups to come the closest before were probably the Stooges (a bit too free jazz influenced), the New York Dolls (a bit too glam) and the Dictators (a bit too stand up comedy), but due to their other elements none of them achieved what the Ramones did - what Tom Verlaine summed up as creating the first pure white urban rock 'n roll without copping any old blues riffs.

I'd question how anyone could have "fully explored that era of music" as you say and not realized that it was the Ramones who Hilly Krystal first booked at CBGBs forever changing rock music as we understand it and creating the NYC scene that Sonic Youth would later rise to the top of in their day (though they of course incorporated the downtown avant garde and No Wave scenes in their rise as well.)

My application was towards the legions of kids/peolpe that talk a lot of talk about music and just say The Ramones were the best at what was going on then, when they don't know what really went on then. Honestly man, I mean what were the ramones listening to? You mean to tell me that The MC5 weren't a white urban rock n roll band?

I wasn't disputing whether Hilly Krystal had booked them and I wasn't trying to get into Wayne/Jayne County either.

My point is that yes they were influential to a lot if not most of the 80's american hardcore movement, but honestly The Heartbreakers were in England before the Ramones were and they receive little credit for influences, eventhough The Sex Pistols, The Clash, Billy Idol etc...saw them and immediately started to be mused.

The fact is that Danny Fields finally got what he wanted, a band that he could mold and turn into what he wanted and I think thats what he lost with The Stooges. I mean he wanted to have all the guys have the same last name and all, its good marketing, catchy and people could readily recognize it.

Im really swaying of course with this post and forgive me for it, all I was trying to say is that a lot of people NOWADAYS are very quick to drop the Ramones as the best, and maybe the really feel that and I am 100% cool with it, what I'm not cool with is kids or people just saying something is the best, without giving the other options a shot. If you've done that (like most here have and I wasn't applying my previous post towards you guys) and you truly believe The Ramones were it, than hell man, the were it and I love you for that.

[Dead-Air]

Originally Posted by RdTv

My application was towards the legions of kids/peolpe that talk a lot of talk about music and just say The Ramones were the best at what was going on then, when they don't know what really went on then. Honestly man, I mean what were the ramones listening to? You mean to tell me that The MC5 weren't a white urban rock n roll band?

I wasn't disputing whether Hilly Krystal had booked them and I wasn't trying to get into Wayne/Jayne County either.

My point is that yes they were influential to a lot if not most of the 80's american hardcore movement, but honestly The Heartbreakers were in England before the Ramones were and they receive little credit for influences, eventhough The Sex Pistols, The Clash, Billy Idol etc...saw them and immediately started to be mused.

The fact is that Danny Fields finally got what he wanted, a band that he could mold and turn into what he wanted and I think thats what he lost with The Stooges. I mean he wanted to have all the guys have the same last name and all, its good marketing, catchy and people could readily recognize it.

Im really swaying of course with this post and forgive me for it, all I was trying to say is that a lot of people NOWADAYS are very quick to drop the Ramones as the best, and maybe the really feel that and I am 100% cool with it, what I'm not cool with is kids or people just saying something is the best, without giving the other options a shot. If you've done that (like most here have and I wasn't applying my previous post towards you guys) and you truly believe The Ramones were it, than hell man, the were it and I love you for that.

Well, the kids you are talking about are not really comparing the Ramones to the music of the original punk days. Most of them these days haven't even heard of Suicidal Tendencies, because that's too old school for them! They are mostly only aware of whatever the Green Day/Blink 182 band of the week is, and they are also aware of the Ramones because a decade after the group finally fizzled out, they now get played on radio stations that never touched them in their heyday. So if those kids are saying the Ramones are "the best", thank god, because think what they are comparing them too!

As for the MC5 being white urban rock 'n roll, they were kind of the first step in that direction, but they specifically got called "white blues" because they really were dependant on those old blues riffs, and for that matter they covered Sun Ra, so they were pretty into the free jazz thing like the Stooges too. In fact both groups played with Funkadelic in Detroit, so there was some major racial crossover going on. Which is all a good thing of course, but the point is, the Ramones really did create a solo-free and blues-progression free music that nobody had heard before. They claimed themselves it was because they weren't smart enough to figure out the harder stuff, but one can never tell how much of that was an act. It really doesn't matter though, they were completely original, and in a world filled with literally thousands of bands copying what they did, that gets pretty easy to forget.

[RdTv]

Dead-Air I like you. I just think that before 75 or 76 when The Ramones started to do it, there were others such as : Television, The Heartbreakers, The dictators, the MC5, The Stooges that were doing it. But, what you said at the end of your post made me realize I was just missing your point earlier. The Ramones didn't invent it, they just changed it forever, and I think I did get caught up with who was doing it first or who was influencing who that I let that important point pass over me. Regardless, I like The Ramones, especially Dee Dee.

[guitarpro]

1+2+3+4

Dee Dee was my favorite ramone

[Pookie]

Originally Posted by Everyneurotic

and my favorite ramones albums are it's alive and live loco, i don't think i need much more from them.

If I had to choose just one Ramones album, I'd have It's Alive. It's a greatest hits (as of New Years Eve 1977) recorded live and has everything you need by them.

[atari 2600]

Some nice posting over here. I read them all. Can't think of much to add.

Too bad the Ramones "Raw" DVD is from '80. Still great though.