100 Best Albums Of All Time

01 Blitzkrieg Bop

02 Beat on the Brat

03 Judy Is a Punk

04 I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend

05 Chain Saw

06 Now I Wanna Sniff Some Glue

07 I Don’t Wanna Go Down to the Basement

08 Loudmouth

09 Havana Affair

10 Listen to My Heart

11 53rd & 3rd

12 Let’s Dance

13 I Don’t Wanna Walk Around with You

14 Today Your Love, Tomorrow the World

‘We did the album in a week and we only spent sixty-four hundred dollars making it. Everybody was amazed,’ said singer Joey Ramone. ‘Especially since it was an album that really changed the world. It kicked off punk rock and started the whole thing – as well as us.’

Fourteen songs in 29 minutes and 52 seconds was statement enough, especially at a time when the Allman Brothers had done one song that took two sides of an album. Prior to the Ramones every rock group started out learning blues and Chuck Berry. After the Ramones every group started out learning Ramones songs.

Everything about the record was perfect – the songs, the sound, the titles, the members’ ‘brother’ names (the gang concept). And it was totally complemented by the simple, brilliant black and white cover shot – the ripped jeans, the motorcycle jackets, the Converse sneakers. It all started with this photograph.

The Ramones – four misfits from the ’burbs of New York – were not trying to tear rock & roll down. They loved it. It’s just that the things they loved, such as glam rock, the Stooges, Phil Spector and the early British Invasion, were no longer being heard. The Ramones simply wanted to play the music they loved, but when they did it sounded quite unlike anything else. Having decided to write their own songs they also chose to write about what they knew – which was being a drug addict and a male hustler, in the case of bass player Dee Dee Ramone, or being OCD and too tall and kinda strange, in the case of Joey. According to Johnny Ramone, ‘We couldn’t write about girls or cars, so we wrote about things we knew.’ ‘We play short songs and short sets for people who don’t have a lot of spare time,’ quipped drummer Tommy Ramone.

So the end result was a repertoire of songs that brought the sparkling innocence of the Ronettes to the mean streets of ’70s Manhattan. It was a completely unique sensibility. Although they couldn’t play their instruments they couldn’t play them quite unlike anyone else. And they had Johnny Ramone who created a one-man wall of sound with his guitar. There was nothing subtle here but there was a majestic beauty in it. When told that people thought the songs sounded too much the same, Tommy replied, ‘Well, they didn’t listen close enough’.

Ramones starts off with a simple count ‘1-2-3-4’ and then charges into ‘Blitzkrieg Bop’ and it’s on. Songs about sniffing glue sit with songs about schlock horror films, cartoonists, kids with death wishes and the eternal quest for the pure love of a girl.

Contrary to Joey’s statement, a total of 17 days from 2–19 February in the studio at Radio City Music Hall were spent recording the album with novice Craig Leon producing. According to Johnny, ‘We laid out the basic tracks in two days. We went through four or five songs in one take.’ It was mixed in basic stereo like the early ’60s classics they loved so much. Making what were in effect revolutionary aesthetic decisions of course has its cost, and while the Ramones and Sire thought the band should have topped the charts, the record was a long way from the public’s taste.

According to drummer Tommy Ramone, ‘it was conceptual like underground art or film, innovative. The first album was a statement of rawness – minimal, striking, unique.’