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Saturday, September 18, 2010

Gabba Gabba Hey

Happy Birthday to Dee Dee Ramone, the bassist and primary songwriter for the seminal punk band, The Ramones. Dee Dee, born Douglas Glenn Colvin, would have been 59 today, but sadly, he died in 2002 of a drug overdose.
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The Ramones took their name from an article Dee Dee read which reported that Paul McCartney often signed into hotels under the name of Paul Ramon. Dee Dee added an "E" to Ramon and the band name was created. Dee Dee was living in Queens, New York when he met John Cummings, "Johnny Ramone", Thomas Erdelyi, "Tommy Ramone", and Jeffrey Hyman, "Joey Ramone", they formed a band, and the rest is history. Not only did The Ramones help to found the punk movement in American rock music, but they influenced countless other singers and bands which followed and literally changed the face of pop music.
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The Ramones hated the overly-produced, boring pop music of the 1970's, and wished for a return to the classic rock of their childhood, i.e. The Beach Boys, The Beatles, The Ronettes, etc. Their high-speed, simple chord play was first noticed by the movers and shakers of the music world in New York when they premiered at CBGB's on Aug. 16, 1974. They quickly became the leaders in a new movement in music which was increasingly being referred to as "punk".
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Surprisingly, for a rock group which is now recognized for its importance, (Spin Magazine named them as the second most important rock group behind The Beatles), The Ramones never actually had a "hit" song on the Billboard charts. Only three of their songs charted on the Hot 100 Billboard Chart in the U.S., "Sheena is a Punk Rocker", #81; "Do You Wanna Dance?", #86, and "Rockaway Beach", #66; all in 1976-77. The punk movement was more popular in England at the time, though, and 14 of their songs charted there, the highest, "Baby, I Love You", reached #8 in the U.K. in 1980. But despite a lack of chart success, many of Ramones hits are well known, and are now considered classics of rock music, including "Rock and Roll High School" and "I Wanna Be Sedated" Their first single, "Blitzkrieg Bop", 1974, opened with what is now considered one of the most famous phrases in rock music, "Hey! Ho! Let's go!".
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The closest The Ramones came to achieving wide-spread, mainstream popularity was when they provided the music for, and appeared in, the 1979 movie, "Rock and Roll High School". When we watched that movie in high school, it was then that we first began to suspect that American radio hadn't really told the truth to we who were teenagers in the 1970's. When we realized our mainstream, overly-programmed radio stations hadn't ever played The Ramones before, we started wondering what else was being hidden from us. It was no surprise then, that soon after, American youth embraced the New Wave movement so heartily; just like The Ramones, we were bored by mainstream pop music, and we suddenly realized there was something else out there. Something a lot more exciting.
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The Ramones were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2002.

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