364. Ramones - Ramones (1976)
















Track Listing

1. Blitzkrieg Bop
2. Beat On The Brat
3. Judy Is A Punk
4. I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend
5. Chainsaw
6. Now I Wanna Sniff Some Glue
7. I Don't Wanna Go Down In The Basement
8. Loud Mouth
9. Havana Affair
10. Listen To My Heart
11. 53rd And 3rd
12. Let's Dance
13. I Don't Wanna Walk Around With You
14. Today Your Love Tomorrow The World

Review

Hey, ho, let's go! That is the sound of Punk starting! We have been charting the beginnings of punk from The Monks back in the mid-60's, now, more than 10 years later we have the actual thing. This is the first universally recognised Punk album and it is a welcome change.

I am not that big a fan of the Ramones, but this album is pretty great. It takes a little bit to get used to it, at the beginning all the songs seem pretty much the same, but you soon start to make them out as individual pieces.

Another interesting thing here is to see where the Ramones are coming from, it isn't just the obvious Iggy Pop and New York Dolls, there is plenty here from Doo-Wop and 50's rock which they were clearly fascinated with. Of course punk is a reaction to some of the crappy music we've been having, but it is a necessary revolution, and even tough I am much more of a fan of proto and post-punk we needed something to clean our palate. It is a bit like that pickled ginger you have between sushi pieces, a bit of a reset button bringing rock back to its essentials and doing hard. Essential.

Track Highlights

1. Blitzkrieg Bop
2. Judy Is a Punk
3. 53rd and 3rd
4. Beat On The Brat

Final Grade

9/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

After Seymour Stein of Sire Records signed the band in the autumn of 1975, the band began to record their debut the following winter. Ramones was recorded quickly and cheaply at Plaza Sound, Radio City Music Hall, New York; recording lasted from February 2 through the 19th, 1976 on a budget of only $6,200. The template of guitar and bass in opposite channels with the drums in the middle was based on early Beatles and Cream records

Many radio disc jockeys were supposedly put off by the records' primitive, frantic music and often bizarre themes and the album did not receive heavy airplay, only peaking at number #111 on the Billboard's (North America) Pop Albums chart upon being released April 23.

Despite this, the Ramones eventually established the reputation as being the godfathers of punk rock, and the album is largely considered a highly influential classic. Its influence on punk and myriad genres of alternative rock cannot be overstated. In 2003 the TV network VH1 named Ramones the 54th greatest album of all time. In 2003, the album was ranked number 33 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time.

Blitzkrieg Bop: