My mum often uses the phrase ‘there’s nothing new under the sun.’
Living as I do on the Costa Blanca it is an expression that regularly enters my head these days – particularly when I see teenagers of all nationalities wearing Ramones tee-shirts.
For those unaware, The Ramones were a proto-punk rock band who roared out of New York in the summer of 1976 and kick started the burgeoning UK punk scene that unfolded in the ensuing twelve months.
To find youngsters wearing Ramones tee-shirts over forty years later gives me cause for a wry smile – especially as all four original members of the band were dead before many of their latter day converts were born.
It was the late summer of 1976 when I first became aware of The Ramones.
Listening to BBC DJ John Peel one night, no doubt hoping he would play something by my recently discovered hero Bruce Springsteen or cut or two from ‘Quadrophenia‘, I was stopped in my tracks when he played a song called ‘The Blitzkrieg Bop‘ (it is currently being used in a television commercial – I neither know nor care what the product is, suffice to say it’s sacrilege).
The early Kinks/Who singles I loved contained what I believed the most ferocious playing ever put down – but The Ramones made them both sound like Mantovani.
Completely smitten, I ordered The Ramones self-titled debut album from a local record shop as an import. Had I waited two months it would have cost me a lot less as the UK release was officially sanctioned in November 1976 – but who cared, this was the most pounding, funny, riotous noise I had ever heard.
Just by looking at the cover I could see they weren’t the Eagles. No, these were four slouching, scruffy, disaffected New York youths who the residents of Forest Hills would surely cross the street to avoid.
The album, which registered only modest sales on release and never threatened the charts, finally attained gold record status in 2014, thirteen years after the last surviving founder member died.
Legend has it the few people who bought The Byrds least successful album, the Nashville-tinged ‘Sweetheart of the Rodeo‘ all formed country-rock bands on the strength of it.
So it was with The Ramones debut album (myself excluded), the few who latched onto it, barely taking the record off the turntable before forming punk bands – The Ramones an obvious influence on the Sex Pistols and The Clash, two bands who inspired two hundred more.
Given the abrasive nature of Ramones music I wonder how it sits with the tee-shirt army of today. Becoming no less aggressive on subsequent albums, it must sound unsophisticated to the point of prehistoric to a young listener of 2017.
But perhaps I’m missing the point – those wearing the shirts are making a fashion statement and sadly would not know a Ramones song from one by Taylor Swift.
In which case they can wear the attire and I’ll stick with the music.
Besides, I no longer have the figure for a Ramones tee-shirt.
This article was first published on 11/10/2017.
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NEIL SAMBROOK is the author of ‘MONTY’S DOUBLE‘ – an acclaimed thriller now available in paperback and as an Amazon Kindle Book.