R.A.M.O.N.E.S.

I don't often quote myself but on the morning of July 12th I awoke and found a news article on The Ramones Family Retrospective Facebook page about Tommy Ramone's death and posted this status update:
"If your legacy was that you in were the greatest American rock 'n roll band then I think you did all right. Goodbye, Tommy, the last Ramone standing."

People "Liked" my comment because it was something that resonated with them. One dude made a comment about another band, Grand Funk Railroad, possibly holding the title of "greatest American rock 'n roll band" but for me it's a no-brainer.

Their hometown, New York City, is my idea of the quintessential American city: culturally fragmented yet somehow unified, capitalistic, and burgeoning with possibility and pain. There wasn't a single ideology represented by the Ramones. There wasn't an activist spirit. They didn't write an advice column. They didn't ask you to identify with them. They just said what was going on.

Sometimes they wanted to pick up chicks in school. Sometimes they wanted to go to the beach. Sometimes they wanted to hock their stuff for heroin. Sometimes they fucked dudes for money but would kill you if you questioned their sexuality. They were a bunch of reprobates doing something that is purely American: playing rock n' roll for fun. F-U-N

They played a Trashmen cover. They played a Rivieras cover. They played a Ronettes cover. They were uniquely positioned in that they were able to take dashes of the speed and pop sensibilities of early rock, the energy of garage rock, and fragments of America's psychotronic cultural history without being hippies, without being ironic, and without popular approval. They set the stage for a hundred thousand bands that learned to reduce rock down to it's necessary components and shoot from the hip but none of there followers ever seemed to make you want to clap your hands and dance like they did.

To me, that's America. We struggle with racism, sexism, homophobia, drug abuse, homelessness, war, a growing police state and all sorts of absolutely fucked up things but, goddamnit, we know how to have a good time even at our own expense. Let's face it, sniffing glue is a pretty terrible idea but if you know how to write a catchy song about it I'll play that shit loud enough to shake a grave.