Performer Notes
- The Ramones: Joey Ramone (vocals); Johnny Ramone (guitar); Dee Dee Ramone (bass); Tommy Ramone (drums).
- Producers: Craig Leon, T. Erdelyi, Marty Thau.
- Reissue producers: Gary Stewart, Bill Inglot.
- Engineers: Rob Freeman, Jack Malken, Don Hunerburg.
- Recorded at Plaza Sound, Radio City Music Hall, New York, New York and 914 Studios, Blauvelt, New York. Includes liner notes by Donna Gaines and Arturo Vega.
- Digitally remastered by Dan Hersch and Bill Inglot (Digiprep).
- Personnel: Joey Ramone (vocals); Johnny Ramone (guitar); Tommy Ramone (drums).
- Audio Mixers: Craig Leon; Rob Freeman .
- Recording information: Plaza Sound, Radio City Music Hall, New York, NY (02/1976).
- Photographer: Manuel Lanzagorta.
- The Ramones' self-titled debut is a justifiably adored album--not just one of the best albums to come out of the initial New York punk explosion of the mid-'70s, but one of the greatest rock and roll albums of all time. RAMONES is one of those rare records where there is not a single weak or out-of-place song. Changeups like the bubblegummy near-ballad "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend" and the uncharacteristically harsh "53rd and 3rd" (an unsentimental song about Dee Dee Ramone's days as a teenage hustler) vary the album's sound and mood more than its detractors (and even some of its fans) maintain.
- The 2001 reissue adds eight bonus tracks. Most are culled from early demos, including two songs, "I Can't Be" and "I Don't Wanna Be Learned/I Don't Wanna Be Tamed," that were never officially recorded, and two others, "You Should Never Have Opened That Door" and "I Don't Care," which eventually appeared on their second and third albums respectively. None of the demos are particularly different from the final recordings, but, interestingly, they tend to be a little slower and poppier-sounding. The cleaner-sounding, more trebly single mix of "Blitzkrieg Bop" closes the package.
Professional Reviews
Rolling Stone (12/11/03, p.106) - Ranked #33 in Rolling Stone's "500 Greatest Albums Of All Time" - "...An intense blast of guitar power, rhythmic simplicity and ferocious brevity..."
Spin (5/01, p.108) - Ranked #1 in Spin's "50 Most Essential Punk Records" - "...The apotheosis of punk....Blitzkrieg pop stripped down to its 1-2-3-4..."
Spin - Included in Spin's list of Top Ten College Cult Classics "everything good that's happened to music in the last fourteen years can be directly traced to The Ramones".
Q (5/02 SE, p.140) - Included in Q's "100 Best Punk Albums".
Q (8/01, pp.156-7) - 4 stars out of 5 - "...Amongst their best work....the tunes have lasted...creating a similar effect to an early Beatles album: pleasure heading directly to the brain..."
Uncut (8/01, p.94) - 5 stars out of 5 - "...Easily one of the 10 best first-footings in rock'n'roll history....Even today it still pricks senses....As an exemplary definition of rock'n'roll RAMONES is infallible..."
Mojo (Publisher) (3/03, p.76) - Ranked #4 in Mojo's "Top 50 Punk Albums" - "...The coolest, dumbest, simplest, greatest rock'n'roll record ever to be cut by four sweet, dysfunctional screw-ups..."
NME (Magazine) (6/23/01, p.41) - 10 out of 10 - "...The most toweringly aggressive, misleadingly primitive, perfectly phrased musical statement ever made....The demos and alternate versions included demonstrate how finely honed every gangly gesture was from the very beginning..."
Uncut (magazine) - "The Ramones, like Warhol or Lichtenstein, were masters of doing one thing brilliantly and repetitively - something reinforced by the second disc of this set, which contains singles and unreleased demos, including tracks that would appear on subsequent albums..."
