The Greatest Rock Band in the World: Ramones

This is one of what will probably be quite a few posts about who should be considered for the title of greatest rock bands in the world.  We already know the Beatles are one of them.  The rest are up for grabs.  I plan to just post some of my thoughts on different groups as I think of them.  I've already made a post about U2, this time it's the Ramones.   Feel free to weigh in with your own thoughts and choices.

 

(This one is for Laura Lee.  She doesn't understand how the Ramones could be considered one of the greatest rock bands in the world. She wanted five reasons why they should be, so here are my five reasons, Laura.)

 

1.)  They helped create punk music.  Any time you try to pinpoint who actually created a style of music, it gets hard.  The New York Dolls were before the Ramones, but most groups that considered themselves punk and a lot that didn't all give their dues to the Ramones.

 

2) Their songs.  Blitzkreig Bop, Shenna is a Punk Rocker, Teenage Lobotomy, Beat on the Brat, Gimmie Gimmie Shock Treatment, Pinhead, Rock and Roll High School, Do You Remember Rock n Roll?, Rockaway Beach....the list goes on and on.  How can you not smile and want to just get up and jump around when you hear these songs?  The songs were short, simple and fast.

 

3) They rescued rock music from the overblown, pretenious "art" rock that was everywhere at the time.  Emerson, Lake and Palmer, Yes, all the groups that made singles that lasted an entire side of an album (oops, this is for those who remember albums and not cds) and thought just plain rock music was not good enough. 

 

4) The cover to their first album.  The were dressed in torn jeans, leather jackets, long hair hanging in their face.  They looked like punks.  They looked like throwbacks to the 50s and the beginning of rock and roll.

 

5) And the best reason of all...they're just cool!

 

There was nothing serious about the Ramones, their song titles are evidence of that.  But that's what made them so great.  I know in my last post about U2 I liked the fact that they thought rock music could save the world, that they did take their music so serious.  But not all groups have to be like that.  I admire and like groups like U2, but I also find something fresh and vital to rock music in groups like the Ramones.