The band Joey Ramone said inspired him the most: “A body-mind experience”
Despite being recognised as one of the most formidable punk acts to have emerged from the US during the 1970s, the influences that make up the sound of the Ramones have always tended to veer far from the domain they dominated.
It was well-established in the early years of the iconic Queens-based group that they were infatuated with pop music more than they were with punk rock, and while their image and raucous delivery tended to lend itself to appealing more to fans of the latter, it’s evident from the melodies and hooks that they produced that pop was actually something that inspired the band to a far greater degree.
Frontman Joey Ramone was obsessed with the work of producer Phil Spector and the multitude of girl groups that he wrote and produced songs for on his Philles Records label. Not only that, but he had an undeniable obsession with other bubblegum pop from the 1960s, which was loaded with saccharine melody lines, and if you feel as though that isn’t the sort of thing that translates well to being incorporated into bratty punk rock, then the Ramones did everything in their power to refute this idea.
Having emerged in the 1970s, they spent a large amount of their time being lumped in with other punk acts, and so by the ‘90s, they’d begun to embrace this connection a little more. There was a far greater variety in punk rock by this time, and there had been countless acts who had done everything in their power to diversify the genre, and with there being far more established names in the field, there were other similarly-minded acts that the Ramones could look to for inspiration rather than reflecting on the music that they grew up listening to.
By this point, it makes sense that they were finding more of a connection to this part of the world of music, having become so integrated into the punk scene. The Ramones were rowdy, but full of an ebullient energy that was influential to many other acts, and to see this happen helped them turn their heads towards praising other acts who were rising to the top by offering something of a similar ilk.
In 1995, the band would end up releasing their 14th studio album, Adios Amigos. While it ended up being the final record they produced together due to collapsing relationships in the band and Joey’s diagnosis of the debilitating Non-Hodgkin lymphoma, it was clear that they were intent on sticking to the identity that had served them so well in the first place.
Around this time, Joey was interviewed by RAD to talk about how punk rock had evolved during their lifespan as a band, and he revealed that one of his greatest influences around this time was one of the most high-octane punk acts in operation, who had been a mainstay in the genre for a long time.
“Motörhead inspires me musically,” the singer revealed, “And with Motörhead it’s like a body-mind experience, so it’s like an assault on the body, which is nice. You don’t get that from everybody these days. It’s very hard for me to find anything I like because a lot of these bands insult me mentally.”
As a group, Motörhead certainly carried the spirit of what punk was all about, always delivering something that was direct yet fearless in its approach. While Joey may have acknowledged that punk was beginning to feel diluted and insulting with its evolution into something that felt removed from its original concept, Motörhead were clearly keeping it alive and well, and this is understandably something that thrilled him no end.
