The bands Joey Ramone thought were “all derived from the Ramones”
The Ramones, along with the rest of the reprobates at the heart of the CBGBs scene in New York, were treading new ground back in the 1970s, offering an endearingly abrasive, grassroots revolution in absolute defiance of the musical mainstream. It is no surprise, then, that the spirit of the band soon found its way into other groups.
Everybody has their own theories on when exactly punk rock burst onto the airwaves, whether it was during the garage rock era of the 1960s when groups like The Stooges rebelled against the age of ‘peace and love’ hippiedom, or some years later when Malcolm McLaren concocted the Sex Pistols. Regardless of which side of the argument you fall upon, the pioneering importance of The Ramones certainly cannot be disputed.
Not only was that rock and roll fraternity the first group to officially release an out-and-out punk record, with their self-titled debut back in 1976, but they played a colossal role in establishing the image of punk, and spreading that rebellious gospel across the land. Bedecked in their leather jackets and blue jeans, the band helped to popularise punk rock revolution, but their legacy extended far beyond the confines of the 1970s.
Such was the intensity of their cult following that the Ramones became lauded by virtually every alternative, punk, and hard rock outfit that followed in later years. Among these disciples of the Queens-based outfit were the metal heroes of the 1980s, Metallica.
As Joey Ramone recalled to Rockstop back in 1991, “Lars [Ulrich] saw us in 1980 in Copenhagen and that’s basically where he got the idea to combine the music of The Ramones with, you know, metal influences like Black Sabbath, Deep Purple, and people like that.” From that initial spark of inspiration, Ulrich helped create one of the biggest bands in American history, and Joey Ramone seems to take some credit for that fact.
“Bands like Megadeath, Jane’s Addiction, and all the thrash stuff, it’s all derived from the Ramones,” he rather boldly declared. Still, it is a difficult claim to properly dispute. Certainly, in the cases of the groups he mentioned, each one owed something of their sound to the punk rock revolution of the 1970s, and The Ramones were about as iconic as any band from that particular scene became.
Metallica, in particular, never made any attempt to hide their debt to The Ramones, either. Over the course of the group’s illustrious discography, they have covered multiple Ramones tracks at one time or another, from ‘Today Your Love, Tomorrow the World’ to ‘53rd and 3rd’.
Although those blitzkrieg influences were blended with the lineage of hard rock and metal to create Metallica’s inherent sound, without the Ramones there is no telling what the band might have sounded like – or whether they would have existed at all.
So, despite claims from the likes of John Lydon that The Ramones were “deeply unoriginal,” for their adoration of Phil Spector’s ‘Wall of Sound’ pop, the punk pioneers still managed to exercise a colossal influence not just over the punk realm but over American rock and roll in its entirety.
