BLITZKRIEG GREASE – OL’55 & THE RAMONES (AND A LITTLE BIT OF KISS), A PERSONAL ODYSSEY THROUGH THE 50’s REVIVAL OF THE ‘70s AND BACK AGAIN
As we celebrate the 40th anniversaries of the first albums by both Sydney’s 50’s/early’60s’ rock’n’roll & pop revivalists Ol’55 and New York’s game-changing and future-creating Ramones, we hear from one man whose love of rock’n’roll is indelibly marked by them both.
I’ll admit it: I was a big Ol’55 fan from the beginning. I was too young to feel nostalgic for the era they echoed; eleven was too young an age to feel nostalgic about anything I guess, but I was already an Elvis fan and I loved Happy Days, so I either had a thing for the ‘50s and early ‘60s or simply just didn’t like the times I was living in. Maybe I wanted to be Fonzie (although I’m sure I would’ve settled for Potsie). Whatever the reason, when I first heard Ol’55 on 3XY in 1976, I instantly loved them. Too young and sheltered to experience then live, they became my favourite band based purely on ‘Take It Greasy’. And I loved the singles that followed – ‘(I Want A Rocking) Christmas’ and ‘C’mon Let’s Do It’ - even more, even though by then I was really starting to dig Kiss too. The ‘70s were beckoning me.
The next singles ‘Stay (While The Night Is Young)’ and ‘(Feels Like A) Summer’s Night’ were even better, although definitely more in an early ‘60s vein. They were like Phil Spector’s pocket symphonies, although I probably didn’t know who Phil Spector was just then . I did know that Ol’55’s singer Rockpile Jones had one of the best, most thrilling voices I’d ever heard though, and I figured that was why Frankie J Holden had left. I was hanging out for the long-promised ‘Cruisin’ For A Bruisin’’ album, even though it was taking forever and another local band with a vaguely ‘50s edge (and wordy song titles incorporating parentheses) , The Sports, had won me over with their first single ‘Boys (What Did The Detectives Say)’. My other new faves in ‘78 were Welsh rocker Dave Edmunds and his hit ‘I Knew The Bride’ - little did I know then that Ol’55 had been performing that tune for months before radio picked it up - and Cheap Trick. I didn’t know either that Cheap Trick’s ace ‘50s-style rock’n’roller ‘California Man’ was written by perhaps the grand master of the ‘50s/early ‘60s and Spector pastiche Roy Wood…
Anyway, December ‘78 comes and ‘Cruisin’ for A Bruisin’’ finally arrives. I get it, but the best songs are the last two singles and there’s a few too many throwaways on it. I do love ‘Ruby’ though, and ‘Time To Rock’n’Roll’ is a great opener. So it’s pretty good really. But it’s the Xmas holidays, it’s not really filling the void, I’m kinda bored and over the space of a week or two I pick up a couple of magazines at the local newsagent’s – a magazine out of England called Zigzag that had a free record stuck to the cover (a flexi-disc – first one I’d seen – with two weird 60s bands, the 13th Floor Elevators and Red Krayola; not bad) and the 100th issue of RAM, which was nice and thick and seemed like good value for money…
The only times I’d ever bought rock mag’s before was to clip an Ol’55 piece for my collection - but for some reason I spend a bit of time with these. And both feature stories on a band called the Ramones, who look cool in an goofy and agreeably awkward sort of way – leather jackets like Fonzie, long hair and ripped jeans – and who are described as being influenced by Elvis and ‘60s pop. The interviews crack me up, and they’re supposedly ‘punk’ too. I’d seen the Sex Pistols on TV and they came across as pretty boring, but these guys sounded like they could be fun. I see too that they’ve done a version of ‘Do You Wanna Dance?’ – I know the song through Ol55 ‘s version on their Fiveslivejive lp. So first chance I get I go to Brashes, look in the ‘new wave’ section for the first time ever and find a copy of the Ramones new lp – the double live one ‘It’s Alive’ - and ask if I can have a listen.
I can still remember how they sounded through those headphones as Rockaway Beach kicked in. I can still remember how my mind was blown wide open and my whole body felt an electrical charge. Loud distorted guitars and a killer beat– kinda like Kiss on ‘Rock’n’Roll All night’ but faster and so much more exciting – and the tunes catchy in a familiar kind of way too; early 60s pop and surf-inspired.
‘Cruisin’ for a Bruisin’’ goes to the back of the pile along with my Kiss records and the Ramones become my everything. Soon, through the Ramones I get into Australia’s own Saints and Radio Birdman, the Flamin’ Groovies, the New York Dolls and the Dictators. Through Birdman I hear about the MC5, the Stooges and American ‘60s punk groups like the 13th Floor Elevators (who I actually knew of because they were on that flexi-disc that came with that issue of ZigZag), and then a London band called the Barracudas who kinda sound like all these bands combined. In 1980, the Ramones come down under on the back of their hit, the Phil Spector-produced ‘Rock’n’Roll High School’ and they are incredible ; around the same time Ol’55 reappear with a new line-up and it all seems a bit uncool and cheesy, although I do note that they do a decent job with the Fantastic Baggys’ ‘Anywhere the Girls are’ which I could imagine the Barracudas or even the Ramones doing too.
At the same time I’m getting into this thing called power pop that I’d read about, again in RAM, in an article on a Adelaide band called Young Modern. That’s led me to a bunch of other bands including the Flamin’ Groovies and Big Star. A eventually the Raspberries, the Paley Brothers and the Rubinoos, and then… and then it all comes flooding back to me.
The melodies and the harmonies. The innocence (and I was still decidedly innocent unfortunately) and the big beat. I’d heard it all before. I guess I’d known it was Ol’55 that had led me to the Ramones – or given me a musical lead-in - but now I was hearing stuff that sounded even more like them, especially those four fantastic singles of theirs’ that followed ‘Take It Greasy’. And it clicked: those cheesy, not-to-be-taken seriously revivalists Ol’55 had not only created a particular template in my head for what good music sounded like, but, at their best, they’d made that music themselves. And they’d made it as well as anyone did.
I realised that then, and I believe it even more strongly now. Those four singles in particular - ‘(I Want A Rockin’) Christmas’, ‘C’mon let’s Do it’, ‘Stay (While The night Is young)’ and ‘Feels (Like a Summers night)’ – were the key. Jimmy Manzie’s best songs combined with the miraculous pop vocals of Rockpile Jones – as well as Bob Jones’ arrangements and Charles Fisher’s production – are hard to beat. Put ‘em next to the Raspberries or the Rubinoos, the Barracudas or Radio Birdman, Dave Edmunds or Cheap Trick, even the Ramones, and they stand up. If Brian Wilson or Phil Spector himself had heard this stuff, they would definitely have come knocking. Though they sold themselves short with the ‘50s schtick and ultimately doomed themselves to a career in clubland by their own lack of a grander vision for themselves, Ol’55 deserve better than they’ve ever been given, Gold and Platinum records notwithstanding...
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…. All of which leads me to today and Festival’s new 2CD set ‘Time to Rock’n’roll’, which I’m pleased to be able to say I had a hand in putting together. This 56-track collection captures the best and a lot of the rest of this most under-rated Australian rock band. Those singles are here, as is the two or three-times platinum selling ‘Take It Greasy’, which honestly pales in comparison to a lot of what follows. ( I later figured out that all this early stuff was recorded at Trafalgar Studios around the same time as Radio Birdman were recording there with the same engineer and producer . I can hear a similarity in the drums sounds on the two bands Trafalgar recordings even, and of course Birdman were in there own way rock’n’roll purists as well – and had been known to do the odd surf cover – which is maybe why Jimmy Manzie was photographed by Bob King at the time wearing a Birdman badge.) In addition, the collection includes a good chunk of the spirited farewell-to-Frankie live album ‘FivesLiveJive’ (including that ‘Do You Wanna Dance’ which gave me a link to the Ramones), together with Jimmy’s best pop tunes from ‘Cruisin’’ (“Time to Rock’n’Roll” actually could stand as a companion to the Ramones’ ‘Rock’n’Roll Radio”). There’s also the spot on cover of Dion’s ‘Ruby Baby’ and the Rubinoos-inspired version of ‘Peek-A-Boo’ from the same album. There’s even some rough early demos from after ‘Greasy’ which hint at future directions, including directions not taken maybe – dig the cover of Tom Waits’ sentimental ballad ‘The Heart of Saturday Night’ (and of course the band actually got their name from an early Tom Waits tune too.) Additionally, there’s a decent number of tracks from the later line-ups (including an unreleased demo of a tune Ross Wilson wrote for them), which sound fresher and tougher than I would have thought, and which more than justify Rockpile and Pat ‘Meatballs’ Drummond’s decision to keep the band going after their songwriter left.
Anyway, ‘Time To Rock’n’Roll’ is the kind of anthology that Ol’55 have always deserved but never been given. It includes all those tracks, a bunch of great images and memorabilia, and great notes from original manager Glenn A Baker. If you’re an old fan, you’ve got to be happy with all that. If you’re a newcomer, or a doubter who thinks they were just another ‘50s revival band, but do love the sort of music that I’m talking about here, I urge you to give this stuff a listen. And if you’re a Ramones fan – especially if you love their pop side - you can take it from one whose life was very much changed by those guys, that there’s something here for you too. - DL