The Ramones - Part One: The Music - An Interview with Linda Ramone
When critics and fans reminisce about punk’s earliest incarnation in New York in the 1970s, there’s one thing Linda Ramone suggests is often overlooked: the terrible smell. The widow of The Ramones’ guitar-slinger Johnny Ramone recalls Manhattan’s punk and new wave hub CBGBs had a stench as memorable as the bands that performed on its tiny stage.
“CBGBs stunk,” Linda says. “Max’s Kansas City was much cleaner, but CBGBs stunk. Hilly [Kristal, CBGBs owner] had his dog there and the dog would go to the bathroom in the club wherever it liked. CBGBs was pretty stinky and the city was too, but the funny thing is that when you’re living there you never notice that. It’s only when you go back you realise the city really smells! The city is the city – that’s what makes New York great. It’s part of the fun growing up.”
Linda Daniele was just 16 years old when she first saw a fledgling version of The Ramones perform at CBGBs in 1976. She dated lead singer Joey Ramone for more than three years, but, in a twist to rival any Game Of Thrones storyline, began seeing guitarist Johnny after the release of 1980’s End Of The Century and married him in 1984. Linda recalls that it was Joey’s stage presence which initially caught her eye back at that first CBGBs gig.
“I think your eyes always focus to the singer because he’s right in the middle… Then when you get a little smarter you go over to the guitar player,” she laughs, acknowledging the comment’s underlying allusions to her Ramones love triangle. “I’d gone to CBGBs because a friend of mine was in a band called Milk & Cookies, who were opening for The Ramones. When I started going to CBGBs, no one was calling this music punk rock. When you’re ‘in’ something, nobody really knows until much later on. Going to CBGBs you’d see The Ramones, the Talking Heads and Blondie, but no one ever used the term ‘punk rock’ back then.”
This year sees The Ramones’ self-titled debut celebrate 40 years of ragged glory, yet the four (unrelated) founding members of punk’s most pivotal US band aren’t here to enjoy the anniversary. Frontman Joey succumbed to lymphoma in 2000, bassist Dee Dee took a fatal hit of heroin in 2002, Johnny was taken by prostate cancer in 2004 and drummer Tommy was struck down by bile duct cancer in 2014. In their absence, Linda Ramone acts as a high profile advocate of the band’s legacy. Animatedly reflecting on The Ramones from her colourful Ramones Ranch home just out of Los Angeles, Linda’s memories of the early days remain vivid. She says the first Ramones set she witnessed was very different to the debut album’s eventual track-listing.
“In the beginning they only played for 15 minutes!” she laughs. “The set was very limited – Joey didn’t even use a mic stand. When someone first filmed The Ramones at CBGBs, Johnny went home and watched through everything with Tommy. Johnny and Tommy decided that Joey shouldn’t do so much Alice Cooper [theatrics] and should just stand there with a mic stand. They arranged that everyone had to be in a certain place and they really studied the concept of how they should walk on stage. Johnny felt that walking on stage was the most important thing. That’s why they played [Ennio Morricone’s] The Good, The Bad And The Ugly in the beginning, because it pumped the audience up when they played that song and had smoke on the stage. Johnny knew from very early on from going to see bands that walking on the stage – that first moment you see a band – is a big thing.”
While various websites and New York walking tours offer a chance to visit downtown destinations important to the fledgling punk group, Linda Ramone nominates a lesser known spot when asked for an important Ramones location.
“CBGBs and a lot of the places we loved hanging out aren’t there anymore, but Johnny loved going to John’s Pizza [on Bleecker Street, Manhattan],” Linda says. “It’s fun to still go back and see John’s Pizza is still there, but so many things aren’t there anymore. We never really used to go uptown, we only hung out downtown. I always think about walking in Washington Square Park with Johnny, which was fun. No one really thinks about Johnny Ramone walking around a park, so that was always quite interesting. We would hold hands and walk through the park. He was romantic in that way.”
While Linda looks back on the early days of The Ramones with vibrant clarity, she says her husband was never sentimental about the band which became synonymous with the burgeoning punk movement. Even after The Ramones hung up their leather jackets and retired in 1996, Johnny Ramone wasn’t one to fixate on ‘the good old days’.
“No, he didn’t look at The Ramones like that at that point. Johnny was just happy he could retire. It was the same with Joey. It’s funny, because people say they hated each other, but Joey would send Johnny a Christmas card each year.”
And would Johnny reciprocate?
“No!” Linda laughs. “But he would call Joey on the phone and I would hear their phone conversations. Johnny was very nice to Joey on the phone. People would say they never talked in the tour van and they hated each other, but if Johnny thought that was cool and got a reaction, he’d do it even more. He’d say anything to annoy someone, that’s how he was. And it was very easy to annoy Joey – sometimes anything you said would annoy Joey! Johnny played up on that.”
Despite the numerous reports of Joey and Johnny Ramone’s disagreements, Linda’s words suggest the two punk icons who had once fought for her love maintained an unspoken bond until death. It was this shared understanding that saw them stick out 2280 gigs, public indifference and Hilly Kristal’s stinking dog before finally earning icon status.
“Apart from moving to Los Angeles, the happiest time for Johnny was on stage,” Linda says. “He would talk about it all the time – when he was on stage he really did feel like he was king of the hill.”
The 40th anniversary deluxe edition of Ramones, featuring the original album, live tracks, demos and unreleased material, is released on September 9. It's available to pre-order now.
-Scott McLennan