Tommy Ramone passed this week. He was great. 1,2,3,4 Hey Ho, Let’s Go. 2 minutes, bam, bam, bam.
“It wasn’t just music in The Ramones: it was an idea. It was bringing back a whole feel that was missing in rock music – it was a whole push outwards to say something new and different. Originally it was just an artistic type of thing; finally I felt it was something that was good enough for everybody.” Tommy Ramone
Things aren’t always as we remember them.
Tommy left the world with four glorious Ramones records, three studio and one live, and they kicked ass then and will forever. He quit that at the top of his game and then produced some good stuff ( eg. the “mats – Tim) and in later years started playing bluegrass. His group was Uncle Monk.
My friend Jim Sullivan does some great music writing that you can check out at jimsullivanink.com
He interviewed Tommy:
Tommy Ramone – the Ra
mones original drummer and producer – co-leads a bluegrass duo named Uncle Monk. It’s not as unlikely a transition to him as it probably seems to you. “I’ve always been into this type of music,” Ramone says from New York. “My older brother brought home (bluegrass) records from the library when I was a kid. It’s more than that, though. There’s a similarity between punk rock and old time music and even bluegrass. Think about it: Bill Monroe was a pretty rebellious, angry guy who liked to play fast. Old time music, it’s like home-brewed stuff.”
I was lucky enough to see the Ramones. Lucky enough to see Bill Monroe as well. Both kicked ass.
And by the way, although he made quintessential American music, he was born in Hungary and immigrated to the states.
R.I.P. Tommy Ramone
Toummy was my dearest and oldest friend.
We grew up together in Forest Hills Queens New York.
I went to Stephen A Halsey Jr High and Forest Hills High school with him.
He got me to pick up the bass guitar and enter into the crazy world of rock music.
We played in several bands together (Triad & Butch) here in NYC over the late 60’s and early 70’s. We built and managed Performance Studios in NYC, a recording/rehearsal studio the Ramones started in. I worked with him when he was in the Ramones and well after he left. He had an advanced musical foresight, well ahead of the times in forming and being part of the Ramones. He was a great musician on the guitar, then the drums, later on the mandolin, banjo, fiddle and many more instruments. His musical expanse bridged from Punk to Indie Bluegrass.
I mourn the passing of the last of the original Ramones, my friend and a true musical visionary.
Monte A. Melnick
“On The Road with the Ramones”