Joey Ramone dead

1. Throw the body into the East River. 2. Divert the East River to drown SoHo. 3. Torch New Jersey. 4. Eat kosher salami.

God, for want of a better word, bless 'em. RIP Jeffrey Hyman.

But, yeah, the generation now in *some* of the most important positions of the British media were pretty pissed off by the Ramones. Those from the punk / New Wave era *will* reach positions of authority in time, as demographics change, though I have a sneaking suspicion that those who went no further than the Jam will come closest to "the establishment". I'll stop now ...

Joey Ramone - saw 'em in 1982 and 1984. Overrated. These days I prefer the Damned who were the closest we had...

Sort of obvious: where else wuz he gonna get full-on laudation?

Dear EmailNation Subscriber,

The untimely death of punk pioneer Joey Ramone from cancer last Sunday has brought close-to-reverent treatment in the mainstream press for this former pariah rocker.

But, absent from most of these eulogies, was the fact that Ramone, lead singer for the mid-1970s group The Ramones, was more than just a groundbreaking rocker. He was also an artist with a conscience, whose forays into political commentary earned praise from Nelson Mandela and ran afoul of Ronald Reagan.

Read John Nichols's appreciation of this aspect of Ramone's life and career in the latest installment of his web-only feature "The Online Beat." Available currently at:

http://www.thenation.com/thebeat

[Don't know if it still is... Is John Nichols the guy who wrote 'American Blood'?]

Ten years ago today. :(

This was a short RIP thread.

ILM's populace was a lot smaller then!

I had a very impressed five year old when we told Alice that we'd seen the Ramones live, on their "farewell" tour.

Nelson Mandela digs the Ramones?!?

They didn't play Sun City.

kind of blowing my mind that it's been 10 whole years. one of those most lovable people in the history of rock music?

Yes--he'd be on a short-list with Keith Moon, Ringo, a few others.

haha most lovable non-drummer in rock

IIRC, his people didn't go public w/his illness til early '01 (his diagnosis was in '96-'97). I first heard about it in an article in the original "Revolver" mag, and was rather shocked that something like that could happen to JOEY Freakin' RAMONE of all people.

(x-post)

Didn't Joey start out as a drummer?

Ringo can really be a dick, iirc

didn't know a second posthumous solo album entitled Ya Know? was coming out this week, anyone heard it?

Not yet. Saw a mostly negative freelancer review in the Washington Post describe it as “a cache of demos and unreleased recordings” — and "Still, the takeaway is that these half-finished ideas probably should have been left alone."

It's not a very good record.