Wait a minute, someone might say. If these are truly the GREAT first tracks, how in the hell do you skip over "Blitzkrieg Bop" and choose that song from Rock 'n Roll High School, when the Ramones show up in the back of convertable with Marky playing a set of drums that are clearly in the driver's seat? You're just being difficult. Well, maybe. But do you really WANT me to pick "Blitzkrieg Bop"? Nah, I'm going to stick with "I Just Want to Have Something to Do" off Road to Ruin, the 4th Ramones album and one of the last real ones, or, depending on who you ask, the first fake one.
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To further digress, Rock 'n Roll High School is pretty painful, but hey, it features Ramones, and Joey talking about pizza to some 30 year old woman playing a high school girl. The Ramones were the single most important rock band in the United States. I've only recently come to terms with that, deciding that rock 'n roll could have gone on alright without either the Velvet Underground or the Pixies. CCR and Pavement were nice too. Bob Dylan isn't a group, idiots. I could give a fuck all about the Grateful Dead, who aren't a rock band anyway. All the other best and most important bands of earlier eras were from the UK.
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Without the Ramones, we'd still be listening to that 45 minute dicking around on guitar prog shit, or maybe just Gordon Lightfoot. In 1976, it was all over. Really. Check out the top songs sometime. Actually, you could do that for almost any year after the late 60s including the vast majority of my lifetime, but the mid-70s were particularly awful. Ramones is one of the best and most important albums anywhere, ever, and every band you like today wouldn't exist without it, even if they're cool and fashionable and sensitive and complicated and everything else the Ramones certainly weren't. I'm surrrious. It doesn't even matter if you like them, you'd better recognize objective reality, sucker.
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Anyway, I didn't choose "Blitzkrieg Bop" because it's kind of like answering that your favorite vegetable is iceberg lettuce. Think about it. Additionally, I have nothing to say about that song anymore. No disrespect.
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I also considered "Glad to See You Go" off Leave Home, and even "Rock 'n Roll Radio" off End of the Century. I really do love "Glad to See You Go," but think it doesn't have quite the same impact on a first listen to Side 1, Track 1, considering it took me about 12 years to not skip over it (I'm not sure why). Rocket to Russia's "Cretin Hop": yeah, it's pretty good, but great it's not.
I'm not much of a dancer, nor am I too adept at looking cool in public. That's made even worse when I hear this song, and I will occasionally at the Model in Allston or Roots & Razors, a punk/reggae night at ZuZu's in Central Square. I actually feel the need to throw my fist up in the air, kind of like they do in Rock 'n Roll High School. I can't pull it off, because I really can't pull just about anything off. I'm a 145 pound Jewish boy, Then again, so was Joey, but he had the misfortune of spreading that weight over a 8 foot 11 body.
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What to be said of "I Just Want to Have Something to Do"? It was one of the last truly ballsy punk numbers they recorded, as far as I'm concerned. Having said that, it's nowhere near as raw and raging as their earliest stuff, which is what I always remember when I switch back to something like "Loudmouth" after listening to these later rockers.
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Tonight, Tonight, Tonight
Tonight, Tonight, Well Alright
Tonight, Tonight, Tonight
Wait! Now!
Wait! Now!
Wait! Now!
Wait! Now!
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For what it's worth, I still liked them during their tamer middle period--hey, I even think End of the Century was a good album overall. But it ain't like it was.
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I wish the version (track 37 on that there player in the corner) was the full track, but sadly, it is not, breaking up my very lucky streak of full length versions.
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To make up for it, here's the scene from Rock n' Roll High School with the full version!
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Jesus, that movie sucked. I loved it.
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And to answer your question, if I have to pick between Halfway to Sanity and Acid Eaters, I'd choose suicide, because even slowly bleeding out through your wrists has got to be a better option than "I'm Not Jesus." Hey, nothing lasts forever.
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