American Punk Dreams

Picking "Loco Live" after at least two years in which I haven't heard it, I was impressed with the extent to which it still holds as a powerful Rock record. I've been listening to more sophisticated music these few years - blues, funk, experimental rock and some jazz. Yet I'm still attracted to the fast-and-loud, hard edge of rock music. I guess I'm a punk in my soul, and that, in order to enjoy the Ramones, you have to be one, too.

But I've also noticed things that I have never heard before - the transformation of the Ramones's musical style, and the way in which the Ramones was such an American band.

The cliché about the Ramones is how simple their music has always been - "no one can play three chords better" than the Ramones, and so on. But Loco Live finds the Ramones far away from the distorted bubble gum pop band that amazingly failed to conquer the world between 1977 and 1981. By the mid 1980s, the Ramones have evolved into a bona fide hard rock act, heavier and faster then anything they've done in the 1970s.

Listening to "I believe in Miracles" it is hard to believe I've never noticed it before. The song is downright blues-y. There is nothing of the bubble gum in "Love Kills" or "Mama's boy", and "Pet Semetary", the title song to the Stephen King movie, has riffs and mood that are as much hard rock cliché as the lyrics (don't let this sound like I don't like the song - it's fantastic). The early songs are sped up and toughened up, and are transformed into something like acid pop. Among the later tunes, the only one that resembles the innocence of the earlier days is "Palisades Park" an old fifties standard. Hell, they even open up the set with a play back of "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly..."

I can't help thinking that this change has something to do with the changes in the United States in the 1980s. It seems that the Ramones have grown along with the mysterious zeitgeist, and the music, I believe, reflect where the US cultural scene, or at least some of it, was in the Reagan years. Certainly, the lyrics reflect that - "Bonzo goes to Bitberg (a.k.a "My head is hanging upside down") is about a controversial visit of Ronald Reagan's to a Nazi cemetery, and "Ignorance is Bliss" is an undoubtedly political tune. Joey prefaces "I wanna live" with something of a manifesto: "We believe in freedom... we believe in human rights".

Both musically and lyrically, the Ramones were a more sophisticated band than many critics give them credit for. And while "Loco Live" does not quite catch them in their prime, it is a fantastic live gig of a great hard rock/punk band. "Do you remember Rock'n'roll Radio?" If not, the Ramones will remind you.

MUY MUY LOCO!!!

Very good, very fast, very hard. Pure adrenaline from the begin to finish. After 32 songs the spanish punk rockers in Barcelona still loud: HEY HO LET'S GO!... so what can i tell you

Ramones cover their own songs on Loco Live.

Even if you are a newcomer to the world of punk rock, you must be aware of the punk tradition of covering songs that came before...sometimes even decades before the current band re-recorded them. The new version is often harder, or faster than the original, and of course contains the new band's particular characteristics of style. Loco Live is an album of covers. The amazing thing is that the covers are done by the same band that did the originals--the ineffable RAMONES.



This album contains 32 of their best songs in all of their "live" glory. This record is unique in the fact that these are songs that you may have listened to for years, but you have never heard them quite like this. Recorded late in their career, Loco Live was an answer to those critics who had declared the RAMONES to be decrepit old men who gave what they could to Rock and Roll, but should now stand back and watch as a younger generation took over. The RAMONES refused, and rocked out this album in response.



I call this an album of covers because these songs are vastly different from their original recordings. Joey is at his bird-like best. So much so that at times he simply neglects the words in favor of whatever melodic throaty sound he can produce. Most of the time you simply can not understand him, unless you know the words by heart. For example, on Ignorance is Bliss, it sounds like he's saying "aneurysm" instead of ignorance is bliss. The words come out so quickly and with such a snarl, that it's almost incomprehensible. This record is faster, harder, and angrier than anything else the RAMONES put out, and that makes it a punk rock classic.



The only caution I have is directed toward the newcomer to the RAMONES music legacy. In order to fully appreciate this record, you need to know the words to these songs. (Much in the same way that you need to know the right lyrics to appreciate The Parasites cover of "It's Alive" where they sing the wrong lyrics as printed in the original liner notes released in Japan!) Anyway...if you don't know these songs, I recommend that you buy some collection of the RAMONES like "All the Stuff and More" or "Loud, Fast, RAMONES" or "Hey Ho, Let's Go Anthology" to get your bearings, and then throw caution to the wind with Loco Live.



This record rocks from beginning to end. Put it in and watch it burn a hole in your speakers. Loco Live embodies the spirit of Punk Rock like none other, and shows why punk bands today still dress like, sound like, and try to play like, The RAMONES!