Punk Rock Blitzkrieg

by Marky Ramone

  Before we launched into “Rock ’n’ Roll Radio,” I whipped off my leather jacket. I could take 110 degrees, but 130 was pushing it. John was in a T-shirt, and so was Dee Dee, who was also keeping cool these days with short hair. Only Joey kept the leather jacket, and while his personal, psychological, and, more recently, substance abuse problems were growing, he was undaunted in the blazing sun. The only obstacle, ironically, was a technical one. In the middle of “Shock Treatment,” Joey’s microphone failed. It was out for about a minute, but if we had learned anything over the years, it was not to panic. We played through it while one of the roadies swapped out the mike.

  As we blitzed through “Rock ’n’ Roll High School,” “Sedated,” and “Beat on the Brat,” I looked out at the audience from time to time. It was spectacular. You could see way off in the distance where the crowd melted off into the open field, but that was farther than John or I could throw a rock. In between us and the horizon was a sea of kids. They were into it, and a lot of them were dancing shirtless. We felt really good up there. In about twenty-two minutes it was all over.

  The US Festival was prepared for almost anything. Backstage was an oxygen tank connected to tubes and face masks. Dee Dee and Joey went right for it. They really didn’t seem anywhere close to passing out. Knowing them, they probably just wanted to try something new. It was probably the cleanest thing either of them had breathed in since the late sixties.

  Joey was hospitalized on September 12 with another foot infection, which resulted in weeks of canceled shows and a lot of time on my hands. Our next-door neighbor at 29 John Street was a little older than us and the mother of three young kids. Marion and I were both friends with her. She was fun to be around. Meanwhile, we had the Mudd Club just north of city hall, which became my home away from home. Closing time there usually meant calling a cab for a ten-block ride, which was a lot better than staggering a half mile. When I chose to make the walk, fans would literally follow me home. Marion was on my case about the drinking, but this was a long-running soap opera to me, and I basically flipped the dial when I got tired of listening.

  One afternoon Marion left to go shopping. Within ten minutes, the woman next door knocked on the door. I knew she would have something with her. This time it was a bottle of champagne. When that ran out, we had whatever was left over from the night before, and when that ran out, we had the liquor store downstairs. Infinite room service. We ordered a bottle of vodka and a bottle of 151 and cranked the stereo. Fred dropped by with a bottle of Fleischmann’s whiskey. It was an average day.

  When Marion walked through the door around five o’clock in the afternoon, she looked different. She closed the front door hard, walked over, and turned off the stereo. There was quiet for the first time in hours and it hurt my ears. She looked around at the cans, cups, and bottles strewn all over the living room, and then looked at our next-door neighbor.

  “So where are your kids?”

  “They’re . . . home.”

  “Are you sure?” Marion said. “You better go check. Now.”

  When our friend left, Marion told me she couldn’t take it anymore. We were living in a twenty-four-hour party zone populated with enablers. The party was now officially over. We were moving back to Brooklyn.

  Decent rentals were hard to find in New York, but Marion opened the Sunday New York Times real estate section and found a bunch of two-, three-, and four-room apartments available in Sheepshead Bay, a good family neighborhood by the water.

  If they were any good or even if they were not, apartments in New York didn’t remain available for long. You could measure it in hours. So Marion went out to Brooklyn first thing Monday morning. When she got back, she told me there were two apartments available at the rents listed and they were both horrible. They sounded like the apartment I shared with Bruce before I moved upstairs with Joel. But the landlord, on cue, explained that he had something much nicer a couple of blocks away. It was the oldest trick in the landlord’s playbook—bring in a prospective tenant with a low-priced “teaser” apartment and then rent them something a lot more expensive.

  It worked. Marion had put down a deposit on a one-bedroom apartment in a newly constructed two-story concrete-and-brick condominium-style building. The landlord wore another hat, as a developer, and this type of development had become a gold mine in Brooklyn and Queens. They would buy an old Victorian house, tear it down, and build a four- or six-unit building on the same lot. Then they would take the profit and do it again, this time with two or three lots.

  The process sucked a lot of the charm out of the old neighborhoods. But we needed the apartment. It was clean, utilitarian, and came with a garage below. Each apartment had a concrete terrace barely big enough to actually use, but who cared? It was very far from the Mudd Club and our alcoholic next-door neighbor.

  Our landlord at 29 John Street wasn’t happy. He was a friend of ours and a jeweler who had years before carved out some extra space from his ninth-floor workshop. That space was our apartment. When we moved in, it was basically a loft with a bathroom. We poured money into improvements including finish work, an air conditioner, a refrigerator, and a police dead-bolt lock for the front door. We didn’t expect a dime in return then or now.

  But our friend the jeweler told us we were basically leaving him high and dry. On the contrary, we explained, the apartment would take all of one minute to rent and he could pick up a key fee, which is basically up-front money in the landlord’s pocket. So we were leaving both him and the apartment in great shape. High and dry did not apply. Except that the rent would be high and Marion wanted me dry.

  It was hard to give up downtown and the Mudd Club, but the move to Avenue X in Sheepshead Bay came with a nice perk. I bought a 1960 Cadillac Coupe de Ville and restored it. It was a work of art with its big tail fins and dual bullet taillights. I liked to think of it as the pride of the neighborhood. The neighbors included a Mob family in a big brick single-family home across the street. Frank admired my Caddy and had one of his own, a ’58. When we saw each other out front or ran into each other at the little market down the block, we traded Cadillac stories like a couple of doting parents.

  In late October, the Ramones were rehearsing for our upcoming album, Subterranean Jungle, which we would be recording in December. With the ’60 Coupe I had my ride into Daily Planet studio in Manhattan. Little Matt, John’s roadie, lived four blocks away from us on Ocean Avenue. So with Matt, I had a copilot. And with a shot or two in my stomach, I had a smile on my face. What I didn’t have was a driver’s license. I did, however, have an insurance card with my insurance agent’s name on it.

  One afternoon Little Matt and I were riding along Ocean Avenue on the way to rehearsal a little on the fast side. With the horsepower of a ’60 Coupe, it was hard not to go fast. Matt preferred to sit in the back. Not that he was playing Phil Spector, but Matt was a big smoker and preferred the rear.

  I suddenly felt intense heat on my back and asked Matt if he had dropped some ashes down my back. He told me absolutely not. I knew what the problem was instantly. I slammed on the brakes, put the car in park, and jumped out.

  “Get the fuck out!” I said.

  Little Matt followed. The car sat in the middle of the street and small visible flames licked the front seat. We stood on the curb between Avenue T and Avenue U. Behind us was St. Edmund, a Catholic high school for girls. A few girls in their uniforms stopped to look and stood near me and Matt. Within five seconds, the flames were shooting out of the windows. Within another five seconds, the flames were twenty feet high and had engulfed the front end of the car. There were now closer to fifty Catholic girls in uniform watching the spectacle like the Second Coming.

  I didn’t say anything, but I kicked myself for not taking care of the wiring under the seats. The car had electric seat controls, and I had a hunch when I bought it that the wiring was brittle. But, lately, I wasn’t following up on details the way I might have. Just getting up and getting to rehearsal
was an accomplishment.

  Little Matt took gravel from the front yard of St. Edmund and threw it on the car. That slowed the fire down a hair, but the car didn’t stand a chance. Within a few minutes, Ocean Avenue was a sea of fire engines and police cars. The firemen doused the flames with a chemical spray and followed it up with water from the hydrant on the corner. Smoke engulfed the street. It was a while before we could see the Coupe again. It was a goner.

  The cops asked a few questions and, fortunately, one of them wasn’t “Can I see your license?” They just wanted to know what happened, and I told them. They were sympathetic. The firemen were even more sympathetic. “I feel bad for you,” one of them said to me. “Man, that was a beautiful car. That’s gotta hurt.”

  It did hurt. I looked around, and there along the front façade of St. Edmund was a four-story-high crucifix. Smoke billowed up around the cross and then cleared for a moment. I wasn’t a religious person, but I knew whatever was coming next wasn’t good.

  The tow truck came and brought the Coupe back to our building on Avenue X. Little Matt and I jumped out of the tow truck cab, and I took a better look at the car. It was a concentrated fire. The rear was basically intact, but the interior and roof were fried. It had gotten so hot inside that the key melted in the ignition. I asked Matt to call the rehearsal studio and let the band know what happened.

  John called me later at the apartment all pissed off that I missed rehearsal.

  “You fucked up,” he said. “And you fucked up my day. Don’t you think there were other things I would like to do today? You could have told me you weren’t coming. I have a fucking life.”

  “John, my car caught on fire with your roadie in it. Didn’t he tell you what happened? I wanted to rehearse as much as anybody. What was I supposed to do?”

  I could tell from John’s voice he didn’t believe me. To him I was either lying or stretching the truth. There was doubt in his mind that probably started with the Virginia Beach fiasco and grew with every drink I took. It was a boy-who-cried-wolf situation, and I thought it was totally unfair.

  Three days later, the Coupe was still in front of our building and smoldering. I popped the hood and couldn’t find the source. The wires were probably still hot under the seats. I thought about taking the car apart, but now I had another problem.

  Over the three days, Frank had never once walked across the street to ask me what happened to my baby. He waved a couple of times and didn’t look happy. Then he went inside. His uncle and a couple of associates shot me a few dirty looks. If there was one thing in the world the Mob didn’t want, it was attention. And if there was one place in the world they didn’t want it, it was on the block where they lived. I knew I had to dispose of the body. So I had it towed to a scrap yard in Bensonhurst. They gave me fifty bucks for the car. It was an offer I couldn’t refuse.

  By December, when we started recording Subterranean Jungle, I had bought a ’68 Cadillac and carefully checked the condition of the wiring under the front seat. Little Matt and I headed out to Kingdom Sound in Syosset, Long Island, enjoying a little speed on the Northern State Parkway. I was looking forward to recording. The demo we did sounded almost good enough to be an album. The songs themselves were, for the most part, a bit of a return to the Ramones’ punk roots. “Psycho Therapy,” “Outsider,” and “Time Bomb” could have been recorded in ’77 and would have fit right in. The guitar was aggressive, and the lyrics, largely thanks to Dee Dee, were sufficiently warped.

  While Dee Dee himself was perpetually warped, there was a concerted effort by those around him to straighten him out at least a bit. He was medically diagnosed as bipolar. We knew he was on psychotropic drugs, but exactly which ones were the subject of speculation. Lithium, a time-honored conventional drug for treating mood disorders, was likely. After that, it was anyone’s guess: Tofranil, Stelazine, Thorazine, Antabuse. It could have been a whole category on Jeopardy! And as far as we knew, he was still using cocaine. How all those substances, legal and illegal, interacted was a stretch even for a PhD in pharmacology. But I could definitely see one change in Dee Dee: he was starting to gain weight.

  When Little Matt and I arrived at the studio, I went right to the men’s room. I pulled a bottle of vodka out of my bag, took a swig, and placed it gently into the metal garbage can with a flip top. The trick was not to put it in the garbage bag but between the bag and the wall of the garbage can. As I pulled my hand out of the can, I knew this was a departure for me. I had never drunk before or during a recording session in my life. But I thought, Compared with the grab bag of shit Dee Dee is on, this is nothing.

  As usual, the drums came first. Ritchie Cordell, the producer selected by Gary Kurfirst, got my sound going as I warmed up. Cordell was a noted writer and producer who had success in the sixties with Tommy James and the Shondells. He cowrote “Gimme Gimme Good Lovin’ ” for the one-hit wonders Crazy Elephant. Most recently, he had produced Joan Jett and the Blackhearts’ version of “I Love Rock ’n Roll,” which hit number one in the US. I understood we were still after that one huge single and that Ritchie Cordell was supposed to get it for us.

  There was one problem: the drum sound he was getting was horrible. He had his own way of tuning, which made each drumhead sound as if it had a towel over it. There was no bite, no hit. No balls. I had never stayed silent about anything important musically, and I wasn’t about to start now.

  “This is no good,” I said.

  I saw Ritchie Cordell frown through the control room glass. He shrugged his shoulders and then pressed the monitor button for me to hear in the headphones.

  “It’s fine. What’s wrong with it?”

  “Well, to begin with, the whole thing sounds like shit.”

  “Just go with it for now, please.”

  I went with it for one song. It was a cover of “Little Bit O’ Soul.” It was a solid hit song from the sixties, though I thought choosing to do three cover songs for the album was a mistake. But that wasn’t my call, and I played the song while John and Dee Dee laid down scratch tracks. After a second take, Ritchie Cordell asked me into the control room to listen back. To my shock and surprise, it sounded even worse than it did in the cans.

  “What do you have on this?” I said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “You know what I mean,” I said. “What kind of effects are making the drums sound like you wrapped them in a paper bag and flushed them down the toilet?”

  “I have a noise gate on and some compression.”

  He seemed defensive. He pushed a few control panel buttons off and then on again. He looked over at John, who said nothing. There was no way I was backing down for something this important.

  “You need to get rid of the fucking noise gate and lose the compression,” I said. “It’s cutting off the cymbal crashes. You’re fucking with the Ramones’ sound. This is basic stuff. I shouldn’t even have to mention this. You’re the producer. You’re responsible for the drum sound. You need to do your homework.”

  “Okay, Marc,” Monte said. “Why don’t you take a break?”

  Monte was playing peacekeeper, and I figured a break couldn’t make things any worse. I went to the men’s room, first for a piss, then for a drink. With no one else in the bathroom or, for that matter, wanting to be anywhere near me, I reached down into the garbage can and found my friend. As I drank from the bottle, I thought about how in a normal situation the producer would listen to what the drummer had to say and at least try to make a few adjustments. A few compromises. But I wasn’t being given an inch.

  On my way back from the bathroom, Monte stopped me and asked me if I was okay, and I told him of course. I was sticking up for the band’s sound and would have appreciated a little help. I settled down when I got back and tried just to do my job. We were working on “Outsider.” I knew the song well from the demo. Right now, I was clearly the outsider.

  I felt a bit more on the inside the second day. Our old friend Walter Lure of the Hear
tbreakers was with us getting ready to do some lead guitar work later in the week. As with our other albums, by the time we went out and played the songs live, John would eventually sort of get the few leads we ever used. For the leads in the studio, we got a pro. Walter was still using heroin and nobody questioned it. He did his thing.

  And I did mine. I had a fresh bottle of vodka in the bathroom and a few shots already in me plus a few I did before I got in the car with Little Matt. I was feeling good and wanted to spread it around. It was a perfect time for Chicken Beak Boy. I put my hands under my armpits and stuck my elbows out like wings. I arched my back, stuck out my ass, and started strutting around the sound room.

  “Chicken Beak Boy! Chicken Beak Boy! Is he human? Is he a chicken? No, it’s Chicken Beak Boy! Strange visitor from another planet!”

  I jumped up on a couch and squawked around. Walter laughed. John put his guitar down and walked out of the room. Dee Dee popped a handful of pills.

  We worked on a few songs, including “Time Bomb.” The song had a great hook and a manic straight-ahead beat but the same problem as all the other songs: the way it sounded on tape. I threw down my cans and stomped into the control room.

  “Can I ask you something?” I said, looking down at Ritchie Cordell, who was seated at the board.

  “What?”

  “Am I alive?”

  “Marc, what kind of question is that?”

  “It’s a good question,” I said. “Because on that tape, I sound like a drum machine. And not even a good drum machine. One of the really cheap ones at Sam Ash.”

  “I’m not here to argue with you.”

  “This isn’t an argument,” I said. “All you have to do is listen back, and you’ll hear it. You know something else? Lemme say something else.”

  “Marc,” Monte said. “Come on, take it easy.”

  “No, let me finish,” I said. “The demo we did sounds better than this album. Okay? And it’s not even that close. I hear a live drum sound on the demo.”