The Ramones Caricature

The Ramones Caricature, illustrated here at Santa Monica Civic Auditorium, Los Angeles, in August of 1976. With Dee Dee Ramone age 25, Joey Ramone age 25, Tommy Ramone age 27 and Johnny Ramone age 28.

The Ramones were an American punk rock band that formed in the New York City neighborhood of Forest Hills, Queens in 1974. They are often cited as the first true punk rock group.

All of the band members adopted pseudonyms ending with the surname “Ramone”, although none of them were biologically related; they were inspired by Paul McCartney of The Beatles, who would check into hotels as “Paul Ramon”. They performed 2,263 concerts, touring virtually nonstop for 22 years. In 1996, after a tour with the Lollapalooza music festival, the band played a farewell concert and disbanded.
The original members of the band met in and around the middle-class neighborhood of Forest Hills in the New York City borough of Queens. John Cummings (Johnny Ramone) and Thomas Erdelyi (Tommy Ramone) had both been in a high-school garage band from 1965 to 1967 known as the Tangerine Puppets. They became friends with Douglas Colvin (Dee Dee Ramone), who had recently moved to the area from Germany, and Jeffrey Hyman (Joey Ramone), who was the singer for the glam rock band Sniper, founded in 1972.

The Ramones began taking shape in early 1974 when Cummings and Colvin invited Hyman to join them in a band. Colvin wanted to play guitar and sing, Cummings would also play guitar and Hyman would play drums. The lineup was to be completed with their friend Richie Stern on bass. However, after only a few rehearsals it became clear that Richie Stern could not play bass, so in addition to singing, Colvin switched from guitar to bass and Cummings became the only guitarist.
Dee Dee realized that he could not sing and play his bass guitar simultaneously; with Erdelyi’s encouragement, Joey became the band’s new lead singer.

The Ramones recorded their debut album, “Ramones”, in February 1976 and initially was not a commercial success. The two singles issued from the album, “Blitzkrieg Bop” and “I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend”, failed to chart.
Their next two albums, “Leave Home” and “Rocket to Russia”, were released in 1977. “Leave Home” did include “Pinhead”, which became one of the band’s signature songs with its chanted refrain of “Gabba gabba hey!”
“Rocket To Russia” included the hits “Sheena Is A Punk Rocker” and “Rockaway Beach”.

On December 31, 1977 the Ramones recorded “It’s Alive”, a live concert double album, at the Rainbow Theatre, London, which was released in April 1979.

Tommy, tired of touring, left the band in early 1978. His position as drummer was filled by Marc Bell who adopted the name Marky Ramone.

In 1978 the band released it’s fourth album, “Road To Ruin” which included the hit “I Wanna Be Sedated”, which would become one of the Ramone’s best known songs.

Several albums later, the band disbanded in 1996.

On July 20, 1999, Dee Dee, Johnny, Joey, Tommy, Marky, and C.J. appeared together at the Virgin Megastore in New York City for an autograph signing.
This was the last occasion on which the original four members of the group appeared together.

Joey Ramone, who had been diagnosed with lymphoma in 1995, died of the illness on April 15, 2001, in New York age 49.

Dee Dee Ramone was found dead from a heroin overdose on the evening of June 5, 2002, by his wife Barbara at his apartment in Hollywood. He was 50 years old.

On September 15, 2004, Johnny Ramone died in his Los Angeles home at the age of 55 following a five-year battle with prostate cancer.

Ramone died at his home in Ridgewood, Queens, New York on July 11, 2014, from bile duct cancer, aged 65.

On March 18, 2002, The Ramones were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on their first year of eligibility.