Ramones Greatest Songs

[Custodio Groves]

Forthe greatest American band debate on Seed Sing, I'm going to nominate another band that I'm not really a fan of, but to be reputable, we have to acknowledge these bands that most of the music listening population recognizes as an all time great. The band I'm going to talk about today, I actually dislike almost as much as I dislike the Beach Boys. That band is The Ramones.

The Ramones are widely considered the founders of punk rock music, a genre of music I'm not that into, but I recognize how important and influential it is and has been. For my punk rock, I go to Iggy and the Stooges, who I will write about at another date, or more prog type punk rock like King Crimson or Mars Volta, I'll also be writing about Mars Volta at a later date. King Crimson is from England, so they don't make the cut in our debate. Those three bands, in my opinion, are way, way better than The Ramones, but they aren't recognized like The Ramones. The Ramones are credited with starting punk rock because every single one of their songs is a tight 2 minutes and they only play three chords and the lyrics are sung muffled. That, for all intents and purposes, is the definition of punk rock. When it comes to my personal definition, punk rock is anarchy and disestablishment and great, complicated guitar work, especially solos.

When it comes to front men, Iggy Pop is a much better punk rock singer than Joey Ramone. You can understand most of what Iggy Pop is saying and as far as on stage theatrics, there is no one that comes close to Iggy Pop, especially not Joey Ramone. But, Joey Ramone is widely looked at as the essential punk rock front man, much to my shock. He just kind of stood on stage and garbled his way through each song. People will call that punk rock, I say, he was hiding the fact that he was not that good of a singer and he had some form of stage fright.

Then, when you look at the musicians in King Crimson or Mars Volta, they are so much better and so much more proficient than Johnny, Dee Dee and Tommy Ramone. Robert Fripp, of King Crimson, is ten thousand times the guitar player that Johnny Ramone ever wished he could be. And oh my god, Omar Rodriguez-Lopez is one of the greatest, most innovative and weirdest guitar players I've ever listened to in my entire life. I think he's an alien that was put on Earth to show us humans what a real guitar god looks and plays like. He is the Millenial's Jimmy Page. He's a guitar wizard that people will call legendary in about 20 years. I guarantee I will be telling my son about him when he's in his twenties and asks me about music from my generation. He's the man. Do people really say the same thing about Johnny Ramone? Is he a legendary, all time great guitar player? I don't think so. He doesn't have any memorable solos and he basically plays three chords on every song. Anyone that takes one guitar lesson can pretty much learn the entire Ramones song book. It is literally that easy. Just learn a G chord, a C chord and an F chord and you are good to go.

Let's get back to why some believe they are so influential. I will bend and say that without The Ramones, we would have never gotten The Sex Pistols, another band I'm not so fond of, but people love, Jello Biafra, who is a genius musician, there'd be no Black Flag, who is a much better band and Bad Brains, who are a great, great punk rock/reggae band. They did influence these bands and musicians and countless others, but the people I just mentioned took that influence, ran with it and made much, much better music than The Ramones. I know that people love the "simplicity" of their songs. Critics love the fact that they got their message out in 2 minutes or less. In my opinion, they could only handle that small amount of music because they were not that skilled. They needed to get everything done in a short amount of time because, if their songs lasted longer, they would be seen as subpar musicians and songwriters. They wouldn't be as highly regarded as they are now. Big time magazines and publications like "Billboard" or "Rolling Stone" even went as far to name them the second greatest rock group of all time, behind only The Beatles. That's down right insane. No way are they better than The Rolling Stones, Bob Marley and the Wailers, The Kinks, Public Enemy, The Beastie Boys, The Paul Butterfield Blues Band, Janis Joplin and the Holding Company, the Flying Burrito Brothers, I could literally go on and on with bands that are far superior to The Ramones.

I also acknowledge that the Ramones had a big stake and were very influential in making the cult classic movie "Rock and Roll High School" that many people adore. Have any of these people that claim to love that movie seen it lately? It does not hold up well. The movie is a lot like The Ramones music. It's kind of a muffled, garbled look at a Detroit high school in the 70's. It's boring and pointless too. I don't get the love for that movie. It's very overrated.

Look, I understand that a lot of people think The Ramones are one of the greatest American bands, I'm not one of those people. But, I also realize that we at SeedSing have to recognize and write about things we don't like or disagree with if we want to be taken seriously. So, I made the best case that a non fan of The Ramones can make. I believe that there are thousands of bands and musicians that are much, much better than The Ramones, but not everyone sees it that way. Much to my chagrin, these are the "reasons" that The Ramones belong in our greatest American band debate. Please tell me why I'm wrong in the comment section, but also check out some of the people I mentioned above and go listen to the people that The Ramones influenced instead of listening to The Ramones.

Ty is the Pop Culture Editor for SeedSing and the other host of the X Millennial Man podcast. He once adored the Ramones, then learned their entire catalog in one afternoon and moved on. Follow Ty on twitter @tykulik.

Phil Ramone, who passed away today (March 30) at 79, leaves a striking legacy on the Billboard Hot 100 songs chart, where he produced or engineered 39 top 10 hits for such stars as Paul Simon, Billy Joel, Lesley Gore, Peter, Paul & Mary, B.J. Thomas, Gordon Lightfoot and many more.ExploreSee latest videos, charts and news

The ranking of this list of the Top 50 Phil Ramone songs is based on actual performance on the weekly Billboard Hot 100 chart. Songs are ranked based on an inverse point system, with weeks at No. 1 earning the greatest value and weeks at No. 100 earning the least. To ensure equitable representation of the biggest hits from each era, certain time frames were weighted to account for the difference between turnover rates from those years.

Thanks! I wanna be your boyfriend has been one of my favorite love songs. I was creating a playlist of my favorite songs but couldn't remember it. I found this, and added every one of these songs to my playlist. I think the ramones' love songs are overlooked.

Whatever your relationship with school is, chances are you'll hear some of your own experiences in at least a handful of these songs, from the Beach Boys' celebration of school spirit to Taylor Swift recalling how her first day as a high school freshman felt.

Cooper's greatest hit sets the tone with a punkish guitar riff as memorable as anything the kids had heard since "I'm Eighteen," following "School's out for summer" with "School's out forever" because, as the singer reveals in a textbook example of knowing your audience, "School's been blown to pieces." Having school kids join the taunting bridge of "No more pencils / No more books" was a brilliant idea, if not as brilliant as "We got no class and we got no principles / And we got no innocence / We can't even think of a word that rhymes."

With Phil Spector producing, the kings of U.S. punk approach this song with the youthful abandon of actual schoolkids, filtering a classic old-school rock-and-roll vibe through buzzsaw guitars. Meanwhile, Joey Ramone sets the tone with an opening verse that effectively sums up the high-school experience for young punks everywhere: "Well I don't care about history / 'Cause that's not where I wanna be / I just wanna have some kicks / I just wanna get some chicks." This song was made to order for a very silly must-see movie of the same name.

In which the poet laureate of pre-Bob Dylan rock and roll takes young listeners through what he feels is a typical school day, learning American history and practical math while dealing with the botheration of having a guy who won't leave you alone sit behind you in class and a teacher who "don't know how mean she looks." Two months after being released as a single, it served as the opening track on a classic debut titled "After School Session." The single peaked at No. 3 and topped the Billboard R&B chart.

This wistful ballad finds the singer looking back while still in her teens yet coming away with surprisingly grown-up reflections on the battle scars of young romance. But it starts with a richly detailed verse about that all-important first day of your freshman year at high school. "You take a deep breath and you walk through the doors," she sings. "It's the morning of your very first day / You say 'Hi' to your friends you ain't seen in a while / Try and stay out of everybody's way / It's your freshman year and you're gonna be here for the next four years in this town / Hoping one of those senior boys will wink at you and say 'You know I haven't seen you around before.'"

With "Schoolboys in Disgrace," the Kinks' Ray Davies devoted an entire concept album to the education system, setting the scene with the wistful nostalgia of "Schooldays" before concluding, nine songs later, that "even aborigines need education." But "The Hard Way" advanced to the head of the class in part because it was blessed with the kind of guitar riff that defined their early hits, only faster, and in part because the lyrics, sung from the perspective of a disillusioned teacher, played so well to Davies' strengths ("I'm wasting my vocation teaching you to write neat / When you're only fit to sweep the streets").

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