Jewy Ramone

by David Gordon


RIP Jeff Hyman

Believe it or not, it wasn’t always cool to be a skinny, nerdy Jewish kid from Queens. Williamsburg was where my mom took me to buy cheap school clothes from the Hasidic shopkeepers. Long Island City was a wasteland where we went to wreck shit as kids or later on, as young artsy types, to make Super 8 films of ourselves wrecking shit. Those were the days when cool downtown people loathed Brooklyn and one could, literally, go for weeks without crossing above Fourteenth Street or going west of Broadway. In that Old World atmosphere, I had Manhattanite friends who had barely ever set foot in Brooklyn, (a trip to BAM maybe or the Botanical Gardens) but who never, ever touched Queens. Nowadays, just being a native makes me one of the last Mohicans, but back then I was definitely second-class. I was also 125 pounds, allergic and bronchial, sniffly and pasty, bookish and and pathologically shy. I hung in the back of jazz clubs, haunted used record stores, kung-fu triple features, midnight gore films and dusty book and comic shops, but it never crossed my mind that anyone like me could actually do anything cool like that. All those heroes were from a different tribe: cooler, older, richer, poorer, blacker or whiter.

Then, one spring evening, I was sitting in the passenger seat of my parents’ car, parked on the Upper East Side, waiting for them to finish getting their hair cut and twirling the radio dial. I don’t know what year it was, but I was young enough that my family all still got our hair cut together. Somewhere in the air, I stumbled across a tune that changed my life, (for the second time –– the first was hearing what I learned was Bitch’s Brew). I didn’t know the name of the band or the song, but from the minimal lyrics it was easy to guess: "I Just Wanna Have Something To Do."

Coming into consciousness as I did around 1980, in the second wave of punk, or post punk or whatever, and having been drawn first to blues and jazz, and loving the old Stones and Who but finding their shows and recent albums appalling, I would not, at the time, have described myself as a rock fan at all, finding the whole concept embarrassing and overblown, commercial mush for the meathead masses. Nor did the loudness and speed of the Ramones shock me. But it made me re-connect to rock and roll as something that mattered, that was not made for waving a lighter in Giants Stadium, but for prowling the streets, riding the subway, sitting on the stoop waiting for something to come by, writing bad poems, stealing books and doing whippets. It was alive, in all the best and worst senses of the word.

Much of that incredible vitality came from anger, aggression and hopeless energy, the amazing power they unleashed. But there was something else, something that wasn’t there, for me, with The Sex Pistols or The Clash. A note of longing, of yearning, of loss. A bittersweet tone, a beauty, that I think came from Joey’s singing, from his voice. I recognized it immediately in that song, in the choked off last word to the line “I just want to be with you…” and the haunting sweep of the repeated “tonight,” that opens up to take in the world of everything we love and can’t touch. It shows up in many other places too, in “I Want to Live,” in “I Wanna Be Sedated,” even in the dark majesty of “Don’t Bust My Chops” or the strange sob in the immortal “Somebody Put Something in My Drink.”

I connect this note, this tone, both deep and soaring, to blues, to doo-wop, to Sinatra, to Iggy, to something ancient and poetic but also completely modern American urban: the heart in the beast in the jungle. That feeling always grabs me by the throat. I know it’s anathema to say this, but I love those songs as much as the Beatles. Maybe more. Once, when I was in the fashion business (another story) we recruited the cheerleaders from the local, mainly Hispanic high school to perform, and as they leapt and yelled and waved their pom-poms, and formed a pyramid, I had them blast, “I Just Wanna Have Something To Do.” It gave me chills. I think the DJ and I hugged.

In the recent Ramones documentaries, there were two bits I found especially moving: the map that showed where the Ramones played across the country and the world and which bands sprang up in those cities, as if, seeing the guys from Queens triumphant, kids everywhere suddenly realized they could do it too. And I love the footage from Latin America, where crowds of fanatical teens filled stadiums and chased the limo, chanting for Los Ramones.

CBGB is gone, my hearing is going, and Jeff Hyman, in the foreshortened perspective of time seems like what he always was: another great Jewish songwriter and New York pop-singer. But for the angry, lonely, hungry, horny, dorky and lame, for young people all over the world who know they are fucked, that they have nothing but their lives to bet, Joey Ramone will always be a hero. This, to me, is the message behind every Ramones tune: You are a star, and your life, today, is a song.

Download:

"I Just Want To Have Something To Do" mp3
by the Ramones,
available on Road to Ruin

"Listen To My Heart" mp3
by the Ramones, 1976.
available on Ramones

"Today Your Love, Tomorrow The World" mp3
by the Ramones, 1976.
available on Ramones

"It's A Long Way Back To Germany (U.K. B-Side)" mp3
by the Ramones, 1977.
available on Rocket to Russia

"Slug" mp3
by the Ramones, 1977.
available on Rocket to Russia

"Commando" mp3
by the Ramones, 1977.
available on Leave Home

"The KKK Took My Baby Away" mp3
by the Ramones, 1981.
available on Pleasant Dreams

"My Brain Is Hanging Upside Down (Bonzo Goes To Bitburg)" mp3
by the Ramones, 1986.
available on Animal Boy

"We're A Happy Family" mp3
by the Ramones, 1977.
available on Rocket to Russia

"Rockaway Beach" mp3
by the Ramones, 1977.
available on Rocket to Russia

"I Want You Around (Original Version)" mp3
by the Ramones, 1977.
available on All The Stuff (And More), Vol. 2

"Questioningly" mp3
by the Ramones,
available on Road to Ruin

"Danny Says (demo)" mp3
by the Ramones, 1980.
available on End of the Century

"What A Wonderful World" mp3
by Joey Ramone, 2004
available on Don't Worry About Me

"Bye Bye Baby" mp3
by Ronnie Spector and Joey Ramone, 1999.
available on She Talks to Rainbows

top photo: © Roberta Bayley, 1977.

********************************

This is the fourth of eight posts at the Boogie Woogie Flu, in which eight Jewish writers will discuss the works of other Jewish artists for eight consecutive days in celebration of Hanukkah.

Hanukkah Party

by Pamela Harris

Years ago I got invited to a book party at Warner Leroy’s apartment. A foodie Jew, Mr. Leroy owned Tavern on the Green, The Russian Tea Room, et al. He came from a line of uber Jews -- his grandfather, Harry Warner, was Warner Brothers. and his father, Mervyn, produced The Wizard of Oz. (When filming completed, little Warner inherited little Toto.)

His apartment was in the Dakota -- Roman Polanski, naughty Jew, shot Rosemary’s Baby there -- a gothic fantasy of a building that looks massive from the outside, but inside is divided into quadrants around a large courtyard. (It was built this way to let more light in.)

The party was for a best of New York cookbook and took place on the last night of Hanukkah. My date was a nice Jewish boy. We entered the courtyard and a friendly gatekeeper directed us to a rickety elevator that was manned by an equally rickety attendant. The elevator creaked to a rise and a well-dressed woman behind me whispered to no one, "Warner’s neighbor is Leonard Bernstein," West Side Story musical genius Jew. But he also wrote "Kaddish" and "Mass."

And he was in The Revuers with Judy Holliday, a fellow Dakotan. I knew who she was because when I was a kid my dad and I would watch Creature Double Feature movies on Channel 38 and I’d sometimes get screaming. Most of the movies looked like they were made out of paper plates and glue, but occasionally the programmers would slip in Terror in the Wax Museum or Night of the Living Dead and I’d howl in the pillows until my dad changed the channel. The day he flipped the channel to Born Yesterday, a Judy Holliday (b. Judy Tuvim) fan was born.

I was wishing that Judy was still alive; maybe I’d see her upstairs and we’d share a latke, when the elevator stopped and a smiling blond welcomed us through the apartment’s heavy doors. She took our coats and we walked through a foyer into a hall. The ceilings were so high a T. Rex could roam upright -- Marc Bolan, singing Jew (b. Marc Feld) was front man for the band T. Rex -- and my date and I immediately snagged two grease-free mini latkes off a passing tray. We made our way toward the sound of the crowd, trying to be elegant as we downed three caviar blintzes and a quick glass of champagne.

At the end of the hall was a small living room. A Willem de Kooning – husband of Jewish painter Elaine - hung across from a Jasper Johns and I glimpsed the edge of what looked like a drawing by macho Jew Richard Serra. Central Park was lit up through deep-pocketed windows and the buildings far across the park were framed in a way that made their staccato heights look like a Menorah. I could see the old territory of Dutch Schultz – gangster Jew (b. Arthur Flegenheimer) –- and from this vantage point I understood why he wanted to own the city. This was New York, just like I pictured it.

My date wrote for an entertainment magazine and knew everyone by sight. We stood by the windows and stuffed our faces as he pointed out publishers and company presidents. I perked up when he gestured to a nondescript 30-something man. “His last name is Witz. I think he’s related to Gene Simmons.”

“From Kiss?”

My date nodded. “Simmons’s real name is Chaim Witz. He went to a yeshiva in Brooklyn.” My date grabbed four champagnes off a passing tray and gave me two. “Aerosmith’s drummer, Joey Kramer, is from the Bronx.” We downed the champagne and he gracefully cornered four more glasses. Barbra Streisand, Funny Girl Jew, quietly sang from speakers. “Blue Oyster Cult – Sandy Pearlman and Richard Meltzter started that band. Us Jews can rock.”

My date was nebbishy, nasally and nerdy. I was beginning to like him. We finished off two more glasses of champagne and lined up six more on the window seat. “Mama Cass was a big Jew,” I said. “So was Carole King.” Now he was starting to like me.

I snagged a handful of mushroom cups – I was getting drunk – and handed some to my date. “My uncle was a poet,” I said. “He lived on Leonard Cohen’s couch until he ended up in a loony bin in Massachusetts.” Pop pop – I tossed the mushroom cups down my throat and chased them with champagne.

My cuter by the second date did the same then said, “My uncle Milton knew Barry Manilow when he was Barry Alan Pincus.” Why that was funny I don’t know but I snorted a laugh and champagne came out my nose. Wendy Wasserstein – Pulitzer Prize winning Jew – grinned at us then took a seat next to a man who looked like Don Kirschner, the monotone maven of 1970’s televised Friday Night Rock Concerts.

“Oh my god – “ I said a little too loud then pointed my elbow at Joey Ramone, punk Jew (b. Jeffrey Hyman.) My night was made. I had just been turned on to "I Believe in Miracles" and had worn the type off the ‘repeat’ button on my boom box. My date stumbled over to talk with him and I went to look for a bathroom.

A waiter pointed me past an elegant staircase into a master bedroom. I went into the master bath and as I washed my hands it registered that the little painting above the sink was a Renoir. I wanted to put it in my pants, the way we used to steal steaks from Waldbaums when I was in art school. Was that who I was still? Was that who I wanted to be? I smoothed the hand towels out and exited fast.

My date was at the windows, waiting for me. I grew up a lone Jew in New England’s Irish Catholic-ville where the Festival of Lights was Santa and his sleigh bells. I always felt too Jewish for there and not Jewish enough for New York. I walked to my date and we stood side by side, silent, looking out over the lights of Central Park. Etta James’s "At Last" came on the stereo and suddenly too much or not enough no longer mattered.

Download:

"At Last" mp3
by Etta James, 1961.
available on At Last!

"Telegram Sam" mp3
by T. Rex, 1972.
available on The Slider

"I Believe In Miracles" mp3
by The Ramones, 1989.
available on Brain Drain

"The Magazine Seller" mp3
by The Revuers, 1940.
Judy Holliday, Leonard Bernstein, Betty Comden, Adolf Green
from NBC Radio Broadcast

"Cities on Flame With Rock & Roll" mp3
by Blue Öyster Cult, 1972.
available on Blue Öyster Cult

"Seasons of Wither" mp3
by Aerosmith, 1974.
available on Get Your Wings

"Got A Feelin'" mp3
by The Mamas and the Papas, 1966.
available on Gold

"Way Over Yonder" mp3
by Carole King, 1971.
available on Tapestry

*****************

Bonus:

The intro track to the Channel 38 Creature Double Feature.
[ed. note: It's very scary.]

"Toccata" mp3
by Emerson, Lake and Palmer, 1973.
available on Brain Salad Surgery

What Me Worry?

My apologies for the silence of The Flu. I've been in a state of suspended digiflux - stuck between the digital world and my analog ways. I've been switching my computers and my cameras - and in my line of work, that's a major hassle - grappling with the elusive ones and zeroes that control our modern lives. That, and the timely crash of my server has kept things static. I'm still working out the bugs. I'm writing this and posting today because I care - really I do - despite what today's selections may otherwise suggest.

"I Don't Care" mp3
by Reigning Sound, 2001.
available on Break Up Break Down

"I Don't Care" mp3
by the Ramones, 1977.
available on Rocket to Russia

"Careful" (I Don't Care) demo mp3
by Television, 1975.
available on Double Exposure

"Do You Think That I Really Care?" mp3
by the Rolling Stones, 1978.
available on Place Pigalle Vol. 1