Marky Ramone: My 5 Favorite Punk Songs
Drummer explains how tracks by Kinks, Love prefigured the movement
Marky Ramone. Photo: Aroni Alessandro/Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0/Wikimedia Commons
Many consider the Ramones’ self-titled debut, recently named the greatest punk album of all time by Rolling Stone, to be punk’s Big Bang moment. But according to Marky Ramone, the famed Queens group’s later-period drummer, the genre’s roots stretch back quite a bit further. Here, Ramone, who will spend his summer playing classic Ramones tunes on tour in Europe with his band Blitzkrieg, names his five favorite punk songs.
The Kinks, “All Day and All”¨ of the Night”
The raunchiness of the production and Dave Davies’ guitar sound were the beginnings of punk. When I first heard it I was like, “Holy shit!”
The Trashmen, “Surfin’ Bird”
This is an off-the-wall song that’s crazy and insane beyond description. It was different than anything on the radio.
Love, “7 and 7 Is”
This came out 10 years before the genre was really consolidated at CBGB, but it’s still punk. It should have gone Number One.
Richard Hell and the Voidoids, “Blank Generation”
I was in this band. This song spoke for the populace at the time CBGB was going. It reflects a moment in time.
The Music Machine, “Talk Talk”
The fuzz bass, production and singing on this had all the elements of punk. It’s filthy, sludgy and different from anything else that came out in 1966.
