The Ramones, true to the raw, anarchic spirit of punk-rock, played as unclean as the notoriously filthy CBGB restrooms when they received a spontaneous offer from their first manager at the sacred underground of New York’s East Village in 1975.
“They wanted to appear in my piece in the SoHo Weekly News. And I kept repeating, ‘I can’t make it,’ ” legendary Ramones manager Danny Fields told The Post about seeing the famed New York band at the club where they first performed 50 years ago, on August 16, 1974. “But when I finally did, I went back to the dressing room before they went onstage and said, ‘Hello, I’m Danny, and I’m here.'”
That momentous introduction would rock Fields’ and music’s worlds when the Forest Hills, Queens quartet of lead singer Joey, guitarist Johnny, bassist Dee Dee, and drummer Tommy Ramone took the stage.
“The first words out of Joe y’s mouth were, ‘I don’t wanna go down to the basement,'” Fields remembered of the line that would serve as the title of the eighth tune of the Ramones’ 1976 self-titled debut.
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“And I went, ‘Holy s-t!’ That was the brightest and funniest thing I’ve ever heard. So I quickly recognize that they have a sense of humor.”
Fields was also immediately impressed by their sense of style.
“It was the presentation — they looked alike,” he told me. “They all dressed the same way, in leather jackets and trousers. They tried to make the hair seem alike. It just hits you intuitively: this is incredibly intelligent of them, and it advances the process of introducing them.”
But, in the end, it was all about the amazing musical mayhem he witnessed on that dirty set.
“I was kind of speechless,” Fields explained. “I felt they were the best band I had ever seen. They had everything written down. They ripped through one amazing song after another and never stopped.”
After the show, a “blown away” Fields returned to the dismal dressing room.
“And Tommy asked nervously, ‘Do you think you’ll be able to mention us in your column now?'” And something struck me, and I said, ‘I want to manage you.’ I’m not sure where that came from.
The hustling Ramones then presented Fields with an irresistible counter-offer.
“Johnny Ramone said me, ‘I’ll tell you what: We need $3,000 to get drums. “If you get us $3,000, you can be our manager,” Fields explained.
The money, which is around $20,000 when adjusted for inflation today, prompted Fields to make a frenzied cash dash. “I went to visit my recently widowed mother in Florida and asked, ‘Can I borrow $3,000?'” And she pulled out her checkbook and said, ‘I hope you know what you’re doing.'”
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He certainly did. Even though Fields was no fool, it wasn’t all about the drums: “It was enough money to get them through the next few months.”
Still, the dressing-room deal benefited everyone involved.
The Ramones, who derived their common surname from a hotel alias used by Paul McCartney with The Beatles, were signed to Sire Records when A&R guy Craig Leon championed them following his CBGB discovery of the band.
“I just thought they were hilarious,” recalled Leon, who went on to produce 1976’s “The Ramones.” “They were like a cartoon version of a rock band, which was the polar opposite of everything that was going on at the time—you know, everyone was so serious. Bands were performing rock operas while dismissing traditional rock ‘n’ roll.
Indeed, the Ramones, all of whose original members have died but live on in Rock and Roll Hall of Fame immortality, spearheaded a punk revolution that began 50 years ago at CBGB.
David Godlis, a photographer who regularly photographed the band at their home club from 1976 until the original lineup’s final CBGB gig on May 4, 1978, described their influence as follows: “We all thought the Ramones were gonna be as big as the Beatles.”
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