Standing Over By The Record Machine: *The 1975 Sire Demos* presents an alternate universe Ramones debut album

What if JohnnyJoeyDeeDeeTommy cut their first LP in The Year Vietnam Ended, for a tiny local indie like Ork Records?

Say what you will about Record Store Day. I hear almost nothing but complaints about it anymore, at least online. And let’s face it: Since I began writing my book, social media has become the extent of my socializing. I doubt I even remember which fork to use anymore, and can’t remember the last movie I saw in a theater. And I certainly do not remember when my last trip to a record store happened.

But all I seem to hear these days regarding RSD is negative, be it the quality of the releases, the prices, the having to stand in line, yadda yadda yadda. But from where I sit, RSD should be Christmas for Ramones fans.

It sure feels like at least a ¼ of the Ramones releases currently buckling and bowing my record shelves are RSD in origin, such as this pretty decent 17-track greatest hits assembled by Morrissey (of all people). But just about the heppest Ramones-oid thing dropped in the annals of Ramones-oid RSD releases has to be The 1975 Sire Demos. 

Parted out from Rhino Records’ 2016 40th Anniversary Deluxe Edition of JohnnyJoeyDeeDeeTommy’s absolutely perfect debut LP, these tracks were the other essential component of that box set, producer Craig Leon’s special purpose-made mono remix aside. And while that received standalone vinylization last year, these demos remained marooned to the box set’s second CD. Until now.

It also presents an intriguing idea: What if JohnnyJoeyDeeDeeTommy cut their first LP in The Year Vietnam Ended, for a tiny local indie like, say, Ork Records?

What’s now housed on black-splattered clear vinyl are tapes produced by Tommy Ramone himself at New York’s Dick Charles Studios, where he initially learned the recording arts in 1968. (He eventually moved on with some of the Dick Charles staff, who founded the original Record Plant, and he assistant engineered recordings for Jimi Hendrix, among others.) These demos were used to help secure the band’s deal with Sire Records. According to the box set’s booklet, they were sourced from the original 2-Track masters and transferred to 198/24 digital in 2016 at London’s Abbey Road Studios, supervised by Leon. For whatever reason, these snapshots of what the early Ramones sounded like on one of their earliest trips to a recording studio didn’t capture one’s attention on a CD. This vinyl edition, specially produced by superstar mastering engineer Bill Inglot, does a better job of showcasing these tapes. Perhaps it’s vinyl’s inherent sonic properties, which some ears always favor over any digital format. But maybe it’s just down to being a standalone release, like it always should’ve been. 

Among this black-splattered 12-inch’s contents are 11 songs scattered across the Forest Hills Four’s first three LPs, plus two exclusive to this demo. That pair, “I Can’t Be” and “I Don’t Wanna Be Learned – I Don’t Wanna Be Tamed”, previously leaked as bonus tracks on Sire’s 1990 CD of the first two LPs, All The Stuff (And More), Volume One. It’s tantalizing to consider the possibilities for those songs in the Ramones discography – single B-sides? But you also wonder why they were considered substandard in the long-run.

The 1975 Sire Demos patently reinforces the oft-reported maxim that the Ramones wrote everything on their first three albums well in advance, the arrangements and everything nailed down well in advance. Whether they recorded those songs in the order they were written is another story, one which may well be true. But as Tommy told TapeOp magazine in 2005, “The guys in the Ramones turned out to be not only colorful but also very talented. They were coming up with these fabulous original songs. We soon had something really powerful going. When we first went in the studio to cut our demo we were coming up with some unique recording ideas for the times. We decided to go backwards a bit. We decided to use hard left and right ping-pong stereo effects like we heard on old Beatles records. We wanted to make a record that sounded different. We ended up transferring those experiments onto our first album.”

Seven of those fabulous originals appeared on the first album. Two — “I Don’t Wanna Walk Around With You” and “Today Your Love, Tomorrow The World” —  even close out The 1975 SIre Demos in an identical sequence to the real-world first Ramones album.

From opener “Loudmouth”’s first downstroked eighth notes, it’s apparent that every kink in the Ramones’ game plan was fully ironed out at this point. This is the Ramones fully-formed and -realized, from the ripped denim knees to the ramalama crunch. It’s a little tinnier and more indie than later on, sonically, but that Ramones sound is still there, every 1-2-3-4 in place. This can partly be blamed on the demo-level recording, and partly on not yet receiving the equipment upgrade from Sire. Hence there’s no wall of Marshalls and SVTs saturating the tape, as came to pass just a few months later at Plaza Sound, above Radio City Music Hall.

Johnny’s Black & Decker Mosrite guitar sound is fully present, if a little less beefy, due to his early employment of a Mike Matthews Freedom Amp, a solid state 55-watt thing powered by forty D-cell batteries(!!!), with a killer overdrive sound. Going by the video filmed in Arturo Vega’s loft on February 3, 1976, Dee Dee was jacking into one of those old Kustom tuck-and-roll monstrosities, also transistorized. His tone here and in the video is the most notably different – punchier, with a lot more treble and upper mids. Tommy again pans the stringed instruments hard left and right, just like they’d be on the first album. But it also sounds like he had Johnny layer a cleaner, undistorted second guitar beneath his roaring barre chords, mixing them close, adding some cut and note definition to the wall of filth.

At times, such as on “I Don’t Care,” they are slower and perhaps a little clumsier than the Ramones of legend. And Joey phrases far more in his faux English accent, though the Ronnie Spector influence is fully present, about to take over the host body. You also hear him double-track his vocals for the first time, Tommy likely telling him, “This is how The Beatles did it!” But from the minimalist packaging redolent of all mid-’70s indie punk releases and mid-’70s CBGB fliers to the classic pre-fame photos – Bob Gruen’s delightful snap of Da Brudders on the subway, guitars in shopping bags, and Chris Stein’s rare capture of Johnny smiling on the back – everything about The 1975 Sire Demos is perfect. Would this have thrilled the world the same way the proper first album did? Maybe, maybe not – Ramones was a lot more full-bodied in its production. 

Overall, this is a chance to hear the early Ramones with fresh ears, like sitting in two different corners of the studio and getting entirely different points of view. For that reason, it’s thrilling. The 1975 Sire Demos has been the Ramones album I have reached for the most the last few weeks. Hell, it’s the only Ramones album I have played recently. And it sure is great to have a new Ramones album to listen to, after all this time. 

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