V05-T01 Rock 'N' Roll Radio

.....I've just reread the notes for this track that I wrote in 1994 and, while I am going to reproduce them here, I've just got to say that the events that have transpired since writing them are considerably more notorious than is the case for most of these old notes. For one thing, three of the original four band members have passed away. The other thing you might have heard about. The album was produced by Phil Spector. The old notes follow the listing below.

Volume 5: DON'T TOUCH THAT DIAL (YOU DON'T KNOW WHERE IT'S BEEN), track 1

• 03:51 "ROCK 'N' ROLL RADIO" (The Ramones)
• performed by The Ramones
• original source: LP END OF THE CENTURY Sire/Warner Bros. SRK6077 (US) 01/80 [also an A-side in May]
• and my source: CD END OF THE CENTURY Sire/Warner Bros. 6077-2 (US) [no date; 1986?]
• currently available on CD END OF THE CENTURY Rhino R2 78155 (US) 08/20/02 [including both this version and a demo of the song as a bonus track]

.....Every self-important critic's nightmare come true. Imagine, those overgrown teenagers who wear non-designer jeans (with holes worn in the knees!) and told an interviewer that they were glad that they missed out on Woodstock (sacrilege!) because you'd have to be an idiot to sit in the mud a thousand feet from the speakers and get rained on just to pretend you were hearing the music. Imagine them exhuming that old "wall-of-sound" fossil who had most of his hits in mono (when everyone knows that quadrophonics is the wave of the future-- or will be once people wise up and grow a third and fourth ear to satisfy the needs of the technology). Who gave them permission to play fun music? Why can't they be more like Moon Martin or Christopher Cross? Now, those two have bright futures ahead of them...

.....Well, maybe not every critic was that out of it, but most were. It always astounds me, the number of people in the non-creative end of the business who thought Lester Bangs was crazy while they blathered like idiots about how Gordon Lightfoot was America's greatest popular composer (I'm not being sarcastic anymore-- I really read that one in Stereo Review) or voting Christopher Cross a Best New Artist Grammy (look it up), etc.

....."Do you remember Jerry Lee? John Lennon, T. Rex and Ol' Moulty?"

.....Well, do you remember Ol' Moulty? Not likely.

.....Victor Moulton was the drummer for The Barbarians, a Massachusetts-based garage band in the 1960's that got some national airplay (you'll likely find them on Nuggets-style compilations). The band was capable but would have been unremarkable except for Moulty. He had a hook.

.....Now, when I say 'hook', I'm not using a musical term for a catchy simple line of riffs that grabs people's attentions. I'm talking about a crude, metal prosthetic hand. I can't even guess at how uncomfortable it must be to play drums with a hook. That's the kind of dedication and spirit The Ramones associate with rock and roll. About a month after I put the tape together, Goldmine newspaper's 20th Anniversary issue came out and among the people they contacted to recall 1974 was Moulty. He runs a cleaning service now and plays nostalgia shows once in a while.

.....1974 was about the time Phil Spector dropped from sight. (For more on Spector's life, read "He's A Rebel".) Many assumed it was because his style was 'old-fashioned'. The real reason was that his deteriorating mental state (so common in perfectionists; see "Wilson, Brian") made it difficult to maintain associations with the high profile artists he insisted on working with. The Ramones soon learned this when he held them hostage at gunpoint. It was, however, an extremely cool record.