Four Young Men From Queens Who Changed Music
This weekend marks the 40th anniversary of the debut album by The Ramones. The album, simply called The Ramones, would change the music world…just not right away.
The record sold poorly, but The Ramones ushered in the musical tsunami known as punk; and the sound of Western popular music, the way young people dressed, and the way bands made a living, would never be the same.
The Ramones were pioneers in surprising ways: they were among the first to make money not from record sales but from selling their own branded merchandise. They came from an unfashionable part of town, and proudly dressed the part; their “uniform” of leather jackets, cheap t-shirts, ripped jeans and sneakers would become an engine for an underground – and eventually global and very upscale – fashion industry. And they were plugged in to the world of the visual arts in a way that even longtime fans might find surprising.
That is, in fact, one of the major surprises of the exhibit called Hey! Ho! Let’s Go: Ramones and the Birth of Punk, running at the Queens Museum through July 31. But there are others.
[WNYC’s John Schaefer takes a tour of the exhibit; click on "Listen" to hear the story.]
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