One day in August of last year, I was travelling home from work on public transport and listened to “Stay Positive”, the Hold Steady album, on my iPod. I was just about home when the regular album ended, so I shut down the iPod after “Slapped Actress”.

However, I happen to have the version with the bonus tracks, and so “Ask Her For Adderall” was the first song the next morning, when I turned on the iPod again to commute to the office. There’s a couplet in this song that goes:

If she asks just tell her that we opened for the Stones,

It’s her favorite band except for the Ramones.

Now, a few stations later, “Stay Positive” ended and I searched my iPod for something else I could listen to. I happened upon “Unhappy Hour”, an album by an obscure Phoenix band from the mid-90s called The Beat Angels. Since I hadn’t listened to it in ages, I selected it and travelled on.

About fifteen minutes later, I went off the train and walked over to the office building, just when the fifth track began, “Too Much Jazz”. There’s a couplet in this song that goes:

Do you remember when the Ramones were your best friends,

Made it so right to be alone.

I thought, “Well, what a coincidence to start and end that trip with a song that mentions the Ramones.” And then I wondered if there were any other songs like that on my iPod (there were) and how many there would be in my whole record collection (quite a few).

That day, I posted the first version of the list on Facebook, just because it’s the kind of nonsense people do on Facebook. This initial version of the list wasn’t very long, probably about a dozen songs I could think off straight away. Of course it drew some comments from people who added songs. Strangely, more than one comment mentioned “I heard Ramona sing” by Frank Black and “Kung Fu Ramone” by Guitar Wolf. It took me a while to realise that these people had found a list that Alex Ogg had done in May 2010 for Rock’s Backpages. It had 25 songs, but I felt that not all of them would do for me. “I heard Ramona” sing, for instance, may be ABOUT the Ramones, but it doesn’t mention them. Same goes for the Guitar Wolf track, which is an instrumental.

But now my ambition was aroused to do a list with 25 songs that REALLY mention the Ramones, or at least one Ramone. The work was done much more quickly than I thought, so I posted the list anew. Once again, people commented and suggested other songs; once again, I realised they had found these tracks mentioned somewhere on the internet but didn’t really know the songs in question. (Joey Ramone’s Wikipedia entry says “Hello Joe” by Blondie is a tribute song, so people would suggest that. However, the song does not mention Joey, only a Joe, who might or might not be Joey Ramone.)

Anyway, I realised that you CAN search for such songs on the web – if you restrict your search to lyrics. There was, for example, a great moment when I said to myself that people must have written songs about dressing like a Ramone. So I asked our dear friend Google to search for “lyrics dress like ramone” – and this is how I found a song by a Philly band called Howling Fantods entitled “(The Day All The Girls In Philadelphia Dressed Like) Ramones”. What’s more, you could download the song (and the whole album it’s from) for free! And to top it off, it turned out the song is as great as its title would suggest! I immediately tracked down the band on Facebook, told them I love their album – and added  I had only found them because I had been looking for songs that mention the Ramones.

01. “All Good Cretins” – Predator

02. “American Child” – The Stone Coyotes

03. “Ask Her For Adderall” – The Hold Steady

04. “As Long As I Can Listen” – The Dubrovniks

05. “Audacity of Huge” – Simian Mobile Disco

06. “BRB” – Dumbfoundead feat. Andrew Garcia

07. “The CCC Took Joey Away” – The Dirtshakes

08. “Champion The Underdog” – Eureka Machines

09. “Chinese Rocks” – The Heartbreakers

10. “Circles” – Fifteen

11. “Clone A Ramone” – The Liabilities

12. “Country Song (NOFX Should Listen More Ramones)” – Gramofocas

13. “Dancing With Joey Ramone” – Amy Rigby

14. “(The Day All the Girls in Philadephia Dressed Like) Ramones” – Howling Fantods

15. “D.E.A.D.R.A.M.O.N.E.S.” – Modern Life Is War

16. “Debbie Loves Joey” – Helen Love

17. “Dee Dee” – Terrorgruppe

18. “Dee Dee And Joey” – The Transistors

19. “Dee Dee Ramone” – Henry Fiat’s Open Sore

20. “End Of The Ramones” – Mr. T Experience

21. “Fiesta Ramone” – F.A.N.T.A.

22. “Girl About Town” – The Queers

23. “Goodbye California” – The Queers

24. “Goodbye Joey” – The McRackins

25. “Granola-Head” – The Queers

26. “Have You Seen Dee Dee Ramone” – Jesus H. Presley

27. “He Looked A Lot Like Dee Dee Ramone” – Mouthguard

28. “I Blame His Brother” – Lugless Booth

29. “I Don’t Wanna Get Thin” – Blubberry Hellbellies

30. “I Don’t Wanna Look Like No Ramone” – Latex Novelties

31. “I’m Lobotomized ‘Cause Of You” – The Riptides

32. “Intro” – Kid Rock

33. “I Wanna Be A Punk Again” – The Stone Coyotes

34. “I Wanna Be A Ramone” – Go Go Rays

35. “I Wanna Be A Ramone” – The Huntingtons

36. “I Wanna Be A Ramone” – The Dinks

37. “I Wanna Be Like Dee Dee Ramone” – The Parasites

38. “I Wanna Be Your Joey Ramone” – Sleater-Kinney

39. “I Wanna Cut My Hair Just Like Marky Ramone” – The Spazzys

40. “I Was A High School Psychopath” – Screeching Weasel

41. “Jeannie Hates The Ramones” – The Huntingtons

42. “Jeffrey’s Gone” – Sixty-Nine Vette

43. “Joey” – Raimundos

44. “Joey Ja Dee Dee” – Hairikot

45. “Joey, Johnny, Dee Dee & Marky (On Her Arm)” – The Hallingtons

46. “Joey Ramone” – James Marshall Black

47. “Joey Ramone” – Haggis

48. “Joey’s Song” Kitty Kowalski & The Manges

49. “Johnny And Dee Dee” – The Eastern Dark

50. “Johnny Ramone” – Der Nino aus Wien

51. “Johnny Ramone” – Like Some Cat From Japan

52. “Johnny Ramone” – Los Mentas

53. “Johnny Ramone Was In A Fucken Good Band But He Was A Cunt” – Frenzal Rhomb

54. “Just Like Joey Ramone” – Groove End Road

55. “Just Like Johnny Ramone” – David Young & The Restless

56. “Kill The Ramones” – Boris The Sprinkler

57. “Like A Ramone” – High-School Motherfuckers

58. “Made in NYC” – The Casualties

59. “Miss Argentina” – Iggy Pop

60. “My Baby’s Got a Crush On Joey Ramone” – Rat Fink

61. “My First Rock Concert” – Rheostatics

62. “My Girlfriend Looks Like Joey Ramone” – Real Ramoneroonies

63. “My Punk Girl” – Pale Sunday

64. “Nancy Ramone” – Nancys Rubias

65. “Night Of The Livid Queers” – The Queers

66. “Noam Chomsky Versus The Ramones” – Milky Wimpshake

67. “Ode To Ramones” – The Commandos

68. “Ode To The Ramones” – De Heideroosjes

69. “Oh Boy!” – The Dickies

70. “O Mundo Sem Joey” – Carbona

71. “Punkrockgirl” – Die Ärzte

72. “Quiero Ser Tu Johnny Ramone” – F.A.N.T.A.

73. “Ramona” – Las Ultrasónicas

74. ”Ramones & Stravinsky” – Kollaa Kestää

75. “Ramones For Yu” – Cómplices

76. “Ramones Girl” – Shock Treatment

77. “Ramones No Bar Do Ico” – Reatores

78. “Ramones T-Shirt” – The Emersons

79. “Remember The Ramones” – The Fleshtones

80. “Ripped Jeans” – Sneeze

81. “Rock’n'Roll Can Rescue The World” – Electric Eel Shock

82. “Schönen Gruß, Auf Wiedersehen” – Die Toten Hosen

83. “Seidl Doesn’t Have All Ramones Albums” – Carbona

84. “(Sheena’s In Love With) Joey Ramoney” – Helen Love

85. “She’s A Poser” – Teen Idols

86. “She’s Ugly But She Likes The Ramones” – The Come Ons

87. “Shonen Knife” – Shonen Knife

88. “Son Of A Beach” – Venerea

89. “TCP” – The Boys

90. “The Things That Dreams Are Made Of” – The Human League

91. “Thin Ice (Don’t You Ever Coz It Wouldn’t Be Clever)” – The Crybabys

92. “Tommy Ramone” – The Vapids

93. “Too Much Jazz” – The Beat Angels

94. “To The Ramones” – Dustin’s Bar Mitzvah

95. “29 x The Pain” – The Wildhearts

96. “We All Wanted To Be Rocked By The Ramones” – Anna & The Psychomen

97. “White Trash – Junior Senior

98. “Wir Hassen Die Ramones” – Lokalmatadore

99. “You Can’t Kill Joey Ramone” – Sloppy Seconds

100. “You’ll Have Time” – William Shatner

If you wonder about the non-Motörhead bit, I thought it would be very Ramones-like to not go for the most obvious and well-known one. Also, I felt it would be nice to have a song in reserve, so to speak, in case I got to number 49, 74 or 99 and couldn’t find another one. But that situation never arose.

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