Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

ROCK AND ROLL HALL OF FAME

The Ramones - Johnny, Joey, Tommy, Dee Dee, and Marky - were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. The ceremony took place at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in New York City on March 18, 2002. The induction introduction was given by Eddie Vedder, lead singer of Pearl Jam and close friend of the Ramones.

INDUCTION DAY

This is what Danny Fields, the Ramones' first manager, wrote on the official ballot that the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame organizers sent to everyone who votes in this election:

The Ramones were four disaffected guys from Forest Hills who adopted the same surname and the same look and started a band. Inspired by the perfect, simple songs of groups like the Beatles and the Kinks and the attitudes of the New York Dolls and Iggy Pop, they detested instrumental virtuosity - of which they were, in any case, incapable - and all things artsy. So they invented a sound that was at once reductive, revolutionary, alternative and classic. "In their time, the sharpest band on the planet," wrote Rolling Stone's David Frick. Playing at a velocity that smashed the sound barrier, and fronted by the late and wonderful Joey Ramone, the Ramones toured for 22 years, released 22 albums, and played 2,263 shows. They never got the radio hits they so much wanted, but today the chant "Hey Ho Let's Go" is heard before all home games of the New York Yankees, and their songs are everywhere - though still not on the radio.

Here are some articles from around the world about the 2001 Hall of Fame class:

The Ramones Induction Essay, Rock & Roll Hall of Fame:
March 18, 2003

By Dr. Donna Gaines

In the dark ages that preceded the Ramones, fans were shut out, reduced to the role of passive spectator. In the early 1970s, boredom inherited the earth: The airwaves were ruled by crotchety old dinosaurs; rock & roll had become an alienated labor - rock, detached from its roots. Gone were the sounds of youthful angst, exuberance, sexuality and misrule. The spirit of rock & roll was beaten back; the glorious legacy handed down to us in doo-wop, Chuck Berry, the British Invasion and surf music lost. If you were an average American kid hanging out in your room playing guitar, hoping to start a band, how could you possibly compete with elaborate guitar solos, expensive equipment and million-dollar stage shows? It all seemed out of reach. And then, in 1974, a uniformed militia burst forth from Forest Hills, Queens, firing a shot heard round the world.

The Ramones' raw style resurrected the unholy spirit of rock & roll, renewing old-school aesthetics, paying tribute to the Fifties greasers, the bikers, the garage Mods. With their Tiger Beat boy names, ripped jeans, T-shirts, black leather motorcycle jackets and Keds (American-made sneakers only), the Ramones incited a sneering cultural insurrection. In 1976 they recorded their eponymous first album in seventeen days for $6,400. At a time when superstars were demanding upwards of half a million, the Ramones democratized rock & roll - you didn't need a fat contract, great looks, expensive clothes or the skills of Clapton. You just had to follow Joey's credo: "Do it from the heart and follow your instincts." More than twenty-five years later - after the band officially broke up - from Old Hanoi to East Berlin, kids in full Ramones regalia incorporate the commando spirit of DIY, do it yourself.

According to Joey, the chorus in "Blitzkrieg Bop" - "Hey ho, let's go" - was "the battle cry that sounded the revolution, a call to arms for punks to do their own thing." That message spread outward from the bowels of New York City to the U.K. and California, across Asia, into Latin America and Europe, instigating 10,000 new bands along the way. Lean, mean, clean, the Ramones had ushered in a glorious new age. The critics called it punk rock after the garage bands of the early 1960s. History was rewritten; bands like T-Rex, the Velvets and Dolls were reclassified as "prepunk." New sights, sounds, dress codes, art, attitudes and gender relations followed - girls could do it, too! Fans in the audience today became bands onstage tomorrow. Authenticity replaced virtuoso mastery as the central tenet of punk musicianship. The Ramones set the standard for a rising generation of alternative bands learning to balance cult credibility with mass appeal. From CBGB to Sleater-Kinney, Rancid and Green Day. Stripped down, with a streetwise antilook, speed-pop raw aggression and darkly funny lyrics, the Ramones influenced genres from new wave to hardcore, speed metal and thrash. Infused the sensibilities of grunge, riot grrrl, foxcore and queercore.

The original band members grew up as disaffected boomers repulsed by the legacy of peace and love. They were loners, outcasts in their outer-borough middle-class apartment complex. Typical neighborhood guys, bassist Dee Dee lived next door to Johnny, who played guitar, and Johnny was in a band with Joey's brother, guitarist Mickey Leigh. Johnny knew Tommy since high school - they had a band called Tangerine Puppets. After graduation, Tommy got a job as a recording engineer, setting up Performance Studios, a rehearsal space and showcase for early Ramones shows, two-dollar cover, mostly friends. In addition to playing drums, Tommy began coproducing, and after the Ramones' third album, Rocket to Russia, he left the band to produce full-time. Dee Dee knew Joey as the singer in a glitter band named Sniper, who performed at a Queens club called Coventry. A free spirit, tall, shy and gawky, Joey seemed a most unlikely rock star. When he hooked up with his band mates, he was selling acrylic-dipped flowers in the Village and painting with vegetables. Like Dee Dee and Johnny, Joey was alienated at home, at school and in the neighborhood. In their early days, Dee Dee and Johnny sat on rooftops killing time, getting wasted, looking for cheap thrills. "Now I Wanna Sniff Some Glue" was Dee Dee's deadpan dead-end kids' one minute, thirty-four second ode to the pleasures of solvent abuse. Joey claimed the song was just a goof: "We were really just writing about teenage frustration." As Johnny explained, "We couldn't write about girls or cars, so we wrote songs about things we knew."

The Ramones were their fans - outcasts, frustrated suburban youth who played stickball, worked at odd jobs and checked out shows at Flushing Meadow Park. Johnny and Dee Dee were obsessed with war movies. Johnny had spent two years in military school; Dee Dee grew up in Germany on a military base, an army brat. Fiercely patriotic, the two collected war memorabilia and hated hippies. They rode the subway to shows, carried their guitars to rehearsals in shopping bags. Legend holds that in the early 1970s, when Johnny first saw the New York Dolls perform, he took one look and declared, "Hey, I can do that!" The rest is U.S. cultural history.

The Ramones took their name from Paul McCartney's alias - Paul Ramone - when his band was called the Silver Beatles. Like most kids stranded on the wrong side of the bridges and tunnels of New York City, the Ramones knew heaven was just a train ride away. So they hopped the subway to Manhattan and eventually found a home on the Bowery, at CBGB. At first, people wondered if they could play at all, but that wasn't the point; their twenty-minute sets of rapid-fire, under-two-and-a-half-minute songs earned them a recording contract before any of their contemporaries, except Patti Smith.

You had to be sophisticated to realize they weren't d-u-m-b. But if you took them too seriously, you'd miss the point. Joey's clipped words made people wonder if he was serious or just spoofing. He deployed an eccentric phrasing that was wholly unique, a mix of regional Queens dialect and Britboy bastard inflection. Dee Dee and Johnny never smiled; they stood onstage with their legs spread apart, stoic, staring psychotically at their instruments. Sometimes Johnny's white guitar turned totally red; he played with such ferocious fury his fingers bled. Joey sang with the same twisted intensity that lacerated Johnny's hand. Sometimes Dee Dee's bass lines soared past at the speed of light. Their minimalist aesthetic was rooted in Dee Dee's Queens logic: "I think rock & roll should be three words and a chorus, and the three words should be good enough to say it all."

The Ramones' songwriting reflected their obsession with popular culture and all things American - pizza, Carbona, Coney Island, Burger King, chicken vindaloo, surfing, horror movies and soda machines. They helped us laugh at our dysfunctional families, psychotherapists, politicians and piss-poor social skills.

Above all, they upheld a belief in the emancipatory promise of rock & roll radio: the Top Forty seven-inch vinyl, three-minute hit single. Unlike the snotty urban art crowd, they loved television, baseball, comic books and cartoons. Joey wrote "Chain Saw" after seeing Chain Saw Massacre, rhyming massacreeeeee with me. Johnny's "I Don't Wanna Go Down to the Basement" was an ode to all the B-movie horror flicks he loved. Likewise, "Pinhead" was a cooperative effort inspired by the 1932 horror film Freaks.

Over the course of eighteen studio and live albums, and more than 2,250 shows, the band remained accessible and local. As Joey explained, "Our fans played a major part in the whole thing. I remember meeting certain artists I admired and them being real obnoxious. That wasn't how I wanted to be." Brooklynite Marc Bell, an acclaimed drummer for Richard Hell and the Voidoids, Dust and Wayne County, replaced Tommy on drums in 1978 and became Marky Ramone. The son of a longshoreman turned labor lawyer readily embraced the band's ethic of inclusion. Marky said the most important thing he learned from being a Ramone was "how to treat people right, you know, don't act like a rock star, just be yourself. . . . I hate rock stars." Through it all, the band upheld the primacy of the fans, the importance of the kids, the purity of band-fan relations. Of the people, by the people, for the people.

Over the years, the Ramones worked with Phil Spector, starred in Roger Corman's 1979 movie Rock 'n' Roll High School and wrote the title track to Stephen King's Pet Sematary. American popular culture spawned the Ramones; today their legacy permeates it. Today you'll hear them at football stadiums, as crowds cheer "Hey ho, let's go," and on film soundtracks ranging from The Royal Tenenbaums to Jimmy Neutron.

E Pluribus Unum. The Ramones always called themselves an American band, patriotic, goofy, innocent and too tough to die. Individualistic yet inclusive, eccentric yet populist, the Ramones stood firm, in perfect paramilitary formation, a uniformed assault team, a well-disciplined fighting army. They became one of the most prolific, hard-touring bands in the world. Their all-for-one, one-for-all work ethic prevailed over self-interest or ego. After Dee Dee left the band in 1989, C.J. played bass with edgy vitality and great humility. The former U.S. Marine said, "I tried not to look like I'm taking someone else's place, but go up there to do my job and entertain people."

When the band broke up in 1996, the members pursued solo projects - cool new bands, art shows, memoirs, novels, spoken-word tours, films and albums. Tragically, at age 49, Joey Ramone passed away on April 15, 2001, following a lengthy battle with lymphoma. Joey's worldview is evident in his posthumous solo album, Don't Worry About Me, in the upbeat momentum of songs like "What a Wonderful World" and "I Got Knocked Down (but I'll Get Up)." Today the former high school reject is a personal hero. By just being himself, "the King of Punk" gave teenage outcasts everywhere something to believe in, an alternative to killing themselves or blowing up the high school.

The Ramones have given us many brilliant anthems to hang our dreams on. Whether by land or by sea, the Ramones never forgot their primary purpose - to be true to their fans. When they played, we knew they did it for us. They never wavered, never betrayed our faith. Their impact on popular music, their influence on youth subculture cannot be measured in the banal, quantitative language of market shares, chart positions and radio airplay. Like the proud-standing Militia of Lexington who fired the shot that sparked the American Revolution, the Ramones of New York City changed history.

*Essay in loving memory of Joey Ramone.

The Village Voice:
Punks in the Hall
The Ramones and Talking Heads Battle Their Way From CBGB to Cleveland

by Bill Werde

Gary Kurfirst, the longtime manager of Talking Heads, illustrates just how irreverent the band was when they started touring in the mid '70s. "They were in Boston," recalls Kurfirst. "It must've been around '77, and we were in a nasty fight with the headlining band - they didn't want to let us use their stage lights. Finally David [Byrne] walks up and says, 'Screw it!' They played the whole show with the house lights on!"

Ask Kurfirst the name of the bullies, though, and he gets suspiciously quiet. Turns out he so impressed the headliners with his tenacity that he wound up managing them, too.

That band was The Ramones.

Come Monday, Talking heads and The Ramones - along with Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers, Isaac Hayes, Brenda Lee, and Gene Pitney - will have gilded rocking chairs reserved in the giant, industry-approved Cleveland pantheon that is the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. But for New Yorkers who consider the heyday of CBGB as much a part of the city's fabric as Central Park or the Yankees, it's all about a motley crew of solvent huffers from Forest Hills and a few preppy RISD transplants.

The Ramones and Heads were written off as weirdos by a music industry dominated by singer-songwriters and prog rock in the mid '70s; now the ultimate industry establishment is offering validation. The induction ceremony at the Waldorf-Astoria, with its $2500-a-seat prices and tables full of record executives, is anything but punk. But as Heads drummer Chris Frantz says, "If they're handing out honors, I guess we'll take them."

So Talking Heads are reuniting. The key syllable here is "nite," as in only one. Don't hold your breath for the follow-up tour. "We're talking about playing a couple of songs for the thing," says David Byrne, fidgeting with a CD in the downtown office of his Luaka Bop record label. "It'll be fun." He doesn't sound convincing.

The reunion was not a foregone conclusion. When Salon.com asked Byrne in '99 about the specific possibility of playing at the Hall of Fame ceremony, his response was a terse "I don't think so." As late as February, matters were undecided. Even as husband-wife team Frantz and bassist Tina Weymouth excitedly ticked off songs they might play at a reunion (" 'Psycho Killer' was always a hit to me," says Frantz. "It would be great to play something unexpected, like 'I Zimbra' "), Byrne was touring the Eastern Hemisphere, solo, and in no rush to decide.

It's been 14 years since the band performed together. Byrne, Frantz, Weymouth, and keyboardist Jerry Harrison have all remained busy since the band broke up in '91. Weymouth and Frantz are constantly on tour as the Tom Tom Club, and contributed a track on the Gorillaz' breakthrough album. Harrison established a platinum production career with Live's Throwing Copper, and worked on No Doubt's latest. Byrne just finished 12 months on tour supporting the dadaist-ages-gracefully classic Look Into the Eyeball; he's been singing some Heads classics regularly, so, as he says with a maniacal laugh, he "knows the words." Still, the four haven't been in the same room since '99, when they were promoting the reissue of their concert film Stop Making Sense. In '96, Byrne went to court to stop Weymouth, Frantz, and Harrison from releasing the ill-conceived No Talking Just Head project (they eventually settled out of court and the album was released). Just weeks ago, Byrne characterized the Heads' relationship as "better than Israel and Palestine."

Talking Heads' first gig had them opening for the Ramones at CBGB, and in '77 the two would take their first proper tour of Europe together. To hear Johnny Ramone talk, you might think the notorious hardass has gone all soft. "We always knew the Talking Heads were good," he says. "But we looked at them as this college, intellectual band. To me rock and roll was always supposed to be rebellious punks." Danny Fields, the Ramones' first manager, from '75 to '80, remembers it another way: "Johnny said, 'They really suck, they can open.'"

"We were going for the preppy look," says Byrne. "We just wanted to turn the rock iconography on its head. We wanted to see if we could get away with establishing that as an alternative. I don't think it really worked." Weezer probably begs to differ, but certainly there were many - particularly those outside the major metropolitan areas - who didn't care to have their iconographies flipped. "Isn't it strange," asks Weymouth, "to think that the first song that happened for us was 'Take Me to the River'? That's when people finally understood the band. 'Cause, oh, when you mix up your sex and your gospel, they say 'Oh, now I know where you're coming from. You're as fucked up as I am!'"

The Heads' imprint on modern groups is so obvious (Radiohead even took their name from a track on True Stories) that it's worth remembering that before there was an alternative rock circuit, Byrne and co. had to blaze trails through folk clubs in Nashville and pizza parlors in Pittsburgh. ("Our opening act was a fire-breathing clown," recalls Byrne. "He was drunk by our second set.")

"My first impression of the Ramones," says Byrne, "and the impression probably never changed, was that this was real art rock. The concept was so strong and so focused that it became invisible. People almost didn't notice that it was tongue in cheek." Loser kids who'd barely made it through high school in the early '70s really weren't walking around with leather jackets and extended bowl cuts. That was an "iconography" the Ramones gave the world.

The band blazed a few trails of their own. Monte Melnick - the Ramones' tour manager for the whole wild ride - remembers an early fuel stop in rural Texas. After pumping the gas, Monte walked into the small shop where Tommy, Dee Dee, Joey, and Johnny were stretching their legs. On the way out, the beehived clerk pulled him aside and said in a low voice, "Mister, it sure is nice of you to take care of those retarded people."

As the cliche goes, wherever the Ramones went, 10 new bands sprung up. That takes on more weight when you note bands that made it past the garage. Pearl Jam, Rob Zombie, the Chili Peppers, Green Day, and Rancid are all cutting tracks for a Ramones tribute that Johnny is putting together. Bono has long said that his band would not have existed without the Ramones; this past April, U2's "In a Little While" played at the Weill Cornell Medical Center as Joey slipped away. And since he passed on, U2 has taken to playing "I Remember You."

The Ramones obviously, sadly, will not be reuniting Monday night, but that precludes no drama on their part. First on Johnny Ramone's list of gripes is the exclusion of bassist CJ Ramone from the induction; the Hall of Fame Foundation wouldn't even grant him a ticket. When the band played their last gig, in L.A. in August of '96, CJ had been a member for eight years and three studio albums; he was such a longtime, die-hard fan before he joined that he still refers to the Ramones as "them." Today he works 12-hour shifts cleaning polluted air ducts at the World Trade Center site, and is among the first to explain why he shouldn't be inducted. "Only the original members should be going in," says CJ. "That's when they put out Ramones to Rocket to Russia, the stuff that made them legendary."

Johnny, the guitarist with the iconic downstroke, sees things differently. "The '80s were a lonely time for us," he says. "We were out there by ourselves. When the '90s came, you had this movement of punk bands again. We would just sit in the dressing rooms and not talk to anyone because we didn't think anyone cared about us. But CJ was our ambassador. And all of a sudden Soundgarden wanted us to tour with them. And White Zombie. And Pearl Jam. I felt [CJ] was more important than Mark. Mark is a great drummer, but CJ is a frontman." Johnny has arranged for CJ to attend, and plans to bring him on stage.

Meanwhile, Marky (who replaced Tommy after Rocket to Russia) bristles at Johnny's assessment. After launching into a tirade about everything from Johnny's pre-Ramones gold lame pants to his guitar playing ("We would tour each city and a guy who knew the leads would be behind the curtain and play guitar. John could only play the rhythm." Johnny denies this), Marky called back twice in a couple of days. "Johnny is the greatest living punk guitarist," he said finally, calm and contrite. "He has his opinion and obviously the Hall of Fame voters didn't agree. I don't want there to be any negativity."

The sparring, though, is as much a part of the Ramones' history as their baseball-bat-clutching American eagle logo. "They'd play for 40 minutes," recalls CBGB proprietor Hilly Kristal. "And 20 of them would just be the band yelling at each other." Danny Fields says that early on, they'd also come to blows after their sets. "Johnny would be strangling Dee Dee, and there'd be press or fans waiting to see them," he says. "I'd tell folks they were just toweling off, give them a couple of minutes, and by the time people saw them, they'd be sipping a beer."

Beyond the ungainly frictions of youth lay deeply harbored grudges. Johnny and Joey were the only beginning-to-end Ramones, but Johnny stole Joey's girlfriend in the early '80s and the pair weren't friendly again. Johnny never called Joey before he passed. Instead, the guitarist checked in every couple of days with Arturo Vega, the Ramones' lifelong art director and lighting supervisor. Vega had remained friends with both, and ultimately recommended that Johnny not phone Joey. "On Easter Sunday, I was about to go to a friend's house and I got the word," Johnny says. "It didn't really sink in until I got home and there was like 20 messages. After a week of that every day, I felt very depressed."

But Johnny's not sorry. "I wouldn't want him to call me," he reasons. "I would not want to be hearing from someone I didn't get along with. A lot of people don't understand that."

Marky says he buried the hatchet with Joey about two years ago, though friends say Joey never really forgave Marky for telling Howard Stern's listeners that Joey was fighting cancer. When Joey was in the hospital, Marky visited with tapes of their appearances on Stern, and they laughed until they turned red. Joey's favorite was a segment with the full band. "Howard asked Johnny to look at Joey on the show and he wouldn't, and he was sitting right next to him," says Marky. "So Howard asked Joey to look at Johnny, and he wouldn't. It was just so funny, the pent-up emotion that was involved, that was released in the music."

Johnny was the colonel who kept the Ramones (relatively) in line and on time, and he seems ill-prepared to take marching orders from the Hall of Fame Foundation or anyone else. When Joey died, his mother, Charlotte Lesher, and brother Mickey Leigh proceeded with plans for his May 19 50th birthday bash. The planning committee decided to invite the surviving Ramones to play, so Vega contacted the band members. What happened next could only charitably be called gross miscommunication. Vega, in an apparent attempt to get Johnny to agree to perform, neglected to immediately explain precisely what Lesher wanted: Behind an empty mic stand, the surviving Ramones would play instrumental versions of a couple of songs and the audience would sing along. Johnny, who hadn't played for keeps in years and had retired because he thought he was slipping, started practicing and contacted pals Eddie Vedder, Rob Zombie, and Joe Strummer with the idea they could front the band. "I wanted to make this an event where people would have a good time," says Johnny. But weeks after Joey's funeral, Lesher was not ready to see Joey's shoes filled. Depending on who you talk to, the Ramones were either uninvited or declined to come. Regardless, the ensuing months saw Marky and CJ lashing viciously at Mickey Leigh, making unsupported claims in fanzine interviews that he wanted to front the band. The fiasco was an inauspicious beginning to an unlikely partnership; Joey left his half of Ramones Productions Inc. to his mother, so Lesher and Johnny are now business partners.

Johnny is asking to be seated away from Lesher and Leigh at the induction ceremony. "Decisions were always made by the band," says Johnny. "I find it ridiculous that anyone has to be consulted. It should always be just the bandÑIf I die, I don't expect anyone to call up my wife to make a Ramones decision. Why do I have to discuss a Ramones performance with his brother and his mother?"

For her part, Lesher says she hopes to sit next to Tommy. And as for the birthday party, she says the Ramones were out of line. "Who do you invite to a birthday party?" she asks. "You invite the people that love you."

Thankfully, Joey left more behind than a dysfunctional musical family. His first solo project, Don't Worry About Me, was recorded over the space of about four years and released late last month. It's a really good Ramones album, but for the not-so-minor detail that it isn't a Ramones album at all. Only the opener, a cover of Louis Armstrong's "Wonderful World," offers up the band's signature eighth-note wall of sound. Still, the hard-charging riffs and sense of humor that always combined for an aggressive sort of sweetness on the finest Ramones records are present, whether Joey's rhyming stock-market lingo in "Maria Bartiromo" or covering unwritten Who songs in the theatrical "Mr. Punchy."

The vocals, mostly recorded at longtime Ramones producer Daniel Rey's Fourth Avenue home studio, sound superb. From his back window, Rey can see Joey's old 9th Street apartment; Joey would often call if he saw Rey's light on. Rey produced Don't Worry About Me, and he and Joey had an unspoken agreement that Joey wouldn't sing unless he felt good.

Joey didn't write about his illness, except on the album's weakest track, "I Got Knocked Down." (The lyrics aren't clever and the progressions are lame, but gabba gabba hey, if your heartstrings are pulled by Joey singing about beating his lymphoma, we understand.) Elsewhere, though, lines haunt: "Nothing lasts forever and nothing stays the same. . . . When you finally make your mind up, I'll be buried in my grave," sings Joey in "Stop Thinking About It."

The Dictators' Andy Shernoff played bass on the record, and says Joey wanted to add a few more songs. "He was a little worried that the album was too down," says Shernoff. "He had some more upbeat tracks in his mind. I wish to God we'd have been able to hear them." But Rey says that Don't Worry About Me is a completed project. "Joey was never done," he says. "He always wanted to change one little thing. He had a fear of completion like a lot of artists do." He even refused a feeding tube, fearing it would damage his vocal cords. "When he went in the hospital," says Rey, "we were always thinking positive: 'When you get out, we'll do this or that, cut another song.' But then he was in for a while, and we kind of spoke about it and it was 'Hey, we got 11 finished songs here. It's cool.' Not stating the obvious, because we never really talked about it. But the recording was done."

The Ramones' bickering and the Heads' cynicism only underscore the greatest irony of Monday night: The guy who would have been most pleased to be inducted can't be there. "Joey really appreciated the history of rock and roll," says his mother. "He knew he was being nominated, and he was really excited about it."

Joey also spoke about the Hall with Rey. "Joey always felt that rock and roll was a valid art form and should be recognized," says Rey. "He would say" - and here, Rey squints a bit and takes on the famous Queens-cum-British-cum-teenage-lobotomy accent - "'Yeh, it would be cool if we got inducted the first year. Yeh, that would be reeeally cool.'"

Ramones Inducted Into Rock Hall By Vedder
March 19, 2002

Chad Dougatz, New York

The Ramones, who pioneered punk in New York City with such songs as "I Wanna Be Sedated" and "Blitzkrieg Bop," were inducted by Pearl Jam's Eddie Vedder into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame last night in their hometown.

Vedder noted in his induction speech that while they may have pioneered punk, none of the Ramones members ever had a mohawk. "They were just a bunch of guys from Forest Hills, Queens," Vedder said. "Commercially, they were never embraced... Punk bands now sell in their first record 10 times more records then the Ramones did through their careers."

After Vedder's 17-minute speech, Johnny Ramone, Marky Ramone, Dee Dee Ramone, and Tommy Ramone expressed thanks to the industry for the honor.

Tommy took a moment to recognize the late Joey Ramone by saying, "Believe it or not, we really loved each other, even when we weren't acting civil to each other. We were truly brothers. The honor of our induction to the Hall of Fame means a lot to us. But it's really meant everything to Joey. Thank you very much."

A bit of controversy swirled moments later in the backstage press area, after the Ramones left the stage. Joey Ramone's mother Charlotte Lesher and brother Mickey Leigh were asked by a reporter why they did not go on stage to accept Joey's award on his behalf. The family members replied they had not been invited to go on stage with the group. To make matters even more uncomfortable, Lesher and Leigh had not been asked to sit at the Ramones' table during the gala.

In spite of the controversy, Joey Ramone's spirit was indeed alive when Green Day performed the Ramones classics "Teenage Lobotomy," "Rockaway Beach," and "Blitzkrieg Bop" for the punk pioneers' performance segment. The surviving Ramones have vowed never to perform again following the death of Joey Ramone, who succumbed to cancer last April.

The Ramones formed in 1974, and based their career on short and punchy songs played at a breakneck speed. They focused on bringing rock back to its original motivations of frustration, rebellion and lust, and their crude instrumentation sometimes hid clever humorous lyrics and the band's love of classic '60s rock songs. They broke up in 1996, after perfecting a "punk" aesthetic of both looking unattractive and singing about unattractive topics, and influencing everyone from the Sex Pistols and the Clash to Pearl Jam and Green Day.

New York Post:
March 19, 2002
RAMONES ROLL INTO ROCK 'HALL'

By DAN AQUILANTE and DEVLIN BARRETT

New York's homegrown punk pioneers The Ramones blitzed their way into the Rock n' Roll Hall of Fame last night - a bittersweet honor for the group that lost lead singer Joey to cancer almost a year ago. The shaggy-haired band from Queens was inducted during a touching ceremony at the Waldorf, along with the Talking Heads, Tom Petty, Isaac Hayes, Brenda Lee, Gene Pitney, the late Chet Atkins and Jim Stewart, who co-founded Stax records.

The Ramones, who burst onto the Manhattan music scene in the 1970s at bars like CBGB's, where the Talking Heads also gained notice, were inducted by Pearl Jam frontman Eddie Vedder. "They were four delinquents from Forest Hills . . . and their music was an assault," said Vedder, "but it changed music forever." With tunes like "Blitzkrieg Bop" and "I Wanna Be Sedated," The Ramones ushered in a new era of jagged, three-chord songs from a generation of punk-rock disciples, including Green Day, who performed a tribute to the group.

The Talking Heads called a temporary truce in their long-running feud to perform at the ceremony, playing "Burnin' Down the House" and "Life During Wartime."

Associated Press:
LONG-OVERDUE INDUCTIONS TO ROCK HALL

By NEKESA MUMBI MOODY, AP Music Writer

They represented the anti-establishment, so it was a bit odd to see the Ramones so happy to become part of the music establishment as members of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. But for the remaining members of the punk rock originators . whose lead singer, Joey Ramone, died last year . Monday night's induction at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel represented long-overdue respect for the band that helped revolutionize rock with their rapid-fire, guitar-heavy songs.

"I'd like to congratulate myself, and thank myself, and give myself a big pat on the back,'' joked Dee Dee Ramone. "Thank you Dee Dee, you're very wonderful.'' The Ramones were inducted along with another of punk's first generation, the Talking Heads. Also inducted were Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, former teen idol Brenda Lee, soul maestro and "Shaft'' score creator Isaac Hayes, and hitmaker Gene Pitney.

Joey Ramone, the lead singer of the Ramones, had anticipated the day that the Ramones would be inducted into the hall. But it came about a year too late . He died in April 2001 from cancer. Still, his mother said he died knowing that the Ramones . whose groundbreaking songs included ``Blitzkrieg Bop'' . would find their place in the hall someday. "He felt pretty sure they were going to be inducted,'' said Charlotte Lescher. "It was important for him to have recognition for what they did. He never felt they were really recognized.''

Eddie Vedder, the lead singer of Pearl Jam, echoed those sentiments as he inducted the Ramones, which he described as the precursor for bands like his own and Nirvana. "Something very unusual is happening here tonight, and that is this industry is paying some respect to the Ramones,'' said a Mohawk-wearing Vedder in a long, rambling speech, which he interrupted twice to swill on a bottle of wine.

The Talking Heads, who dissolved in bitterness in the early 1990s, played their first live gig in 18 years. They performed "Psycho Killer,'' "Burning Down the House'' and "Life During Wartime,'' cuts that tracked their progression from arch, minimalist rockers to a funk orchestra. "I'd like to thank the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame for giving this band a happy ending,'' drummer Chris Frantz said. However, backstage, the band said the media had overplayed their differences, and even caused them. ``If it wasn't for the press, we wouldn't have had the acrimony,'' said bassist Tina Weymouth.

At the end of the evening, Hayes joined the traditional all-star jam, although it was missing some faces, including the Ramones, Tom Petty, Lee, Keys, Vedder, and a few other participants. The jam was hampered by long delays in between songs and technical difficulties.

When asked why the Ramones hadn't participated in the closing festivities, the Talking Heads' Jerry Harrison said with a smile: "The Ramones don't jam.''

March 19, 2002
Pearl Jam's Eddie Vedder Bows Down To The Ramones

Neal Weiss, Los Angeles and Bruce Simon, New York

Pearl Jam's Eddie Vedder inducted the Ramones into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame during Monday night's (March 18) ceremonies in New York. Vedder made a rambling 17-minute speech about the group's groundbreaking sound, their immense influence, and how underappreciated they were during their 20-plus years in existence.

Sporting a fresh mohawk, Vedder told the crowd, "When punk finally broke in '91, the Ramones still weren't brought along for the ride, even though Nirvana, Rancid, (and) Green Day wouldn't have existed without them." Vedder said that he is also someone who is indebted to the group. "You know, punk bands now sell with one record - their first or second record - sell 10 times the amount of records that the Ramones did throughout their career with 20-something records. That's why I go over to Johnny Ramone's house and do yard work three times a week, just to absolve some of the guilt."

Vedder continued, "And a bunch of people do it, like (U2's) Bono and Edge do the windows. Kirk Hammett, the guitar player from Metallica, he dusts, house cleans, makes French toast. That's a true story," he said with a laugh.

Green Day was also on hand to perform the Ramones classics "Teenage Lobotomy," "Rockaway Beach," and "Blitzkrieg Bop." The surviving Ramones have vowed never to perform again following the death of Joey Ramone, who succumbed to cancer last April.

USA Today
Rock's honor roll: Oldies, New Wave goodies
March 19, 2002

By Mike Segar, Reuters

NEW YORK - A few days before he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Tom Petty described the sense of accomplishment he felt.

"It's amazing just to stay employed for 25 years," the singer/songwriter quipped - a reference to the minimum length an artist must have been recording before becoming eligible for one of pop music's most elite clubs. At the Hall of Fame's 17th annual induction ceremony, held Monday night at the Waldorf-Astoria, Petty and his band, The Heartbreakers - who, fans may be chagrined to note, released their first album in 1977 - were among several veterans whose labors were celebrated by their younger colleagues.

Kicking off the ceremony, Hall of Fame President Seymour Stein delivered more sobering news to the many baby boomers in attendance, announcing that the evening's honored artists would include "the first inductees from punk rock and the alternative/New Wave explosion, The Ramones and Talking Heads." After a slightly older inductee, Isaac Hayes, performed a blistering rendition of his '70s soul-man anthem, Theme From Shaft, Jewel welcomed Brenda Lee into the Hall with a speech that emphasized Lee's precocity - the crooner was a star in her early teens - and her country, R&B and rock credentials.

Accepting, Lee mused, "I feel like Cinderella at the ball." She then performed a medley of early hits, delivering her signature tune, I'm Sorry, with her trademark achy-breaky vibrato intact.

Next up was Eddie Vedder, who seemed intent on winning this year's Bono award for most quotable induction speech. Sporting a mohawk, the Pearl Jam frontman explained he had been so upset by recent world events that "I took it out on my own hair." He then launched into a rambling, sometimes wry tribute to the seminal New York punk band The Ramones.

On a more serious note, Vedder recounted a phone call from The Ramones' manager in 2000 when Joey Ramone, who died of cancer last Easter, had broken his hip. Vedder said that acknowledging the achievements of musicians such as Joey and his bandmates is "why tonight's really important."

The post-punk trio Green Day was on hand to play The Ramones' music, just as neo-rockabilly guitarist Brian Setzer celebrated influential guitarist Chet Atkins, inducted as a sideman. Legendary R&B singer Sam Moore's piercing rendition of When Something Is Wrong With My Baby - delivered in honor of Stax Records' founder Jim Stewart, this year's non-performer inductee - was another highlight. Gene Pitney offered a frisky medley of Hello Mary Lou and Town Without Pity, and Talking Heads and Tom Petty performed their songs.

From the Official Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Site:
Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Inductees

Performers Inductees
Dee Dee Ramone (bass, vocals; born September 18, 1952), Joey Ramone (vocals; born May 19, 1951, died April 15, 2001), Johnny Ramone (guitar; born October 8, 1951), Marky Ramone (drums; born July 15, 1956), Tommy Ramone (drums; born January 29, 1952).

The Ramones revitalized rock and roll at one of its lowest ebbs, infusing it with punk energy, brash attitude and a loud, fast new sound. When the punk-rock quartet from Queens hit the street in 1976 with their self-titled first album, the rock scene in general had become somewhat bloated and narcissistic. The Ramones got back to basics: simple, speedy, stripped-down rock and roll songs. Voice, guitar, bass, drums. No makeup, no egos, no light shows, no nonsense. And though the subject matter was sometimes dark, emanating from a sullen adolescent basement of the mind, the group also brought cartoonish fun and high-energy excitement back to rock and roll. They launched the grassroots punk-rock movement in New York and London - the Clash were among those who paid heed when the Ramones first toured Britain - and helped downsize rock from arenas and stadiums to the more sensibly scaled environs of clubs and neighborhood holes-in-the-wall.

The first four Ramones albums - Ramones (1976), Leave Home (1977), Rocket to Russia (1977), Road to Ruin (1978) - incited a revolution in music and lifestyle. Though the Ramones' songs might seem simple on the surface, their delightful directness came from paring away in an almost sculptural sense till nothing remained but a bone-hard, iconographic essence. Moreover, though the group revered the music of the early to mid Sixties, drawing upon the artful brevity of Top Forty radio in its heyday, they brought considerable originality to the Ramones. Guitarist Johnny Ramone strummed rapid-fire barre chords in a style that owed little in the way of influence to any other musician or group. Dee Dee Ramone introduced songs with a raw-throated countdown ("1-2-3-4") that became a group trademark, and he pounded a relentless stream of eighth notes on the bass. Drummer Tommy Ramone anchored the frantic beat with superhuman energy. Joey Ramone's vocals were woven into the high-energy fabric, becoming part of the unified collective identity that the Ramones worked hard to make appear effortless.

The Ramones ignited the punk-rock movement with their eponymous 1976 debut album. The fact that punk is thriving nearly thirty years later attests to the durability and worth of the genre they helped invent. Their short, combustible songs drew from the worlds of comic books, horror films, girl groups, and garage rock. They were a loud-fast punk-pop band, mixing humor and horror in equal measure and giving their urbanized fans a way to purge all the pent-up energy that comes from living in a concrete jungle. A Ramones set, especially in the early years, rarely lasted half an hour, and they might perform fifteen or more songs during the sonic blitzkrieg. Their originals were just that - without question, they were the only group in rock history to write two songs about cretins and twenty-five that begin with some variation of the pronoun "I" - while the songs they covered were unfailingly well-chosen, including the Rivieras' "California Sun" and the Trashmen's "Surfin' Bird."

Slagged by old-guard sorts who couldn't hear or didn't understand, the Ramones nonetheless connected with a youthful underground in New York, London, Los Angeles, and eventually the whole world. They never had a Top Forty hit, which seems an ironic pity since their songs possessed a melodic, hypnotic and energetic magic that would have served the stultifying AM playlists of the Seventies well. Such Ramones classics as "Blitzkrieg Bop," "Glad to See You Go," "Sheena Is a Punk Rocker," "Rockaway Beach," "I Wanna Be Sedated," "Rock 'n' Roll High School," and "Do You Remember Rock 'n' Roll Radio?" have stood the test of time, while the terrible records that clogged the Top Forty during the period the Ramones were minting these brilliant nuggets now elicit groans and mockery. As Tommy Ramone put it with no false modesty in the liner notes to the Ramones' Hey Ho Let's Go! compilation - which crammed 55 songs on two CDs - "This is art. Sometimes it doesn't sell at first. Sometimes it takes awhile for the world to catch on."

The Ramones performed 2,263 concerts - roughly as many as the Grateful Dead, as ironic as that may seem - between their formation in 1974 and final show in Los Angeles on August 6, 1996. They released 21 studio, live and compilation albums over a 20-year period, almost faithfully issuing an album a year. The first four are their acknowledged classics, providing much of their live repertoire even into the Nineties. Rocket to Russia, in particular, was one of the defining releases of the punk-dominated year of 1977. End of the Century (1980) bore the distinction of being produced by the legendary Phil Spector. Later albums didn't always rise to the genre-smashing brilliance of those first four, but the Ramones were always compelling and entertaining, and albums like the defiant, metal-edged Too Tough to Die insured their relevance well into the Eighties. The Ramones have been incalculably influential not just on punk-rock but its offshoots, including speed metal and hardcore. Bands like Green Day, Offpsring and Blink-182 are inconceivable without the Ramones. The British speed-metal band Motorhead paid them tribute with a song, entitled "R.A.M.O.N.E.S.," that the Ramones themselves later recorded.

Along the way, there were personnel changes. Tommy Ramone relinquished the drum kit to Marky Ramone in 1978, though he remained involved as a coproducer and group advisor through 1984's Too Tough to Die. Marky went on hiatus in 1984, replaced by Richie Ramone, and then returned in 1987. Dee Dee Ramone left in 1989, replaced by C.J. Ramone (a former Marine), though he continued to contribute material to Ramones albums all the way through their celebrated bow-out, 1995's Adios Amigos. Joey Ramone died of cancer on April 15, 2001, and the solo album he'd been working on came out in early 2002.

History, it seems, has finally caught up with the Ramones. They are now hailed as one of the most influential American bands, and their music reaches more ears today than it did during those hard-working years when they were loudly going about the revolutionary business of reinventing rock and roll.

Plain Dealer:
March 19, 2002

John Soeder, Plain Dealer Pop Music Critic

New York Punk and new wave crashed the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's big party last night.

The Ramones, whose stripped-down, souped-up songs defined punk, and Talking Heads, a prime example of the new-wave movement, joined the ranks of rock 'n' roll's elite at the rock hall's 17th annual induction ceremony, along with fellow performers Isaac Hayes, Brenda Lee, Gene Pitney and Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers.

Stax Records co-founder Jim Stewart and guitarist Chet Atkins were inducted in the nonperformer and sideman categories, respectively.

A crowd of 1,000-plus music industry VIPs turned out for the black-tie gala at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in midtown Manhattan - only a 10-minute subway ride from CBGB, the downtown club where the Ramones and Talking Heads launched a musical revolution in the mid-'70s. Of course, most of the swells took limousines, not the No. 6 train, to the rock hall soiree.

With its chandeliers, gilded decor and swank ambiance - the "cheap" seats were $1,500 a pop - the hotel's ballroom was a far cry from CBGB, where neon beer signs provide illumination, the walls are covered with tattered concert fliers and the rest rooms are unspeakable.

Pearl Jam's Eddie Vedder, sporting a Mohawk, inducted the Ramones. He described their music as an "assault" and recalled the first time he saw the group in concert.

"All hell broke loose," Vedder said. "It was terribly frightening and totally blissful at the same time."

For the Ramones, the rock hall's group hug was bittersweet. Singer Joey Ramone died last April of cancer. Accepting the honor were guitarist Johnny Ramone, bass player Dee Dee Ramone and two drummers from different stages of the band's career, Tommy Ramone and Marky Ramone. They got a standing ovation. Bassist C.J. Ramone, who replaced Dee Dee in 1989, was in the crowd, although he was not inducted. Getting into the rock hall "meant everything to Joey," Tommy said.

In true punk fashion, Dee Dee refused to take the occasion too seriously. "I'd like to congratulate myself and thank myself and give myself a big pat on the back," he said.

Green Day serenaded the punk pioneers with a raucous medley of "Rockaway Beach," "Teenage Lobotomy" and "Blitzkrieg Bop."

The ceremony built to a climax with the reunion of Talking Heads, whose bickering members last played together in 1989. Singer-guitarist David Byrne, guitarist-keyboardist Jerry Harrison, bass player Tina Weymouth and drummer Chris Frantz put aside their differences long enough to tear through a three-song set.

By way of introducing "Psycho Killer," Byrne told a story about a stranger in New Orleans who said to him: "I know who you are. . . . You're Norman Bates!"

Joined by percussionist Steve Scales and keyboardist Bernie Worrell, the arty quartet also revisited "Burning Down the House" and "Life During Wartime."

"I listened to Talking Heads and it made me feel smart. . . . Talking Heads also made me want to dance like a maniac," said presenter Anthony Kiedis of the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

"Tonight we celebrate the first inductees from the punk-rock and new-wave alternative music explosion," said Seymour Stein, president of the New York-based Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation.

Look for more incoming punks and new wavers next year, when the likes of the Clash and Elvis Costello become eligible.

CNN:
Petty, Ramones, Heads, Hayes enter rock hall

NEW YORK (AP) -- The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame opened its doors Monday to punk rock's first generation as well as Tom Petty, former teen idol Brenda Lee and "Shaft" maestro Isaac Hayes.

The Ramones and Talking Heads, whose careers germinated during the mid-1970s in the Manhattan dive bar CBGB's, were considerably more uptown at the Waldorf-Astoria for the induction ceremony.

With a rapid-fire, three-chord (or less) guitar attack, the four Queens, New York, friends in the Ramones kicked rock's complacency with exhilarating, fun songs like "Blitzkrieg Bop," "Rockaway Beach" and "I Wanna Be Sedated."

The timing of their induction is bittersweet, since gangly lead singer Joey Ramone died of cancer last April.

The Talking Heads began as arch, minimalist rockers with the song "Psycho Killer," then flowered in the early 1980s with funk influences on the hits "Once in a Lifetime" and "Burnin' Down the House."

Lead singer David Byrne and his three band mates, bitterly estranged, were to put their differences aside for a two-song performance at the induction.

Washington Post:
March 19, 2002
Punk Pioneers Enter Rock Hall

By David Bauder, Associated Press Writer

NEW YORK -- Leather jackets and mohawk hair cuts mixed with tuxedos as the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame welcomed punk rock's first generation Monday, along with Tom Petty, Brenda Lee and "Shaft" maestro Isaac Hayes.

The Ramones and Talking Heads, whose careers germinated during the mid-1970s in the Manhattan dive bar CBGB's, were considerably more uptown at the Waldorf-Astoria for the induction ceremony.

Country guitar picker Chet Atkins, who died last June, early 1960s hitmaker Gene Pitney and Stax records co-founder Jim Stewart also joined the hall.

Pearl Jam lead singer Eddie Vedder sported a black mohawk as he inducted the Ramones. He said his new look was due to frustrations at world events and "I took it out on my own hair."

Vedder said the Ramones were a blueprint for a new generation of rockers and recalled the first time he saw the band.

"It was terribly frightening and totally blissful at the same time," said Vedder, who swilled a bottle of wine during his speech.

Guitarist Johnny Ramone, accepting his trophy, said, "God bless President Bush and God bless America." The induction was bittersweet, since gangly lead singer Joey Ramone died of cancer last April. Band members said the induction would have meant the most to Joey.

The trio Green Day replicated the band's rapid-fire, three-chord (or less) attack onstage. A lone slam-dancing couple, the woman with spiky blue hair, gyrated in front of them.

The Talking Heads, who dissolved in bitterness in the early 1990s, played their first live gig in 18 years. They performed "Psycho Killer," "Burning Down the House" and "Life During Wartime," cuts that tracked their progression from arch, minimalist rockers to a funk orchestra.

"I'd like to thank the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame for giving this band a happy ending," drummer Chris Frantz said. Other artists said they hoped a young generation gets the chances they did.

Petty recalled how their first manager put the band up in a house for a year before their first record, and wondered if bands today would get the same chance.

Popular music now is "Disney kids singing songs written by old men and being marketed to six and seven-year-olds," Vedder said. "Some kind of change might have to happen again soon."

E! Online:
March 19, 2002
Ramones, Talking Heads Invade Rock Hall

by Josh Grossberg

Punk music, Filet Mignon and a bunch of tuxedo-clad attendees can mean only one thing: It must be time for those Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductions again.

The Ramones, Talking Heads and Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers were among this year's crop of music legends formally admitted Monday night into rock's hallowed hall.

Joining them in the class of 2002 were soul survivor (and South Park Chef) Isaac Hayes, 1960s "Little Miss Dynamite" singer Brenda Lee, '60s rock 'n' roller Gene Pitney and the late Chet Atkins, who was admitted posthumously as an influential sideman.

The annual dinner party, held at New York's Waldorf Astoria Hotel Monday night, proved that punk music has come a long way uptown since its days in the bowels of the Bowery district at the Big Apple's famed club CBGB.

With their stripped-down anthems no more than two-and-a-half minutes in length, the Ramones launched the do-it-yourself ethos of the punk movement in the early '70s that defined a generation and influenced countless bands in the decades since.

One group that took a cue from the punk pioneers included Green Day, which covered three Ramones classics Monday night, including "Rockaway Beach" and "Blitzkrieg Bop."

Meantime, Pearl Jam's Eddie Vedder put everyone in the punk frame of mind when he came out on stage to introduce Dee Dee, Tommy, Johnny and Marky Ramone, while sporting a mohawk and a drinking a bottle of wine.

"Yeah, I do have a mohawk, and no, I didn't get it for this exulted event. It stemmed from my frustration with bombings and world events and I took it out on my own hair," Vedder said before introducing the band.

The surviving members of the Ramones dedicated the occasion to their legendary frontman, Joey Ramone, who died of lymphoma last Easter at age 49.

"It was very important to him that he be inducted and he knew it," Tommy Ramone told reporters backstage during the ceremony. "I give great thanks that we were inducted for Joey."

Perhaps one of the most notable events of the night came when Red Hot Chili Peppers singer Anthony Kiedis introduced the Talking Heads, as the group reunited on stage for the first time in nearly 18 years.

It was a triumphant return for a band that was not only contemporaries of the Ramones but also ushered in the '80s New Wave revolution with their melding of funk, blues and world music infused with a unique art-school sensibility.

Led by wiry frontman David Byrne (getting funky with his trademark white man-can't-dance routine), the Heads capped the evening with a rousing three-song set that included the hits "Pycho Killer," "Burnin' Down the House" and "Life During Wartime."

"This is a song completely inappropriate at this time, but then again, maybe it is appropriate," Byrne said before launching into "Life."

Appropriate or not, the night ended with the obligatory all-star jam, led by house bandleader Paul Shaffer and plagued by technical snafus. Nearly all of the inductees (with the exception of the Ramones) joined Talking Heads for their version of Al Green's soul classic, "Take Me To The River," which was followed by "He's a Rebel" and "Here Comes the Sun," a tribute to late Beatle George Harrison.

Meanwhile, Talking Heads fans who tune in Wednesday night to see VH1's broadcast of the Rock Hall induction can take heart. When asked backstage if they will ever get back together, the sometimes quarrelsome quartet didn't exactly rule it out.

"People perceived us as being angry at each other and acrimonious and stuff like that, and to a great extent, that's a false perception," said drummer Chris Frantz. "On the other hand, we haven't played together for a really long time and I think we're all very grateful to have a happy night like this and to have a good vibe."

The group said any talk of a permanent reunion would happen later.

REUTERS:
December 14, 2001
Gotham Punks Impact the Rock Hall of Fame
The first class from the New York punk movement is graduating to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

The Ramones and the Talking Heads, two of the premier bands that, along with Television, Richard Hell and the Voidoids and others, established punk rock at Gotham venues such as CBGB, the Mudd Club and Max's Kansas City, are among the six performers in the hall's class of 2002. Both bands were on the ballot for the first time.

They are joined by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Isaac Hayes, Gene Pitney and Brenda Lee. Jim Stewart, who co-founded Stax Records with Mae Axton, will be inducted in the nonperformer category; the sideman inductee is guitarist Chet Atkins. The induction ceremony will be held March 18 in New York, and VH1 will broadcast it on March 20.

Petty and the Heartbreakers, a first time nominee as well, is the only act still performing together, although various drummers have been used since the departure of Stan Lynch. Joey Ramone, the lead singer of his group, died earlier this year of cancer; the band staged a final tour in 1996. Talking Heads has been split up for 10 years. Leader and songwriter David Byrne has had a separate solo career for nearly two decades while Tina Weymouth, Jerry Harrison and Chris Frantz have since performed as Heads. Weymouth and Frantz were also members of the Tom-Tom Club.

Hayes was an established songwriter at Stax Records before exploding as a solo act with ``Theme From 'Shaft'''; Lee had 29 top 40 hits between 1960 and 1967, among them ``I'm Sorry'' and ''Sweet Nothin's''; and Pitney had early '60s pop hits such as ''Only Love Can Break Your Heart,'' while writing ``Hello Mary Lou'' for Rick Nelson and ``He's a Rebel'' for Phil Spector and the Crystals. It was the seventh time Pitney had been nominated, Lee's third.

Among those on the ballot who qualified but did not make the cut were the Sex Pistols, Jackson Browne, Gram Parsons, the Dells, the 5 Royales, AC/DC, Black Sabbath and Patti Smith, whose Patti Smith Group has already been inducted. Artists become eligible for induction 25 years after the release of their first record, and although Elvis Costello and the Clash qualified, they were not included on the initial ballot.

The Associated Press:
NEW YORK (AP) -- The Ramones and the Talking Heads, two bands that helped define the punk sound, are among the artists inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame for 2002.

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Isaac Hayes, Brenda Lee and Gene Pitney were also inducted. The announcement was made Thursday by Suzan Evans, executive director of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation.

The induction ceremony, scheduled for March 18, will take place almost a year after Joey Ramone, the Ramones' lanky, leather-jacketed lead singer, died of lymphoma at age 49.

The Ramones, the New York City-based quintet who all adopted the same last name, are considered the founding fathers of punk. Their sound was defined by Joey Ramone's yelp and the band's three-chord thrash. Bruce Springsteen, U2 and Patti Smith are among those who've been inspired by the band's sound.

The Talking Heads were contemporaries of the Ramones, but their sound was defined more by their experimentation with different genres, including world music. Quirky lead singer David Byrne, the band's most readily identifiable member, left in 1991.

It's the first time the hall has honored members of the first punk rock generation, and voters pointedly snubbed Britain's Sex Pistols in favor of two New York bands.

Hayes got his start as a sideman in R&B groups. Playing keyboard, he backed up artists such as Otis Redding, but later became a solo artist. He's best known for scoring the 1971 blaxplotation film ``Shaft,'' with its funky theme song highlighted by his signature deep vocals. He's now a disc jockey on WRKS in New York City and the voice of ``Chef'' on the animated TV series ``South Park.''

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers mixed classic rock, folk and Southern rock for 26 years. Their hits include ``Free Fallin','' ``Don't Come Around Here No More'' and ``The Waiting.''

Lee, a smoky-voiced singer of the late '50s and '60s, is perhaps best known for hits such as ``Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree'' and ``I'm Sorry.'' Pitney, a rock singer with country influences, has recorded hits such as ``Only Love Can Break a Heart,'' ``(The Man Who Shot) Liberty Valance'' and ``It Hurts to Be in Love.''

Guitarist Chet Atkins, who died in June, is this year's sideman inductee. Atkins' unusual finger-picking style influenced generations of other guitarists.

The non-performer inductee is Jim Stewart, co-founder of Stax records. Sam and Dave and Otis Redding are among the artists who performed on the independent music label.

Artists are eligible to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame after at least 25 years have passed since their first record was released. Nominees are selected by a group of rock historians, and inductees are chosen by about 1,000 rock experts across the globe.

The ceremony will be held in Manhattan on March 18, and will be aired by VH1 two days later.

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is based in Cleveland.

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's press release:
Thursday, December 13, 2001

New York, NY - The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation announced today the Inductees for the Seventeenth Annual Induction Ceremony, which will be held in New York on Monday, March 18, 2002.

VH1 will exclusively air the ceremony at 9:00pm (ET/PT) on March 20th, 2002.

Announcing the Inductees in the categories of Performer, Non-Performer and Sidemen, Suzan Evans, Executive Director of the Foundation, said, "The 2002 class of inductees reflects the diversity of rock & roll. This year's honorees represent genres from Memphis Soul, early Sixties pop, classic rock to the New York punk movement. We expect this ceremony to be one of the best ever."

The following Performers, listed in alphabetical order, will be inducted:

Isaac Hayes first arrived on the 60's scene in Memphis as the keyboardist for the Mar-Keys, the Stax Records ensemble, where he can be heard on recordings for Otis Redding and William Bell. There Hayes teamed up with David Porter, which led to a string of hits they wrote and produced for other Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Inductees, including Sam & Dave ("Hold on I'm Comin'" and "Soul Man"). This set the stage for Hayes' emergence as a solo artist. He virtually invented the Blaxploitation film score with "Shaft" and constructed a persona that presaged hip-hop's posturing by decades.

Brenda Lee's childhood was pulled out from under her at age 8 when her father died and she was forced to employ her prodigious vocal power as the family breadwinner. By age 12, Brenda Lee was recording for Decca. She was (and is) "Little Miss Dynamite", with an unbroken string of #1 and top 10 chart hits.

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Gainsville Florida's most famous musical native son, has charted more than two dozen singles (and a dozen original studio albums) during his long and productive career with the Heartbreakers, Mike Campbell, Benmont Tench, Ron Blair, Stan Lynch and Howie Epstein. Their hits include "American Girl," "I Need To Know," "Refugee" and "Don't Do Me Like That".

Gene Pitney, one of the golden voices of early 60's rock, amassed scores of hit records while also writing hits as one of the most successful "Brill Building songwriters", including "Hello Mary Lou" for Rick Nelson, "He's A Rebel" by the Crystals and "Rubber Ball" for Bobby Vee. Pitney was among the first to combine country and rock through his numerous duets with the legendary George Jones and also Melba Montgomery.

Ramones, Joey Ramone, Johnny Ramone, Tommy Ramone, Dee Dee Ramone and Marky Ramone, were five guys who adopted the same surname and the same look, and started a band. Inspired by the perfect simple songs of groups like the Beatles, the Kinks and the attitude of the NY Dolls and Iggy Pop, they detested instrumental virtuosity and all things arty. So they invented a sound that was at once reductive, revolutionary alternative and classic. Playing at a velocity that smashed the sound barrier, and fronted by the late and wonderful Joey Ramone, the Ramones toured for 22 years, released 22 albums, and played 2,263. Today the chant "Hey Ho Lets Go" is heard before all home games of the NY Yankees, and their songs are everywhere.

Talking Heads, David Byrne, Chris Frantz, Jerry Harrison and Tina Weymouth, turned punk rock into an art form and were at the very forefront of the new wave of mid-70's music, which spawned the alternative rock movement of the 80's. Not only one of the most critically acclaimed bands of their time, the Talking Heads chalked up several major top 40 hits. Their influence can be seen in scores of bands as diverse as REM, B-52's, Nirvana, Jane's Addiction, Live, Living Colour, Red Hot Chilli Peppers and many more.

The "Non-Performer" inductee is Jim Stewart, who co-founded Stax Records, an independent record label that was synonymous with rhythm and blues and soul music during the 60's and 70's. Stewart's Stax Records virtually created contemporary soul music and had a racially diverse group of black and white musicians and producers that was unprecedented.

The "Side-men" inductee is Chet Atkins, who was one of the most successful guitar players in the history of popular music. Atkins played on recording sessions for Elvis Presley, The Everly Brothers, Hank Williams and numerous Nashville legends, while his playing style influenced such rock legends as George Harrison, Mark Knofler and Eddie Cochran.

Artists become eligible for induction 25 years after the release of their first record. Criteria considered includes the influence and significance of the artist's contribution to the development and perpetuation of rock and roll. Similar criteria are used for the "Non Performer" and "Side-men" category, whose career must have commenced at least 25 years prior to induction. Those eligible for the "Non Performer" category include songwriters, producers, disc jockeys, record company executives (who are mainly related to A&R), recording engineers, managers, journalists and other industry professionals.

The Foundation's nominating committee, composed of rock and roll historians, selects nominees each year in the "artist" category. Ballots are then sent to an international voting body of about 1,000 rock experts. A special selection committee elects inductees in the "Non-Performer" and "Side-men" categories.

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation was formed in 1983 and the first induction ceremony was held in 1986. All inductees are represented in the "Hall of Fame", a permanent exhibit at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame & Museum, in Cleveland Ohio.