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There's no senior slump for the clown prince

of hate-your-high-school rock

Back when the world was dominated by peaceful easy feelings and seasons

in the sun, the Ramones were busy tearing at the foundations of rock 'n'

roll convention. They didn't know it at the time, but their infectious

alchemy of rough-and-tumble guitars, bored white-boy rage and Beach Boys

bubble-gum melodies would set the music world on its collective ear.

Never before 1976, when the Ramones' first self-titled album came out,

had anyone heard music so irreverent, so potent and so damn fun. Never

had anyone seen anything like it: four black-leather-jacket-wearin'

badass Long Islanders blazing through rapid-fire, short rants, clocking

an average of two minutes each.

Joey, Johnny, Dee Dee and Tommy Ramone played at a musical and cultural

frontier, their songs urgent Dionysian expressions of teenage wants and

grievances. Having come of age in a country in convalescence after

Vietnam and Watergate, theirs was a voice of uniquely American

confusion. Sometimes violent ("Come knocking at my door, I'm gonna knock

you to the floor"), sometimes poignantly juvenile ("I don't wanna be a

pinhead no more, I just found a nurse that I could go for"), the

Ramones' sound and fury resonated with the disaffected of an entire

generation.

Their aftershocks inspired everyone from the Sex Pistols and the Clash

to New York "no wave" to the California surf-punk scene of the mid-80s.

Pick a band, particularly one under the "modern rock" rubric, and a debt

is owed to the Ramones in there somewhere.

Guitarist Johnny Ramone (ne John Cummings) doesn't see it that way; he

and the band just dig playing. Besides, it's up to us overly analytical

critic types to contextualize this stuff into some super-complicated

cultural backdrop. Johnny is 44 now, and his band has gone through

remarkably few changes. Tommy and Dee Dee were replaced by Marky and CJ

in the 1980s, but the sound remains the same.

"I think it's like a regular Ramones album," Johnny says of Adios Amigos,

the latest record in the Ramones' illustrious career. "I hope it is. I

don't wanna be doing anything different." Produced by longtime buddy

Daniel Rey, Adios was recorded live in the studio with a minimum of

rehearsal. "Makin' Monsters of My Friends," "Born to Die in Berlin" and

"Cretin Family" are vintage Ramones; stripped-down and twisted raw

energy.

Johnny Ramone is from the old school. Hell, he founded the school. But

he shows a surprising tolerance for the music business, which -- after

21 years of nonstop touring -- has not brought the Ramones the

commercial success of some of its punk progeny (that's . . . uh . . .

Offspring).

"It's amazing that so many punk-type bands are having success now," he

says, more bewildered than resentful. "Bands now pop up and sell 4

million records. I don't remember that happening before. It used to be a

quarter million was great. You went gold, you were doing well. Now,

that's completely changed.

"We'd probably hate each other if we'd sold as many records and [been]

subjected to those pressures. We had to continue working hard as a unit,

which is probably good as far as longevity."

The Ramones are, and always were, a performing band. Johnny sees the

advent of MTV as the demise of many a young group wanting a shot at the

live performance circuit. "You can just eliminate too many bands by

looking at their videos and going, 'I can see they suck live. They're

ugly.' "

Despite his anti-MTV sentiments, Johnny says the Ramones were aware from

the onset of the importance of a band's public image: "Back in '74, we

became conscious of it. Image was what separated the bands that only

sold some records from the bands that really drew people live. Not that

we thought anyone would care, but we chose the leather jackets -- the

whole look -- to say, 'Hey. We're a band.'

"It was like they knew how to be cool better than you did," he says of

his childhood musical heroes, the Beatles, the Who and Led Zeppelin.

"These days, punk bands don't have unique images anymore, They don't

look any different from each other; they don't even look any different

from the people in the audience."

Despite his surly image, Johnny Ramone is one of a rare breed of

gracious punk rockers. "You have to know that you made all this money

and you have all of the things you have became of the fans. You do owe

them something. You do. We have a reputation to live up to every night.

No matter how bad you feel, you get up on stage and all of a sudden you

feel good for that one hour. After 21 years, it's still as much fun.

It's probably more fun because I can appreciate how lucky I've been."

Having played 2,100 shows in the last two decades, it's all the more

miraculous that Johnny and his mates are still standing.

The Ramones still kick ass live. At a recent show in D.C., they crammed

35 songs in 70 minutes with the vigor of the old CBGBs days. But the

Ramones are winding down, As its name suggests, Adios Amigos will

probably be the Ramones' last record. "I've done this for 21 years. I

could never do anything as good as this again, so there's no point in

doing something different in music," Johnny says. "I think my goal has

always been to do nothing anyway, so now I can fulfill my goal in life:

I'll be so busy doing nothing all day that I won't have time for

anything else."

The Ramones are headlining this year's Edgefest Sunday, May 28, at the

Apple River Ampitheatre in Somerset, Wisconsin. Gates open at 11 a.m.;

music starts at noon. Tickets available through Ticketmaster. All

proceeds above cost go to local charities.

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By JANET RAY