- Anvilicious: "Censorshit," and how! It's a direct criticism of Tipper Gore, the Parents Music Resource Center, and their creation of the infamous Parental Advisory label. Even by Ramones standards, it's pretty on-the-nose.
- Audience-Alienating Era:
- Most of their The '80s catalogue. They had their moments (most notably the minor classic Too Tough to Die from 1984) but fans are divided over their heavily produced pop crossovers.
- Dee Dee's 1989 rap album Standing in the Spotlight, recorded as "Dee Dee King". The only thing of value to come from it was the song "The Crusher", which was revived for the Ramones' last studio album, Adios Amigos.
- Broken Base:
- End of the Century, produced by no less than Phil Spector and presenting a somewhat Lighter and Softer Ramones. Some people resent this album and feel it began a downward trajectory for the boys, who spent the better part of the 80s chasing more pop crossovers. However, there's plenty of people that see the sound of this record as the logical conclusion of the band's love for classic pop music, and love it on that level. It's easily the most polarizing record in their discography.
- Their latter-day albums with C.J. Ramone. It's more accurate to say that C.J. himself seems a bit of a Base Breaker, as he replaced the extremely popular Dee Dee. The same could be said for Richie Ramone, who replaced Marky for a few albums.
- Covered Up:
- "I Don't Want to Grow Up" was originally written by Tom Waits from Bone Machine (it helps they've written many songs that are either "I Wanna X" or "I Don't Want X").
- Their version of "Surfin' Bird" was this for a long time, though it's up for debate now after the Trashmen's original went memetic after an episode of Family Guy.
- It takes a truly mighty band to do this to The Beach Boys, and the Ramones did just that with "Do You Wanna Dance."
- The band scored a UK top ten hit with their cover of The Ronettes' "Baby I Love You", while the original is pretty much forgotten these days.
- Critical Dissonance: At least regarding album sales, as the band is popular with critics and has many fans but never had a studio album above #44 at the Billboard 200, and only had three certified records (Gold for their debut album, the compilation Ramones Mania and the DVD Raw).
- Ensemble Dark Horse: Marky is better remembered as the Ramones' drummer than Tommy.
- Epic Riff: For the sake of brevity, let's just say a lot. Especially on the first four albums.
- Fan Nickname: "The bruddas" was popular with fans and critics back in the day.
- Fanon Discontinuity: Fans will say that they never released a '60s themed Cover Album called Acid Eaters. They never worked on End of the Century with Phil Spector, either, and Dee Dee was never threatened with a gun. Others will say the band ended when Dee Dee Ramone left.
- Friendly Fandoms: With Motörhead. Lemmy was good friends with the band (Joey in particular), wrote a song about them and even performed at their final concert as a guest.
- Fridge Brilliance: Their association with Spider-Man (performing a cover of the theme song, Peter having a poster in The Amazing Spider-Man 2 and their songs featuring in Spider-Man: Homecoming and Spider-Man: Far From Home) make perfect sense when you realise that the band hail from Queens - just like Peter Parker.
- Germans Love David Hasselhoff:
- The band helped launch Punk Rock in Britain and Spain, where they were one of the 80's most important bands
. - They also had a large fanbase in Argentina, and their influence reaches from top-level bands such as Attaque 77 and Los Violadores to underground bands and artists.
- The band helped launch Punk Rock in Britain and Spain, where they were one of the 80's most important bands
- Growing the Beard: Sure, Ramones kickstarted punk almost by itself. But critics almost universally agree that Rocket to Russia was when the band really came into their own, and many prefer the latter album.
- Harsher in Hindsight:
- Their last studio album is called "¡Adios Amigos!" ("¡Goodbye, buddies!"). After such album and the consequent tour, the band disbanded, and the four founding members died of different illnesses.
- Joey's solo song, "I Got Knocked Down (But I'll Get Up)" from his solo album Don't Worry About Me is heartbreaking under the circumstances — by the time it was released, lymphoma had already taken his life.
- The music video of "Pet Sematary" features the band at a cemetery, performing to which a tombstone is put on top of them as they're technically buried alive. This is worse now that Joey, Johnny, and Dee Dee are gone (Tommy as well tragically, but he left the band well before the time Brain Drain was recorded).
- Too Tough to Die. The title is very tragic because, out of the four members who performed on the album, only drummer Richie Ramone is still alive.
- In "Love Kills" from Animal Boy (a song Dee Dee wrote about his friend Sid Vicious and Sid's girlfriend Nancy Spungen), Dee Dee sang this line that practically foretold how he'd pass away years later:
When you're hooked on heroin
Don't you know you'll never win- Joey singing the line "I have been blessed with the power to survive" in "I Believe In Miracles" is definitely this as he was the first member of the band to die.
- The songs that invoked Nazi imagery are, let's say, not quite as ironic and dark-humored now as they were then, what with the notorious rise in white supremacist groups in the 2010s.
- Heartwarming Moments: In 2002, the band were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Johnny thanked the fans and Tommy spoke about how honored the group felt and what it would have meant for Joey.
- Hilarious in Hindsight:
- Joey rejecting ping pong and the Viet Cong in "I'm Against It" becomes this with the existence of Forrest Gump.
- If Dee Dee had been wearing a purple shirt on the cover of End Of The Century, the band would be wearing the exact same colours as The Wiggles would over a decade later.
- More Popular Replacement: Tommy was the original drummer, but Marky is arguably the most famous.
- Music to Invade Poland to: They had goofy semi-hits like "Today Your Love, Tomorrow the World" and "Commando" that traded on Nazi imagery. A few listeners didn't get the joke, and didn't realize that Joey was Jewish.
- Narm:
- Dee Dee's out-of-print solo debut (under the name Dee Dee King) Standing In The Spotlight. While there are songs that are more typically Ramones-esque, most tracks prominently feature him rapping in a tone of voice that has been memorably compared to "a cartoon moose" and making memorable boasts like "I'm the cut-creator, the master of rap\ when I walk down the street, homeboys tip their hat". What might be the weirdest moment on a fairly bizarre album is a hip-hop update of 60's dance craze "Mashed Potato Time" featuring back-up vocals from Debbie Harry note . The Ramones themselves did evidently like one song enough to remake it, though - they recorded a version of "The Crusher" that altered the lyrics, removed the Rap Rock elements, and featured Dee Dee's replacement CJ Ramone on vocals.
- While it's actually an outtake, one song coming from this same period was a silly but adorable rap written from the point of view of Dee Dee's pet cat.
- Dee Dee's out-of-print solo debut (under the name Dee Dee King) Standing In The Spotlight. While there are songs that are more typically Ramones-esque, most tracks prominently feature him rapping in a tone of voice that has been memorably compared to "a cartoon moose"
- Narm Charm: "Garden of Serenity" feels like it's supposed to be the band's answer to horror punk and death rock, with cryptic lyrics about graveyards and angry spirits, a somewhat cleaner guitar tone, and Ominous Latin Chanting backing vocals all trying to establish a more gothic, theatrical tone than their usual style. The intended somber mood should be killed by Joey's Brooklyn accent cropping up heavily, especially in the chorus ("In dah gahden of sa-ren-uh-tay!")... But somehow it still sounds pretty cool, though it may have been overshadowed by the similarly horror-themed "Pet Semetary" a few years later.
- Once Original, Now Common: As with a lot of early punk bands, they're subjected to this. After all manner of harder, faster styles (Hardcore Punk for instance) have made their presence known in the ensuing decades, some people may find the early Ramones albums to be a little slow, and would have trouble appreciating how absolutely blistering they would've sounded to listeners in the 70s.
- Posthumous Popularity Potential: They kept touring and recording relentlessly, but never got much wealth or recognition for it... until they disbanded and the first four members had died (well, more like until Joey and Dee Dee died; by the time Johnny joined them in the afterlife, the band was already at a posthumous fame high).
- Refrain from Assuming: "Blitzkrieg Bop" is often misidentified as "Hey Ho Let's Go".
- Retroactive Recognition: When you next watch the video to "I Wanna Be Sedated", look in the background and you'll notice a young Courtney Love.
- Seasonal Rot: The general consensus is that this happened sometime after Road to Ruin. Whether this includes End of the Century or not is the subject of debate.
- Signature Song: "Blitzkrieg Bop" and "I Wanna Be Sedated".
- Suspiciously Similar Song: Many of their songs sound like they were cut from the same cloth, but a particularly notable example of the Ramones doing this to themselves is their song "Touring," which is more or less a rewrite of "Rock & Roll High School" which is itself more or less a rewrite of "Sheena Is A Punk Rocker".
- "My My Kind of Girl" starts out sounding almost exactly like "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend" at a slower tempo - the verse melody is entirely different though, and the chorus uses different chords, so ultimately it just comes off as a new song arranged in an extremely similar style to an old one.
- They Changed It, Now It Sucks!: Many fans disliked End of the Century due to the more mainstream sound.
- Unintentional Period Piece: Rocket to Russia, due to its Cold War associations.
- Vindicated by History:
- They were not very popular during their day (at least in their home country, where the punk movement was mostly more underground) but are today a staple of classic rock radio, and widely considered one of the most important rock bands in history.
- The latter albums made with Richie and CJ have become more well liked by fans in recent years. Too Tough To Die in particular is now considered one of the band's best albums.
