“The songs were played a hair slower than the way we played them live,” explains Tommy.
#Blitzkrieg bop chords and lyrics how to
The sheer speed and physicality of the Ramones’ sound landed the record label with an unforeseen problem: how to get played on the radio. There’s a lot more to it than you might think.” That added to the sense of chaos, that disturbing psychological weirdness. And we decided to exaggerate that old three-track English sound, which Joey loved. It was very much a case of multi-layered guitar tracks, overdubbing and quite a bit of vocal technology. The common myth that the band just went in there and did it isn’t true. Certain songs were given priority because they were the major tracks, Blitzkrieg Bop being one of them.
"The Ramones were total chaos live, but their studio sound was still not quite there. He had the concept and I did the next step of putting it onto record and making it a little more unconventional and jarring than he might have originally intended. Tommy had a vision for everything about the band. There were quite a few rehearsals, but everything was pretty much structured already. “I know exactly how much that album cost to make,” laughs Leon, “because I was the A&R guy and had the cheapest boss in the world. The Ramones’ self-titled debut LP, of which Blitzkrieg Bop was the opening volley, was recorded in the dead of night because the rates were cheaper. In charge of bottling the band’s lightning in the studio was Craig Leon, A&R man and in-house producer at Sire Records. Dee Dee came up with the title and that line, but the rest of it is mine.” This might have led to the conspiracy ideas, but they’re not the original lyrics of the song. It used to be ‘They’re shouting in the back now’ and he rewrote it to ‘Let’s go shoot ‘em in the back now’. Dee Dee came up with Blitzkrieg Bop because he wanted to Ramones-ize it. “The original title of the song was Animal Hop. Internet forums are stuffed with similar conspiracy theories even today. They were amazing.”īlitzkrieg Bop may have been about the simple pleasures of going to a rock concert, but the Teutonic reference in the title led some to suggest that its true meaning was a kind of oblique commentary on Germanic warfare and the Jewish heritage within the Ramones. Another great show was The Who at the Village Theatre, before it became the Fillmore East. They did a long, gospel-tinged version of Shout that had everybody going out of their minds. “One of the best was a Murray the K revue show at the Brooklyn Fox Theatre, featuring Joey Dee and the Starliters. “I saw lots of great live shows,” offers Tommy. So was the song's meaning based on one particular cherished memory? “ They’re forming in a straight line / They’re going through a tight wind / The kids are losing their minds / The Blitzkrieg Bop,” spurts Joey in his best bubblegum-punk. The heady thrill of it all is captured in the first verse. And I started bashing away on it and came up with the chords.” I happened to pick up Joey Ramone’s guitar, a two-string guitar with A and E strings tuned to a fifth. “It was basically about a few kids going to a concert,” he explains, “getting away from it all and having a great time.
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