Punk is Crazy!

as ab Ramones Story for NY Press - Ramone For A Day! Un-edited Version By George Tabb So I'm hanging out in front of the Continental, which used to be called the Continental Divide, on Third Avenue and St. Marks. Drinking. Something I do a lot of. And up comes my pal Ryan, who just saw the Ramones show, and he is all sweaty and stuff. I mean, his usually spiky black hair is kinda all matted down, and even the plastic skeleton on his leather jacket looks like it was just in the sauna or something. "Hey Ryan," I say to the wet figure before me, all dressed in black. "Punk is crazy", he says back to me. Ryan says that a lot. "Punk is crazy?"I once asked him. "Yeah", he told me, "punk is crazy." "Oh.", I said back. Actually the reason I was hanging outside of Continental that night was cause I was supposed to meet up with him, and my bass player, Evan, to give out Furious George fliers to people coming out of the Ramones show at Coney Island High. I mean, hell, if people like the Ramones, they would have to like my band. Geez. I mean, fuck, I basically based my life on that band. The Ramones, that is. And since they were playing a local gig, I figured I¹d nail everyone with fliers. See, on the flier is this little monkey, who kinda looks like me. Or that other monkey. The one with the yellow covers on his books. Anyway, that monkey on the flier is wearing U.S. pins on his leather jacket. Just like me. Just like Johnny Ramone. So, being the clever guy that I am, I figure that giving out these fliers to people leaving a Ramones show will increase the size of my audience. Or at least, my ego. So that is why I was on Third Avenue. "Hey George," says Evan, my bass player, as he comes walking up to me and Ryan. "Sup?" I say to Evan. He then explains to us that today is a pretty good day for him. Ryan makes the mistake of asking him why . "Well," explains Evan, "I only had like two Twinkies today, and a Snickers bar, and well, my stomach doesn¹t hurt too bad. I mean, usually it does. Lots of Diarrhea and stuff. But today it is pretty good." I just look at Evan, and Ryan kinda giggles. "Maybe it¹s your diet," explains Ryan. Evan tells us he¹s not on a diet. Doh. "So, George," says Evan, "are we gonna go down to Phony Island High and give out fliers or what?" I tell him in a few seconds, but to let me finish my Zima first. Of course at this point they both make fun of me for drinking a clear malt liquor. Then these two jock guys come walking by, hear the conversation, and join in, calling me a "pussy" and stuff for drinking Zima. I just kinda smile at them and try to explain that I enjoy the fruity taste. That it sorta tastes like a rancid Seven-Up or something. They just look at me. So I tell them that compared to Zima Gold, the regular Zima is amazing. I explain that Zima Gold tastes like somebody put out their cigar in a glass of bad whiskey, and then bottled it. The jocks kinda laugh. Evan and Ryan don¹t. Cause they are already on their way down to Coney Island High to give out Furious George fliers to the people leaving the show. I figure I better do the same and excuse myself from the two big college guys, who, in a few more minutes, were likely to punch me, cause I was getting kinda drunk, and when I do that, I kinda sometimes say stupid things. In fact, a couple of weeks ago, I was at this bar, Psycho Mungo, on First Avenue. This guy is picking on some girls. Some punk girls. Some nice punk rock girls. Karin and Gunvor. And Tracy. Well, maybe not picking on them. Just telling them that Space Hog was the next big thing for the Generation X¹ers, and stuff like that. They were kinda getting annoyed with him, and asked him to leave. When he didn¹t, I kinda did. Anyway, I somehow managed to insult him, and he punched me in the face a few times. Then his friends jumped in to help him fight me, and the punk rock girls, nice polite people that they are, managed to kick and beat the shit outta the guys. Even using their little lunch pails. It was great. Anyway, so, it was good I left the jock guys before they gave me a shiner like that guy did. Actually, I had to go to a wedding with that black eye. Everyone made fun of me. Called me a "pussy" and stuff. And I wasn¹t even drinking Zima. Shit. So I get to Coney Island High, which Evan refers to as "Phony Island High", cause of the "hair and boob" crowd that kinda seems to flock there. I mean, the guys who work there and run it are very, very cool. I mean, hell, they are my friends, but the crowd that goes there tends to be a bunch of trendy little fucks who probably used to go to the Scrap Bar in the West Village, and now that Punk is in, go to Coney Island instead. On more than one occasion, I have found myself drunk, and talking to large sets of breasts on women, who I swear, have I.Q.s no higher than their bra size. And the hair in that place- I swear that everyone who goes there is a girl. I mean, some of them may have a penis, but, shit, well they look like girls. Every time I go to take a leak in there, some guy is combing his long hair in the mirror and fixing himself up. Or herself up. Whatever. So, all these people are coming out of the Ramones show and we start to give out fliers. Everyone is all sweaty like Ryan, which reminds me. "Hey Ryan," I say to him as he is handing out Furious George fliers to these two blonde girls, one wearing a "Rocket To Russia" t-shirt that I have not seen in like fifteen years. "Punk is crazy," he replies. I then ask him if the Ramones were good. He tells me that they were great, and the two blonde girls nod their head and agree. "This is the first time I ever saw them," says the blonde girl without the cool t-shirt. "This is my twenty-fifth," adds the other. Then Evan asks, "Hey George, how many times have you seen the Ramones?" I start to think. I think I first saw the Ramones back around 1977 or so. It was at CBGB, and at the time, I really didn¹t think too much of them. Or of CBGB. Actually, I was scared shitless of them, and the club. Me and some friends from the suburbs had snuck into the city to go out to some clubs, and somehow we ended up at CBGB. I remember getting off the train at Grand Central and getting a taxi. We told the driver we wanted to go someplace exciting, that we were from Connecticut, and wanted some action. The driver took us to Forty Second Street and dropped us off. I think we wandered around there for like an hour, looking in all the windows of the girlie places, but too chicken-shit to go into any of them. So we got another cab and told the driver to take us too the coolest club in the city. We got lucky. When he dropped us off on the corner of Bleecker and Bowery, I told my friends I wasn¹t so sure this was a good idea. And when we went into the club and all these biker type people were staring at us with our Izod shirts, I thought it wasn¹t a good idea. And when this band in leather jackets took the stage, and played so loud that I was sure I was gonna be deaf forever, and therefore never get into a good college, so then I¹d probably be drafted, cause that¹s what my dad told me happened to people who didn¹t go to college, and be killed in some foxhole somewhere with a bunch of guys I didn¹t know, and no running water, which really pisses me off, cause I like to take lots of showers, I knew it wasn¹t a good idea. But nothing really happened. That bad. Well, to my friends, anyway. But it did to me. I got so nervous that I got a good dose of colitis, and I had to go really bad. So I made my way to the back of the club and down the stairs after the band played to the CBGB men¹s room. Lemme tell ya, it was just as bad then as it is now. I kinda had to squat over the toilet seat which was covered with piss, and get this, dog shit. I could tell it was dog shit cause it smelled like dog shit. And also cause it was all over the stairs leading to the bathroom. Someone must of tried throwing it into the toilet, and missed. Either that, or there must of been a well trained dog around. I wonder if he was the one who wrote the Dead Boys graffiti on the wall. Anyway, so like I didn¹t see the Ramones again until New Years Eve, 1979-1980, at the Palladium. The greatest night of my life. Well, almost. I mean, there was another time with these two girls in Michigan, a wiffle ball bat, a can of whip-cream and a blue condom. But, well, this night, the Ramones one, is the one that changed my life forever. Ya see, I kinda grew up as a wuss. I mean, I was born in Brooklyn, moved to Long Island, and when my dad made it big in insider trading in the stock market in the early seventies, moved to Connecticut. There I learned that black people lived in tall buildings called projects, and that I, along wove, so below.