Richie Ramone on his current UK and Ireland tour

Total Rock caught up with Richie Ramone on his current UK and Ireland tour and watched Richie and the band play a blindingly great set at Blackpool Waterloo Bar.

We spoke about his new album “Live To Tell” and single “Not Afraid” and also chatted about acting in horror films and what it was like being in the Ramones.

Richie Ramone was the drummer for the Ramones from February 1983 until August 1987

He played on the Ramones albums Too Tough to Die, Animal Boy and Halfway to Sanity and appears on their compilation albums Greatest Hits, Loud, Fast Ramones: Their Toughest Hits and Weird Tales of the Ramones, and on the Ramones live DVD It’s Alive 1974-1996.

Total Rock: So who’s in the band Richie?

Richie Ramone: I have Claire Misstake on bass she’s been with me for the longest. Ronnie Simmons on guitar and Chris Moye he plays drums because I, you know I play probably, seven, eight songs on drums and sing, it’s hard to just sit behind the kit, not be out front because I’m so far back there. So it’s worked out good.

Total Rock: And for people who are wondering, is it a kind of a Ramones sound? Or is it kind of a bit different?

Richie Ramone: I have my own sound. You know, I’m Richie Ramone, but my sound is very tough and energetic and fast and emotional. So when you come and see us it all blends perfectly. I do a bunch of Ramones classics, I do a bunch of stuff off my two albums. And I have a third one coming out in a couple of months. And so it all works out great. The new single “Not afraid.” It was written by Mark Diamond who is in the Dwarves And I asked him to write a song and he did and you know, most people don’t write songs for me, but I really loved the lyrics and I really liked the song so I recorded that. And then the B-side is “Cry Little Sister” from The Lost Boys movie soundtrack, that video drops at Halloween and I did that song because of the director of a movie called Protégé-moi where I play a vampire. The director wanted that song as the soundtrack. So that’s why I did that song too. And it came out really good. So we did a whole music video for it and everything. I have been doing a lot of acting, I have another movie coming out in a couple of weeks. So it’s been going good. It’s like weird, you know, the older I get more things are happening. You know, it’s kind of weird.

Total Rock: Well tell us about these films because, I’ve looked on the internet and you seem to be the head vampire, or you seem to be in a lot of films.

Richie Ramone: Yeah, that’s Protégé-moi, which is called “Protect me”. I’m not sure the date of that. But, you know, also we did a fan film, you know, like a Friday the 13th. It’s called “Vengeance 2 Bloodlines”, where I play, a singer in a band and that I have, you know, fights with Jason Vorhees, from “Friday the 13^th”. You can see it on YouTube, I think starting I believe, in a couple of weeks. So it’s fun, you know, making movies it was really a lot of fun. I never did this before. And I thought like, all these actors are a bunch of stiffs, but they’re crazier than rock and roll people. I mean, they are real. They are, they’re really, so I fit right in there. And I’m doing a good job, and I wouldn’t do it if I’m not any good, you know, but they’re, like, very excited about it and think that I’m great at acting. So, I mean, I don’t do Shakespeare, I just do me, as a thing.

Total Rock: But you you’ve got to match up to them when you’re acting, you can’t let them act you off the screen.

Richie Ramone: It’s a new thing. You got to remember all those lines and study and read the scripts and have that expression, you know what I’m saying? So, it’s, it’s challenging, and it’s kind of fun. I did there was I am doing a series which will be coming out soon called the T. And that’ll be on I think Amazon or Lifetime or something. That’s a six part series, where I play a director. The only movie you can see now that’s out right on this day is called Headcheese- The movie. That’s on Amazon Prime It’s like a Gremlins it’s animatronics where these little creatures take over a town and I go around saving people and killing these things. And I work in a diner, you know, I kind of play myself I played Richie in this in this film, and I work in a diner and, but the animatronics is no CGI stuff you know, it’s all Puppets. The creatures are puppets, a lot of blood of doing a lot of horror stuff, horror fits in with punk rock, you know, they go side by side pretty much.

Total Rock: I’m a huge Ramones fan. I’ve got “Rock and Roll High School” on DVD in which the Ramones had, what, two lines and fluffed them both.

Richie Ramone: This is full on lines and acting. Yeah, this is this is the real deal. It’s not like I make a cameo appearance. I’m in all these films.

Total Rock: You do The Depeche Mode tune “Enjoy The Silence”. Where did the idea for that come from?

Richie Ramone: Yeah, well, that’s on my last album Cellophane. I did that, you know, two or three years ago. So it was a Depeche Mode song, you know, I always think of trying to do a great cover and it really worked well for me, the voicing the words to this to the song really worked well. And boy when that when you’re, when you’re going live, and then you go into that song, you see that people’s eyes light up, you know, I’m saying they’re just like, “Oh my god. He’s doing that!” And you know, there’s no synthesizer. It’s just heavy guitars. You know, like, my arrangement of it type of thing. And they love it and everybody sings along. And you know, it’s that song really works really, well.

Total Rock: It’s surprising because a lot of Depeche Mode fans are like ‘nobody can touch this band’. You know, ‘you can’t cover them’ and all this sort of thing.

Richie Ramone: No, I’ve had more People say I own that song. Now my version, I own it. So that’s a nice compliment, you know?

Total Rock: Okay. And have you got a new album coming out soon ish?

Richie Ramone: Yes. So that single will be on the new album and the album is actually being finished mixing right now it will be mastered. So by the time it comes on vinyl, probably early spring, I’d say March, it’ll be out. And it’s gonna be called “Live To Tell” it’s a pretty dark record. It’s, you know, written during the COVID thing which was really dark times. So a lot of the lyrics are pretty tough, but I think it’s my best album. I think I keep topping myself, which is what I’m trying to do. I make records. So that’s important. I don’t want to go backwards.

Total Rock: Yeah, because just taking you back a while. I mean, after you left the Ramones, you know, we didn’t really hear anything from you for a while. You just…

Richie Ramone: Disappeared, after all the thing with you know, everybody knows about the t-shirt money and all that nonsense and all of that. I came out to Los Angeles, I moved from New York City, and I started playing in some other bands. And it just wasn’t working. So I disappeared for a while and, and then something was bugging me. For years. I was like, well, what’s the matter with me? You know, I was missing the fans. I was missing the adrenaline that I get on stage. And they said, oh, you should start writing again and make a record. And I never made a record before. And that’s how the album and title came about. And, and now with my band, the second album sounds more like my band. So it’s really good. So I’m really happy where I am. I just wish I was 20 years younger. But that’s about it. Yeah, it’s working out good.

Total Rock: It’s almost the Ramones is a brand that you can’t escape.

Richie Ramone: Right? That’s the hardest thing because you have the Ramones brand right on your forehead. So you’re constantly thinking, Oh, I have to sound exactly like the Ramones. And I’m over that now. You know, I sound like Richie Ramone. Now, Richie Ramone is finally got his own identity. Now, his own sound I’ve grown as a singer immensely over the past three years. You know? And so this album is going to shock people because it’s really, really good.

Total Rock: You did play on some of Joey’s last stuff. (“Ya know” was a Joey Ramone solo album posthumously made up from vocal demos- using a whole host of musicians to complete the songs. It includes Holly Beth Vincent, Steven Van Zandt and Joan Jett amongst many others.)

Richie Ramone: I did like four or five tracks on that album “Ya know”, and it was really difficult, you know, because it was recorded, and I laid the drums over all the singing and like, hearing Joey’s voice in my headphones singing those songs… It was really touching and really sad and really emotional to play those tracks to that. It was tough for me, you know, but yeah, I’m on I think four tracks on “Ya know” they used a couple of different drummers, they use Bun E. Carlos from Cheap Trick on one and I forget the other drummers names…

Total Rock: The thing is about the Ramones obviously was seen as being very tight as a band, but then everybody’s written the life story. And it’s like, well, were they really friends

Richie Ramone: I was extremely tight with Joey. I mean, that was in the band four years and 10 months, and we were together every day. And Dee Dee I knew very well, Johnny was very, he’s a recluse, you know, he really kept to himself a lot. And, in fact, I don’t even think I had his phone number the whole time. I wouldn’t have to like, call the manager if I wanted to talk to Johnny he kept to himself. He actually stayed on a different floor in the hotels, you know that was his deal. But, I mean, Joey and I were very, very close.

Total Rock: What was Joey like, was he quite shy? He always seemed it.

Richie Ramone: No he wasn’t shy. He was just a great guy. I mean, you know, we hit it off really well. When I first got in the band, you know, he took me under his wing. You know what I’m saying? Like, he pushed me, he pushed me to write songs. He pushed me to sing in the band. He really, lit a fire under me and it was really cool. So, he understood my talent. He used to call me like Phil Collins, I could drum and sing and write songs. So it was kind of cute, you know?

Total Rock: The first time most people in the UK will have seen you. Do you remember the Old Grey Whistle Test? When you were just like live on the TV?

Richie Ramone: Yeah, I loved that. So there you can see. And that thing, I was like conducting. And it’s probably the only time that besides 1234 I sang 5678 Just to guide Johnny in and he could never in “Chasing The Night”, he could never count that part to come in right. And in fact, even in that thing, he messes up, you know, even if I’m counting seven, Hey, come on, John, now play, you know it was interesting. But, I mean, you know, I was blessed and fortunate to have ever known these guys to have played in this band. To have that surname, you know, gave me a whole career, it was so very, very fortunate and very respectful for that band. They taught me a lot of things, how to treat the fans and all that kind of stuff. So I owe them a lot. Okay,

Total Rock: What were all these rumours about Johnny being really right wing? I mean, were they true? Or was he just winding people up?

Richie Ramone: Well, it’s a little bit overblown. He was a Republican. So I mean, you know, and, like, Joey and Dee Dee. They were, you know, they were Democrats or whatever. But he was a Republican, you know, all that stuff about them not talking and Joey and all that stuff. During my time in the band. I don’t know if it got worse after 1988. But it, I think it was a good story. And, all the media loves to write about that kind of stuff. But we were still a family. And when we were backstage, ready to go on, there was no other show like that. All that stuff went behind us. And we, just gave a powerful performance every night.

Total Rock: Yeah. Because I mean, the thing that the Ramones did was certainly hone down a rock and roll show to it’s elements. But anything beyond what the Ramones did suddenly seemed like a lot of messing about.

Richie Ramone: I mean, we were a tight unit. And, you know, we didn’t hang out together at the same time all sit around and write songs. We weren’t that kind of band. You know, I’m saying we, we kept to ourselves in a way. But Joey was my, you know, my right arm. I mean, you know, when we were home, I hung out with him every night when on tour, we went out together, or we went to both we sat together, you know, he was special. I missed them all. And, Joey always loved new artists and new bands, you know, just technology now, we could have podcasts and stuff. He would have had a fabulous show, you know, had he been around now, you know? So, he would have loved to have done that.

Total Rock: How do you go down in different countries? I mean, you finding like UK is alright, What happens with Richie Ramone?

Richie Ramone: How do I go down in different countries? I mean, this is all good. You know, the best country where the fans are the craziest is naturally Argentina. Latin America, although, those kids are really crazy. In fact, like Argentina, they the parents, teach them about Ramones, here’s the problem you you’re gonna have now, if you don’t learn about punk rock from your parents, or someone in school, it’s disappearing. Because they’re not playing it on the radio as much. So I find like a lot of shows that dad would bring his daughter with a dad or bring his son now to these shows. And that’s really cool to teach them about this kind of music, because they’re not going to hear it on the radio. The UK is probably different. Your radio isn’t so corporate owned like it is in America.

Total Rock: The rock stations which will play rock all day, they are still out there.

Richie Ramone: Okay, yeah, they won’t allow that here. Everything is like corporate owned stations, you know? And it’s sad, there’s a lot of good music out there that just doesn’t make it on the radio and, you know, I’m talking mainstream radio. Internet yeah, you can still find stuff but you gotta search for it more.

Total Rock: Tell me about your song “I Fix This”

Richie Ramone: This is a funny story. So when I was playing Sweden few years ago, I forget what town I was in. The promoter there who traveled with us. Whenever I whenever I you know, wanted something. I said, Oh, can you give me a cheeseburger or something? He always always say “I fix this.” Instead of like, I’ll get that for you. He would always say I fix this, I fixed this. That’s his thing. That’s what he says. So one day, I went in the store, and I wanted to get something I was looking for something. And I said, Do you have this and this? And the girl said, “I fix this”. And I was like, oh my god, this is like a term that they use in the in this country. I was blown away. I said, I gotta write this song. The song isn’t necessarily about that. But it gave me the inspiration to you know, use that title.
You know? Like if you’re having a problem and anything “I fix this” as opposed to saying I’ll take care of it for you or whatever you would say.

Richie Ramone’s new Single “Not Afraid” is out now on Outro records