MARKY RAMONE

Interview with Marky Ramone
by Jason Walsh

I got a call from Marky Ramone on a cold, Sunday night to talk to him about his participation with a company called "Ready Two Go." They had just released a signature line of condoms of various artists, himself being the most notable, in an attempt to raise awareness about AIDS and STDs, as well as helping support a local charitable organization in New York City. This was one of several interviews I did for a piece that will be later published in AMP Magazine and I decided to transcribe the entire interview to pass along to friends, family, whomever that might be interested in reading it.

Aside from the condoms, we discussed his current projects, how he came to become a Ramone, and for the sake of my father, we started with Brooklyn.

MARKY: Hi Jason.

JW: Hey Marky. How you doing tonight?

MARKY: How are you?

JW: Are you still up in New York now?

MARKY: Oh yeah.

JW: How's the weather up there?

MARKY: A little chilly. I was a way for a while when the weather was warm and then when I got back you really noticed it. I guess you could say that it's gotten chilly, yeah.

JW: Is it snowing up there right now?

MARKY: No, it's about 44-45 degress.

JW: Yeah, I'm down in Virginia and I just saw a video of Albany which is just getting pounded by snow.

MARKY: Oh probably up there, yeah. Not here.

JW: Yeah, I was wondering how it was in the city. My dad grew up in Brooklyn and I grew up in Jersey and Philadelphia area.

MARKY: Ah, Brooklyn. Yeah, that's where I was raised.

JW: What part of Brooklyn are you from originally?

MARKY: Flatbush.

JW: My dad was down in the Bay Ridge area.

MARKY: Oh, OK. I know exactly where it is.

JW: So I'm doing a piece about the "READY TWO GO" line for AMP Magazine. So, basically how did you get involved with this program?

MARKY: Well they contacted me and asked me if I would do it. You know, I've been involved with a lot of charities and a lot of things over the years and I thought it was a good thing to do from my state of mind because it is helping people. Over the last, I would say, five or six years, I don't know, politicians haven't been talking about AIDS or research or things like that. They might have given money to it but they put it on the back burner and because of that a lot of people are squeamish to talk about it. But, it is a subject that needs to be addressed and I was approached to lend my name to it and y'know, my logo so that's what I decided to do. I knew two people who died of AIDS and it's just as bad as any other disease so to be preferential to any one disease doesn't make sense because it is a killer.

JW: The thing is it's not so much promoting sexuality or promiscuousness, but just kind of encouraging responsibility.

MARKY: Of course, and it's not just AIDS. It's other venereal diseases that unfortunately are out there and the thing is it's not only young people, it's older people in nursing homes too that are getting these diseases because they're having sex and not wearing condoms. Yeah and y'know, whatever I can do to promote safe sex to help then that's the number one priority if it helps save lives.

JW: Now the cool thing is this organization is very much about awareness and trying to put out the message. It's not so much that they're just trying to put out a product but they're trying to lend a message to people.

MARKY: Yes. Politicians should be doing that but I think in this climate, they're not doing it like they used to. Maybe because the God-church, Christian right-wing thing, they don't want to promote that in schools or churches and I know those are the places to teach. Y'know, what does it take? The whole idea of the church and this other thing is to save lives et cetera. In schools, kids are very open to learning things and I would think that would be one of their top priorities.

JW: Now you're a person that's known by several generations. A lot of these young kids, obviously didn't get a chance to see the Ramones.

MARKY: But they know who they are. They have the records and t-shirts and all the other stuff, but I mean if I can get to them, or anybody, it doesn't matter what age or what music they like, then my task is something that's positive and would have an effect.

JW: I saw that 10% of the net proceeds are going to an organization called City Wide Harm Reduction, a program up there in NYC, that not only provides information to individuals in the city, you know that are homeless, low-income, who might be struggling with drug addiction, and it actually helps these people out in a way that some people might not understand. Tell me what you think about that, with the donation going to them.

MARKY: In poor neighborhoods and things like that, people can't most of the time afford contraception so they'll have sex no matter what and then all of a sudden you'll have AIDS through obviously sharing needles, drug addiction, so y'know, it all goes hand in hand. I mean you can get AIDS from needles and things like that so it's not just sexual contact.

JW: So I got to ask you about this. I saw on your model the tag line is "Too Tough To Break." What's that all about?

MARKY: It's a takeoff on one of the albums the Ramones did, "Too Tough To Die" so it's called "Too Tough To Break." It's just a clever statement. It's just something that might attract attention and from there you can read and get serious over it, you know what I mean? You got to have some kind of punchline, y'know.

JW: And that's the thing, it's a serious situation but still making light of it.

MARKY: Yeah, making light of it because maybe at this point, I hope that's the right approach to get people's attention.

JW: The other thing I also noticed was one of the other promotions that they're throwing out there is that every hundredth customer wins an autographed pair of Vic Firth drum sticks.

MARKY: Oh yeah.

JW: How'd that come about?

MARKY: Oh, I wanted to do that. I thought it was a good idea and it just promotes more of this awareness and I'm willing to do that whenever I can.

JW: Aside from this, you've been pretty busy lately?

MARKY: Oh yeah.

JW: You did the Teenage Head thing, You're doing the Marky Ramone and Friends thing. And are you still doing the radio show?

MARKY: Oh yeah at Sirius radio, the only punk rock channel from East to West Coast, all over the country. That's Faction 28. Four years, I get to choose my own songs and it's on twice a week for two hours. It's just another facet of the business that I'm in that I really enjoy doing. When I was a little kid, I used to listen to all these great DJs and I grew up on that, y'know.

JW: So, something you enjoy doing still?

MARKY: Yeah, yeah. Not as much as drumming, but I like them both. Obviously, that's what I do is play the drums and that will be part of it in the DJ stuff. I also do DJ appearances at certain parties and situations so the vastness of the music business never stops. You have to be involved, y'know.

JW: Coming up in the New Year, what's Marky Ramone going to be doing? Are we going to see you hitting the road or anything?

MARKY: A new DVD will be coming out about my times in the punk scene all the way up 'til now, when I started as a kid and everything with the Ramones, Richard Hell and the Voidoids, CBGB's, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, y'know, all the stuff. All the way up to doing the radio show and just basically the beginnings of the punk scene in New York City and CBGB's. If anybody wants to find out more about this they can go to myspace (http://www.myspace.com/markyramone) and that's where you can check out the condoms too.

JW: Very cool.

MARKY: And I'll be coming out, believe it or not, with a Tommy Hilfiger clothing line of leather jackets that I designed and a pair of jeans that I designed and two or three new t-shirt designs.

JW: Are you still doing the Marky Ramones and Friends project you were doing?

MARKY: Oh yeah, yeah. Still touring. I will be touring. I just did Argentina. It was a big deal this year, 2008. Beijing, I did Dubai, I did Spain, Italy, so I'm probably going to hit the States in April or May.

JW: Who is doing that with you?

MARKY: Some people from a band called AntiProduct, a girl bass player and a guy on guitar. They're really, really good. They have to be good in order to do this kind of music and I might use Michael Graves as lead singer.

JW: Just for a little background. You started off in Dust, you did Richard Hell and the Voidoids. How did you come to become in the Ramones? How did that start for you back in the day?

MARKY: They used to come and see me play with my band before they started the Ramones and we all knew each other, so when Tommy (Ramone) wanted to produce, they just came up and asked me and that's the way it went. Dee Dee was first, then John, and then the next thing I knew, I was in the band. So, I ended up with them for fifteen years and close to 1700 shows, so that's really how it was.

JW: That must have just been an incredible experience for you?

MARKY: Oh yeah, I mean it's something you work hard for and continue doing and the fruits of your labor pay off.