It's Alive (Ramones album)

It's Alive is the first live album by the American punk rock band the Ramones, titled after the 1974 horror film of the same name. It was recorded at the Rainbow Theatre in London on December 31, 1977, and released in April 1979 as a 2-LP set. The album draws material from the band's first three studio albums, Ramones (1976), Leave Home (1977), and Rocket to Russia (1977). Four concerts during the UK tour were recorded, but the New Year's Eve performance was chosen because ten rows of seats were thrown at the stage after the concert and it was considered the best of the performances at the venue. The album and concert is often referred to as the band at its live peak. The concert was also filmed and later released in a truncated form on the 2007 compilation DVD It's Alive 1974-1996.

It's Alive
Live album by Ramones
Released	April 1979
Recorded	December 31, 1977
Venue	The Rainbow Theatre, London
Genre	Punk rock
Length	53:49
Label	Sire
Producer	Tommy Ramone Ed Stasium
Ramones live album chronology
It's Alive (1979) Loco Live (1991)

The album was certified gold in Argentina in 1993.[1] It is the only live album by the band that does not feature the concert intro music "The Good, the Bad and the Ugly" or the outro music "The Ecstasy of Gold," both of which are from Ennio Morricone's score to the film The Good, The Bad & The Ugly.

Critical reception

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[2]
American Songwriter	[3]
Classic Rock	9/10[4]
Encyclopedia of Popular Music	[5]
Q	[6]
Record Collector	[7]
The Rolling Stone Album Guide	[8]
Smash Hits	8/10[9]
Tom Hull – on the Web	B+ ()[10]
The Village Voice	A−[11]

In a 1996 retrospective review, Robert Christgau of The Village Voice wrote: "Redundant when it was dropped on the punk-besotted U.K. in 1979, this concert is precious history now—seems so impossibly light and quick it makes you suspect they didn't fully sustain their live pace into their forties after all."[11] Paul Rigby of Record Collector described the album as a "high energy, one-hour blitz" that attests to "how high-octane they really were."[7] AllMusic critic Mark Deming deemed It's Alive to be "not only the best Ramones live album," but also "one of the best and most effective live albums in the rock canon, and every bit as essential as Ramones, Leave Home, or Rocket to Russia."[2] In 2005, It's Alive was ranked number 279 in Rock Hard magazine's book of The 500 Greatest Rock & Metal Albums of All Time.[12]

Track listing

Side one

No.	Title	Writer(s)	Original release	Length
1.	"Rockaway Beach"	Dee Dee Ramone	1977 ~ Rocket to Russia	2:24
2.	"Teenage Lobotomy"	Ramones	1977 ~ Rocket to Russia	1:55
3.	"Blitzkrieg Bop"	Tommy Ramone, Dee Dee Ramone	1976 ~ Ramones	2:05
4.	"I Wanna Be Well"	Joey Ramone	1977 ~ Rocket to Russia	2:23
5.	"Glad to See You Go"	Joey Ramone, Dee Dee Ramone	1977 ~ Leave Home	1:51
6.	"Gimme Gimme Shock Treatment"	Johnny Ramone, Dee Dee Ramone	1977 ~ Leave Home	1:37
7.	"You're Gonna Kill That Girl"	Joey Ramone	1977 ~ Leave Home	2:28

Side two

No.	Title	Writer(s)	Original release	Length
8.	"I Don't Care"	Joey Ramone	1977 ~ Rocket to Russia	1:41
9.	"Sheena is a Punk Rocker"	Joey Ramone	1977 ~ Rocket to Russia	2:16
10.	"Havana Affair"	Dee Dee Ramone, Johnny Ramone	1976 ~ Ramones	1:35
11.	"Commando"	Dee Dee Ramone, Johnny Ramone	1977 ~ Leave Home	1:40
12.	"Here Today, Gone Tomorrow"	Joey Ramone	1977 ~ Rocket to Russia	2:55
13.	"Surfin' Bird"	Al Frazier, Sonny Harris, Carl White, Turner Wilson	1977 ~ Rocket to Russia	2:20
14.	"Cretin Hop"	Ramones	1977 ~ Rocket to Russia	1:46

Side three

No.	Title	Writer(s)	Original release	Length
15.	"Listen to My Heart"	Dee Dee Ramone	1976 ~ Ramones	1:36
16.	"California Sun"	Henry Glover	1977 ~ Leave Home	1:45
17.	"I Don't Wanna Walk Around With You"	Dee Dee Ramone	1976 ~ Ramones	1:25
18.	"Pinhead"	Ramones	1977 ~ Leave Home	2:46
19.	"Do You Wanna Dance?"	Bobby Freeman	1977 ~ Rocket to Russia	1:39
20.	"Chain Saw"	Joey Ramone	1976 ~ Ramones	1:29
21.	"Today Your Love, Tomorrow the World"	Dee Dee Ramone	1976 ~ Ramones	1:55

Side four

No.	Title	Writer(s)	Original release	Length
22.	"Now I Wanna Be a Good Boy"	Dee Dee Ramone	1977 ~ Leave Home	2:03
23.	"Judy Is a Punk"	Joey Ramone	1976 ~ Ramones	1:14
24.	"Suzy Is a Headbanger"	Ramones	1977 ~ Leave Home	1:53
25.	"Let's Dance"	Jim Lee	1976 ~ Ramones	2:03
26.	"Oh, Oh, I Love Her So"	Dee Dee Ramone	1977 ~ Leave Home	1:40
27.	"Now I Wanna Sniff Some Glue"	Dee Dee Ramone	1976 ~ Ramones	1:18
28.	"We're a Happy Family"	Ramones	1977 ~ Rocket to Russia	2:07

Release History

It's Alive was first released on CD in the US in 1995. The album was reissued as a 4 CD/2 LP 40th Anniversary Deluxe Edition on September 20, 2019, limited to 8,000 copies. The set includes all four concerts that were recorded during the Ramones' UK tour in December 1977 and is housed in a 12x12 hardcover book, with liner notes written by Steve Albini and Ed Stasium.[13]

Personnel

Ramones

• Joey Ramone - lead vocals
• Johnny Ramone - guitar
• Dee Dee Ramone - bass, backing vocals
• Tommy Ramone - drums

Production

• Ed Stasium - engineer
• Tommy Ramone, Ed Stasium - producers
• Basing Street Studios Ltd. - mobile recording facilities
• Greb Cobb, Frank Owen, Jo Yu, Ray Doyle - mobile crew
• Ramona Janquito, Phil Shrago - studio crew
• Monte Melnick - tour manager
• Arturo Vega - lighting
• Tasco - sound, lighting

Album Design-Spencer Drate Art Director-John Gillespie Photography-Various Photographers

References

1. "Argentinian album certifications – Ramones – Alive". Argentine Chamber of Phonograms and Videograms Producers.
2. Deming, Mark. "It's Alive – Ramones". AllMusic. Retrieved June 3, 2020.
3. Horowitz, Hal (December 25, 2019). "Ramones: It's Alive–40th Anniversary Edition". American Songwriter. Retrieved November 25, 2020.
4. "Best of the Rest". Classic Rock. No. 273. April 2020. p. 95.
5. C. Strong, Martin. Encyclopedia of Popular Music. Canongate. ISBN 1841955515.
6. "Ramones: It's Alive". Q. No. 167. August 2000. pp. 120–21.
7. Rigby, Paul (May 2009). "Ramones – It's Alive". Record Collector. No. 362. Retrieved January 6, 2017.
8. Wolk, Douglas (2004). "The Ramones". In Brackett, Nathan; Hoard, Christian (eds.). The New Rolling Stone Album Guide (4th ed.). Simon & Schuster. pp. 675–76. ISBN 0-7432-0169-8.
9. Starr, Red (June 28 – July 11, 1979). "Albums". Smash Hits. Vol. 1 no. 15. p. 25.
10. Hull, Tom (October 12, 2020). "Music Week". Tom Hull – on the Web. Retrieved October 14, 2020.
11. Christgau, Robert (February 20, 1996). "Consumer Guide". The Village Voice. Retrieved January 6, 2017.
12. [...], Rock Hard (Hrsg.). [Red.: Michael Rensen. Mitarb.: Götz Kühnemund] (2005). Best of Rock & Metal die 500 stärksten Scheiben aller Zeiten. Königswinter: Heel. p. 102. ISBN 3-89880-517-4.CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
13. https://www.rhino.com/article/ramones-its-alive-40th-anniversary-deluxe-edition-available-september-20-from-rhino