RICHIE RAMONE'S THIRD SOLO ALBUM: LIVE TO TELL
(APRIL 21, 2023)INFORMATION IN THIS PAGE:
1) BASIC INFORMATION AND TRACKLISTING.
2) CREDITS / LINE-UP DETAILS.
3) MORE BACKGROUND INFORMATION.
4) 7' SINGLE: NOT AFRAID / CRY LITTLE SISTER (2022).
5) 7' FLEXI SINGLE: THE LAST TIME (2018).
6) AN ADVANCE INTERVIEW I DID WITH RICHIE OF ALBUM IN 2022.
1) BASIC INFORMATION AND TRACKLISTING:
Release date of Richie Ramone's third solo album Live To Tell was on April 21, 2023. Richie's first solo album is Entitled (2013) and second Cellophane (2016).
Labels of new album Live To Tell are Livewire / Cargo Records (CD) and Outro Records (VINYL).
Live To Tell got published as a CD, LP and digital. Buy LP (clear or black vinyl) from here (Outro Records) or CD from here (Cargo Records).
Outro Records released clear vinyl (signed and limited to 250 copies) and black vinyl.
Live To Tell has 12 songs. It is produced by Richie Ramone. From Live To
Tell was released two singles before album got rocked out. The Last Time
(7' flexi single and single) was released first in 2018 (more
details here) and second single Not Afraid / Cry Little Sister (7'
vinyl and digital) was released in 2022 (more
details here). Album has new remix version of The Last Time.Check out video of Cry Little Sister here. Video of Cry Little Sister was published on November 1, 2022 and video of Suffocate one year later on October 30, 2023. See Suffocate here. Also Suffocate is one track in Live To Tell.
- Suffocate is a really hardcore song, feeling like you know I'm in a straight jacket, I am trying to find self love, it's about self love. I always like be myself father and try to do that. The words were made by a woman called you Julifer Day. A friend of mine. She wrote those lyrics and Old Ways lyrics, Richie Ramone told me (Jari-Pekka Laitio-Ramone) in 2022.
Album is dedicated to Steve "Fiddleboy" Miller and Alan "Dink" Denkerson.
Richie Ramone support the release (Live To Tell) with a South American tour in November-December, 2023, and with European dates to follow in 2024.
See information of Richie Ramone's shows here on my Ramones page.
TRACKLISTING: LIVE TO TELL:
1) Live To Tell (Written by Richie Ramone and Clare MissTake/ lyrics: Kathleen Branick)
2) When The Night (Richie Ramone and Clare MissTake)
3) Who Stole My Wig (Richie Ramone)
4) Old Ways (Richie Ramone/ lyrics: Julifer Day)
5) Find Our Place (Richie Ramone and Rodrigo "Txory" Goni)
6) I Sit Alone (Yeah-Yeah) (Richie Ramone)
7) Not Afraid (Marc Diamond)
8) Cry Little Sister (Gerard McMahon and Mike Mainiera)
9) Suffocate (Richie Ramone/ lyrics: Julifer Day)
10) Other Things (Richie Ramone)
11) Master Plan (Richie Ramone)
12) The Last Time (remix) (Richie Ramone)
2) CREDITS / LINE-UP ON ALBUM:
Album is produced by Richie Ramone.
* Richie Ramone: Singer and drummer.
* Clare MissTake: Bass and backing vocals. Clare also plays guitar in Live To Tell.
* Ronnie Simmons: Guitar (expect songs Not Afraid, Cry Little Sister and The Last Time).
* Marc Diamond: Guitar (expect The Last Time).
* Paul Roessler: Keyboards.
* Ben Reagan: Guitar (only the song The Last Time).
Background vocals: Ronnie Simmons and Marc Diamond: Who Stole My Wig and Master Plan.
Background vocals: Clare Misstake and Julifer Day: Who Stole My Wig and Suffocate.
3) BACKGROUND INFORMATION:
I did an interview with Richie Ramone of this album. I will publish it later.
Here are some comments by Richie:
"Ramones DNA is all over the record for sure. But at the same time these songs are very personal to me. Addiction, depression and fighting our demons is something we all struggle with at times, and this comes through in a big way. At the same time, these tracks rock hard as anything I've ever done. I really dig it and I'm eager to hear what my fans have to say."
4) 7' SINGLE NOT AFRAID / CRY LITTLE SISTER (2022):
Richie Ramone completed a digital and 7' single in 2022. Outro Records published Not Afraid along with a cover of Cry Little Sister (from the movie Protege Moi):
A-side: Not Afraid (3.13).
B-side: Cry Little Sister (4.56). Check out video of Cry Little Sister here.
There is two versions of 7' single:
1) Black vinyl.
2) Orange vinyl. The limited orange vinyl (only 300 pressed) with sleeve signed by Richie.
LINE-UP ETC.:
Richie Ramone: Drums and vocals.
Clare Misstake: Bass and vocals.
Marc Diamond: Guitar.
Paul Roessler: Keyboard on Cry Little Sister.
Recorded and mixed by Paul Roessler at Kitten Robot Studios in Los Angeles, USA.
Mastered by Maor Appelbaum.
Produced by Richie Ramone.
Label: Outro Records.
You can buy single from Outro Records or
from streaming
platforms.- This single from his (third) album proves he refuses to fit in anyone's box. As he continues to push himself as an artist, we are the fortunate ones who get to sit back and enjoy Rock'n'Roll history being created by a legitimate Rock'n'Roll legend!, told Outro Records' staff in April 2022.
RICHIE'S COMMENTS OF NOT AFRAID:
Not Afraid song is written by Marc Diamond (The Dwarves). Richie tells of Not Afraid in The Houston Press's article by Jesse Sendejas Jr.
- It's (Not Afraid) not really about covid. This song, first of all, was written by Marc Diamond from The Dwarves. I was on tour with them two years ago or three years ago and I said: "Marc, you've gotta write me a song," and finally he wrote me this song. It really had nothing to do with covid but I loved the lyric in it and it sounds great. Not many people write songs for me and I was really pleased that somebody wrote me a complete song that I could lyrically make my own, tells Richie Ramone in The Houston Press's article.
AC Rock Reviews writes following of new single Not Afraid / Cry Little Sister: "Too often do you see old school musicians sticking to the same path and not pushing the boat out as much as they should. But, this new single from Richie Ramone is not like that at all. Both these songs sound fresh, energetic, catchy and distinct in their attention stealing presence. The level of enthusiasm and cutting edge energy in this song could easily fool you into believing this was released by a new up and coming band, instead of a pioneer of the punk genre."
5) DIGITAL / 7' FLEXI SINGLE: THE LAST TIME: (2018)
The Last Time is Richie Ramone's single. The single released by Outro Records was drop on iTunes on April 19, 2018: click here to buy it / listen the sample.
The Last Time is written by Richie. It is recorded and mixed by Paul Roessler at the Kitten Robot Studios in Los Angeles, USA. The Last Time is mastered by Maor Appelbaum.
Live To Tell album has new remix version of The Last Time.
Song was available also as a bonus flexi in New Noise Magazine. Issue #40 was put out on May 1, 2018.
Steve Pilace of Outro Records wrote me then (2018) they has some extra copies of flexis.
- If you buy 2 or more Outro Records' releases (7' or 12' or both) we'll include a Richie Ramone flexi for free, Steve wrote.
So that was in 2018. Also Richie sold The Last Time flexis in his tours.
AN ADVANCE INTERVIEW I DID WITH RICHIE OF LIVE TO TELL ALBUM IN 2022
I and my girlfriend Pia Voutilainen traveled to Richie Ramone's shows to United Kingdom in September, 2022. We attended shows in Edinburgh (Bannerman's Bar) and Leeds (The Constitutional).
I did an interview with Richie in Edinburgh. This is just a part of an longer interview and is about an album. So we did this interview seven months before Live To Tell got published. FULL INTERVIEW IS HERE.
Thanks Jennifer L. Beckwith for typing up this interview from tape.
Jari-Pekka: I know you are really impressed of some Dwarves releases and you did an tour together in 2017. You wanted Marc Diamond (Dwarves, Motochrist etc.) to write for you a song, song Not Afraid. Outro Records published it in March 2022.
Richie: They (Dwarves) invited us on the tour before covid and then we did like 10-15 shows. Marc lives now a couple miles away from me in California. I said, Marc write me a song. One day he came with a song. I said I like that. If someone write the song for me the lyrics have to be right and for me it's all about what it's singing about. I kind of like the lyrics when he was talking about and there was it happened.
Jari-Pekka: Tell me something of the upcoming album?
Richie: It is a very, very dark album, the words are very personal. Very dark because of doing covid all that. Maybe personal issues I have and many other people have too, millions of other people were experiencing the same thing.
Jari-Pekka: So you wanted to have doomsday feelings?
Richie: Yes. My mind never stops.
Suffocate is a really hardcore song, feeling like you know I'm in a straight jacket, I am trying to find self love, it's about self love. I always like be myself father and try to do that. The words were made by a woman called you Julifer Day. A friend of mine. She wrote those lyrics and Old Ways lyrics.
My sister (Kathleen Branick) wrote lyrics to Live To Tell (song). I have some new lyricists on the record which is kind of nice. I'm finding people who can get inside my head and write words that, wow, I can sing that but that relates to me. So it's different. I am a different artist than the Ramones because I don't write those happy, funny songs like they did. I just don't have that in me. I write different kind of stuff so I feel at this point in time, by this third record people can really understand that I'm Richie Ramone, I'm not the Ramones. I am my own artist. It's taken a long, long time, 10-12 years to get to this point.
Jari-Pekka: You told me sad news this going to be your last album?
Richie: I keep going. This is my last record. It is so difficult to write records because I really wanted to mean something when I do it.
You don't want to go through that again. It's very difficult to put it all together on your own, writing music to me is a very lonely dark place, you sit in the room, you have a glass of wine and day after day, its been months and then you think: "oh, throw away, this is no good, I don't know?" One day you're like: "all the best thing, next day: no good".
I need support from other people to: "go, you're on the right track." And you know the cover of Cry Little Sister is awesome and people are like telling me: wow.
But now you can listen to my phone, I already wrote two more songs.
.