User:CrowzRSA/Sandbox/Sandbox 2/Ramones Tracklist/Blitzkrieg Bop

Background and writing
Tommy Ramone is the primary writer of the song, originally calling it "Animal Hop". Unreceptive to the song's output, Tommy Ramone reviewed the song and renamed it "Blitzkrieg Bop", and innovated a new concept. Tommy said "I originally wrote this song called 'Animal Hope', and it was rejected. It wasn't about Nazis. It's about kids going to a show and having a good time." Dee Dee responded to the piece saying "Let's call it 'Blitzkrieg Bop'." Tommy said that Dee Dee "was sabotaging the song." Joey Ramone added that "basically we decided to write some crazy bubblegum music."

Composition
"Blitzkrieg Bop" is two minutes and fourteen seconds long. It begins instrumental, which lasts twenty seconds. At second twenty, the guitar and bass cease, marking Joey's first line "Hey Ho, Let's Go!". The bass and guitar "gradually" rebuild and it is "in full–force again." The piece is resolved in the same way as the seconds twenty to thirty–three. Described as a "three-chord assault," it lives up to the speed, menace, humor, and mystery. The first lines are "not so much a warning as an innovation to the listener."

Joey Ramone said that the song "was sort of a call to arms... for everyone to start their own bands." The first three lines of the piece were said to "identify the potential destructive, unfocused, and desperate teen–energy that can be read as a punk stable. Scott Schinder and Andy Schwartz said that it was a "bracing opening salvo," and said that the chorus lines were a "rousing chant."

Reception
Critics who mentioned "Blitzkrieg Bop" gave it positive reviews. Andy Schwartz said that the song was a "bracing opening salvo of 'Blitzkrieg Bop', with its rousing 'Hey Ho!, Let's Go!' chant. Popularizing the lines "Hey Ho!, Let's Go!," it is also considered by the Icon Group International to be one of the most famous punk rock song of all time. Kelso Jacks from College Music Journal considered it to be one of his favorite songs. Nicholas Rombes, author of the 33⅓ book Ramones, wrote about "Blitzkrieg Bop", writing: "when I sat down to write about the album's opening song 'Blitzkrieg Bop' my first line was 'this is the best opening song on any rock album.' Then I decided that sounded too creepily fanatic and more than a little disingenuous, since I haven't heard every rock album ever made, and took it out. But then I went downstairs to the turntable and played it and midway through ran back upstairs and put the line back in even before the screensaver clicked in."

It was covered by Rob Zombie on

Notable covers

 * The song has been covered by various artists including studio versions by Rob Zombie (for his 2003 released album 'Past, Present and Future'), The Beautiful South, Jason Mraz, Screeching Weasel and The Hanson Brothers.
 * Die Toten Hosen covered the song for the 1991 cover album Learning English, Lesson One. It features Joey Ramone as a guest musician.
 * Dee Dee Ramone performed bass and backing vocals for the Youth Gone Mad version, included on the Ramones Maniacs tribute album and the posthumous Youth Gone Mad featuring Dee Dee Ramone album.
 * Green Day covered this song along with "Teenage Lobotomy" at the 2002 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony for the remaining member of the Ramones, and regularly play the song live, sometimes getting kids out of the audience to play the song on their instruments, though more usually the song "Knowledge". Furthermore, their track "St. Jimmy" from the album American Idiot uses the same chord progression, but in a different tempo.