Morrissey has compiled the track-listing and chosen the sleeve for "Best of the Ramones" - TTY

Re: Morrissey digs Ramones! ~ tty

The photo is lazy and I would have hoped for something better, if Morrissey did indeed choose it. I doubt it took too much digging around and sifting through photos to find that one. It's so cliched it is boring.

It is from THIS collection. If he really wanted to be subversive he would have chosen this one:

3296-1-e1389486054750.jpg


I guess he chose the former because it has four guys in it--one for each of the Ramones. The other only has three.

I'm a sucker for black and white photography so I appreciate the artistry of these photos. I wonder if Moz has this book on his coffee table?

bb_cover.jpg



Well, at the very least, some of us Moz fans have been introduced to a new photographer. Or at least those who have read this thread/news item. Perhaps Moz is a huge fan of his work.
 
Re: Morrissey digs Ramones! ~ tty

Well, at the very least, some of us Moz fans have been introduced to a new photographer. Or at least those who have read this thread/news item. Perhaps Moz is a huge fan of his work.

He is a fan—this is the book and tour backdrop photographer that Detritus and I were discussing earlier in the thread.
 
Re: Morrissey digs Ramones! ~ tty

It is from THIS collection. If he really wanted to be subversive he would have chosen this one:

3296-1-e1389486054750.jpg


I guess he chose the former because it has four guys in it--one for each of the Ramones. The other only has three.

I'm a sucker for black and white photography so I appreciate the artistry of these photos. I wonder if Moz has this book on his coffee table?

bb_cover.jpg



Well, at the very least, some of us Moz fans have been introduced to a new photographer. Or at least those who have read this thread/news item. Perhaps Moz is a huge fan of his work.

More like on his bedside table next to the baby oil.
 
The album cover is definitely homoerotic, and reminiscent of the lyrics to "53rd and 3rd". I'm dead curious to see what he's picked.
 
Re: Article: Morrissey has compiled the track-listing and chosen the sleeve for "Best of the Ramones

The album cover is definitely homoerotic, and reminiscent of the lyrics to "53rd and 3rd". I'm dead curious to see what he's picked.

Yes. And yes, I too want to know the track-listing. Been listening to the Ramones all morning.
 
Re: Article: Morrissey has compiled the track-listing and chosen the sleeve for "Best of the Ramones

The album cover is definitely homoerotic, and reminiscent of the lyrics to "53rd and 3rd". I'm dead curious to see what he's picked.
Oh, good observation. I wouldn't have made that connection.

Like realitybites, I assume the four young men in the photo represent the Ramones, or more specifically, Morrissey's idea of an alternate take on the Ramones as rough-and-tumble rentboys or street thugs. Sort of how the four girls in the Jurgen Voller image used for The World Won't Listen and the Smiths remastered boxset are supposed to be female counterparts to the four members of the Smiths.

Whoever runs the Intl Playboy tumblr page found more information about the photo:

As far as we know, Fitzgerald never printed this image. We found a short, four-frame strip of images of brothers Johnny and Vinny (second and fourth from left) smoking between two vintage cars with friends, on a street in Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn. The film roll was dated 1963.

This image appears in the book Brooklyn Boys: Danny Fitzgerald and Les Demi Dieux.
 
Re: Article: Morrissey has compiled the track-listing and chosen the sleeve for "Best of the Ramones

Oh, good observation. I wouldn't have made that connection.

Like realitybites, I assume the four young men in the photo represent the Ramones, or more specifically, Morrissey's idea of an alternate take on the Ramones as rough-and-tumble rentboys or street thugs. Sort of how the four girls in the Jurgen Voller image used for The World Won't Listen and the Smiths remastered boxset are supposed to be female counterparts to the four members of the Smiths.

Whoever runs the Intl Playboy tumblr page found more information about the photo:

You're good. Very resourceful and knowledgeable. :)
 
Re: Article: Morrissey has compiled the track-listing and chosen the sleeve for "Best of the Ramones

Exactly how is this a homo erotic image? It baffles me how one's own perception of reality bleeds onto paper as fact.

No matter, nice photo, I don't get the gay angle apart from that gayboys might like it, and it's pretty cool that our man's done the compiling.

Yeah I'll probably get this one as I haven't got any Ramones stuff yet. I guess the photographer was gay so that makes the photo gay? Dude with his shirt off=gay. Shirt on=not gay.

The image isn't "gay" per se, but it definitely has homoerotic undertones, of which I'm sure Morrissey is very aware. A photograph doesn't need to depict male/male sexual activity in order for it to have homoerotic value. A lot of people mistakenly conflate homosexuality with homoeroticism, but they aren't necessarily interchangeable terms and the distinction is an important one, particularly when it pertains to art. Homoeroticism as an aesthetic form is often about perception and representation, whereas homosexuality or "gayness" relates to a characteristic of being.

Take, for example, the sleeve art of Hand in Glove. Few people would deny the homoeroticism inherent in that image, but why is that? It has to do with the way the male body is presented as an object of desire, something to be looked at, objectified in a manner much more typically associated with media representations of women. We are socialized to view the subject in a sexualized way. Feminists would call this a product of the "male gaze," or perhaps more accurately where this photo is concerned, a subversion of it. If the majority of images in films, television programs, advertisements etc. that we're bombarded with are ostensibly created for the attention and benefit of men, when a man is depicted as an object to be looked at, then the image becomes suspect and the homoerotic connotation becomes apparent, if only on a subconscious level.

The Fitzgerald photo is less obviously homoerotic than the Hand in Glove sleeve, but can easily and understandably be read as such. The homosocial interaction, the way the young men are posed--especially the shirtless kid with his rugged masculinity on display, almost looking at the camera but not quite, drawing the viewer in.
 
Re: Article: Morrissey has compiled the track-listing and chosen the sleeve for "Best of the Ramones

never a big ramones fan, there appeal is quickly lost on me after like one listen, despite being super into hardcore and punk rock. cover pic is weird, maybe it alludes to dee dee and his prostitution etc, but it doesnt really seem to have any ramones connection that i can see and isnt going to help sell albums when looking at the cover, you cant tell that it has anything to do with the ramones at all. thats weird and i dont get it. nice photo though. im guessing that theyre putting out another compilation because the drummer just died and its stirring a bit of noise for them (the ramones). hes was the last left alive so no more stories of this sort will be popping up in the future. im desperately trying hard to not say fame fame fatal fame even though it actually does apply here (most people mis quote it). its weird for morrissey to be helping in that situation against the backdrop of the songs lyrics.

in terms of photo collections, as an aside, i just got platons republics which is a portrait collection of normal average people next to celebrities and politicians. some shots were really really good.
 
Re: Article: Morrissey has compiled the track-listing and chosen the sleeve for "Best of the Ramones

The album cover is definitely homoerotic, and reminiscent of the lyrics to "53rd and 3rd". I'm dead curious to see what he's picked.

Further to the observations made about "53rd and 3rd," Dee Dee was very frank about his experiences hustling in his youth. This is all of a piece. So he picked a picture from Brooklyn? One could say he has picked his fill of Queens. As 'twere.
 
Re: Article: Morrissey has compiled the track-listing and chosen the sleeve for "Best of the Ramones

Further to the observations made about "53rd and 3rd," Dee Dee was very frank about his experiences hustling in his youth. This is all of a piece. So he picked a picture from Brooklyn? One could say he has picked his fill of Queens. As 'twere.

Of course, 53rd & 3rd/"the loop" is in Manhattan, so maybe it doesn't matter at all that the photo was taken in Brooklyn rather than Queens. ;)

I like how provocative/unexpected the cover photo is, personally, whether it's interpreted as homoerotic, heteroerotic, or just plain erotic. It's at least one of those three things, if not all three! I don't see it as being the antithesis of the Ramones, either—but then I never saw them as being a particularly "hetero" band (whatever that means) in the first place.

I tend to find compilation albums more interesting when the curator is permitted to assemble something that represents their own take on a band, as opposed to standard "greatest hits" compilations. The more Ramones the better, I say! I'm very curious to see the track list for this collection.
 
Re: Article: Morrissey has compiled the track-listing and chosen the sleeve for "Best of the Ramones

If a girl finds this pic hot which I'm sure many would, even if none do here is the pic still homoerotic? If it lights the fire of both sexes then isn't it just a photo?
 
Re: Article: Morrissey has compiled the track-listing and chosen the sleeve for "Best of the Ramones

If a girl finds this pic hot which I'm sure many would, even if none do here is the pic still homoerotic? If it lights the fire of both sexes then isn't it just a photo?
I am female, I find the men in the photo attractive, and yes, it can still be "just a photo" but that doesn't mean it also can't be perceived as homoerotic.
 
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Re: Article: Morrissey has compiled the track-listing and chosen the sleeve for "Best of the Ramones

Would have loved a photo from Queens, my hometown. Especially one with the Ramones actually in it. But the one he chose is very nice, too.
 
Re: Morrissey digs Ramones! ~ tty

I don't understand the use of a homoerotic image taken by a photographer notorious for capturing the male physique and its significance to a hetero, macho punk band from Queens. The only relevance seems to be that the Ramones were from New York. And this image is of Brooklyn boys, taken in New York. Hard to believe the management approved this sleeve. I like the photo. But it doesn't exactly scream Ramones.
That was my thought before I even saw what you posted.
God forbid morrissey ever puts the female body on anything related to him.
 
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Re: Article: Morrissey has compiled the track-listing and chosen the sleeve for "Best of the Ramones

The image isn't "gay" per se, but it definitely has homoerotic undertones, of which I'm sure Morrissey is very aware. A photograph doesn't need to depict male/male sexual activity in order for it to have homoerotic value. A lot of people mistakenly conflate homosexuality with homoeroticism, but they aren't necessarily interchangeable terms and the distinction is an important one, particularly when it pertains to art. Homoeroticism as an aesthetic form is often about perception and representation, whereas homosexuality or "gayness" relates to a characteristic of being.

Take, for example, the sleeve art of Hand in Glove. Few people would deny the homoeroticism inherent in that image, but why is that? It has to do with the way the male body is presented as an object of desire, something to be looked at, objectified in a manner much more typically associated with media representations of women. We are socialized to view the subject in a sexualized way. Feminists would call this a product of the "male gaze," or perhaps more accurately where this photo is concerned, a subversion of it. If the majority of images in films, television programs, advertisements etc. that we're bombarded with are ostensibly created for the attention and benefit of men, when a man is depicted as an object to be looked at, then the image becomes suspect and the homoerotic connotation becomes apparent, if only on a subconscious level.

The Fitzgerald photo is less obviously homoerotic than the Hand in Glove sleeve, but can easily and understandably be read as such. The homosocial interaction, the way the young men are posed--especially the shirtless kid with his rugged masculinity on display, almost looking at the camera but not quite, drawing the viewer in.






Can you please define homoeroticism? Morrissey was asked in an Australian interview in 1985 to explain a piece that was written on him in Rolling Stone in regards to him being gay. He said he was never asked if he was gay and he attributes it to wishful thinking on behalf of the interviewer. "That person said I was gay. He never asked me. He never approached the subject. I think it was wishful thinking on his part. People see what they want to see." I quote the interview because as far as 'homoeroticism' I truly think it is what you want to see.
 
Re: Article: Morrissey has compiled the track-listing and chosen the sleeve for "Best of the Ramones

I think Morrissey's choice of pic is a nice display of irony. If anyone thinks the Ramones are macho, I don't know what to tell you.
 

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