Animal Boy Addendum

Extras

The Animal Boy CD is the same as the vinyl therefore no extra material. As I wrote in an earlier entry, Johnny Ramone was behind all the Expanded Edition releases. While going over the band's later works, Johnny realized that there wasn't much extra material to be added since they refused to make demos for the executives to choose from by this point in their careers. The only b-sides that I know about are "Go Home Ann", the B-Side for "Bonzo Goes to Bitburg" produced by Lemmy (of Motorhead fame and a longtime friend and supporter of the band) and "Can't Say Anything Nice", a Richie Ramone sung track that was a b-side to "Somebody Put Something in My Drink"



"Go Home Ann" is an atypical song lyrics-wise as it's about a girl who slept with one of the band members and refuses to leave the premises after the band member asks her to. While there have been tracks like "Glad to See You Go" and "You're Gonna Kill That Girl", the band rarely turned the romance songs to the opposite direction as this song does. The closest song that compares to this is probably "Don't Bust My Chops". Musically, it has a sad, eerie mood to it that borders on their creepier tracks like "Garden of Serenity".


The second B-Side, "Can't Say Anything Nice", is rare in that RICHIE RAMONE SINGS! If it wasn't for this blog, I would have never known about this track and others where he had sung. Holy crap does he sound more like a punk kid than Joey or Dee Dee. For what it's worth, I like his vocals more than Dee Dee's but he's a different singer compared to Joey. The lyrics are about leaving a hateful relationship with some girl who is described to be an animal. (Youtube users think it's about a band member or the band in general). Music-wise, the riff is similar to "Hair of the Dog", except the the last few notes change a bit. It's also out of the norm for the group, but an interesting bit of history nonetheless.

I don't know why these songs are not easily available for purchase, but problems with Richie may the the reason why "Can't Say Anything Nice" won't be released anytime soon. As for "Go Home Ann", it's probably a contract issue, laziness, or a presumed lack of interest in the track.



Album Length  

All time references are based on my iTunes tracklist.


Length - 39.2 minutes
# of Tracks - 12
Shortest Track: "Freak of Nature" - 1:34 
Longest Track: "Something to Believe In" - 4:07

No "Blitzkrieg Bop" on this album.

Before I end this post, I should point out one thing. This album marks a brief return to the short songs the band used to play. Three songs are under two minutes ("Animal Boy", "Eat That Rat", and "Freak of Nature"), but "Animal Boy" is the only track of those three that feels as if it was completed. "Eat That Rat" and "Freak of Nature" both come off as fragments and not as well-written as the short songs found on the earlier albums. It's not completely fair to compare "Now I Wanna Sniff Some Glue" to any of these three as the band had changed the way they write and played since that era, but the difference in quality is apparent. They had a longer song mentality and the days of minimal lyrics and fast playing were relegated to their live shows.