Judy Is a Punk

Judy Is a Punk is a song by the American punk rock band Ramones, released on their 1976 debut album. It is the album's shortest song, being one minute and 32 seconds,^[1] and gained further notoriety for its use in a montage scene in The Royal Tenenbaums and its inclusion on the film’s soundtrack.

Composition[]

Judy Is a Punk was written around the same time as "Beat on the Brat". Joey had explained that the first line came about after he walked by Thorny Croft, an apartment building that Joey said was "where all the kids in the neighborhood hung out on the rooftop and drank." The second line came about after walking down a different street.^[2] The lyrics refer to two juvenile offenders in Berlin and San Francisco and their possible deaths at the conclusion of the song;^[2] the first/second verse has the protagonists Jackie and Judy joining the Ice Capades, and the third verse, the SLA. Despite the song's title, the lyrics proclaim "Jackie is a punk, Judy is a runt."

The line "Second verse/same as the first" is a reference to Herman's Hermits' rendition of "I'm Henery the Eighth, I Am".^[3]

The line “Oh I don’t know why...perhaps they’ll die” is a reference to Burl Ives’ 1953 folk song, “There Was An Old Lady Who Swallowed A Fly”.

Demo versions[]

In 1975, "Judy Is a Punk" was recorded at 914 Studios in New York by Marty Thau. One version of this demo, along with a demo of "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend" that was recorded at the same time, was originally released in 1991 on The Groups Of Wrath: Songs Of The Naked City. The same two songs were later released as a 7" on Norton Records in 1997, and then on the remastered and expanded version of Ramones in 2001.

In 2016, for Record Store Day, Norton Records released another 7", this time featuring two different 'lost versions' of "Judy Is a Punk" from the same 1975 session.

References[]

External links[]

• Lyrics of this song at MetroLyrics