I had the good or bad fortune of living near the Chelsea hotel in the mid and late 90s and would see Dee Dee fairly often.

He was a regular at the Chelsea guitars usually trying to hawk or buy back one of his basses for dope money.

I talked to him a few times and wish i didnt.

Eh.. it was just sad.

He was just being whatever people thought he was.... trying to live up to whatever image and being a fuck up.

I think their racket was they would sell his “bass he played with Ramones” for crazy money and hope some tourist would buy it.

If they did sell it they would magically have another “bass he played with the Ramones” for sale next day. I went in there probably 100 times and they always had something of his for sale which is odd since he was obviously broke and didnt own 30 basses.

He could never remember my name but he knew my band so he called me by my bands name… one of those people you talk to but they aren’t really there.

The Ramones are what they are... for most people they are a t-shirt.

To be a dick we used to go up to people in NYC wearing a Ramones shirt and ask them to name 5 Ramones songs, normally they didnt know any.

I wasnt really trying to harp on the junkie thing more the trying to live up to an image.

Ramones like CBGB became a T shirt at some point and 100% image.... they became a symbol not a band.

Their records didnt sell but they did sell millions upon millions of t shirts all over the world... even Justin Beiber has one Im sure.

He was one of those people that would turn on the Dee Dee act depending on who was around. Thats the part that was sad.

Fat Mike is the worst with this... normal kinda quiet guy but get them in a room with 10 people who "know who they are" and boom its a song and dance clown show.