jon langford

Hear Dennis and Lois...

REMEMBER their early Ramones fanhood.

DESCRIBE Joey Ramone's apartment and his sneakers.

TALK about Joey's inconvenient rituals.

GIVE a memoribilia tour of their home.

EXPLAIN why Lois is the Betsy Ross of early punk.

MAP OUT the web of their connections to the bands The Doves, The Happy Mondays, and the Ramones.

Some people listen to punk rock, some people play punk rock and some people ARE punk rock. Dennis and Lois, while not musicians themselves, have been literally following punk rock since its inception. They sold t-shirts for the Ramones and the Mekons and just about everyone in between.

Dennis and Lois are currently on the road in the U.S. selling t-shirts for the Manchester, England band The Doves. The Doves lead singer, Jimi Goodwin, appreciated the couple's punk rock pedigree early on. When he was a kid, he met the superfans when his dad took him to a Ramones concert and tried to buy him a t-shirt. When they couldn't find one small enough, Lois offered to take the impressionable future punker backstage to meet Joey Ramone instead.

The rest, as they say, is history.

Dennis and Lois may look like kindly grandparents on their way to tour the Grand Canyon (and they are kindly) but they’re fiercely devoted to punk rock then and now. Their Bensonhurst apartment reflects their passions. Crammed full of memorabilia and paraphernalia, it contains the sights and smells of 25 years (and counting) of punk rock.

Contents Copyright 2001, National Public Radio