The Ramones Discography: Part 10 : Halfway To Sanity

On the Ramones tenth album, they make a slight return to form. Whereas Animal Boy was a rougher and more raw release, Halfway To Sanity cleans up things a bit and actually hearkens back to the band's eighth studio effort, Too Tough To Die.  And that is a great thing to hear, since a lot of Animal Boy just sounded so stale to me, or was slathered in so many synths, it was really hard to get excited about what was happening on any given track. Luckily, Halfway To Sanity doesn't suffer from nearly as many weak moments as its predecessor, and while it isn't an overall great Ramones album. it is solid.

The album opens with perhaps its best moment, the anthemic "I Wanna Live" and is followed up by a decent little punk tune called "Bop til' You Drop". However, aside from some great standout moments like the moody "Garden Of Serenity" and the endearing "A Real Cool Time", Halfway To Sanity suffers from a lot of filler. tracks like "Weasel Face" and "I'm Not Jesus" are instantly forgettable and don't hold a candle to any of the more aggressive tracks that were on Too Tough To Die or even Subterranean Jungle. Also, while I think "Go Lil Camaro Go" is a 'cute' song, this kind of track just feels out of place on a latter day, post Too Tough To Die Ramones album; especially when you consider the weighty subjects on both that album and even Animal Boy to some extent.

At this point in the band's career, pretty much every band member hated each other, and the band's followup to this album would prove to be the breaking point and would see the departure of the band's main creative force, Dee Dee Ramone. Even this album waves goodbye to then drummer Richie Ramone, who held things down for the better part of the decade, despite never earning the respect that very much deserved.

Anyway, drama aside, Halfway To Sanity marks another okay, but not great album in the Ramones discography, and according to most other review sites, this is the lowest point in the band's career. Although those same sources said Animal Boy was just short of great... so we shall see!

6.8/10