Dee Dee Ramone

Douglas Glenn Colvin (September 18, 1951 – June 5, 2002), better known by his stage name Dee Dee Ramone, was an American musician.

He was the bassist and a founding member of the punk rock band the Ramones.

Douglas Glenn Colvin was born on September 18, 1951, in Fort Lee, Virginia.

He was the son of an American soldier and a German woman.

As an infant, his family relocated to West Berlin, West Germany, due to his father's military service.

His father's military career also required the family to relocate frequently.

As a result of these frequent moves, Douglas had a lonely childhood with few real friends.

His parents separated during his early teens and he remained in Berlin until the age of 15 when he, along with his mother and sister Beverley, moved to Forest Hills, Queens, New York, in order to escape Dee Dee's alcoholic father.

There, he met John Cummings and Thomas Erdelyi (later dubbed Johnny and Tommy Ramone), then playing in a band called the Tangerine Puppets, named after a Donovan song.

Bassist Monty Colvin from the progressive metal band Galactic Cowboys is one of Dee Dee's cousins.

Colvin, later Dee Dee, and Cummings, later Johnny, quickly became friends, as they were both social outcasts in their middle-class neighborhood.

Throughout the band's existence, he was the most prolific lyricist and composer, writing many of their best-known songs, such as "53rd & 3rd", "Chinese Rock", "Commando", "Wart Hog", "Rockaway Beach", "Poison Heart" and "Bonzo Goes To Bitburg" (also known as "My Brain Is Hanging Upside Down").

In the early 1970s, Dee Dee worked at The Bureau of Advertising, located at 485 Lexington Ave., Manhattan, NYC.

Later renamed The Newspaper Advertising Bureau, the agency promoted newspapers as the best media source for advertising.

Dee Dee was a printer's helper for about one year in the company's small in-house print shop.

Because of his creative abilities he would hang out, when he could, with the graphic designers in the company's art department.

In 1973, Colvin became friends with Arturo Vega, a Mexican artist who had relocated to New York City and would become a close associate of the Ramones for the duration of their existence.

Officially dubbed their artistic director, Vega designed their famous logo, oversaw stage lighting and had other duties as needed.

He was then the band's bassist and songwriter from 1974 until 1989, when he left to pursue a short-lived career in hip hop music under the name Dee Dee King.

He soon returned to his punk roots and released three solo albums featuring brand-new songs, many of which were later recorded by the Ramones.

After an unsuccessful guitar audition for Television, Johnny convinced Dee Dee to form their own band with then-drummer Jeffrey Hyman, later Joey Ramone, in 1974.

Joey took over vocal duties after Dee Dee decided that he could not sing lead vocals for longer than a few songs as his voice shredded.

Dee Dee would continue, however, to count off each song's tempo with his signature rapid-fire shout of "1-2-3-4!"

It was Dee Dee who first suggested naming the band the Ramones, after reading that Paul McCartney often signed into hotels under the alias "Paul Ramon".

He added an 'e' to the end of that surname and the band members all agreed to adopt the surname "Ramone" as a means of conveying their unity.

The Ramones played before an audience for the first time on March 30, 1974, at Performance Studios.

The band's debut album, Ramones, was greeted positively by rock critics.

The album was not a commercial success, reaching only number 111 on the Billboard album chart.

Their next two albums, Leave Home and Rocket to Russia, were released in 1977.

Rocket to Russia was the band's highest-charting album to date, reaching number 49 on the Billboard 200.

In 1978, the band released their fourth studio album, Road to Ruin.

It failed to reach the Billboard Top 100.

However, "I Wanna Be Sedated", which appeared both on the album and as a single, would become one of the band's best-known songs.

The artwork on the album's cover was done by Punk magazine cofounder John Holmstrom.

The latter won the New York Music Award for best independent single of the year in 1986, while Animal Boy, which the song is from, won for best album.

Dee Dee was the band's lead vocalist until original drummer Joey Ramone took over lead vocalist duties.

He toured the world playing his new songs, Ramones songs and some old favorites in small clubs, and continued to write songs for the Ramones until 1996, when the band retired.

Dee Dee was addicted to drugs, particularly heroin, for much of his life.

He began using drugs as a teenager and continued to use for the majority of his adult life.

He died from a heroin overdose on June 5, 2002, at the age of 50.