Music: Don't Worry About Me

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Whatever praise New York City's Ramones deserved for more or less inventing punk rock, they could never be accused of versatility. The band found its groove--fast, heavy, black-humored three-chord assaults--and luxuriated in it for almost a quarter century. But before his death last year, the singer, Joey, got relatively experimental on his first and last solo album. Relatively is the key word here: he fits five, sometimes six chords into a single song, and (gasp) evinces a heartfelt concern for social issues. But the first track, a cover of What a Wonderful World, makes up for the general dearth of originality by wedding Joey's affectless vocal style and kick-butt guitar arrangements with Tin Pan Alley poetry and tunefulness. It's proof his comic instinct and exuberance stuck with him to the end.

--By Benjamin Nugent