It’s just a sad fact that there aren’t enough punk songs about reanimated cats. Surely the most famous of these is “Pet Sematary” by the Ramones. The song was is the title song for the film adaptation of Stephen King’s “Pet Sematary”, which completes the rare trifecta of being an awesome book, awesome movie, and awesome song. Seriously, go read the book. Then see the movie, if only for Herman Munster as a crotchety old man. Then listen to the song. Oh, the song….
UltimateClassRock has a great article on how nobody’s sure when or how this song came about. King is happy to let whatever story is most interesting be “the truth”, so that’s fine with me. The video features the Ramones walking through a graveyard slowly (as most 70s punks did at the time), then encountering the pet cemetery and performing in the grave as they slowly are lowered down. Meanwhile a bunch of people dance and there’s cats and kids and Blondie for some reason. Looks like a good time.
The song itself is a mid-tempo rocker about, vaguely, the events in the book. The chorus is kinda bleak when you really listen to it – “I don’t want to be buried in Pet Sematary / I don’t want to live my life again“. Sort of the opposite of people wanting to become vampires.
What’s crazy is as hugely influential as their late 70s output is, this (in 1989) was technically their biggest hit. Also crazy is during the writing of the song, Dee Dee Ramone quit the band to become a rapper. Not joking.

Either way, crank it up, dance with a dead cat, have a good time. There’s a great article on Tidal that goes way more into the song than I will.
