Long live rock.
Showing posts with label Chuck Berry. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Chuck Berry. Show all posts
Monday, March 20, 2017
Johnny B. Goode
This is one of the greatest, most apropos covers I've ever seen, up there with Springsteen covering Dylan and R.E.M. covering CCR, from the trademark Green Day energy and sound to the oddly appropriate lackluster approach to the lyrics.
Long live rock.
Long live rock.
Saturday, March 18, 2017
RIP Chuck Berry
"If you tried to give rock-n-roll another name, you might call it 'Chuck Berry.'"—John Lennon
Chuck Berry is gone. He died today at the age of 90.
In a musical genre where old age is much more wishful thinking that anything based remotely in reality, Chuck beat the odds and fooled 'em all, like he always did. He outlived basically everyone who came up with him in the early days of rock-n-roll and so damn many who came up under his influence. 90 years in rock-n-roll is an ice age, and era, so much more than a lifetime. And still it hurts so much that he's gone. Gone too soon. RIP Charles Edward Anderson Berry. And damn.
It's hard to say that Chuck Berry invented rock-n-roll, because so many people played a part in this magical and in many ways still indescribable invention that we now call rock-n-roll. Did Chuck invent it? Did Elvis Presley? Did Roy Brown and Louis Jordan and Big Joe Turner? Did Hank Williams? Did Ike Turner? Did Jerry Lee Lewis? Hell, did the amazing Big Mama Thornton?
Yes to all. And no to all. Rock-n-roll emerged from the lava, from the magma. Thanks to giants like all of those mentioned above and others. Thanks to people with the talent, the vision and, yes, the balls of Chuck Berry.
Here's what we know. If Chuck Berry didn't invent rock-n-roll—and I am not contending he did (see above paragraph)—he sure as hell refined it. He did what Miles Davis did to jazz. What Marvin Gaye did to soul. What Johnny Cash did to the American songbook and what Michael Jackson did to pop. He wasn't the first, but it's really hard to argue that anyone did it better. And in Chuck's case, that anyone did it better for longer.
Here is what I will say tonight, while mourning a man I never met (I saw him in concert once in the late 1980s, something I now am just so damn grateful for) but have listened to devoutly and worshipped since I was just a young white boy in Catholic high school 30+ years ago.
Chuck Berry invented rock-n-roll guitar.
Chuck Berry invented rock-n-roll songwriting.
Chuck Berry invented rock-n-roll as therapy for the twisted, haunted soul.
And Chuck Berry invented a sound. A sound so unique, so whole, so complete and so overpowering that the only way to describe it is "the Chuck Berry Sound."
What Chuck Berry did was he took everything his brilliant ears and body ingested and made it into something more. The blues and doo-wop and boogie woogie and jazz and country and gospel and the sweetest soul sounds you ever heard. And he took them all and he added those elements that only he had, those tortured and lovely and brutal things lurking inside his brain, and he strapped on his Gibson guitar and he mixed them all together in a musical jambalaya that no one had ever tasted before, and he hooked us in one bite. From the opening, ear-splitting strains of "Maybelline" on through, he fed us rock-n-roll like no one had ever heard or imagined before. And in doing so he foretold so much of what was to come. From the Beatles and Rolling Stones who worshiped him to Jimi Hendrix who bled him, from Stevie Wonder who channeled him in unimaginable sensory ways to Chuck D. and the forerunners and geniuses of rap and hip-hop who used his streetwise tales and too-cool-for-school skat-a-tat lingo to blaze their own trails, Chuck Berry saw it all. Maybe he's not the father of rock-n-roll (or maybe he is). But to me, anyway, he is more. He's the father of the 20th century sound. And beyond.
As an equal parts musical fanatic and sports fanatic, the best comparison I could always make to Chuck Berry was Magic Johnson. Outsized and overbearing, playing the same old game in a way we never imagined it could be played. To picture Magic is to picture Chuck—the effervescent smile and devilish gleam in their eyes, always one step ahead of everyone else, seeming to make it up as they go but always in such dynamic and rhythmic control, 1,000 different ways to wow us waiting at their fingertips. And at the end, a wink. And a promise of more to come. Magic Johnson leading the fast break and firing a no-look pass was the first cousin to Chuck Berry's duck-walking across the stage and stretching it all out in the spirit of unbridled musical ebullience.
The songs explain it all far better than I ever could. The sheer fun of "Too Much Monkey Business." The epic travelogue of "The Promised Land." The torrential sadness of "Memphis." The very raison d'etre of rock-n-roll stardom that was "Johnny B. Goode." The statement of purpose(s) of "Roll Over Beethoven" and "Rock-n-Roll Music." The rumbling fever of "Downbound Train." The rebellion of "School Days." The outright glory gush of "Back in the USA." The aching of "Carol" and "Nadine." The youthful joyride of "You Never Can Tell." The naughty wink of "My Ding A Ling." On the tale rocks, on the train rolls. Take those Chuck Berry creations and dozens of others and put them under glass. Paint them in oils. Preserve them in amber. Their likes we will never see again. And that we did get to see and hear them, for 60+ years, makes us so lucky. So damn lucky.
Hail, hail rock-n-roll, Mr. Berry. Thanks to you our hearts are beatin' rhythm and our souls will always, always be singin' the blues.
Chuck Berry is gone. He died today at the age of 90.
In a musical genre where old age is much more wishful thinking that anything based remotely in reality, Chuck beat the odds and fooled 'em all, like he always did. He outlived basically everyone who came up with him in the early days of rock-n-roll and so damn many who came up under his influence. 90 years in rock-n-roll is an ice age, and era, so much more than a lifetime. And still it hurts so much that he's gone. Gone too soon. RIP Charles Edward Anderson Berry. And damn.
It's hard to say that Chuck Berry invented rock-n-roll, because so many people played a part in this magical and in many ways still indescribable invention that we now call rock-n-roll. Did Chuck invent it? Did Elvis Presley? Did Roy Brown and Louis Jordan and Big Joe Turner? Did Hank Williams? Did Ike Turner? Did Jerry Lee Lewis? Hell, did the amazing Big Mama Thornton?
Yes to all. And no to all. Rock-n-roll emerged from the lava, from the magma. Thanks to giants like all of those mentioned above and others. Thanks to people with the talent, the vision and, yes, the balls of Chuck Berry.
Here's what we know. If Chuck Berry didn't invent rock-n-roll—and I am not contending he did (see above paragraph)—he sure as hell refined it. He did what Miles Davis did to jazz. What Marvin Gaye did to soul. What Johnny Cash did to the American songbook and what Michael Jackson did to pop. He wasn't the first, but it's really hard to argue that anyone did it better. And in Chuck's case, that anyone did it better for longer.
Here is what I will say tonight, while mourning a man I never met (I saw him in concert once in the late 1980s, something I now am just so damn grateful for) but have listened to devoutly and worshipped since I was just a young white boy in Catholic high school 30+ years ago.
Chuck Berry invented rock-n-roll guitar.
Chuck Berry invented rock-n-roll songwriting.
Chuck Berry invented rock-n-roll as therapy for the twisted, haunted soul.
And Chuck Berry invented a sound. A sound so unique, so whole, so complete and so overpowering that the only way to describe it is "the Chuck Berry Sound."
What Chuck Berry did was he took everything his brilliant ears and body ingested and made it into something more. The blues and doo-wop and boogie woogie and jazz and country and gospel and the sweetest soul sounds you ever heard. And he took them all and he added those elements that only he had, those tortured and lovely and brutal things lurking inside his brain, and he strapped on his Gibson guitar and he mixed them all together in a musical jambalaya that no one had ever tasted before, and he hooked us in one bite. From the opening, ear-splitting strains of "Maybelline" on through, he fed us rock-n-roll like no one had ever heard or imagined before. And in doing so he foretold so much of what was to come. From the Beatles and Rolling Stones who worshiped him to Jimi Hendrix who bled him, from Stevie Wonder who channeled him in unimaginable sensory ways to Chuck D. and the forerunners and geniuses of rap and hip-hop who used his streetwise tales and too-cool-for-school skat-a-tat lingo to blaze their own trails, Chuck Berry saw it all. Maybe he's not the father of rock-n-roll (or maybe he is). But to me, anyway, he is more. He's the father of the 20th century sound. And beyond.
As an equal parts musical fanatic and sports fanatic, the best comparison I could always make to Chuck Berry was Magic Johnson. Outsized and overbearing, playing the same old game in a way we never imagined it could be played. To picture Magic is to picture Chuck—the effervescent smile and devilish gleam in their eyes, always one step ahead of everyone else, seeming to make it up as they go but always in such dynamic and rhythmic control, 1,000 different ways to wow us waiting at their fingertips. And at the end, a wink. And a promise of more to come. Magic Johnson leading the fast break and firing a no-look pass was the first cousin to Chuck Berry's duck-walking across the stage and stretching it all out in the spirit of unbridled musical ebullience.
The songs explain it all far better than I ever could. The sheer fun of "Too Much Monkey Business." The epic travelogue of "The Promised Land." The torrential sadness of "Memphis." The very raison d'etre of rock-n-roll stardom that was "Johnny B. Goode." The statement of purpose(s) of "Roll Over Beethoven" and "Rock-n-Roll Music." The rumbling fever of "Downbound Train." The rebellion of "School Days." The outright glory gush of "Back in the USA." The aching of "Carol" and "Nadine." The youthful joyride of "You Never Can Tell." The naughty wink of "My Ding A Ling." On the tale rocks, on the train rolls. Take those Chuck Berry creations and dozens of others and put them under glass. Paint them in oils. Preserve them in amber. Their likes we will never see again. And that we did get to see and hear them, for 60+ years, makes us so lucky. So damn lucky.
Hail, hail rock-n-roll, Mr. Berry. Thanks to you our hearts are beatin' rhythm and our souls will always, always be singin' the blues.
Thursday, December 11, 2014
You Never Can Tell
Once upon a time, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band were one of the great bar bands of all time—only the Beatles were clearly better (although The Band themselves, back in their gin mill days, when they were known as The Hawks, might very well have given both a run for their money, but as far as I can tell, few if any recordings from those days have survived). In the 1970s, Springsteen would pepper his shows with covers, even after he had three or four or even five albums out, so it clearly wasn't for want of material. And his choice of covers tended towards the unusual: rather than obvious crowd-pleasers like the Beatles or the Rolling Stones or the Who, Springsteen tended towards 1950s early rock, like Chuck Berry, Buddy Holly or Elvis, or 1960s frat rock, such as "Double Shot (Of My Baby's Love)" by The Swingin' Medallions or proto-soul like "Cupid" or raucous pop such as "Do You Love Me" by The Contours.
He continued adding covers to his concerts for the rest of his career, many of which—his transformation of Jimmy Cliff's "Trapped," for instance, or his cover of The Byrds' cover of Bob Dylan's "The Chimes of Freedom"—were transcendent. But he tended to add fewer covers as the years went on, and he had more and more original material to sift through. So for a long time, covers tended to be many of the same early rock songs he'd first covered in the 1970s, and largely relegated to the encores.
But a few years back, Springsteen started a new feature called "Stump the Band," where audience members could bring signs with requests. Springsteen would grab a half dozen or so, shuffle them around, maybe consult with Steve Van Zandt, and then play a couple. The results were almost uniformly well-done—no surprise, given the level of talent and experience on stage—and the entire thing was a lot of fun.
But every once in a while, it was more than that. This July 2013 concert in Leipzig, for instance. He and Steve try to figure out a good key for it—they never do seem to quite agree—and then Springsteen gives the horn section a rough arrangement, which they pick up on remarkably rapidly; impressive in any context, but in front of 75,000 or so fans? Insanity. The look in the eyes of the horn section as he's giving them their cues seem to indicate they're aware of the pressure.
Meanwhile, the casualness of Springsteen as he runs through a brief semi-rehearsal and then just kicks into the thing is slightly surreal. This is a guy who's very comfortable being one of the largest rock stars in the world for 35 years. The open rehearsal just suddenly ends with a "are you ready band? Here we go!" and boom. They're off to the races and, rock and roll veterans or no, you'd swear they'd practiced the damn thing dozens of times.
It's a first-rate cover, with lots and lots of room for each member of the horn section, and the redoubtable Professor Roy Bittan to let loose—in fact, one of the biggest "are you kidding me?" moments comes at the end of the very first line, when the professor kicks in with some amazing piano riffing, followed moments later by Nils on some smooth slide guitar (balanced later by some stinging leads courtesy of Steve).
But as Springsteen biographer Peter Ames Carlin pointed out, one of the very coolest bits of the entire experience comes towards the very end, when Bruce holds up four fingers, indicating they should all go to the IV chord, rather than the expected I, a slightly usual move harmonically. Not surprisingly, there doesn't seem to be a single misstep.
And you can tell Springsteen's feelin' the spirit. They've been going for eight minutes, but he's not done. After a remarkably successful outing, he decides to go one more round, and yells at everyone to kick back in. Which they do, perfectly. Another quick run and they're out, for good this time.
It all seems so effortless, which it is, if you're blessed with mind-boggling levels of talent, superhuman drive, and put in tens of thousands of hours of practice. Perhaps the only sign that it's not quite as easy as it seems, are the pit stains on Springsteen's shirt, although calling them that is deceptive, as by the end, his shoulders, ribs and a third of pectorals are also soaking wet. The price you pay.
He continued adding covers to his concerts for the rest of his career, many of which—his transformation of Jimmy Cliff's "Trapped," for instance, or his cover of The Byrds' cover of Bob Dylan's "The Chimes of Freedom"—were transcendent. But he tended to add fewer covers as the years went on, and he had more and more original material to sift through. So for a long time, covers tended to be many of the same early rock songs he'd first covered in the 1970s, and largely relegated to the encores.
But a few years back, Springsteen started a new feature called "Stump the Band," where audience members could bring signs with requests. Springsteen would grab a half dozen or so, shuffle them around, maybe consult with Steve Van Zandt, and then play a couple. The results were almost uniformly well-done—no surprise, given the level of talent and experience on stage—and the entire thing was a lot of fun.
But every once in a while, it was more than that. This July 2013 concert in Leipzig, for instance. He and Steve try to figure out a good key for it—they never do seem to quite agree—and then Springsteen gives the horn section a rough arrangement, which they pick up on remarkably rapidly; impressive in any context, but in front of 75,000 or so fans? Insanity. The look in the eyes of the horn section as he's giving them their cues seem to indicate they're aware of the pressure.
Meanwhile, the casualness of Springsteen as he runs through a brief semi-rehearsal and then just kicks into the thing is slightly surreal. This is a guy who's very comfortable being one of the largest rock stars in the world for 35 years. The open rehearsal just suddenly ends with a "are you ready band? Here we go!" and boom. They're off to the races and, rock and roll veterans or no, you'd swear they'd practiced the damn thing dozens of times.
It's a first-rate cover, with lots and lots of room for each member of the horn section, and the redoubtable Professor Roy Bittan to let loose—in fact, one of the biggest "are you kidding me?" moments comes at the end of the very first line, when the professor kicks in with some amazing piano riffing, followed moments later by Nils on some smooth slide guitar (balanced later by some stinging leads courtesy of Steve).
But as Springsteen biographer Peter Ames Carlin pointed out, one of the very coolest bits of the entire experience comes towards the very end, when Bruce holds up four fingers, indicating they should all go to the IV chord, rather than the expected I, a slightly usual move harmonically. Not surprisingly, there doesn't seem to be a single misstep.
And you can tell Springsteen's feelin' the spirit. They've been going for eight minutes, but he's not done. After a remarkably successful outing, he decides to go one more round, and yells at everyone to kick back in. Which they do, perfectly. Another quick run and they're out, for good this time.
It all seems so effortless, which it is, if you're blessed with mind-boggling levels of talent, superhuman drive, and put in tens of thousands of hours of practice. Perhaps the only sign that it's not quite as easy as it seems, are the pit stains on Springsteen's shirt, although calling them that is deceptive, as by the end, his shoulders, ribs and a third of pectorals are also soaking wet. The price you pay.
Wednesday, May 21, 2014
Maybellene
Happy Birthday, Maybellene! You're 59 years old today.
And just like on May 21, 1955 when the great Chuck Berry birthed you, we're all still wondering, "Why cain't you be true?"
Few have had, or ever will have, more of an impact on this great expansive world we call rock-n-roll as Charles Edward Anderson Berry. From his signature guitar riffs to his coolest-guy-in-the-room terminology to his uncanny ability to blend rhythm and melody into something so thoroughly irresistible, Chuck has duck-walked his way through history as the living, breathing embodiment of the genre, and in doing so has put his stamp not only on rock but on country, funk, dance and even rap. And today, at 87 years old being one of the few seminal rockers to make it to old age, Chuck Berry continues to, in his own inimitable lingo, "motorvate" along.
And it all started in earnest today, 59 years ago in a studio in Chicago, when after inking his epochal deal with Chess Records he introduced us to "Maybellene," that Cadillac-riding trollop who loved driving fast and stepping out on her man, only to be caught, again and again, at "the top of the hill."
Let's fall in love with her all over again, from the very beginning when that jagged, distorted guitar sets the pace.
And then remember what Rolling Stone magazine said of Chuck's brilliant opening shot at history: "Rock-n-roll guitar starts here."
And just like on May 21, 1955 when the great Chuck Berry birthed you, we're all still wondering, "Why cain't you be true?"
And it all started in earnest today, 59 years ago in a studio in Chicago, when after inking his epochal deal with Chess Records he introduced us to "Maybellene," that Cadillac-riding trollop who loved driving fast and stepping out on her man, only to be caught, again and again, at "the top of the hill."
Let's fall in love with her all over again, from the very beginning when that jagged, distorted guitar sets the pace.
And then remember what Rolling Stone magazine said of Chuck's brilliant opening shot at history: "Rock-n-roll guitar starts here."
Saturday, March 1, 2014
Memphis, Tennessee
I can't say this is the best Chuck Berry tune, but it may just be my favorite. And it really is a masterpiece of narrative lyric writing. John Cale's version is more than a little ominous. Whereas Berry's—and most covers—slowly reveal the sad and all too common heartbreak at the core, Cale's arrangement and delivery seem to imply there might just be a good reason they've been separated, and it's not just spite on the part of his ex. Scary, amazing stuff.
[H/T: the great Cover Me Songs.]
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