You Ain

You Ain't Never Caught A Rabbit: Rock and Roll's second stringers

We all know rock’s early heroes by heart: Elvis, Chuck, Richard, Buddy, Fats, Phil & Don, Jerry Lee. There were many others of equal importance in terms of shaping the new idiom and advancing it as art. That they didn’t always get their due from the public at

least is clear, but the influence of their work would certainly leave its mark on those who followed. To paraphrase Willie Dixon, the fans don’t know but the musicians understand.

1) LaVern Baker – The former Delores Williams accepted her musical gifts as her birthright, being the niece of blues belter Memphis Minnie (co-writer of the apocalyptic “When The Levee Breaks”, famously rendered by Led Zeppelin.) After apprenticing as a gospel singer in her teens, she was spotted by big band arranger Fletcher Henderson, who dubbed her “Little Miss Sharecropper” when he scored her a recording deal. (He must

have meant it in a good way.) Her brassy vocals and dynamic stage act made her a natural for success, and in 1953, this R&B spitfire found vision and muscle to support her chops when Ahmet Ertegun signed her to his hit-making Atlantic label. Their collaboration paid off in 1955 when “Tweedlee Dee” became a million seller. It also sparked considerable controversy when Miss Baker, outraged by the whitebread note-for-note cover by pop crooner Georgia Gibbs, filed suit for damages.

Until the late fifties, strict segregation wasn’t just for drinking fountains and lunch counters: it spilled over into the music charts, too. White singers were played on white radio stations with success measured in the Pop (short for “popular”) charts. Black performers were by and large only measured by R&B charts, begun in the late forties (as a considerable improvement over their former characterization, “race” music). To achieve real success, a song either “crossed over”, i.e. sold so well that the pop stations couldn’t ignore it; or the song was “covered” by a white performer, making it safe for airplay on the powerhouse white-controlled airwaves. More often than not, a white singer simply introduced the song to white America, secure in the knowledge that most of the country would never hear the original. In some cases, entire careers had been built on this whitewashing of outstanding R&B recordings. Miss Gibbs specialized in this, being canny enough to lift her arrangements verbatim from the source. For LaVern, this was

stealing, pure and simple, and she demanded justice, going so far as to petition her congressman. It went all for naught, but the noise she generated drew attention her way (and may also have embarrassed the white singers enough to ease up). She would go on to further success with “Jim Dandy”, “See See Rider”, and “I Cried A Tear” before her heyday ended.

2) Hank Ballard – The Royals were a Detroit-based vocal group, specializing in smooth, Orioles-like ballads. Bandleader Johnny Otis discovered them in 1952 and signed the group to a recording deal, but to little success. Original singers Henry Booth and Charles Sutton soon departed, ceding the vocal chores to one Hank Ballard (born John Kendricks), who was either sixteen or twenty five at the time, depending on who you believe. His approach to singing was altogether different – rough, raunchy, and redolent. His first effort with the Royals, “Get It”, quickly charted, reaching number eight in the R&B market in 1953. Their follow-up would assure his place in rock history.

Entering the studios in January 1954 with a ditty entitled “Sock It To Me, Mary”, he was told in no uncertain terms that the material was just too much to expect any consideration for airplay, even in a market that was steeped in suggestive songs. Recording engineer Eddie Smith’s pregnant wife Annie happened to be in the studio as an undeterred Ballard re-thought his lyrics. By the time he was finished, “Sock It To Me, Mary” had become “Work With Me, Annie”, a marvelously raw piece of work which would be branded “smut” by Variety. Upon its release, the Royals changed their name to the Midnighters (to avoid confusion with a similarly named outfit) and watched as the banned release went on to become a million seller. Follow-ups came in its wake, including “Annie Had A Baby” and “Annie’s Aunt Fanny”, all cut from the same cloth. Enhancing the original’s reputation as a trailblazer was the spate of “reply” songs it inspired, chief and best among them being Etta James’ “The Wallflower (Roll With Me, Henry”), sanitized

for white audience’s protection by the ever reliable Georgia Gibbs (Dance With Me, Henry). Annie became a phenomenon - even Buddy Holly chimed in with a response entitled “Midnight Shift”. Replies from lesser luminaries included “Annie Pulled A Humbug”, “My Name Ain’t Annie”, “Annie’s Answer”, and with finality, “Annie Kicked The Bucket”. Ballard would do likewise in 2003, at the age of sixty-seven (or seventy-five).

3) The Big Bopper – Born Jiles Perry Richardson (a name he despised), there was more to this larger than life performer than simply a one-off novelty number and a tragic death. J.P. was a disc jockey by trade in his native Beaumont, Texas. At KTRM, he hosted a popular evening show as the “Big Bopper”, setting an on-air record in May of 1957 for continuous broadcasting. (Stretching out for six days and over 1,800 sides spun, he lost

thirty-five pounds in the process.) Success on one end of the business didn’t preclude the other, for Richardson was a prolific songwriter as well. A promising singer named Johnny Preston would score a number one with Richardson’s “Running Bear” in 1960. Assisting J.P. with backing vocals on the aforementioned was aspiring country singer George Jones, who likewise benefited from their association with his first number one, the Richardson-penned “White Lightning”.

The Bopper persona became Richardson’s outlet for performing – a zoot-suited, flat-topped, over-sized wildman. Sometimes sporting a leopard-skin jacket he dubbed “Melvin”, his songs sketched out a distinctive character, whether it be a broke but libidinous would-be suitor on the phone (“Chantilly Lace”) or a leering wolf (“Little Red Riding Hood”). While the most obvious gift Richardson brought to the table was humor and personality, his musical abilities are not to be overlooked. Several of the numbers on the album eventually released have a Louie Jordan-esque swing to them, such as “That’s The Truth, Ruth”. “Big Bopper’s Wedding”, (which bore no resemblance to Richardson’s actual nuptials) was a minor follow-up to “Chantilly…” with the promise of more to come. Some songs were performed “straight” – that is, out of character; “Someone Watching Over You” being a fine example of Richardson’s tender side. While not the first rock and roll performer to inject comedy into his act, he certainly pioneered it, and for that alone he should not be forgotten. Today, the son he never knew performs his songs around the world as “Bopper Jr.” For anyone wishing to connect with rock’s pioneers, he is not to be missed.

4) Eddie Cochran – This Minnesota-born rocker was something of a rarity – a rock and roll pioneer not of Southern origin (although funnily enough, his career began as one half of a country duo). After seeing Elvis perform live in Dallas in 1956, Eddie, by now a solo act, decided to make the switch. It was his good fortune to cross paths with Jerry Capehart, who became a songwriting partner as well as manager. Capehart got Eddie a

slot in the prestigious film, The Girl Can’t Help It, where he performed “Twenty Flight Rock”. Liberty Records took him on, and straight out of the box, he enjoyed a hit with “Sitting In The Balcony”. Almost immediately, Eddie recognized that he really preferred being a musician to being a star, seeing up close what crowds and excessive adulation could do to someone. He therefore picked and chose his performing dates carefully.

In 1958, he released the song that made him immortal, “Summertime Blues”. Like Chuck Berry, Eddie had a handle on teen angst, but with a lighter touch. He also had a thick, layered guitar sound, the result of multi-tracking his parts to create a rhythm heavy sound. Other hits followed, including “Something Else”, “My Way” (no, not the Sinatra-Elvis tune), and “C’mon Everybody”. As his career advanced, Eddie realized that his heart lay more in a behind the scenes role, perhaps as producer and songwriter. He became engaged to Sharon Sheeley, a songwriter of note (Ricky Nelson’s “Poor Little Fool” was her first composition), and made plans to segue out of performing. The death of his close friend Buddy Holly had hit him hard and he developed a fear of flying. But when Gene Vincent beckoned him to England, he felt duty bound to visit the place where his sales were even stronger than at home. In the spring of 1960, an original five week tour became expanded into fifteen. During a brief lull, he decided to fly home to fulfill some recording duties. En route to the airport, the taxi carrying Eddie, Sharon, and Gene blew a tire and crashed. At twenty-one, Eddie passed into legend, but his legacy lives on.

5) Esquerita – Young Eskew Reeder grew up in a Greenville, South Carolina locality known as “Greasy Corner”, alongside neighbor Jesse Jackson. Musically schooled in church, when rock and roll asserted itself, he dropped the gospel for rock, becoming a key-pounder at the Owl Club. It was at this time that a certain Richard Penniman sat up and took notice of the outrageous, pompadoured, piano-playing spectacle. Though having cut some sides with an outfit called the Heavenly Echoes in 1953, a recording career wasn’t particularly sought after. Only when Blue Cap’s guitarist Paul Peek took it upon himself to bring the newly-dubbed Esquerita to Capitol in 1957 did making records suddenly seem of interest.

Like many pioneers, his earliest recordings stand as his best. Both “Oh Baby” and “Rockin’ The Joint” should’ve been career-defining hits, but somehow escaped public consciousness. Only aficionados seemed privy to this man’s greatness. To the uninitiated, just a glance at the grinning, high-haired pianist would seem to draw a clear connection to his better known protégé. But this rocker’s musical excesses made Richard look like Pat

Boone. Without ever scoring a bona fide hit single, his Capitol work is notable for its daring and out of control atmosphere. It’s a real shame that his outrageousness precluded mass appeal. After Capitol dropped him, he continued to record steadily but never again with the same abandon. He died in obscurity in1986.

6) Screamin’ Jay Hawkins – Although no one will ever accuse Hawkins of being a genius or possessing an outstanding body of work, his singular eccentricity, both on and offstage, warrants some kind of acknowledgement, if only for the trail he blazed for the likes of Alice Cooper, Kiss, G.G. Allin, and Marilyn Manson. He was the first true shock-rocker – Elvis’ pelvis may have been lewd and crude, but Hawkins’ stage act made even hard-core rockers take pause. Emerging from a coffin to begin his set and carrying a real skull on a staff, (named Henry, it often sported a lit cigarette. See what smoking will do to you?) he wasn’t exactly cut out for mainstream acceptance. His theatrics nearly made the music beside the point, which was too bad, since Jay (born Jalacy) - in possession of a fine baritone - was an aspiring opera singer. Auspiciously, his first recording was a number entitled “Screamin’ Blues” – Atlantic shelved its 1953 release as “unsuitable”.

The sign of things to come was the 1955 single, “(She Put The) Wamee (On Me)”. As a blueprint for future stylings, it was unmatched for vocal excess and macabre subject matter. The song that eventually put him on the map and over the top was actually a re-make. He’d cut “I Put A Spell On You” once before, as a straightforward lover’s plea. But upon changing labels, in September of 1956 he decided to give it another go. Unfortunately for Jay, he and his fellow musicians decided to immerse themselves in a case of Muscatel before the session took place. When the tape rolled, the tender ballad was high-jacked by an otherworldly performance punctuated by screams, gurgles, and groans, well into the coda. Horrified by the result once his head cleared, there was no recalling the disc once word of mouth got out. Though banned by many radio stations, it became an underground smash. Having no choice (and egged on by Alan Freed, who suggested the casket bit), his voodoo wildman persona inevitably followed. Face make-

up and bone through his nose helped forward the out-of-control image, but so too did a genuine anger at the role he felt was foisted upon him. Solace would be found in dozens of affairs. Upon his death in 2001, his belief that he had fathered fifty seven screaming Baby Hawkins’ was revealed. A website was established to connect his scattered progeny that they might all find each other, in celebration of their father’s dying wish.

7) Wanda Jackson – In a decade where female singers were expected to be sweet and chirpy (Connie Francis, Doris Day) or soft and sultry (Julie London, Peggy Lee), Oklahoma-born Jackson was neither, out-rocking even some of the boys. Her characteristic growl, coupled with a sass and attitude that accepted second place to no man made her irresistible. (Being easy on the eyes didn’t hurt either.) To some, she was the female Elvis (or Presley was the male Wanda, depending on one’s point of view). While somewhat accurate, in some ways it sells her short. Wanda, like many a true

pioneer, broke down barriers of acceptance. Even without the kind of star-making success that would’ve made her a household name (at least not in America), her influence upon rediscovery would elevate her to the upper pantheon of rock heroes.

A country singer beginning in her early teens, it would in fact be Elvis who encouraged her to try her hand at rock. Their paths crossed as his was in upward ascension, and for a time they’d been an item. Given her background versus her current leanings, Wanda’s handlers at Capitol were at a loss for a marketing strategy before deciding to have it both ways. “I Gotta Know”, her first release, starts out as a fiddle-driven waltz but swings fiercely into pure rockabilly, before swaying back and again. The schizoid approach shouldn’t have worked but it did, garnering her a number fifteen on the country charts in 1956 and convincing doubters of her viability. From then on, nothing could stop her. “Hot Dog! That Made Him Mad” is a witty pre-feminist declaration of self-actualization, enhanced by a milk-induced raspiness on the vocal. Her incendiary 1958 song “Savin’ My Love” is a sexually-charged number in which the singer enumerates the ways she’ll demonstrate her passion. Possibly her most infamous recording was “Fujiyama Mama”, a song which, bizarrely, was huge in Japan, despite containing the declaration: “I been to Nagasaki, Hiroshima, too. The things I did to them, baby, I can do to you!”

Wanda’s foray into rock, stunning though it was, never really found an audience in America. One song, “Let’s Have A Party”, became re-discovered in 1960, three years after its initial release, when an Iowa DJ used it as his on air theme. A LP quickly recorded to capitalize on its latter-day success didn’t click, and following her marriage, Wanda went back to her country origins. In the mid-seventies, she became born again and recorded a series of Gospel records. She might have faded into obscurity altogether but not for a series of re-issues putting her back in the game, including a German box set release. Currently, Wanda is still going strong, playing her rockabilly to appreciative fans the world over. Good news indeed.

8) Carl Perkins – A lifetime of working side by side in the cotton fields of east Tennessee with black sharecroppers gave young Carl an invaluable musical education. Something of a prodigy, he wrote his first song, “Movie Magg” at 14, and played “guitar” on an instrument he’d fashioned out of a cigar box and a broom handle. Though the poorest among the poor in their area, the Perkins boys – Carl, Clayton, and Jay – eventually put together a musical outfit, with Carl handling the composition duties. Among the tunes Carl would crank out over time were “Your True Love”, “Honey Don’t”, “Everybody’s Trying To Be My Baby”, and “Matchbox”(the last three all recorded by the Beatles). His skill with a guitar is not to be overlooked either, with his licks coming second only to Chuck Berry’s in terms of listener recognition. Upon hearing Elvis for the first time on the radio, Carl hastened over to Memphis and Sam Phillips, presenting himself as the next candidate for the Phillips’ magic. Under the latter’s tutelage, a series of increasingly accomplished songs set the stage for Carl’s certain stardom. “Blue Suede Shoes” was to be his money song, as everyone who heard it predicted. But his disastrous car accident shattered his chances for national acclaim, and its aftermath nearly ruined him.

Thought feted by the Beatles during his 1964 British tour, the joyful interlude soon faded away as he became enveloped by the darkness of alcoholism. By the mid-1960s, he’d bottomed out. Without a recording contract and embittered by cruel turns of destiny, he seemed ready to quit the business when his friend Johnny Cash reached out to him. Having just lost his lead guitarist Luther (no relation) Perkins in a fire, Johnny brought

Carl into his act just as it began to reach a climax. Carl rewarded his benefactor by writing “Daddy Sang Bass”, a hit for Cash in 1969. In the ensuing years, Carl stayed active with touring and recording, living long enough to see his contributions to rock acknowledged. In 1982, he recorded a pair of songs with Paul McCartney, who was plainly delighted to work with his early hero. Three years later, Carl managed to coax the reclusive George Harrison out to join him for a Rockabilly cable special that included Eric Clapton, Ringo Starr, Dave Edmunds, and Rosanne Cash. After penning his autobiography, Go, Cat, Go, Carl succumbed to declining health in 2000.

9) Gene Vincent – For sheer greasiness and embodying what “grown-ups” routinely derided about the new movement, Vincent is entitled to a place of honor on our list. At a time when every effort was made to tone down and tame the entertainers of youth, the leather-clad Vincent was purposely provocative and unapologetic. An ex-sailor from Virginia, the former Eugene Craddock got into a motorcycle crack-up that left his left leg permanently damaged. It would be the combination of painkillers and drink that would fuel most of his troubles ever onward. His start in rockabilly came about when he won an Elvis-inspired talent sponsored by Capitol Records in 1956. The first single, “Woman Love”, did okay business, but when DJs discovered the flip, it went through the roof. “Be Bop A-Lula” became his signature song, beginning a string of fine releases which

included “Blue Jean Bop”, “Race With The Devil”, and “Lotta Lovin’”. His back-up, the Blue Caps (the name derived from their cheekily sporting President Eisenhower’s golfing headgear) were rockabilly heavyweights, spawning not one but two guitar heroes, Cliff Gallup and Johnny Meeks. Within such a limited idiom, they demonstrated remarkable savvy and sophistication, shining on flat-out rockers as easily as ballads. (They even

covered “Somewhere Over The Rainbow”!)

That such a charismatic singer and such able musicians were not able to rise to greater stardom in this country can be chalked up to bad business as well as bad luck. At the peak of their success in 1957, the original Blue Caps left Gene after weeks without pay, owing to disreputable promoters stiffing them, giving Vincent troubles with the musician’s union as well. Gene recruited some new backing, but in April of 1960, touring the rockabilly stronghold of Britain with Eddie Cochran, their taxi spun out of control, killing Cochran and seriously re-injuring Vincent’s leg. It would all be downhill from there on. Continuous pain required self-medicating, and his performances reflected it. His last hurrah would come in 1969’s Toronto Rock and Roll Revival show, which featured Chuck Berry, Little Richard, The Doors, Chicago, Alice Cooper, and soon to be ex-Beatle John Lennon. Vincent performed sans Blue Caps, backed up by Alice Cooper’s band. (This would also be the site of the infamous chicken incident of rock lore.) By

October of 1971, his body was at the end of its tether. He went on a three day bender that inflamed his stomach ulcers beyond repair. After a day of knocking back tomato juice like it was water (he did not want to die drunk, he declared), he collapsed at his parent’s home and died at the hospital. He was thirty-six.

10) Larry Williams – As a teenager in a band called the Lemon Drops, Larry drew the attention of singer Lloyd Price, who hired him as his personal valet before introducing him to his record producer. Specialty Records, home to both Price and Little Richard, was keen on signing new talent, especially with the volatile Richard as their sales leader. The young Williams would be groomed and promoted to be Richard’s successor, although possessing a sound devoid of the camp that had defined Little Richard’s success. His first record was a deliberate cop on Richard’s “Long Tall Sally” entitled “Short Fat Fannie”. Quickly proven a hit-maker, he followed up with “Bony Moronie” (lest any girls feel left out). Though backed by Richard’s band and a piano-pounder as well, Williams was an altogether different breed of writer and singer. No falsetto whoops for him- his vocals were tough and gritty, making them a favorite of John Lennon’s. (The Beatles would in fact record three of his songs – “Slow Down”, “Bad Boy”, and “Dizzy Miss Lizzie”; as a solo, John would record two more.) His “She Said Yeah” would be covered by the Rolling Stones.

He might have gone on to greater successes had his career not been derailed in 1959 with an arrest for narcotics trafficking. Specialty dropped him, and following jail, he recorded sporadically throughout the sixties, often with Johnny Guitar Watson. After a decade of silence, he released a poorly received funk album in 1978. In January of 1980, he was found dead at his home from a gunshot wound that would be ruled a suicide, although

persistent rumors painted it as a drug hit. A sorry end for an undeniable talent.

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