Out In The Be-Bop-Be-Bop Night: Jerry Lee Lewis

Showing posts with label Jerry Lee Lewis. Show all posts

Sunday, August 28, 2011

Out In The Be-Bop Night- In The Time Of The High School Hop, Circa 1960-With Jerry Lee Lewis In Mind

Click on the headline to link to a YouTube film clip of The Cadillacs performing She's So Fine.

Recently I have been in something of 1960s high school remembrance mode, mainly as a result of evaluating the influence of the “beats” (Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, William S. Burroughs, Neal Cassady and the usual suspects), on my youthful political (not much), social (a fair amount), and cultural (lots) development, but also as a result of re-watching George Lucas’ American Graffiti, a 1960s coming-of-age film that fits comfortably in my own high school mode. I have reviewed the film as a whole elsewhere in this space but I wish to make a special point about the high school dance segment of the film (The Baby-Boomer Birth Of The Search For The Blue-Pink American Western Night- “American Graffiti”-A Film Review, dated September, 8, 2010).

George Lucas’s inclusion of a local high school dance segment in this film was inspired. The segment is not central to the action, such as it is, of the film, but it certainly is calculated to evoke almost universal nostalgia for anyone (meaning almost everyone these days) who has ever had to deal, in one way or another, with the question of this time-honored (if hoary) high school tradition. Each generation probably has its own take on what this experience was like, but most of the real action was behind the scenes. And in that sense the film caught the three high points. Women can fill in own blanks in reverse, but here are some of them from a man’s perspective.

First of all stag (single no way, with the guys, or not at all, although how many and who was always up for grabs, especially on the important “shotgun” question) or on a date (double-date, somebody’s left out sister, your sister, anything to not be a wallflower, a sickly wallflower among the ‘losers’ to boot, as those dance moments ticked slowly, so slowly by). Many an ungodly hour was spent on that date question mulling over, no, not what you think, who to invite, no that was usually the easy part, but rather getting up enough nerve to make the call to make the invitation. And check this out, on more than one occasion, and I am sure the same was true for you, somehow your intelligence network had failed and it turns out that the certain she, your dreamy certain she, damn, her, had a “steady.” Christ, what a waste of time.

Secondly, grooming preparations- I will propose here, in best scientific method form (or at least quasi-scientific form for that is all this thing will hold) that there was an inverse relationship to the amount of time that one spent on this work, you know, shower, shave (in those days you had to, if you could), comb always at the ready, a little something for the underarms and some men’s fragrance to give the smell of being the least bit civilized, and the answer to the stag/date question. In this sense the inverse is the extra time spent in order to attract that certain she (remember women just reverse the gender, or today everyone fill in your own preference experience) so when the next goddam dance or mixed social event came up you were dated up with that certain she and you could just throw a little fatal after-shave on and fly out the door. Oh, by the way, I refuse, I totally refuse to go over the number of time that I cooled my heels while that occasional captured “she” made her grooming preparations, first date or any date, even if it was just to make preparations to go to the drugstore soda fountain. Mercifully, on that score I did not have a sister to scream at or else I might not be writing this screed today, at least this side of a cell block.

Thirdly, the gathering of the dough, the always short of dough problem that plagued our poor working class household and that I noticed did not seem to be any kind of problem in that California suburban valley locale of American Graffiti. Money for exotic appearing (hey, it was California, remember, even the fast food drive-ins had to be retro-fine) double-dip hamburgers (with fries), cherry cokes, for two, for two, my god, plus some gas money, plus, plus, plus, you know a guy has got expenses in this world. The real problem was whether to borrow from parents, or pick up some chattel slave job. Getting it from the parents always came with some awful terms, usually worthy of some international diplomatic accord, and more grief than it was worth, unless I was desperate, or girl-hungry. Oh ya, and you had to hear the obligatory we do this and that to keep a roof over your head along with the bucks. You know the drill, probably.

And while we are on the subject of parents the inevitable question comes up about what time one should be home by. They say X, and make that loan, that hard-scrabble hideous loan that has more conditions and enforcements than a loan shark, contingent on the observance of a “reasonable” (parent reasonable) hour. I say Y, because in the back of my mind I, if I get lucky (no further discussion necessary, right?) then I need plenty of time and can’t be worried about curfews, or reasonable times. Come to think of it, even fifty years later, come on Ma you be reasonable (and it was always Ma on this one in our old working class neighborhoods, and maybe yours too. Dad was brought in, if he was brought in at all, at this point in our lives only for the heavy artillery stuff).

Once these preparations and battles have been settled then, and here is where American Graffiti is like from a dream, the question of transportation to the dance comes into play. Here I mean a car, and if you’ve read my review of American Graffiti you know I mean a “boss” car. You would have to go to an automobile museum to see such treasures these days. By the way don’t even utter the words public transportation for this occasion or I will think that you grew up in New York City or some place like that and that you have not really been paying attention after all my paeans to the California endless highways and the search of the elusive blue-pink great American Western night.

In any case, this car-less writer, this foot-sore, shoe leather-beaten, car-less writer, depended, sometimes cynically so, on cultivating friendships with guys who had such “boss” cars, particularly the renowned ’57 Chevy that still makes me quiver at the thought of. Needless to say, in expectation at least, of the night’s successes a stop at the local gas station for a fill-up (a couple of bucks then) check the oil and water, kick the tires and so on preceded our big entrance at the dance.

Part of the charm of the American Graffiti segment on the local high school dance is, as I have noted previously, once you get indoors it could have been any place U.S.A. (and I am willing to bet any time U.S.A., as well. For this baby-boomer, that particular high school dance, could have taken place at my high school when I was a student in the early 1960s). From the throwaway crepe paper decorations that festooned the place to the ever-present gym bleachers to the chaperones to the platform the local band (a band that if it did not hit it big would go on to greater glory at our future weddings, birthday parties, and other important occasion) covering the top hits of the day performed on it was a perfect replica.

Also perfect replica were the classic boys’ attire for a casual dance, plaid or white sports shirt, chinos, stolid shoes, and short-trimmed hair (no beards, beads, bell-bottoms, its much to early in the decade for that) and for the girls blouses (or maybe sweaters, cashmere, if I recall being in fashion at the time, at least in the colder East), full swirling dresses, and, I think beehive hair-dos. Wow! Of course, perfect replica were the infinite variety of dances (frug, watusi, twist, stroll, etc) that blessed, no, twice blessed, rock and roll let us do in order to not to have to dance too waltz close. Mercy. And I cannot finish up this part without saying perfect replica hes looking at certain shes (if stag, of course, eyes straight forward if dated up, or else bloody hell) and also perfect replica wallflowers, as well.

Not filmed in American Graffiti, although a solo slow one highlighted the tensions between Steve and Laurie (Ron Howard and Cindy Williams) but ever present and certainly the subject of some comment in this space was that end of the night dance. I’ll just repeat what I have repeated elsewhere. This last dance was always one of those slow ones that you had to dance close on. And just hope, hope to high heaven, that you didn’t destroy your partner’s shoes and feet. Well, as I have noted before, one learns a few social skills in this world if for no other reason that to “impress” that certain she (or he for shes, or nowadays, just mix and match your sexual preferences) mentioned above. I did, didn’t you?

And after the dance? Well, I am the soul of discretion, and you should be too. Let’s put it this way. Sometimes I got home earlier than the Ma agreed time, but sometimes, not enough now that I think about it, I saw huge red suns rising up over the blue waters. Either way, my friends, worth every blessed minute of anguish, right?

Wednesday, August 10, 2011

From Out In The Be-Bop 1950s Rock Night-Carl Perkin's "Boppin' The Blues"

Click on the headline to link to a YouTube film clip of Carl Perkins performing his classic Boppin' The Blues.

Markin comment:

Hell, I don't need to comment here. Carl Perkins says it all- bop, bop the blues-get it.
******

Boppin' The Blues Lyrics- Carl Perkins

Well, all my friends are boppin' the blues; it must be goin' round
All my friends are boppin' the blues; it must be goin' round
I love you, baby, but I must be rhythm bound

Well, the doctor told me, Carl you need no pills.
Yes, the doctor told me, boy, you don't need no pills.

Just a handful of nickels, the juke box will cure your ills.

Well, all my friends are boppin' the blues; it must be goin' round
All them cats are boppin' the blues; it must be goin' round
I love you, baby, but I must be rhythm bound

Well, the old cat bug bit me, man, I don't feel no pain
Yeah, that jitterbug caught me, man, I don't feel no pain.
I still love you baby, but I'll never be the same.

I said, all my friends are boppin' the blues; it must be goin' round
All my friends are boppin' the blues; it must be goin' round
I love you, baby, but I must be rhythm bound

Well, all my friends are boppin' the blues; it must be goin' round
All them cats are boppin' the blues; it must be goin' round
I love you, baby, but I must be rhythm bound

Well, grand-pa Don got rhythm and he threw his crutches down.
Oh the old boy Don got rhythm and blues and he threw that crutches down
Grand-ma, he ain't triflin', well the old boy's rhythm bound.

Well, all them cats are boppin' the blues; it must be goin' round
All my friends are boppin' the blues; it must be goin' round
I love you, baby, but I must be rhythm bound.

A rock bop, rhythm and blues.
A rock bop, rhythm and blues.
A rock rock, rhythm and blues.
A rock rock, rhythm and blues.
Rhythm and blues, it must be goin' round.

Monday, April 18, 2011

When Rockabilly Rocked The Be-Bop 1950s Night- “Rock This Town”- A CD Review

Click on the headline to link to a YouTube film clip of Buddy Knox performing his classic Party Doll.

CD Review

Rock This Town, Volume 1, various artists, Rhino Records, 1991

The last time that I discussed rockabilly music in this space was a couple of years ago when I was featuring the work of artists like Elvis, Johnny Cash, and Jerry Lee Lewis who got their start at Sam Phillips’ famed Sun Records studio in Memphis. Part of the reason for those reviews was my effort to trace the roots of rock and roll, the music of my coming of age, and that of my generation, the generation of ’68. Clearly rockabilly was, along with country and city blues from the likes of Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf, and Ike Turner and rhythm and blues from the likes of Big Joe Turner, a part of that formative process. The question then, and the question once again today, is which strand dominated the push to rock and roll, if one strand in fact did dominate.

I have gone back and forth on that question over the years. That couple of years ago mentioned above I was clearly under the influence of Big Joe Turner and Howlin’ Wolf and so I took every opportunity to stress the bluesy nature of rock. Recently though I have been listening, and listening very intently, to early Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins and Jerry Lee Lewis and I am hearing more of that be-bop rockabilly rhythm flowing into the rock night. Let me give a comparison. A ton of people have done Big Joe Turner’s classic rhythm and bluish Shake, Rattle, and Roll, including Bill Haley, Elvis, Carl Perkins, and Jerry Lee. When I listen to that song as performed in their more rockabilly style those versions seem closer to what evolved into rock. So for today, and today only, yes Big Joe is the big daddy, max daddy father of rock but Elvis, Jerry Lee, and Carl are the very pushy sons.

And that brings us to this treasure trove of rockabilly music presented in two volumes of which this is the first. I have already done enough writing in praise of the work of Sam Phillips and Sun Records to bring that good old boy rockabilly sound out of the white southern countryside. There I noted that for the most part those who succeeded in rockabilly had to move on to rock to stay current with the youth wave (the disposable income/allowance post World War II youth wave) and so the rockabilly sound was somewhat transient except for those who consciously decided to stay with that sound. Here the best example of that is Red Hot by Bill Riley and His Little Green Men, an extremely hot example by the way. If you listen to his other later material it stays very much in that rockabilly vein. In contrast, take High School Confidential by Jerry Lee Lewis. Jerry Lee might have started out in rockabilly but this number (and others) is nothing but the heart and soul of rock (and a song, by the way, we all prayed would be played at our middle school dances to get thing, you know what things going). Case closed.

Other stick-outs here include Ooby Dooby, Roy Orbison (although he has a ton of better songs); Blue Suede Shoes (the teeth-cutting, max daddy of rockabilly songs), Carl Perkins; Susie-Q (right at that place where rockabilly and blues meet to form rock and a classic come hither song), Dale Hawkins; Party Doll (another great middle school dance song), Buddy Knox;and, Come On, Let’s Go (bringing just a touch of Tex-Mex into the rockabilly mix), Ritchie Valens.

Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Those Oldies But Goodies…Out In The Be-Bop ‘50s Song Night- The Battle Rages- Jerry Lee or Elvis?- Jerry Lee Lewis’ “High School Confidential”- Billie And Peter Paul Square Off

Click on the headline to link to a YouTube film clip of Jerry Lee Lewis banging away on that piano for his life on High School Confidential from the movie of the same name.

Markin comment:

This is the back story, the teen listener back story if you like, going back to the primordial youth time of the mid to late 1950s with its bags full of classic rock songs for the ages. Of course, any such efforts have to include the views of one Billie, William James Bradley, the schoolboy mad-hatter of the 1950s rock jailbreak out in our “the projects” neighborhood. Ya, in those days, unlike during his later fateful wrong turn trajectory days, every kid, including best friend Markin, me, lived to hear what he had to say about any song that came trumpeting over the radio, at least every one that we would recognize as our own.

Billie and I spent many, many hours mainly up in his tiny bedroom, his rock heaven bedroom, walls plastered with posters of Elvis, Bo Diddley, Chuck Berry, somewhat later Jerry Lee Lewis, and of every new teen heartthrob singer, heartthrob to the girls that is, around, on his night table every new record Billie could get his hands on, by hook or by crook, and neatly folded piles of clothing, also gathered by that same hook or by crook, appropriate to the king hell king of the schoolboy rock scene, the elementary school rock scene between about 1956 to 1960. Much of that time was spent discussing the “meaning” of various songs, especially their sexual implications, ah, their mystery of girls-finding-out-about worthiness.

Although in early 1959 my family had started the process of moving out of the projects, and, more importantly, I had begun to move away from Billie’s orbit, his new found orbit as king hell gangster wannabe, I still would wander back there until mid-1960 just to hear his take on whatever music was interesting him at the time. These commentaries, these Billie commentaries, are my recollections of his and my conversations on the song lyrics in this series. But I am not relying on memory alone. During this period we would use my father’s tape recorder, by today’s standard his big old reel to reel monstrosity of a tape recorder, to record Billie’s covers of the then current hit songs (for those who have not read previously of Billie’s “heroics” he was a pretty good budding rock singer at the time) and our conversations of those song meanings that we fretted about for hours. I have, painstakingly, had those reels transcribed so that many of these commentaries will be the actual words spoken during those conversations(somewhat edited, of course). That said, Billie, king hell rock and roll king of the old neighborhood, knew how to call a lyric, and make us laugh to boot. Wherever you are Billie I’m still pulling for you. Got it.
*********
High School Confidential lyrics-Jerry Lee Lewis

You better open up honey it's your lover boy me that's a knockin'
You better listen to me sugar all the cats are at the High School rockin'
Honey get your boppin' shoes Before the juke box blows a fuse
Got everybody hoppin' everybody boppin'

Boppin' at the High School Hop
Boppin' at the High School Hop
Shakin' at the High School Hop
I've rollin' at the High School Hop
I've been movin' at the High School Hop
Everybody’s hoppin' Everybody's boppin'
Boppin' at the High School Hop

Come on little baby gonna rock a little bit tonight
Woooh I got get with you sugar gonna shake things up tonight
Check out the heart beatin' rhythm cause my feet are moving smooth and
Light

Boppin' at the High School Hop
Shakin' at the High School Hop
Rollin' at the High School Hop
Movin' at the High School Hop
Everybody’s hoppin' just a boppin' just a boppin'

Piano Solo!

Come on little baby let me give a piece good news good news good news
Jerry Lee is going to rock away all his blues
My hearts beatin' rhythm and my soul is singin' the blues

Oooooh Boppin' at the High School Hop
Shakin' at the High School Hop
Rollin' at the High School Hop
Gettin' it at the High School Hop
Everybody’s hoppin' Everybody's boppin'
Boppin' at the High School Hop
********
Peter Paul Markin comment:

“Who are you taking to the hop? Come on now, tell me, tell me, your old buddy Billie, who you asked? Was it Theresa? Was it Donna? Was it Karen?” That was the incessant bugging by my old elementary school boy compadre, Billie, William James Bradley if you didn’t know already, every time a school sock hop came up. But you know, or you should know, that was just a little way that he had to bait me about my shyness, or rather my awkwardness around girls. Around girls that he, king hell king of the late 1950s rock night “discarded” and left for the rest of us, especially for me.

And he knew, he knew damn well that I had not gotten up the nerve to ask any of those three ex-flames, or any girl, to the dance coming up in a few days. For one thing because, as king hell king of the rock night, and therefore king, crowned or uncrowned, of the sock hop he had all the configurations, combinations, set-ups, and, and, no-go bust-ups all computed out, no, not on some machine memory depot but in his head. For another because he didn’t know that I had decided just to go to the dance alone and maybe getting lucky there. Heck, I had done it before, a few times, although not with any great success but if there is any rhyme or reason to youth it is around the possibilities of getting lucky. Of course, old Billie had “selected” Laura as his escort, no awkwardness in Billie, although I had heard, heard from more than one budding teenage source that she “liked me,”(don’t ever tell him this though for I will deny it on seven stacked bibles). Or liked my seriousness, and my clowny, get in the way bookishness. So I am going “stag” on the hope, the hell or high water hope that Billie will let his old buddy, his old amigo, his, well you know, have a dance with his escort to see if I have some “magic.”

Now, and ever since I heard about her opinion of me, I have been wracking my brain to figure out this question. How could she “like me”, or not like me for that matter, I do not know because although I had looked over in her direction in class dreamily (yes, dreamily) more than somewhat I had never said word one to her, or her to me. Now this Laura, if you want a description is not drop-dead beautiful, at least by Billie-Markin defined drop-dead beautiful, twelve and thirteen year old girl beautiful, but she has something else that I would not (and Billie definitely would not) figure out how to say for many years, she was fetching. Definition: nice figure, meaning having a shape, if you really want to know, because when you think about it, boy or girl, twelve and thirteen year old boy or girl, any girl that had a shape (meaning had womanly contours, hips, breasts, nicely-formed legs) rather than a stock stick figure tomboy-like girl was bound to get ahead in that be-bop night, and probably now too.

But more than that, for me, if not for Billie, she didn’t giggle, silly giggle like the other girls when a boy said something stupid-funny (and the twelve and thirteen year old boy universe is more than somewhat filled with stupid-funny stuff done by eons of clueless guys, trying, trying just like me, and just like Billie if he could have ever been honest about it, to figure out the key to the girl-charm thing, yes, there is plenty of room in that universe even now for the stupid-funny) and, she carried herself in a way, sometimes with a certain thoughtful look, sometimes by a thing she did by putting her fingers to her lips, and maybe the most important, that she knew she was a girl and was content with that knowledge. She would lack for no dates or admirers, ever. Oh, ya she was also smart, not Billie street smart, not Markin two-thousand facts smart but asking and answering teacher smart, without being crazy smart about it that you also knew every boy, or almost every boy, in the twelve and thirteen year old boy universe did not like in girls then, and maybe now for all I know. It only gets sifted out later.

But enough of Laura, of Billie, christ of Markin as well, of pre-sock hop arrangements, derangements and dreamily kid in the night be-bop stuff let us get to the sock hop. Hey, wait a minute, you know what sock hops are, or you heard from your parents or grandparents what sock hops are, right? Back in the fifties, yes, the 1950s (and a little bit into the 1960s but the term had kind of died out by then, at least for “non-squares”). If you don’t then I’ll fill you in quickly now, but you’ll see you really know about all of this because it is nothing but a “primitive”, maybe Stone Age when you hear it, version of any school dance scene since they started making teenagers a separate social category in the world, the whole wide world even. Okay the idea was to hem in this mad dash, this mad craze to dance, and dance guys with girls and vice versa, that kids have been into since the radio and jukebox came on the scene, maybe back in that Stone Age now that I think about it.

So dear mother and father, you name the generation, figured out if you can’t beat them join them, and the schools (and churches later) were in cahoots. So every once in a while to keep three eyes on this stuff (and to avoid the feared, seriously feared, basement or “family room”-launched “petting parties” if kids are left to their own devices), maybe a few times a month they would throw a sock hop (the sock part comes from the fact, the hard fact, that most girls, most twelve and thirteen year old girls, wore ankle socks. Ya, no nylons, etc. If you don’t believe me look it up on Wikipedia, or something). Now, most times, this was nothing but some parent or teacher acting as dee-jay and "spinning platters” (records) in some dank, well-lighted, too well-lighted school gym or church basement, christ more than once in the school cafeteria when the gym was being used for other purposes that night. Yes, the night, the night in those days being from seven to about ten in the evening so you would have to think pretty hard about not going, stag or dated up, to the dance if for no other reason than to be able to get out of the house, the cramped, nowhere project house (really apartment) for a few hours uncramped freedom.

This night, this night that Billie kidded me about, this Billie and Laura night, though somehow, although I am vague on the details of how they were brought in, we are not reduced to cranky, scratchy records but a real live local band, a band that prided itself, I heard, on doing covers of the “hot” new singers and groups we knew from American Bandstand (an afternoon television show that had Philly kids, older Philly kids, dancing and swaying to whatever dee-jay Dick Clark, is he still around?, decided was wholesome and fit for the ears of America’s afternoon rock obsessed youth). So this is a time you definitely did not want to miss. And to truth to tell I went early, nervously early if you must know, to see what was up and watch the band set up.

Now this is not just any time in the 1950s, although the sock hop thing, the worried parent, worried about those “petting party” things(and more, much more, about sex things) and this wild and woolly rock obsessed thing their no understand what kids are into could have been anytime from about 1955 on, from the time that Elvis exploded onto the scene with those swiveling hips, that jumping girl guitar, that unkempt hair (ya, unkempt to them), and that permanent sneer came onto the scene.

No, this is 1958 when the Elvis thing had died down a little now that he was dead, or we thought he was dead, and for a fact he might have well have been dead in the constant teen chew-up of rock talent from the kind of music and movies he was into after giving us such great stuff like Jailhouse Rock, Good Rockin’ Tonight, Heartbreak Hotel and One Night With You. Ya, the king was dead, long live the king, and let’s move on, okay. Billie and I talked about it, about how guys, rock guys that is, seen to have a short shelf-life, but as Billie knew, knew from his own bumpy rock “career”, that’s show biz. So this night we are wondering, wondering like crazy, how the band will work out and whose music they will cover.

Like I said I got there early and watched the band set up, including a piano besides the guitar and drums so I figure maybe they will do some Little Richard or Fats Domino stuff. Seven o’clock comes and here comes Billie with Laura. Wow, Billie has on a nice jacket, wide lapels like all the rock guys are wearing these days (I’ll tell you about how he got it sometime but you can figure that a projects boy didn’t get it as a birthday present from Ma and Pa). Really sharp. But double wow on Laura who has on a cashmere sweater, some wide skirt and, can you believe this, nylons, to show off her nice legs. Oh ya, and just a hint of smile on her face like she is here with the king of the rock night, crowned or uncrowned, and she has staked out the territory as queen, demure queen, but queen nevertheless.

Yes, fetching (although we will agree between ourselves that I don’t know that word, or how to use it in relationship to describing girls and their charms just yet, alright). But here is where the sweetest part comes in when Billie and Laura make their royal entrance and come over to where I am standing when Billie introduces me, formally introduces Laura to me, she gives me this, well, I don’t care if I do wear out the word, fetching smile and says “I’ve seen you in class but you never seem to pay any attention to me. I thought that report you gave on Greek democracy in class was very well done.” Be still my heart, she actually remembers the report… and me. And here I am wearing some bedraggled (always bedraggled, always) stripped (stripes, jesus) white collared shirt, ratty black pants, and old Thom McAn Easter-bought brown shoes. Well, she remembered my report, that’s a start, and it actually was pretty good because I went to the Thomas Crane Public Library right up in Adamsville Square to look the stuff up.

But enough of reports, and "be still my hearts" because the music is going on. A few covers of Little Richard and Fats as I expected, with that piano and all, some Buddy Holly that sounded a little tinny, a few other non-memorable odd and ends, including some Elvis that sounded, and I again swear on seven bibles, like old time parents’ music, like Frank Sinatra, or those guys. The suddenly, the leader of the band said that he had a special guest on the piano for the next number. We all wondered what the song would be while they were setting the piano up closer to the front. I heard somebody say it was going to be something by a new guy, Jerry Lee Lewis. Whoa! I have only heard him once or twice but I thought his piano was smoking so maybe this guest guy could do a good cover on it. Billie, Billie king hell king of the rock night, must have known something was up, and why (always why) because he brought Laura over and asked me if wanted to dance the next dance with her. Me, two left feet, or two right feet, stag, coming to the dance stag just hoping that I would get lucky with “discarded” Theresa, Donna, or Karen dance with fetching Laura. No way. The she said “but I really want to dance with you, you being Billie friend, and he says you are a good dancer,” and then turns a very whimsical smile on me.

Well what are you going to do when a woman (alright girl, but a girl with a shape) wants to dance with you, and had something nice to say about your school report, and, oh yes had that smile, that come hinter smile that leaves a man (okay, boy) anywhere from twelve to twelve hundred weak at the knees. Well, the music is starting so I say yes, okay yes.

And what does our guest pianist do but a cover, a hot cover by the way, of Jerry Lee Lewis’ latest, High School Confidential, which I had heard about but had not heard. Great. Laura and I are dancing away and she is doing nothing but give me meaningful smiles and, maybe that rumor about her “liking me” was true. I am just dancing away like crazy and people are looking at me like where did he learn how to do that. After the dance I returned Laura to Billie, a little miffed Billie but I could have been wrong on that. And then Theresa came over and asked if I wanted to dance. A few dances, a few Laura-less dances later the call for last dance came, and not feeling like watching Laura with Billie just then I headed home.

The next morning, a Sunday morning, if I recall, Billie came over to the house and was fuming/hangdog as we talked, talked obviously about the sock hop doings. Fuming because I had switched up on him. How? Well, apparently, Laura, sweet fetching Laura, spent more than the allotted time talking about me, rather than about Billie’s virtues and he had used the dance, the Jerry Lee Lewis manic rock number that he had found out the band was going to play to make me look silly (his word, although mine when I heard it was more of an expletive). Hangdog because he felt bad now that he had done his best friend wrong, wrong over a girl although, in Billie fashion, he tried to step back and argue that maybe he did me a favor getting me out on the dance floor. See, though what he didn’t know (and don’t tell him either, if you know his whereabouts) is that I had been taking lessons from his slightly older sister, Carol, on how to dance this latest faster dance stuff.

So that is the end of the story, or almost the end. A few days later Laura knocked at our apartment door in the afternoon after school. My mother answered the door and invited her in, although she, my mother that is, said Laura was coming in no matter what from the look on her face. She was fuming, although as it turns out good fuming, because she said she had been smiling at me like crazy when we were dancing to give me the “hint” to ask her for the last dance, the last close to her dance. Sorry, Laura. And then she blurted out her command, “You and I are going to the next sock hop together and you had better not say no.” Well, when a woman (girl, are you happy) "insists” on something, almost anything like that, and on top of that had that kind remark about that school report, and that shape, what is a boy, a boy of the twelve and thirteen year old universe to do but say yes. So at the next dance I won’t be dancing with Billie “discard” Theresa, Donna, or Karen although they are okay but with fetching Laura. So there Billie, we are even. And if anybody asks you, like they asked me once-Elvis or Jerry Lee? Jerry Lee, long live the king.
*********
Billie, William James Bradley comment:

I am fuming, fuming six ways to Sunday if that is possible, fuming until the cows come home if there are any cows around, and if they have wandered I am still fuming. Why? I just called up Laura, Laura that I took to the school dance last week, to ask her if she wanted to go to the church sock hop scheduled for this weekend, Saturday night. Now it wouldn’t be as good as the last school one with a live band, and all, but even with just records and just ten thousand poor as church mice chaperones doing their chaperone thing to get grace or something, for real, we could still have a good time.

And do you know what she said. “I’ve got a date.” What, no way, no possible way, when everybody knows that she is my “personal property.” “Who is the guy, who is the guy, who is the guy who would dare cross the king of the rock night? This world is not big enough for the two of us, give me his name,” I said as I readied my arrows. “It’s Peter Paul, and before you get all crazy I asked him,” she darted back the sound of her voice pleased, pleased as punch the way she said it. “Double what?” I shouted over the phone so everyone within a twenty square mile area could hear, if they wanted to. And she came back, all sweet reason just like every girl, every stick or shapely girl, women even “I like you, I definitely like you, you’re funny, and you’re a good dancer, and you sure know a lot about rock ‘n’ roll, but you seem too bossy, and you take that "king of the rock" thing that Peter Paul keeps telling everybody about way too seriously. If Peter Paul hadn’t spent what seems like half his life building you up as, what did he call it, oh ya, “king of the be-bop night” you might be a better boy to be with. But the big thing, and here is where it all comes down on you, I found out, found out from Karen, that you tried to make a clown out of poor Peter Paul when you let him dance with me and you knew, or thought you knew, that he couldn’t dance for beans.” After she let that set in my head, uneasily in my head for a minute, she continued “So, yes, I went right over to his house and told him, no, what did he say I said, ‘insisted’ that we were going to the next dance together.” But get this, get this dagger thing aimed right at my heart. She finishes off with “And he makes me smile with his silly bookish ways, and you don’t okay. Next dance I’ll go with you, your highness, maybe.” And then she hung up. Ouch!

Two-timing that is all that it is. I can see that now. No, not Laura, you know how girls are, twelve and thirteen year old girls, with their hard to figure giggles, their starting to get shapes, and their monthlies (my sisters, Carol and Donna, told me all about it, sorry, tough luck girls). No, Peter Paul, Markin, that s.o.b., two-timed his best friend that’s all it can be. Probably went to the Thomas Crane Public Library branch that is attached to the school and read up everything that was on the shelves about two-timing, the history of two-timing, boys two-timings girls, girls two-timing boys, everything on the subject back to Pharaoh Egypt times. Just to two-time Billie, William James Bradley, known far and wide, despite what Laura said, as the king of the be-bop rock night. And Markin, no more Peter Paul nice guy now, didn’t have diddley to do with that. Period

But how did he switch up on me? I don’t get that. First, I know, I know from Karen, I know from Donna (not my sister Donna, Donna O’Toole, Cool Donna O’Toole, or was until I ditched her, or what did Markin call it, “discarded her”), I know from Theresa, and I know now, because I just asked her before she went out the door, from my sister Carol, that Markin never said word one to Laura before I introduced them the other night. Although now that I think about it I am still ticked off at Carol for not telling me about helping Markin learn to dance, rock dance, not that silly cowboy, barn dance, square dance thing that he calls rock dancing. I also know from Carol that Markin did not know much about jumping Jerry Lee Lewis. He was just hoping to get maybe an Elvis One Night With You, Good Rockin’ Today, Jailhouse Rock chance. Or a Chuck Berry Sweet Little Sixteen, or a Bo Diddley Who Do You Love? chance with Theresa, Karen or Donna (O’Toole). No way he believed, and I am going to go over right now and ask him about it, that he was going to step up to Laura’s league. Hell, it couldn’t have been that silly report, that silly report that he kept hammering me about as he leaned each new thing, Jesus Christ, Greek democracy, what are you kidding.

At his house I confront him. “Okay Markin what gives, what, how, why, where, when did you figure out how to break my time with Laura? And don’t play innocent and definitely, I warn you, start talking about that report, that silly Greek geek report.”

Of course I do not believe Peter Paul’s story, is who me story, no way. No way in hell, excuse my language, is a nice shape like that Laura, a nice shape in all the right places, or trying to be in all the right places, and smart, real smart going to go off the deep-end for a, let’s face it, ragamuffin boy like Markin. Christ, even he said it, a guy with a clowny outfit, a shirt, a shirt, a white stripped shirt for Christ sake, if you can believe that, a Bargie special, or straight of the back-rack at Woolworth’s, black chino pants with cuffs, jesus, cuffs and those square, too square Thom McAn brown shoes that I haven’t worn since about first communion is going to put the whammy on a babe like Laura.

Against me, against the king of the rock night in these parts, with my smart-looking wide lapel two-tone sports jacket just like Eddie Cochran, my black pants (ya, black pants, the black is okay it is the chinos, and, and the cuffs that have to go) nicely-pressed (ya, ma-pressed), my Elvis-style hair-do with just the right length sideburns and my foxy, spit-shined Florheim suede shoes (no, not blue suede, that’s squarey square now).

Ya, it was some drugstore medicine whammy he put on her at the dance that night. No question, although I haven’t quite figured out how he did it, because everybody knows, or I know anyhow that Peter Paul and science don’t mix. Don’t mix since he tried that rocket ship caper last year, trying personally to beat the commies at their own game after Sputnik jumped the night sky, when he tried to send some balsa wood rocket into space when he punctured a CO2 cartridge with a nail and a hammier and almost got us all killed. Or when, after that, he started to mix some chemicals in his cellar to go about it another way with some three-stage rocket concoction and almost blew the whole place up. I’ll tell you about that sometime but right now I wish, I wish, well I wish. See, Peter Paul is really about things like Abigail Adams, or her son John Quincy, or about literary guys, like this guy Fitzgerald who wrote about rich kids with names like Basil something and Josephine this or that and their hi-jinks ages ago that he has been yakking about lately. Ya, reading about rich kids, rich, rich guys having fun with rich girls like that is going get us out of the projects, and like reading that stuff is going make him rich, or even get him a pass out of this dungeon project.

Hey, wait a minute, no, no, it is not about science, it’s not about some silly book report, and it’s not about Peter Paul suddenly being a lady’s man. Why didn’t I think of it before? It’s about this new rocker- Jerry Lee Lewis and his be-bop thing, be-bop piano thing. Ya that's it. They say he is going to replace the king, and for all you squares, cubes, and fourth dimension guys and frills, that means Elvis. And if you don’t know that name you must have been up in space with the dogs, monkeys, or robots or whoever is riding those rockets.

Okay, okay I can take a joke. The spell is not Markin, it’s Jerry Lee. Hell, a momentary thing, maybe a few weeks while the king is resting up and waiting to go into the service, or something. No way someone who jumps up and down on a piano, and is kind of a wild man ever going to be, in his wildest dreams, better than Elvis. No way, no comparison, forget it. Name song names, okay. Heartbreak Hotel, That’s When You’re Heartbreak Begins, Jailhouse Rock, Good Rockin’ Tonight, Hound Dog, One Night (that alone says it all). Come on now, I listed enough. And Jerry Lee, High School Confidential. Ya, it’s good, its be-bop but this guy is strictly a one-hit Johnnie. Ya, okay I’ll let Peter Paul have his moment of glory, and maybe a kiss or two, if he’s not scared like usual, but Laura will be back with me at the next dance. Who knows, if I cut in at this Saturday's dance that's coming up, to spare her having to dance with Peter Paul and his black chino cuffed pants all night, maybe this dance. Then Peter Paul can go back and try his luck on those stick girls that are more his speed anyway. Ya, Elvis and Billie. Long live the kings!

Saturday, April 9, 2011

Those Oldies But Goodies…Out In The Be-Bop ‘50s Song Night- The Battle Rages- Jerry Lee or Elvis? - Jerry Lee Lewis’ “High School Confidential”-Billie's, Billie From The Projects, King-Size View

Click on the headline to link to a YouTube film clip of Jerry Lee Lewis banging away on that piano for his life on High School Confidential from the movie of the same name.

High School Confidential lyrics-Jerry Lee Lewis

You better open up honey it's your lover boy me that's a knockin'
You better listen to me sugar all the cats are at the High School rockin'
Honey get your boppin' shoes Before the juke box blows a fuse
Got everybody hoppin' everybody boppin'

Boppin' at the High School Hop
Boppin' at the High School Hop
Shakin' at the High School Hop
I've rollin' at the High School Hop
I've been movin' at the High School Hop
Everybody’s hoppin' Everybody's boppin'
Boppin' at the High School Hop

Come on little baby gonna rock a little bit tonight
Woooh I got get with you sugar gonna shake things up tonight
Check out the heart beatin' rhythm cause my feet are moving smooth and
Light

Boppin' at the High School Hop
Shakin' at the High School Hop
Rollin' at the High School Hop
Movin' at the High School Hop
Everybody’s hoppin' just a boppin' just a boppin'

Piano Solo!

Come on little baby let me give a piece good news good news good news
Jerry Lee is going to rock away all his blues
My hearts beatin' rhythm and my soul is singin' the blues

Oooooh Boppin' at the High School Hop
Shakin' at the High School Hop
Rollin' at the High School Hop
Gettin' it at the High School Hop
Everybody’s hoppin' Everybody's boppin'
Boppin' at the High School Hop
********
Billie, William James Bradley comment:

I am fuming, fuming six ways to Sunday if that is possible, fuming until the cows come home if there are any cows around, and if they have wandered I am still fuming. Why? I just called up Laura, Laura that I took to the school dance last week, to ask her if she wanted to go to the church sock hop scheduled for this weekend, Saturday night. Now it wouldn’t be as good as the last school one with a live band, and all, but even with just records and just ten thousand poor as church mice chaperones doing their chaperone thing to get grace or something, for real, we could still have a good time.

And do you know what she said. “I’ve got a date.” What, no way, no possible way, when everybody knows that she is my “personal property.” “Who is the guy, who is the guy, who is the guy who would dare cross the king of the rock night? This world is not big enough for the two of us, give me his name,” I said as I readied my arrows. “It’s Peter Paul, and before you get all crazy I asked him,” she darted back the sound of her voice pleased, pleased as punch the way she said it. “Double what?” I shouted over the phone so everyone with a twenty square mile area could hear, if they wanted to. And she came back, all sweet reason just like every girl, every stick or shapely girl, women even “I like you, I definitely like you, you’re funny, and you’re a good dancer, and you sure know a lot about rock ‘n’ roll, but you seem too bossy, and you take that "king of the rock" thing that Peter Paul keeps telling everybody about way too seriously. If Peter Paul hadn’t spent what seems like half his life building you up as, what did he call it, oh ya, “king of the be-bop night” you might be a better boy to be with. But the big thing, and here is where it all comes down on you, I found out, found out from Karen, that you tried to make a clown out of poor Peter Paul when you let him dance with me and you knew, or thought you knew, that he couldn’t dance for beans.” After she let that set in my head, uneasily in my head for a minute, she continued “So, yes, I went right over to his house and told him, no, what did he say I said, ‘insisted’ that we were going to the next dance together.” But get this, get this dagger thing aimed right at my heart. She finishes off with “And he makes me smile with his silly bookish ways, and you don’t okay. Next dance I’ll go with you, your highness, maybe.” And then she hung up. Ouch!

Two-timing that is all that it is. I can see that now. No, not Laura, you know how girls are, twelve and thirteen year old girls, with their hard to figure giggles, their starting to get shapes, and their monthlies (my sisters, Carol and Donna, told me all about it, sorry, tough luck girls). No, Peter Paul, Markin, that s.o.b., two-timed his best friend that’s all it can be. Probably went to the Thomas Crane Public Library branch that is attached to the school and read up everything that was on the shelves about two-timing, the history of two-timing, boys two-timings girls, girls two-timing boys, everything on the subject back to Pharaoh Egypt times. Just to two-time Billie, William James Bradley, known far and wide, despite what Laura said, as the king of the be-bop rock night. And Markin, no more Peter Paul nice guy now, didn’t have diddley to do with that. Period

But how did he switch up on me? I don’t get that. First, I know, I know from Karen, I know from Donna (not my sister Donna, Donna O’Toole, Cool Donna O’Toole, or was until I ditched her, or what did Markin call it, “discarded her”), I know from Theresa, and I know now, because I just asked her before she went out the door, from my sister Carol, that Markin never said word one to Laura before I introduced them the other night. Although now that I thik about it I am still ticked off at Carol for not telling me about helping Markin learn to dance, rock dance, not that silly cowboy, barn dance, square dance thing that he calls rock dancing. I also know from Carol that Markin did not know much about jumping Jerry Lee Lewis. He was just hoping to get maybe an Elvis One Night With You, Good Rockin’ Today, Jailhouse Rock chance. Or a Chuck Berry Sweet Little Sixteen, or a Bo Diddley Who Do You Love? chance with Theresa, Karen or Donna (O’Toole). No way he believed, and I am going to go over right now and ask him about it, that he was going to step up to Laura’s league. Hell, it couldn’t have been that silly report, that silly report that he kept hammering me about as he leaned each new thing, Jesus Christ, Greek democracy, what are you kidding.

At his house I confront him. “Okay Markin what gives, what, how, why, where, when did you figure out how to break my time with Laura? And don’t play innocent and definitely, I warn you, start talking about that report, that silly Greek geek report.”

Of course I do not believe Peter Paul’s story, is who me story, no way. No way in hell, excuse my language, is a nice shape like that Laura, a nice shape in all the right places, or trying to be in all the right places, and smart, real smart going to go off the deep-end for a, let’s face it, ragamuffin boy like Markin. Christ, even he said it, a guy with a clowny outfit, a shirt, a shirt, a white stripped shirt for Christ sake, if you can believe that, a Bargie special, or straight of the back-rack at Woolworth’s, black chino pants with cuffs, jesus, cuffs and those square, too square Thom McAn brown shoes that I haven’t worn since about first communion is going to put the whammy on a babe like Laura.

Against me, against the king of the rock night in these parts, with my smart-looking wide lapel two-tone sports jacket just like Eddie Cochran, my black pants (ya, black pants, the black is okay it is the chinos, and, and the cuffs that have to go) nicely-pressed (ya, ma-pressed), my Elvis-style hair-do with just the right length sideburns and my foxy, spit-shined Florheim suede shoes (no, not blue suede, that’s squarey square now).

Ya, it was some drugstore medicine whammy he put on her at the dance that night. No question, although I haven’t quite figured out how he did it, because everybody knows, or I know anyhow that Peter Paul and science don’t mix. Don’t mix since he tried that rocket ship caper last year, trying personally to beat the commies at their own game after Sputnik jumped the night sky, when he tried to send some balsa wood rocket into space when he punctured a CO2 cartridge with a nail and a hammier and almost got us all killed. Or when, after that, he started to mix some chemicals in his cellar to go about it another way with some three-stage rocket concoction and almost blew the whole place up. I’ll tell you about that sometime but right now I wish, I wish, well I wish. See, Peter Paul is really about things like Abigail Adams, or her son John Quincy, or about literary guys, like this guy Fitzgerald who wrote about rich kids with names like Basil something and Josephine this or that and their hi-jinks ages ago that he has been yakking about lately. Ya, reading about rich kids, rich, rich guys having fun with rich girls like that is going get us out of the projects, and like reading that stuff is going make him rich, or even get him a pass out of this dungeon project.

Hey, wait a minute, no, no, it is not about science, it’s not about some silly book report, and it’s not about Peter Paul suddenly being a lady’s man. Why didn’t I think of it before? It’s about this new rocker- Jerry Lee Lewis and his be-bop thing, be-bop piano thing. Ya that's it. They say he is going to replace the king, and for all you squares, cubes, and fourth dimension guys and frills, that means Elvis. And if you don’t know that name you must have been up in space with the dogs, monkeys, or robots or whoever is riding those rockets.

Okay, okay I can take a joke. The spell is not Markin, it’s Jerry Lee. Hell, a momentary thing, maybe a few weeks while the king is resting up and waiting to go into the service, or something. No way someone who jumps up and down on a piano, and is kind of a wild man ever going to be, in his wildest dreams, better than Elvis. No way, no comparison, forget it. Name song names, okay. Heartbreak Hotel, That’s When You’re Heartbreak Begins, Jailhouse Rock, Good Rockin’ Tonight, Hound Dog, One Night (that alone says it all). Come on now, I listed enough. And Jerry Lee, High School Confidential. Ya, it’s good, its be-bop but this guy is strictly a one-hit Johnnie. Ya, okay I’ll let Peter Paul have his moment of glory, and maybe a kiss or two, if he’s not scared like usual, but Laura will be back with me at the next dance. Who knows, if I cut in at this Saturday's dance that's coming up, to spare her having to dance with Peter Paul and his black chino cuffed pants all night, maybe this dance. Then Peter Paul can go back and try his luck on those stick girls that are more his speed anyway. Ya, Elvis and Billie. Long live the kings!

Friday, April 8, 2011

Those Oldies But Goodies…Out In The Be-Bop ‘50s Song Night- The Battle Rages- Jerry Lee or Elvis?- Jerry Lee Lewis’ “High School Confidential”

Wednesday, March 2, 2011

When The Times Called For Be-Bop, Be-Bop- Jerry Lee Lewis Or Elvis?

Click on the headline to link to a YouTube film clip of Jerry Lee Lewis performing High School Confidential. Not as good as in the movie of the same name , but good.

Markin, Class of 1964, comment:

Jerry Lee Lewis or Elvis?

What is your choice? Here is mine.

DVD REVIEW

Last Man Standing, Jerry Lee Lewis in Concert, New York, 2006

Elvis, Chuck Berry, Carl Perkins, Bo Diddley. Yes those are the men who created Rock 'n' Roll, as we know it. However in that list do not forget one Jerry Lee Lewis. Fate dealt him an uneven hand due to the foibles of his personal life (the subject of a movie, Great Balls of Fire, with Dennis Quaid) but his form of rockabilly/boogie-woogie piano-driven music and madman presentation must be placed in the mix of influences that drove the best of early rock.

If for no other reason that that he is one of the few 'still standing' from that generation it was nice to see what "The Killer" could do in his 71st year in concert in New York City in 2006 with a host of guests some old, some young. Clearly off these performances he has lost a couple of steps. Hell the kind of energy that Jerry Lee produced in the 1950's definitely had a short shelf life. There are some nice clips from that period interspersed with the concert, by the way. Think about that opening scene in High School Confidential of 1958 where he is playing like a madman on the back of a flatbed truck as he heads toward the local high school. Whoa.

Despite the lost of energy here Jerry Lee can still give out on some tunes like in the old days. Take his duo with R&B master Solomon Burke on Who Will the Next Fool Be. How about Tom Jones on Green, Green Grass of Home. Or Norah Jones on Hank Williams' Your Cheating Heart. Or Jerry cover on Chuck Berry's Roll Over Beethoven. Or his classic Crazy Arms. And on and on. In fact the covers of his old material and some Hank Williams material highlight this concert. If you have a couple of hours better take advantage of it. Then you will know what it was like when men (and women) played rock and roll for keeps.

CD REVIEW

Last Man Standing, Jerry Lee Lewis and other artists, Shangri-la Records, 2006

The last time we heard the name Jerry Lee Lewis in this space (see above) was in connection with a rave review of his star-studded concert in New York City in 2006 also entitled The Last Man Standing. I was not aware at the time I wrote that review that there was a CD connected with the DVD (silly me). This CD also gets a rave review from these quarters. The last paragraph details some of the highlights of this CD. However, I can tell you right now to save your old eyes- get this thing. It is not the fire-balling of Jerry Lee's youth but virtually from start to finish it is some very nice work. If you need to go back to the Fifties and hear his original work there are plenty of his greatest compilations elsewhere (or on YouTube). Here are a couple of words on this one:

Apparently in putting together this album every musical artist who has ever been anything, ever wanted to be anything or who will be in the various musical Halls of Fame signed on to play with "The Killer". Let's make this clear though- Jerry Lee is in charge here- the other artists are basking off of his reflected glory. Ya, he is an old man and he has lost a step, and maybe he has not learned all of life's lessons but he still rocks & rolls, does rockabilly and can country rock with the best of them.

Highlights here concerning some of life's lessons that old Jerry Lee has learned, as reflected in some of the lyrics, are his duo with Willie Nelson on Couple More Years, his duo with Keith Richards on That Kind of Fool (a take-off on his old classic- Who Will The Next Fool Be) and his duo with Eric Clapton on Trouble In Mind. To show that he can still rock-listen to the duo with Kid Rock (yes, that Kid Rock of rapper fame) on Honky Tonk Woman. If you need to hear rockabilly and boogie-woogie then the classic Hadacol Boogie with Buddy Guy will keep you moving. Enough said, except the production values on this CD are very good, as well.
*************
Here Are Some Lyrics For Jerry Lee and Elvis So You Can Make An Informed Decision On These Burning Questions Of The Day.

High School Confidental lyrics-Jerry Lee Lewis

You better open up honey it's your lover boy me that's a knockin'
You better listen to me sugar all the cats are at the High School rockin'
Honey get your boppin' shoes Before the juke box blows a fuse
Got everbody hoppin' everybody boppin'
Boppin' at the High School Hop
Boppin' at the High School Hop
Shakin' at the High School Hop
I've rollin' at the High School Hop
I've been movin' at the High School Hop
Everybodys hoppin' Everybody's boppin'
Boppin' at the High School Hop
Come on little baby gonna rock a little bit tonight
Woooh I got get with you sugar gonna shake things up tonight
Check out the heart beatin' rhythm cause my feet are moving smooth and
Light
Boppin' at the High School Hop
Shakin' at the High School Hop
Rollin' at the High School Hop
Movin' at the High School Hop
Everybodys hoppin' just a boppin' just a boppin'
Piano Solo!
Come on little baby let me give a piece good news good news good news
Jerry Lee is going to rock away all his blues
My hearts beatin' rhythm and my soul is singin' the blues
Oooooh Boppin' at the High School Hop
Shakin' at the High School Hop
Rollin' at the High School Hop
Gettin' it at the High School Hop
Everybodys hoppin' Everybody's boppin'
Boppin' at the High School Hop

Hound Dog lyrics-Elvis Presley

You ain't nothin' but a hound dog
cryin' all the time.
You ain't nothin' but a hound dog
cryin' all the time.
Well, you ain't never caught a rabbit
and you ain't no friend of mine.

When they said you was high classed,
well, that was just a lie.
When they said you was high classed,
well, that was just a lie.
You ain't never caught a rabbit
and you ain't no friend of mine.

Sunday, January 30, 2011

Out In The Be-Bop 1950s Night- A Breathe Of Fresh Air Hits The Radio Airwaves – When Elvis Was Young And Hungry And Billie Was A Madman

CD Review

Sunrise: Elvis Presley, Elvis Presley, 2 CD set, BMG Records. 1989

“I hate Elvis, I love Elvis,” I can still hear the echo of my old “the projects” boy, William James Bradley, also known as Billie, Billie from the hills, a mad demon of a kid and my best friend down in the elementary school. We grew apart after a while, and I will tell you why in a minute, but for a long time, a long kid time long, Billie, Billie of a hundred dreams, Billie of fifty (at least) screw-ups made me laugh and made my day when things were tough, like they almost always were, at my beat down broke down family house.

You know fifty some years later Billie was right. We hated Elvis, especially at that time when all the girls, the young girls got weak-kneed over him and he made the older girls (and women, some mothers even) sweat and left no room for ordinary mortal boys, “the projects boys” most of all, on their “dream” card. And most especially, hard as we tried, for brown-haired, tow-headed, blue-eyed ten, eleven and twelve year old boys who didn’t know how to dance, or sneer. We both got pissed off at my brother because, he looked very much like Elvis and although he had no manners, and no time for girls, they were all following him. Christ there really is no justice in this wicked old world.

And we loved Elvis for giving us, at least as far as we knew then, our own music, our own "jump' and our own jail-break from the tired old stuff we heard on the radio and television but did not ‘”speak” to us. And for the songs that he left behind. Not the goofy, Tin Pan Alley or somewhere like that, inspired “happy” music that went along with his mostly maligned, and rightly so, films but the stuff from the Sun Records days, the stuff from when he was from hunger. That, as we also from hunger, was like a siren call to break-out and then we caught his act on television and that was that. I probably walk “funny”, knees and hips out of whack, today from trying way back then to pour a third-rate imitation of his moves into my body to impress the girls.

But enough of Elvis’ place in the pre-teen and teen rock pantheon this is after all about Billie, and Elvis’ twisted spell on the poor boy. Now you know Billie, or you should, from another story, a story about Bo Diddley and how Billie wanted to, as a change of pace break from the Elvis rut create his own “style.” Well, in hard, hard post-World War II Northern white "the projects" racial animosity poor unknowing Billie got blasted away by one of the older, more knowing boys about wanted to emulate a n----r for his troubles.

That sent Billie, Billie from the hills, back to Elvis pronto. See, Billie was desperate to impress the girls way before I was aware of them, or their charms. Half, on some days, three-quarters of our conversations (I won’t say monologues because I did get a word in edgewise every once in a while when Billie got on one of his rants) revolved around doing this or that, something legal something not, to impress the girls. And that is where the “hate” part mentioned above comes in. Billie believed, and he may still believe it today, that if only he could approximate Elvis’s looks, look, stance, and substance that all the girls would be flocking to him.

Needless to say, such an endeavor required, requires money, dough, kale, cash, moola whatever you want to call it. And what twelve year old project boys (that’s the age time of this story, about late 1957, early 1958) didn’t have, and didn’t have in abundance was any of that do-re-mi. And no way to get it from missing parents, messed up parents, or just flat out poor parents. Billie’s and mine were the later, poor as church mice. No that‘s not right because church mice (in the way that I am using it, and as we used it back then to signify the respectable poor who “touted” their Catholic pious poorness as a badge of honor in this weaselly old world) would not do, would not think about, would not even breathe the same air of what we were about to embark on. A life of crime, kid stuff crime but I'll leave that to the readers judgment.

See, on one of Billie’s rants he got the idea in his head, and, maybe, it got planted there by something that he read about Elvis (Christ, he read more about that guy that he did about anybody else once he became an acolyte), that if he had a bunch of rings on all his fingers the girls would give him a tumble (a tumble in those days being a hard kiss on the lips for about twelve seconds or “copping” a little feel, and if I have to explain that last in more detail you had better just move on). But see, also Billie’s idea is that if he has all those rings, especially for a projects boy then it will make his story that has set to tell easier. And that story is none other than he wrote to Elvis (possible) and spoke man to man about his situation (improbable) and Elvis, Elvis the king, Elvis from nowhere Mississippi like we were from the nowhere projects, Elvis bleeding heart, had sent him these rings to give him a start in life (outrageously impossible.) Christ, I don’t believe old Billie came up with that story even now when I am a million years world-weary.

But first you need the rings and as the late honorable bank robber, Willie Sutton, said about robbing banks-that’s where the money is-old Billie, blessed, beatified Billie, figured out, and figured out all by himself, that if you want to be a ring stealer that you better go to the jewelry store because that is where the rings are. Now the reader, and rightly so, now, might ask where was his best buddy during this time and why was he not offering wise counsel about the pitfalls of crime and the virtues of honesty and incorruptibility. Well, when Billie got off on his rant you just waited to see what played out but the real reason was, hell, maybe I could get a ring for my ring-less fingers and be on my way to impress the girls too. I think they call it, or could call it, aiding and abetting.

But enough of that superficial moralizing. Let’s get to the jewelry store, the best one in the downtown of the working class town we were appendaged to (literally so because it was located on a one road in and out peninsula). We walked a couple of miles to get there, plotting all the way. Bingo the Acme Jewelry Store(or some name like that) jumped up at us. Billie’s was as nervous as a colt and I was not far behind, although on this caper I am just the “stooge”, if that. I’m to wait outside to see if John Law comes by. Okay, Billie, good luck. And strangely enough his luck is good that day, and many days after, although those days after were not ring days. That day though his haul was five rings. Five shaky rings, shaky hands Billie, as we walked, then started running, away from the down town area. When we got close to home we stopped near the beach where we lived to see up close what the rings looked like. Billie yelled, “Damn.” And why did he yell that word. Well, apparently in his terror (his word to me) at getting caught he just grabbed what was at hand. And what was at hand were five women’s rings. Now, how are you going to impress girls, ten, eleven or twelve year old girls, even if as naïve as us, and maybe more so, that Elvis is you bosom buddy and you are practically his only life-line adviser with five women’s rings? Damn, damn is right.

Tuesday, December 21, 2010

Out In The Be-Bop 1950s Night- Out In The Church Hall Dance Night- A CD Review

Click on the headline to link to a YouTube film clip of the Teen Angels performing Eddie, My Love.

CD Review

The Rock ‘N’ Roll Era: 1956: various artists, Time-Life Music, 1987

I, seemingly, have endlessly gone back to my early musical roots in reviewing this Time-Life classic rock series that goes under the general title The Rock ‘n’ Roll Era. And while time and ear have eroded the sparkle of some of the lesser tunes it still seems obvious that those years, say 1955-58, really did form the musical jail break-out for my generation, the generation of ’68, who had just started to tune into music.

And we, we small-time punk in the old-fashioned sense of that word, we hardly wet behind the ears elementary school kids, and that is all we were for those who are now claiming otherwise, listened our ears off. Those were strange times indeed in that be-bop 1950s night when stuff happened, kid’s stuff, but still stuff like a friend of mine, not Billie who I will talk about later, who claimed, with a straight face to the girls, that he was Elvis’ long lost son. Did the girls do the math on that one? Or, maybe, they like us more brazen boys were hoping, hoping and praying, that it was true despite the numbers, so they too could be washed by that flamed-out night.

Well, this I know, boy and girl alike tuned in on our transistor radios (small battery- operated radios that we could put in our pockets, and hide from snooping parental ears, at will) to listen to music that from about day one, at least in my household was not considered “refined” enough for young, young pious you’ll never get to heaven listening to that devil music and you had better say about eight zillion Hail Marys to get right Catholic, ears. Ya right, Ma, like Patti Page or Bob (not Bing, not the Bing of Brother, Can You Spare A Dime? anyway) Crosby and The Bobcats were supposed to satisfy our jail break cravings.

But can you blame me, or us, for our jail-break visions and our clandestine subterranean life-transistor radio dreams of lots of girls (or boys as the case may be), lots of cars, and lots of money if we could just get out from under that parental noise. Now this Time-Life series has many compilations but as if to prove my point beyond discussion the year 1956 has two, do you hear me, two CDs to deal with that proposition that I mentioned above. And neither includes Elvis, Jerry Lee, Bo Diddley or some other stuff that I might have included. I already reviewed the other 1956 compilation previously but here are the stick outs from this selection:

Blue Suede Shoes, Carl Perkins (Elvis covered it and made millions but old Carl had a better old rockabilly back beat on his version); In The Still Of The Night, The Five Satins (a doo wop classic that I am humming right this minute, sha dot do be doo, sha dot do be doo or something like that spelling, okay); Eddie, My Love, The Teen Queens (incredible harmony, doo wop back-up, and, and “oh Eddie, please don’t make me wait too long” as part of the lyrics, Whoa!); Roll Over Beethoven, Chuck Berry ( a deservedly early break-out rock anthem. Hell I thought it was big deal just to trash Patti Page old Chuck went after the big boys.); Be-Bop-a-Lula, Gene Vincent (the guy was kind of a one hit wonder but Christ what a one hit, "ya, she’s my baby now"); Blueberry Hill, Fats Domino (that old smooth piano riffing away); Rip It Up, Little Richard (he/she wild man Richard rips it up; Young Love, Sonny James ( dreamy stuff that those giggling girls at school loved, and so you "loved" too); Why Do Fools Fall In Love?, Frankie Lymon and the Teenagers (for a minute the king be-bop, doo wop teenage angel boy. Everybody wanted to be the doo wop king or queen); See You Later, Alligator, Bill Haley and The Comets (ya, these “old guys” could rock, especially that sax man. Think about it people still use the expression “see you later alligator”); and Since I Met You Baby, Ivory Joe Hunter (every dance pray, every last dance pray, oh my god, let them play Ivory Joe at the end so I can dance close with that certain she I have been eying all night).

Note: I have mentioned previously the excellent album cover art that accompanies each Time-Life classic rock series compilation. Not only does it almost automatically evoke long ago memories of red hot youth, and those dreams, those steamy dance night dreams too, but has supplied this writer with more than one idea for a commentary. This 1956 compilation album cover is in that same vein. The cover shows what looks like a local cover band from the 1950s getting ready to perform at the local high school dance. Although the guys, especially the lead vocalist, look a little skittish they know they have to make a good showing because this is their small time chance at the big time. Besides there are about six thousand other guys hanging around in their fathers’ garages ready and willing to step up if the Danny and the Bluenotes fall flat.

This live band idea is actually something of a treat because, from what I recall, many times these school dance things survived on loud record playing dee-jay chatter, thus the term “record hop.” From the look of it the school auditorium is the locale (although ours were inevitably held in the school gym), complete with the obligatory crepe, other temporary school-spirit related ornaments and a mesmerized girl band groupie to give the joint a festive appearance.

More importantly, as I said before, at least for the band, as they are to be warming up for the night’s work, is that they have to make their mark here (and at other such venues) and start to get a following if they want to avoid another dreaded fate of rock life. Yes, the dreaded fate of most bands that don’t break out of the old neighborhood, the fate of having to some years down the road play at some of the students they are performing for today children’s birthday parties, bar mitzvahs, weddings and the like. That thought should be enough to keep these guys working until late in the night, jamming the night away, disturbing some old fogy Frank Sinatra fans in the neighborhood, perfecting those covers of Roll Over Beethoven, Rip It Up, Rock Around The Clock and Jailhouse Rock. Go to it boy, you bet.

Wednesday, October 27, 2010

**Once Again-Out In The Be-Bop Night- The School Dance -Last Chance For Romance

Click on the headline to link to a YouTube film clip of The Angels performing Till.

CD Review

The Rock ‘N’ Roll Era: The ‘60s: Last Dance, Time-Life, 1991

As I have noted in reviewing The ‘50s: Last Dance of this Time-Life Roll ‘n’ Roll Era series I have spent tons of time and reams of cyberspace “paper” in this space reviewing the teenage culture of the 1950s, especially the inevitable school dance and the also equally inevitable trauma of the last dance. That event, the last dance that is, was the last chance for even shy boys like me to prove that we were not wallflowers, or worst. The last chance to rise (or fall) in the torrid and relentless pecking order of the social scene at school. And moreover to prove to that certain she that you were made of some sort of heroic stuff, the stuff of dreams, of her dreams, thank you very much. Moreover, to make use of that social capital you invested in by learning to dance, or the “shadow” of learning to dance.

Fair, enough, true enough, if only a rather short sketch of the preparations, the seemingly endless preparations for the ‘big night.’ A night that entailed getting into some serious grooming workouts, including procedures not usually a apart of the daily toilet. Plenty of deodorant, hair oil, and breathe fresheners. Moreover, endless energy used getting worked up about wardrobe, mode of transportation, and other factors that I have addressed elsewhere, and, additionally, factors contingent upon whether you were dated up or stag. All that need not be repeated here. What does stand some further inspection is something that has received scant notice in all this welter of detail, with the exception of that overblown coverage of the last dance. Nothing on the inner workings of the dance itself.

Actually, and I will only speak to the late fifties and early sixties but I am sure this observation will hold up for other times as well, there are two school dance sequels, that first tremulous middle school dance series, and the later even more significant high school dances. Age, more convoluted socials relationships, physical and sexual growth, changes in musical taste, attitudes toward life and toward the opposite sex (or nowadays same sex) all made them two distinct affairs, except the ubiquitous teacher chaperones to guard against all manner of murder and mayhem, or, more likely, someone sneaking out for butts, booze or off-hand nuzzling (or, have mercy, all three). I will keep strictly to the high school dance scene here since the compilation under review includes musical selections that were current in the of my high school time.

These musical selections "spoke" to that gnawing feeling in the back of your head, half hidden by massive teenage psychic overlay of the need to take a constant survey of what is going on in your little so-called world. A moment's glazed stare as you wait to get into the dance venue allows you to think through the litany of problems to be addressed as soon as you get a breather. Shall I give examples?

For example; being stood up for a date; or when that certain he or she did not call; or that certain he or she had another date; or that certain "unto death" friend of yours took that certain he or she away from you; or when that certain he or she said no, no for any number of things but you know the real “no”, right?; or, finally, that mournful, pitiful midnight crying time when sometime he or she, did or did not do, or did or did not say, or he or she forget to remember, and so on. But those issues will wait for another day because right now the doors are opening and you have more pressing issues in your heated little mind. Hope drives your every move from here on in.

I don’t have to spend much time on the physical and technical details of the dance, hell, you can describe them in your sleep. And if you can’t do so watch a film like 1973’s American Graffiti, the segment on the local high school dance, as I have noted previously, once you get indoors could have been 1962 anyplace U.S.A. (and I am willing to bet anytime U.S.A., as well. For this baby-boomer, that particular high school dance, could have taken place at my high school when I was a student in the early 1960s). From the throwaway crepe paper decorations that festooned the place placed around the gym by the ever helpful Girls Club or Tri-Hi-Y up to the ever-present foldaway gym bleachers to those evil-eyed chaperones to the platform the local band (a band that if it did not hit it big would go on to greater glory at our future weddings, birthday parties, and other important occasions) covering the top hits of the day performed on it was a perfect replica of my own experience.

Also perfect replica in that film were the classic boys’ attire for a casual dance, plaid or white sports shirt, chinos, stolid shoes, and short-trimmed hair (no beards, beads, bell-bottoms, it’s much too early in the decade for that) and for the girls blouses (or maybe sweaters, cashmere, if I recall being in fashion at the time, at least in the colder East), full swirling dresses, and, I think beehive hair-dos. Wow! Of course, perfect replica were the infinite variety of dances (frug, watusi, twist, stroll, etc) that blessed, no, twice blessed, rock and roll let us do in order to not to have to dance too waltz close. We all owe Chubby Checker and Gary U.S. Bonds a debt that can never be repaid. Mercy.

Damn, my going on and on about the physical descriptions is just so much eye wash. The thing could have been held in a airplane hangar for all we really cared. And everyone could have been dressed in paper bags. What mattered, and maybe will always matter, is the hes looking at those certain shes, and vis-a-versa. The endless small meaningful looks (if stag, of course, eyes straight forward if dated up, or else bloody hell). Except for those wallflowers who are permanently looking down at the ground, and pleased to be doing it. And that, my friends, is the real struggle that went on in those events, for the stags. The struggle against wallflower-dom. The struggle for at least some room in the social standing, even if near the bottom, rather than outcaste-dom. That struggle was as fierce as any class struggle old Karl Marx might have projected. The straight, upfront calculation (and not infrequently miscalculation)of those evil eyes, the maneuvering, the averting of eyes, the not averting of eyes, the reading of silence signals, the uncomphrehended "no", the gratuitous "yes." Need I go on? I don’t think so, except, if you had the energy, or even if you didn’t, then you dragged yourself to that last dance. And hoped, hoped to high heaven that it was a slow one. Ah, to be young was very heaven as old man Wordsworth had it in another context.

Stickouts here include: legendary blue artist Etta James’ Something’s Got A Hold On Me (fast); The Angels’ Till (slow, ouch); Bo Diddley’s Road Runner (fast); and Donnie Brooks’ classic (the one you prayed they would play) Mission Bell. How is that for dee-jay even-handedness?

********

'Till lyrics

Till the moon deserts the sky
Till the all the seas run dry
Till then I'll worship you

Till the tropic sun turns cold
Till this young world grows old
My darling, I'll adore you

You are my reason to live
All I own I would give
Just to have you adore me, oh, oh, oh

Till the rivers flow upstream
Till lovers cease to dream
Till then I'm yours, be mine

instrumental interlude

You are my reason to live
All I own I would give
Just to have you adore me

Till the rivers flow upstream
Till lovers cease to dream
Till then I'm yours, be mine