afterlife2

afterlife2

Audioholic Warlord
One of the great pioneers. Met him once and he was kind and funny.
 
KenM10759

KenM10759

Audioholic Samurai
I had only seen him perform once. It was a show held at the Memorial Auditorium in my hometown of Worcester MA, and I was probably 12 or 13 years old. His performance never left me because every time I'd see guys like Pete Townsend doing the windmill or that chop hop while playing, I knew who they got it from.

Chuck was THE original high energy rock n' roller! May he rock in peace.
 
haraldo

haraldo

Audioholic Spartan
The guy who "invented" rock'n'roll is gone...

"If you tried to give rock'n'roll another name, you might call it 'Chuck Berry.'"
—John Lennon

 
Dan

Dan

Audioholic Chief
If you want anything like a proper rock and roll music collection you MUST own Chuck' "Golden Decade Volumes 1 and 2". Otherwise your missing much of the important music of the time.
 
slipperybidness

slipperybidness

Audioholic Warlord
If you want anything like a proper rock and roll music collection you MUST own Chuck' "Golden Decade Volumes 1 and 2". Otherwise your missing much of the important music of the time.
I own it on vinyl!

Not sure how much I paid for it, but it couldn't have been more than $10.
 
C

Chu Gai

Audioholic Samurai
In retrospect, how good would it have been if he'd done a Super Bowl halftime?
 
Ponzio

Ponzio

Audioholic Samurai
Wow! I’m surprised at what little love one of the original paterfamilias of rock ‘n’ roll has gotten here on the site [shakes head].
 
Swerd

Swerd

Audioholic Warlord
Wow! I’m surprised at what little love one of the original paterfamilias of rock ‘n’ roll has gotten here on the site [shakes head].
OK, I did some idle thinking about Chuck Berry today and his importance to pop music. He is one of those rare musicians who stands out not only for his library of music, but also for the large numbers of others who copied and imitated him over the years. That would include his style of music and his style of guitar playing. Anyone from the 1960s onward who wanted to play rock guitar learned Chuck Berry songs first, before they learned anything else. It was simple and became essential to most everything that followed. If you couldn’t play Johnny B. Goode, you probably shouldn’t be playing guitar at all.

Earlier today (Saturday afternoon), I heard a local radio station do a 2-hour tribute to Chuck Berry. It included a large number of covers of his music by others. It’s safe to say that Chuck Berry may have been largely forgotten if not for the attention he got from the Beatles and the Rolling Stones early in their careers. By 1965-66, this created a widespread renewal of interest in Chuck Berry among young American musicians.

I took some notes while listening to the radio show, and it inspired me to look through my collection to see what else I could come up with.

Brown Eyed Handsome Man – Taj Mahal; Nina Simone; and others?

Maybelline – Elvis (!)

No Money Down – Duane Allman or Allman Brothers

Chuck’s Boogie – The Yardbirds (instrumental titled Jeff’s Boogie, as played by Jeff Beck)

Roll Over Beethoven – The Beatles

Too Much Monkey Business – The Youngbloods

Sweet Little 16 – Beatles; Beach Boys (Speaking of monkey business, the Beach Boys recorded ‘Surfing USA’ in 1963 with a melody & rhythm identical to Sweet Little 16 without attributing it to Chuck Berry. Under pressure, they later gave the copyright to Berry’s publisher.)

Rock & Roll Music – Beatles

Johnny B. Goode – The Grateful Dead; Johnny Winter; and probably many others.
There are 160 cover versions of JBG, done by most everyone from Conway Twitty to the Sex Pistols. The Grateful Dead have performed it 281 times in concert, and released their version on multiple live albums. It was featured in at least one movie, Back to the Future. This scene was revisited in Back to the Future Part II. (I sought help from the internet for these tidbits.)

Carol – Rolling Stones

Memphis – Sandy Bull

Lil’ Queenie – Jerry Lee Lewis; Rolling Stones (missed it & I have that CD!)

Almost Grown – Loving Spoonful

Nadine – John Hammond

13 Question Method – Rye Cooder

You Can Never Tell – Emmy Lou Harris; Aaron Neville

It Wasn’t Me – George Thorogood & the Destroyers

Talking About You – Rolling Stones

Bye Bye Johnny – Rolling Stones

Promised Land – Grateful Dead
(One hopes the Promised Land is where Chuck Berry can now be found.)

Three songs I heard on this broadcast, Nadine, Too Much Monkey Business, and No Money Down had some very clever lyrics that I had once known and liked, but had forgotten – until today.

This is certainly not a comprehensive list, I hope others can add to it. I’m pretty certain Bruce Springsteen recorded Chuck Berry covers. Who else?
 
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Ponzio

Ponzio

Audioholic Samurai
Rolling Stones cover on 1970's Get Yer Ya-Ya s Out! of "Little Queenie" ... superb.
 
Swerd

Swerd

Audioholic Warlord
A few interesting tidbits I learned while listening to that Chuck Berry radio show today.

Chuck Berry was married to the same woman from 1948 until his recent death – 69 years!

He listened to and was influenced by the music of Louis Jordan and T Bone Walker. The guy hosting the show, named Bill Wax, said Berry adapted the guitar intro from Louis Jordan's 'Ain't That Just Like a Woman' (played by guitarist Carl Hogan) and turned it into the opening of Johnny B. Goode.

 
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Swerd

Swerd

Audioholic Warlord
Searching for info on the Internet can sometimes take all the fun out of remembering stuff from the past. I stumbled over SecondHandSongs. It allows you to name a song and see what covers have been made for it.
 
Johnny2Bad

Johnny2Bad

Audioholic Chief
Chuck was one of the greats, and a clear founding member of Rock Guitar (along with Link Wray).

He gave us so much, and like all great people, did it just by being himself.

RIP Chuck.
 
Dan

Dan

Audioholic Chief
A good list but honestly it is impossible to be comprehensive. I also think of "Around and Around" covered by the Stones and the Dead and the Stones instrumental, "2120 South Michigan Ave." named for the address of Chess records where Chuck recorded.

As for the founding guitarists of rock, number two for me is definitely Bo Diddley who gave us the Bo beat (aka shave and a haircut) found in any number of songs including the number three guitarist Buddy Holly on "Not Fade Away". I've nothing against Link Wray however.
 
Ponzio

Ponzio

Audioholic Samurai
Chuck Berry song/disc data base

http://www.crlf.de/ChuckBerry/cbdb/songindex/C.html

And songwriting credits … always a shot in the dark anytime you’re dealing with publishing rights, Chuck’s occasional sleight of hand plagiarizing and revisionist history, via people’s memory. Overall though this Brit site link seems to have most of the bases covered.
 
Ponzio

Ponzio

Audioholic Samurai
There were rumors of this last year when Chuck went into the studio after his wife, Themetta "Toddy" Suggs, convinced him to give it one last shot after 38 years. :eek:
Thank u Toddy!!!.

Amazingly at 89 he was able to pull it off and then some. I know one tends to wax nostalgic about their musical heroes … guilty … post-mortem recordings and declare them a touchstone album, when in reality it’s just a last gasp at relevancy, especially with older artists. Not here folks, this here is bona-fide Chuckie still kickin’ a$$ and taking names. Chicago, via St. Louis blues, instrumentals, rumba touches, spoken word commentary on the times and obviously ‘effin rock & roll. No details on the band … I smell Steve Jordan on drums … but it ain’t guys he just picked up on the road, which was Chuck’s wont in his later performances from the early 70’s on. This is one hell of a last will and testament to the world.

R.I.P. Chuck
.

 
Swerd

Swerd

Audioholic Warlord
Loved hearing that! Chuck Berry still had it after all these years :D.
 
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