Larry Williams was another of those high energy Rock artists who helped fill the gap Little Richard left.
Larry Williams
After the success of Little Richard the Specialty label was looking around for someone who could emulate that style. They discovered the immaculate Larry Williams. With Little Richard out of the way on his religious pilgrimage Larry’s way was clear to reproduce the same piano based, raw vocalised Rock songs. He came up with a whole string of them many of which have gone on to become classics. They included Boney Moronie, Short Fat Fannie, Bad Boy, Dizzy Miss Lizzy, Slow Down and She Said Yeah. It was quite an impressive list and one that proved popular with later Rock acts including the Beatles, Animals and Stones.
When his Rock and Roll career petered out he formed an association with Johnny Guitar Watson in the seventies to produce a successful Funk act.
Larry himself was always a bit of a gangster with associations in the underworld with violence and drugs. He was found shot in the head at the age of forty four. It was put down as suicide but there was a lot of talk.
Larry was one of the greats of Rock ‘n’ Roll.
