The Blues Muse: Amazon.co.uk: Goodwin, Opher: 9781518621147: Books
Georgia and the South
Once again I had fallen on my feet. I happened to be in the right place at the right time. Little Richard must have heard something in my playing that he liked or at least nothing that he took exception to. As I was there in that band I just fell into place and was slotted in. I had a feel for that beat and a desire to be part of the storm.
Touring was crazy, particularly on the package tours. The Rock ‘n’ Roll Craze was sweeping the nation and the promoters were quick to jump on the wagon. They figured it was likely to last a week or two and be gone; they had to make their bucks while it lasted. They put together package tours with all the guys from Sun Records and lumped in Fats Domino and Little Richard.
The rivalry between Little Richard and Jerry Lee Lewis was immense. They both wanted to blow each other off stage, both used the piano as a weapon, a stage prop and a visual aid as much as an instrument.
On the bus we all got along fine, black and white. We were musicians. We played cards, swapped riffs, talked music and goofed. Those journeys were long and the heat was intense. There was no air-conditioning back then. You sweated and you fried, even with the windows open it was only hot air that blew through. It burned you up and made you grouchy but we coped.
But it was when we stopped that the trouble began. On the bus we all mingled as one. Off the bus we were divided. The whites went off to their eaters and we went to ours, we drank from different water fountains and even used different toilets. When we stopped for the night they got hotel rooms and we got flop-houses that stank, had roaches and bugs. Sometimes we couldn’t find nowhere to put us up and we slept on the bus while they enjoyed a nice bed.
In the concerts it was more of the same. Little Richard was causing a dilemma. The white kids were going nuts for the music. Little Richard was black and was used to playing to black audiences. At these shows there were just as many white kids as there were black. The promoters split the auditoriums in two with white kids on one side and blacks on the other. They thought they’d got it sussed but they hadn’t reckoned with the power of Rock ‘n’ Roll!
Jerry Lee and Little Richard sent those kids into a frenzy. They didn’t care if they was black or white or green; they just wanted to get out of those seats and let the music take them. Within minutes they were screaming, rushing the stage and dancing in the aisles. There was no stopping them. Black and white, side by side, digging that sound, in ecstasy, shrieking and rockin’ their hearts out.
Behind the scenes there was turmoil. The promoters were threatening the acts. They didn’t want the shows pulled. The police were threatening the promoters; they didn’t like to lose control. The establishment was in uproar. They didn’t want their sons and daughters driven into a frenzy by this decadent primitive beat. They saw it as a moral degrading outrage and the mixing of the races was indicative of all that was wrong with the world, the decay of civilisation. The performers didn’t give a hoot. They were having a great time. They loved every minute. Neither Jerry Lee nor Little Richard would back down. They wanted escalation. They both thought they were the greatest. Elvis might say he was the King but they knew different. Their egos saw all that reaction and stoked it up. They both thought they should close out the show, be the headlining act. They both looked for ways to upstage and outdo each other.
From where we stood in the backing group we saw that it couldn’t get any wilder. Jerry Lee would kick his stool across the stage, spring up on to the piano and pound the keys with his feet, he used his elbows and backside, and went crazy, long wavy hair hanging over his face. The fans threw themselves against the thin line of police and did their utmost to get a piece of him. They went berserk.
Little Richard was not about to be outdone. He played with his leg straight up on the keyboard, jumped on the piano and ran on and off stage. He drove the crowd into such a frenzy that they stormed the stage with girls throwing underwear at him.
At one show Jerry Lee was so incensed at having to take his turn at going on first that he took a can of gasoline on stage and finished with ‘Great Balls of Fire’; he soaked the piano and set fire to it.
Walking past a disconcerted Little Richard, as the flames roared behind him, he dusted his hands and said ‘Follow that Richard’.
We stood there and wondered just how he was going to.
Somehow the racial thing niggled at me. I found myself resenting it. It wasn’t the white guys fault. I could see they were embarrassed by it.