Chuck Berry - RIP

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I am deeply saddened by the passing of Chuck Berry. He has been the most influential figure in my enjoyment of music.

His music is the very essence of rock n' roll. The massive impact on subsequent generations of artists includes the Beatles, Stones, Hendrix, Dylan and Springsteen to name just a few. What is just as significant is his influence on contemporaries like Buddy Holly, Jerry Lee Lewis, Eddie Cochran and Elvis Presley who recorded his songs or played them live in concert. It is just immeasurable to estimate the full power of his lyrics, melodies and guitar style (oh the double string sound) on popular music.

From my perspective, CB created a 'music of excitement' that is timeless. As time passes, and while other major artists may fade from memory, CB's music will live on well into the future.

At lease for me, CB is a cultural treasure.
 
If songwriting credits were dealt with back then as they are today? Pretty much every rock song written since 1955 would be paying out a royalty to Chuck.

Elvis may have been the King, but Chuck Berry built his Castle.
 
With regard to Chuck Berry if you look at the music that's being produced today most of it isn't even done by musicians it's all done by effects and machines with some vocals added. These people like Chuck or The Originators kids grew up listening to him and being influenced by his music when they wrote there's. Then came the generation that was influenced by the rock artists of the 70s and you could just tell by their music very little of it was original which makes people like Chuck in a class of his own.

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Back in October 2016, it was announced Chuck Berry would release his first studio album in 38 years entitled "Chuck". The release dated has been announced as June 16th.

http://r.search.yahoo.com/_ylt=AwrB...512.html/RK=0/RS=WXwAfSFn.fvDq_DLTQ9rMRhmjPs-


The first single from the album is "Big Boys" and a sample is included in the attached link. The song is prime Berry music and, in my opinion, it is excellent. :)

http://r.search.yahoo.com/_ylt=AwrB...602.html/RK=0/RS=3bh3LJ9BXH1JZ3m5LFGh6zFUsKA-


After hearing different vocals and a different guitar (Berry plays a Gibson) on "Big Boys", a further search provided additional information that Berry trades vocals with Nathaniel Rateliff (Night Sweats) with a searing guitar solo from Tom Morello (Rage Against the Machine) at the end of the song.

http://newschannelnebraska.com/abc_...morello-amp-nathaniel-rateliff-abcid35882670/
 
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Chuck was born only a few months after my mother (1926), which is incredible to think about. Where most rockers--well, most anyone in pop music--got their start or first success in their late teens or early twenties, Chuck was twenty-nine when "Maybellene" was moving up the charts; that is, he was by pop music standards an oldster right out of the box. And then came great one after great one, defying his age: "Too Much Monkey Business," "Brown-Eyed Handsome Man," "Thirty Days," "You Can't Catch Me," "Roll Over, Beethoven," "School Day," "Rock and Roll Music," "Around & Around," "Sweet Little Sixteen," "Reelin' and Rockin'," "Johnny B. Goode," "Memphis," "Almost Grown," "Little Queenie," "Carol," "Back in the U.S.A."...and those are just the better known '50s tracks! I mean, if he'd gotten on the wrong plane in 1959 instead of Buddy, Ritchie and the Bopper, he'd be no less legendary today, the respected and seminal performer and rock that he was. But there was more to come: "Bye Bye Johnny," "Come On," "I'm Talking About You," and the 1964 'comeback' singles--"Nadine," "No Particular Place to Go," "You Never Can Tell," "Little Marie" and "Promised Land."

Reviewing his career, in fact, I can only think of a few sides I've never dug, like "Anthony Boy" (I think his first A-side not to make the Hot 100) and the 1972 #1 "My Ding-A-Ling," which IMO was beneath contempt. But the scattered, somewhat forgotten gems are there, like "Wee Wee Hours," "Havana Moon," "Deep Feeling," "No Money Down," "Oh Baby Doll," "Jaguar & Thunderbird," "Joe Joe Gun," "Run Rudolph Run," "It Wasn't Me," "Tulane."

Given his maturity when his first hit arrived, it's even more remarkable how Berry not only articulated teen life in the newly minted Rock 'N' Roll age, but understood it. He was like your older brother who wrote chronicles about his younger siblings and their friends, particularly his kid sisters, who symbolized the youthful innocence and excitement of the teen years, and of the new music of the 1950's, too. That the reality of his life and proclivities might have been something less pure seemed beside the point: the purity was and remains in the music, the unforgettable words and guitar lines, the tinkling piano, and the sly voice, always letting us know that he understood it all.

Rest in peace? Don't bet on it! In a just universe the spirit of the music--and therefore, C.B.--will trump everything else, still echoing somewhere long after we are all dust and debris in that Great Cosmos Dr. Sagan so often spoke about.

ED :)
 
RIP

I remember when Chuck first became popular. Yes, I'm THAT old! In the late '60's, I had only one "oldies" album, and what an album it was: Chuck Berry's Golden Decade 2 LP w/black & gold record cover.

Besides influencing so many that came afterward, he introduced lots of words & phrases into our vocabulary:
2 room Roebuck sale
Motorvatin'
Botheration
Jet-off take
Coolerator
and sooo many more!

Too Much Monkey Business, my favorite Berry track: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5b2w_nJLuvw

Keith Richards on Fallon describing Chuck punching him in the face: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Occyx3Z3vIU
 
Another great CB song. Gee - maybe I forgot how many great tunes he had.

[video=youtube;KrbPlr4Wskc]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KrbPlr4Wskc[/video]
 
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