portrait of this blog's author - by Stephen Blackman 2008

Sunday, March 19, 2017



Now this is worth downloading and they were as fast and good as ever, this Chuck Berry live in London from over at Big O

CHUCK BERRY R.I.P. 1926 - 2017





Big O says:

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Chuck Berry, who with his indelible guitar licks, brash self-confidence and memorable songs about cars, girls and wild dance parties did as much as anyone to define rock ’n’ roll’s potential and attitude in its early years, died on March 18, 2017. He was 90. The St Charles County Police Department in Missouri confirmed his death on its Facebook page. The department said it responded to a medical emergency at a home and Berry was declared dead after lifesaving measures were unsuccessful.
While Elvis Presley was rock’s first pop star and teenage heartthrob, Berry was its master theorist and conceptual genius, the songwriter who understood what the kids wanted before they knew themselves. With songs like “Johnny B Goode” and “Roll Over Beethoven,” he gave his listeners more than they knew they were getting from jukebox entertainment. His guitar lines wired the lean twang of country and the bite of the blues into phrases with both a streamlined trajectory and a long memory. And tucked into the lighthearted, telegraphic narratives that he sang with such clear enunciation was a sly defiance, upending convention to claim the pleasures of the moment.
In “Sweet Little Sixteen,” “You Can’t Catch Me” and other songs, Berry invented rock as a music of teenage wishes fulfilled and good times (even with cops in pursuit). In “Promised Land,” “Too Much Monkey Business” and “Brown Eyed Handsome Man,” he celebrated and satirized America’s opportunities and class tensions. His rock ’n’ roll was a music of joyful lusts, laughed-off tensions and gleefully shattered icons. - Jon Pareles, The New York Times
Click here for the full write-up.

CHUCK BERRY R.I.P. 1926 - 2017 Lee Ballinger, 
Rock & Rap Confidential:

“Up in the morning and off to school!”

Chuck Berry died today. I first heard him just before I entered puberty. I liked the music but something about it scared me, pushed me into a dark unknown. I tried to stop listening to it but I couldn’t. Within a year or so, I was fully in the thrall of puberty and Chuck’s music made perfect sense, heightened every experience I had or wished I was having. Those guitar lines, those knowing grown-up vocals, were burned upon my soul, where they still remain for instant access.I highly recommend Chuck Berry’s autobiography, told in the unique voice of a man who, without necessarily intending to, helped to integrate the country while living through the horrors of segregation. This is part of the legacy left by one of the greatest, most influential artists who will ever live.I wrote this in December 2016:I was on a Navy ship in South-east Asia during the Vietnam War. After a tour of duty of several months was over, we headed for home. I went through this three different times. As we would set sail towards California, much of the crew would stay up all night on the helicopter deck, frantically tuning their radios, trying to be the first person to get an American radio station playing some tunes. We were beyond tired, but we were alive and we were going home. Nothing else mattered.The last time I experienced this ritual, I “won.” I got clear channel KOMA/Oklahoma City to come in, blasting through my radio 11,000 miles away from the station. The first song played was, I kid you not, Chuck Berry’s “Back in the USA.”Chuck Berry turned NINETY in October. He’s got a new album coming out, as he sits on the throne of popular music knowing he’s given millions of us memories we will never forget.+ + + + ++ + + + +Chuck Berry, who with his indelible guitar licks, brash self-confidence and memorable songs about cars, girls and wild dance parties did as much as anyone to define rock ’n’ roll’s potential and attitude in its early years, died on March 18, 2017. He was 90. The St Charles County Police Department in Missouri confirmed his death on its Facebook page. The department said it responded to a medical emergency at a home and Berry was declared dead after lifesaving measures were unsuccessful.While Elvis Presley was rock’s first pop star and teenage heartthrob, Berry was its master theorist and conceptual genius, the songwriter who understood what the kids wanted before they knew themselves. With songs like “Johnny B Goode” and “Roll Over Beethoven,” he gave his listeners more than they knew they were getting from jukebox entertainment. His guitar lines wired the lean twang of country and the bite of the blues into phrases with both a streamlined trajectory and a long memory. And tucked into the lighthearted, telegraphic narratives that he sang with such clear enunciation was a sly defiance, upending convention to claim the pleasures of the moment.In “Sweet Little Sixteen,” “You Can’t Catch Me” and other songs, Berry invented rock as a music of teenage wishes fulfilled and good times (even with cops in pursuit). In “Promised Land,” “Too Much Monkey Business” and “Brown Eyed Handsome Man,” he celebrated and satirized America’s opportunities and class tensions. His rock ’n’ roll was a music of joyful lusts, laughed-off tensions and gleefully shattered icons. - Jon Pareles, The New York TimesClick here for the full write-up.
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Great quality recording and fun session.
Always worth reading the entries over at the Big O's re-post too of an older boot but more recent concert (does that make sense? It's from the 90's but was posted ages ago) in case you missed it. 
here
Although this is the superior recording IMHO 

The Rock 'n'Roll giant will be greatly missed the legendary Maestro with NO equal. Name me another signature guitarist with such a title list, who has written as many classic rock standards! The Killer maybe, Little Richard? Then we descend to Carl P, Bill H, Elvis the crooner wrote jack . . . . . . (now you know this will start an argument!) Hah!
Still 90 is a good innings by anyone’s standards and especially if you have been as naughty!
Rock on, Johnny B Goode



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