Rating My CD's: The Lewis Boogie

40. Jerry Lee Lewis -- 18 Original Sun Greatest Hits


Back in 1993, when the Rolling stones were recording Voodoo Lounge in County Kildare, Ireland, they discovered that Jerry Lee Lewis was hiding out from the IRS down the road apiece. Serendipity, right? So they bring the ol' sumbitch into the studio, and jam away. But when Jerry Lee hears the playback, he starts picking the Stones apart, a little "Hey, that drum's a bit slow there; that guitar isn't on point there..." And Keith Richards loses his temper, tells him to back the expletive off, and storms out. Upon which, Jerry Lee turns around and says "Well, it usually works."

I've had this disc forever. I think I either picked it up on Amazon, in the earliest days of same, or it was part of a package I got for joining BMG way the hell back in the summer of 1998. In any case, I got it for the same reason that anyone of my generation ever picked up a Jerry Lee Lewis: that one scene in Top Gun when a wasted Goose howled his way through "Great Balls of Fire" at the piano, and it sequed to Mav on his motorbike with what's-her-name, with the Jerry Lee original in the background. Whatever I thought of that movie as a kid, I loved that song. It was and is perfect, pure boogie, sex and noise and punch.

Rating My CD's: A-Wop-Bop A-Loo-Bop, A Good Goddamn

39. Little Richard -- Georgia Peach

The original lyrics to "Tutti Frutti" were all about butt sex:

Tutti Frutti -- Good Booty
If it fits, don't force it
You can grease it, make it easy
A Wop-Bop A-Loo-Bop, a Good Goddamn

That's according to Jim Miller, author of Flowers in the Dustbin: The Rise of Rock n' Roll 1947-1977 (see link below), a pretty good cultural history of the classic rock n' roll era. Apparently Richard Penniman had no plan of recording "Tutti Frutti" until a producer convinced him that it would be a hit if he just excised all the naughty lyrics. He did and it was, and the result was one of the great nonsense phrases of Rock. The recorded "Tutti Frutti" isn't about anything but a Whole Lot of Shakin' Goin' On. Little Richard just howls and shrieks and hits that ecstatic thrill that Rock'n'Roll so often promises but fails to really deliver.

Rating My CD's: A Lot of Rhythm

38. -- Let's Go! That Rockabilly Rhythm


I suppose I should be filing this under "V" for that bestselling tunesmith "Various Artists" but since those words appear nowhere on this disc, I ain't gonna. Compilations is as compilations do, and this one...well.

I bought it at Starbucks. Yeah. I'm that guy. If you want to know why Starbucks keeps selling music to the phony hip and the crazy pampered, look no further. Because every now and again I see one of their bizarre choices and decide I have to have it. Because a corporation that earns so much hatred for the vile sin of selling coffee well has to have something going for it. And because, as I've mentioned before, I dig 50's stuff.