Showing posts with label Rocket 88. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Rocket 88. Show all posts

Wednesday, August 23, 2023

Sun Records: Top 50 Songs

Sun Records

Top 50 Songs

Sun Records has been called the birthplace of rock and roll. In January 1950, Sam Phillips opened Memphis Recording Service, which evolved into Sun Records in 1952. Located in Memphis, Tennessee, the studio focused on southern-rooted music like blues and country. It was the merger of these two genres which has largely been defined as the beginning of rock and roll. To that end, the studio birthed songs such as “Rocket 88” by Jackie Brenston & His Delta Cats and “That’s All Right” by Elvis Presley, which have both staked claims as the first rock and roll song.

Of course, the studio is best known as the launching pad for Elvis Presley, but it also served that purpose for B.B. King, Howlin’ Wolf, Little Junior Parker, Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins, Roy Orbison, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Charlie Rich.

Click here to see other genre-specific song lists.

Top 50 Songs

Dave’s Music Database lists are determined by song’s appearances on best-of lists, appearances on compilations and live albums by the featured act, and songs’ chart success, sales, radio airplay, streaming, and awards.

DMDB Top 1%:

1. Jerry Lee Lewis “Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On” (1957)
2. Jerry Lee Lewis “Great Balls of Fire” (1957)
3. Johnny Cash “I Walk the Line” (1956)
4. Carl Perkins “Blue Suede Shoes” (1956)
5. Elvis Presley “That’s All Right, Mama” (1954)
6. Jackie Brenston & His Delta Cats “Rocket 88” (1951)
7. Johnny Cash “Folsom Prison Blues” (1955)

DMDB Top 2%:

8. Elvis Presley “Mystery Train” (1955)

DMDB Top 5%:

9. Bill Justis “Raunchy” (1957)
10. Jerry Lee Lewis “Breathless” (1958)

DMDB Top 10%:

11. Jerry Lee Lewis “Crazy Arms” (1956)
12. Roy Orbison “Ooby Dooby” (1956)
13. Jerry Lee Lewis “High School Confidential” (1958)
14. Elvis Presley “Blue Moon” (1954)
15. Johnny Cash “Ballad of a Teenage Queen” (1957)
16. Elvis Presley “Blue Moon of Kentucky” (1954)
17. Howlin’ Wolf “How Many More Years” (1951)

DMDB Top 20%:

18. Elvis Presley “Baby Let’s Play House” (1955)
19. Johnny Cash “Guess Things Happen That Way” (1958)
20. Johnny Cash “Get Rhythm” (1956)

21. Carl Perkins “Honey Don’t” (1956)
22. Jerry Lee Lewis “What’d I Say” (1961)
23. Carl Mann “Mona Lisa” (1959)
24. Carl Perkins “Matchbox” (1957)
25. Elvis Presley “Good Rockin’ Tonight” (1954)
26. Rufus Thomas “Bear Cat” (1953)
27. Billy Riley & His Little Green Men “Flyin’ Saucers Rock & Roll” (1957)
28. Elvis Presley “I’m Left, You’re Right, She’s Gone” (1955)
29. Charlie Rich “Lonely Weekends” (1960)
30. Johnny Cash “Cry! Cry! Cry!” (1955)

31. Carl Perkins “Dixie Fried” (1956)

Beyond the DMDB Top 20%:

32. Johnny Cash “The Ways of a Woman in Love” (1958)
33. Little Junior Parker’s Blue Flames “Mystery Train” (1953)
34. Johnny Cash “There You Go” (1956)
35. Billy Riley & His Little Green Men “Red Hot” (1957)
36. Elvis Presley “I Don’t Care if the Sun Don’t Shine” (1954)
37. Little Junior Parker’s Blue Flames “Feelin’ Good” (1953)
38. Howlin’ Wolf “Moanin’ at Midnight” (1951)
39. Elvis Presley “I Forgot to Remember to Forget” (1955)
40. Johnny Cash “Give My Love to Rose” (1957)

41. Jerry Lee Lewis “You Win Again” (1957)
42. Carl Perkins “Boppin’ the Blues” (1956)
43. Elvis Presley “You’re a Heartbreaker” (1954)
44. Johnny Cash & the Tennessee Two “Big River” (1957)
45. Elvis Presley “Milkcow Blues Boogie” (1954)
46. Johnny Cash “Hey Porter” (1955)
47. Charlie Rich “Who Will the Next Fool Be” (1961)
48. Warren Smith “Red Cadillac and a Black Moustache” (1957)
49. Johnny Cash “Home of the Blues” (1957)
50. Little Junior Parker’s Blue Flames “Love My Baby” (1953)

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First posted 8/21/2023; last updated 8/23/2023.

 
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Sunday, October 23, 2022

The Birth of Rock and Roll: The Top 100 Songs

Rock ‘n’ Roll’s Origins:

Top 100 Songs

The initial intent behind this list was to pinpoint a few key candidates in the birth of rock and roll. As one can see by the multiple resources at the bottom of this page (which includes an entire box set and book devoted to the topic), there is no definitive agreement. In addition, efforts to create a list of candidates for first rock song so regularly crossed over with lists of early rock and roll songs that this became an amalgamation of the two. In other words, this evolved from not just a look at the birth of rock and roll but a glimpse of its “toddler years,” if you will, as well. That leaves it up to you, the reader, to form your own opinions aout which songs are the most important in the early development of rock and roll.

Click here to see other genre-specific song lists.

  1. Bill Haley & the Comets “We’re Gonna Rock Around the Clock” (1954)
  2. Jackie Brenston & His Delta Cats “Rocket 88” (1951)
  3. Chuck Berry “Johnny B. Goode” (1958)
  4. Little Richard “Tutti Frutti” (1955)
  5. Elvis Presley “That’s All Right, Mama” (1954)
  6. Jerry Lee Lewis “Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On” (1957)
  7. Wynonie Harris “Good Rockin’ Tonight” (1948)
  8. Carl Perkins “Blue Suede Shoes” (1956)
  9. Elvis Presley “Hound Dog” (1956)
  10. Big Joe Turner “Shake, Rattle, and Roll” (1954)

  11. Little Richard “Good Golly Miss Molly” (1958)
  12. Buddy Holly & the Crickets “That’ll Be the Day” (1957)
  13. Ritchie Valens “La Bamba” (1958)
  14. Buddy Holly & the Crickets “Peggy Sue” (1957)
  15. Frankie Lymon & The Teenagers “Why Do Fools Fall in Love?” (1956)
  16. Jerry Lee Lewis “Great Balls of Fire” (1957)
  17. Chuck Berry “Maybellene” (1955)
  18. Fats Domino “The Fat Man” (1950)
  19. The Penguins “Earth Angel (Will You Be Mine)” (1954)
  20. Elvis Presley “Heartbreak Hotel” (1956)

  21. The Chords “Sh-Boom” (1954)
  22. The Everly Brothers “Wake Up Little Susie” (1957)
  23. Elvis Presley “Jailhouse Rock” (1957)
  24. Fats Domino “Blueberry Hill” (1956)
  25. Bo Diddley “Bo Diddley” (1955)
  26. Eddie Cochran “Summertime Blues” (1958)
  27. Lloyd Price “Lawdy Miss Clawdy” (1952)
  28. Chuck Berry “Rock and Roll Music” (1957)
  29. Fats Domino “Ain’t That a Shame” (1955)
  30. Danny & the Juniors “At the Hop” (1957)

  31. The Crows “Gee” (1954)
  32. Willie Mae “Big Mama” Thornton “Hound Dog” (1953)
  33. Johnny Cash “I Walk the Line” (1956)
  34. Trixie Smith “My Man Rocks with Me One Steady Roll” (1922)
  35. Jimmy Preston & His Prestonians “Rock the Joint” (1949)
  36. Elvis Presley “All Shook Up“ (1957)
  37. The Everly Brothers “Bye Bye Love” (1957)
  38. The Dominoes “Sixty Minute Man” (1951)
  39. The Platters “Only You (And You Alone)” (1955)
  40. Little Richard “Long Tall Sally” (1956)

  41. The Platters “The Great Pretender” (1955)
  42. The Big Bopper “Chantilly Lace” (1958)
  43. Dion & the Belmonts “A Teenager in Love” (1959)
  44. Arthur Crudup “That’s All Right, Mama” (1946)
  45. Elvis Presley “Don’t Be Cruel” (1956)
  46. Chuck Berry “Roll Over Beethoven” (1956)
  47. Sam Cooke “You Send Me” (1957)
  48. The Dell-Vikings “Come Go with Me” (1957)
  49. The Everly Brothers “All I Have to Do Is Dream” (1958)
  50. The Champs “Tequila” (1958)

  51. Louis Jordan “Saturday Night Fish Fry” (1949)
  52. Ray Charles “What’d I Say” (1959)
  53. Wild Bill Moore “We’re Gonna Rock, We’re Gonna Roll” (1947)
  54. The Flamingos “I Only Have Eyes for You” (1959)
  55. Freddie Slack & Ella Mae Morse “The House of Blue Lights” (1946)
  56. The Coasters “Yakety Yak” (1958)
  57. Gene Vincent & His Blue Caps “Be-Bop-A-Lula” (1956)
  58. Little Richard “Lucille” (1957)
  59. The Five Satins “In the Still of the Nite (I’ll Remember)” (1956)
  60. The Diamonds “Little Darlin’” (1957)

  61. Bobby Darin “Mack the Knife” (1959)
  62. John Lee Hooker “Boogie Chillen’” (1949)
  63. Hank Williams “Your Cheatin’ Heart” (1953)
  64. Les Paul & Mary Ford “How High the Moon” (1951)
  65. Bill Haley & His Saddlemen “Crazy Man Crazy” (1953)
  66. The Isley Brothers “Shout (Parts 1 and 2)” (1959)
  67. Ella Fitzgerald “Rock It for Me” (1938)
  68. Hank Williams “Move It on Over” (1947)
  69. Arthur Smith & His Cracker Jacks “Guitar Boogie” (1948)
  70. Chuck Berry “Sweet Little Sixteen” (1958)

  71. Joe Liggins & His Honeydrippers “The Honeydripper” (1945)
  72. Chuck Berry “School Days” (1957)
  73. Ray Charles “I Gotta Woman” (1955)
  74. Hank Ballard & the Midnighters “Work with Me, Annie” (1954)
  75. Del Shannon “Runaway” (1961)
  76. Johnny Cash “Folsom Prison Blues’ (1955)
  77. Huey “Piano” Smith & His Clowns “Rockin' Pneumonia and the Boogie-Woogie Flu” (1957)
  78. The Platters “Smoke Gets in Your Eyes” (1958)
  79. Roy Brown “Good Rockin’ Tonight” (1948)
  80. The Boswell Sisters “Rock and Roll” (1934)

  81. Stick MgGhee “Drinking Wine Spo-Dee-O-Dee” (1949)
  82. The Drifters “Money Honey” (1953)
  83. Tampa Red & Georgia Tom “It’s Tight Like That” (1928)
  84. Elvis Presley “Blue Suede Shoes” (1956)
  85. James Brown “Please, Please, Please” (1956)
  86. Bobby Day “Rockin’ Robin” (1958)
  87. Buddy Holly & the Cickets “Rave On” (1958)
  88. Lloyd Price “Stagger Lee” (1958)
  89. Shirley & Lee “Let the Good Times Roll” (1956)
  90. The Marcels “Blue Moon” (1961)

  91. The Clovers “Love Potion No. 9” (1959)
  92. The Monotones “Book of Love” (1958)
  93. Bobby Freeman “Do You Want to Dance?” (1958)
  94. Bobby Darin “Splish Splash” (1958)
  95. Phil Phillips & the Twilights “Sea of Love” (1959)
  96. Ruth Brown “Mama, He Treats Your Daughter Mean” (1953)
  97. Eddie Cochran “C’mon Everybody” (1958)
  98. Ritchie Valens “Donna” (1958)
  99. Conway Twitty “It’s Only Make Believe” (1958)
  100. Fats Domino “I’m Walkin’” (1957)

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First posted 4/13/2020; last updated 10/23/2022.

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Thursday, October 20, 2011

First Rock and Roll Record box set released

The First Rock and Roll Record

Various Artists

Released: October 20, 2011

Recorded: 1916-1956

Peak: -- US, -- UK, -- CN, -- AU

Sales (in millions): -- US, -- UK, -- world (includes US and UK)

Genre: rock/pop/country/R&B/blues

Tracks:

Artist “Song Title” (date of single release, chart peaks) Click for codes to singles charts.

Disc 1:

  1. Unknown Artist “The Camp Meeting Jubilee” (1916)
  2. Trixie Smith “My Man Rocks Me with One Steady Roll” (1922)
  3. Jim Jackson “Kansas City Blues” (1927)
  4. Charley Patton “Going to Move to Alabama” (1929)
  5. Hank Williams “Move It on Over” (8/9/47, 4 CW)
  6. Tampa Red “It’s Tight Like That” (1927)
  7. Clarence “Pinetop” Smith “Pinetop’s Boogie Woogie” (2/9/29, 20 US)
  8. Jimmy Blythe “Jimmy Blues” (1925)
  9. Blind Roosevelt Graves “Crazy About My Baby” (1929)
  10. Washboard Rhythm Kings “Tiger Rag” (1932)
  11. Boswell Sisters “Rock and Roll” (11/10/34, 7 US)
  12. Benny Goodman with Helen Ward “Get Rhythm in Your Feet” (1934)
  13. The Harlem Hamfats “Oh Red!” (1934)
  14. Mississippi Jook Band “Skippy Whippy” (1936)
  15. Robert Johnson “Cross Road Blues” (1936)
  16. Benny Goodman with Gene Krupa “Sing, Sing, Sing (With a Swing)” (4/9/38, 7 US)
  17. Ella Fitzgerald “Rock It for Me” (2/19/38, 19 US)
  18. Sister Rosetta Tharpe “Rock Me” (1938)
  19. Bob Wills “Ida Red” (1938)
  20. Big Joe Turner “Roll ‘Em Pete” (1938)
  21. Buddy Jones “Rockin’ Rollin’ Mama” (1939)
  22. John Lee Williamson “New Early in the Morning” (1940)
  23. Will Bradley “Down the Road a Piece” (1940)
  24. The Andrews Sisters “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy” (3/1/41, 6 US)
  25. Virginia O’Brien “Lullaby (Rock-a-Bye Baby)” (1941)

Disc 2:

  1. Lionel Hampton &nd His Orchestra “Flying Home” (5/11/40, 23 US, airplay: 1 million)
  2. Illinois Jacquet “Blues, Pt. 2” (1944)
  3. T-Bone Walker “Mean Old World” (1942)
  4. Judy Garland “The Joint Is Really Jumpin’ Down at Carnegie Hall” (1943)
  5. Gertrude Niesen “Rockin’ the Town” (1938)
  6. Nat “King” Cole “Straighten Up and Fly Right” (4/15/44, 9 US, 1 CW, 1 RB)
  7. Sister Rosetta Tharpe “Strange Things Happening Every Day” (1944)
  8. Helen Humes “Be Baba Leba” (12/15/45, 3 RB)
  9. Joe Liggins & His Honeydrippers “The Honeydripper” (10/20/45, 13 US, 1 RB, sales: 1 million)
  10. Arthur Smith & His Cracker Jacks “Guitar Boogie” (7/10/48, 25 US)
  11. Arthur “Big Boy” Crudup “That’s All Right, Mama” (1946)
  12. Louis Jordan “Let the Good Times Roll” (12/21/46, 2 RB)
  13. Freddie Slack with Ella Morse “The House of Blue Lights” (5/18/46, 8 US)
  14. The Delmore Brothers “Hillbilly Boogie” (1946)
  15. Pee Wee King “Ten Gallon Boogie” (1947)
  16. Wynonie Harris “Good Rocking Tonight” (5/1/48, 1 RB)
  17. Wild Bill Moore “We’re Gonna Rock, We’re Gonna Roll” (1947)
  18. Muddy Waters “I Can’t Be Satisfied” (9/18/48, 11 RB)
  19. Amos Milburn “Chicken Shack Boogie” (1948)
  20. Bill Haley “Rovin’ Eyes” (1948)
  21. The Orioles “It’s Too Soon to Know” (11/6/48, 13 US, 1 RB)
  22. Stick McGhee “Drinking Wine Spo-Dee-O-Dee” (4/2/49, 26 US, 2 RB)
  23. Erline Harris “Rock and Roll Blues” (1949)
  24. Jimmy Preston “Rock the Joint” (1949)
  25. Louis Jordan & His Tympany Five “Saturday Night Fish Fry” (10/8/49, 21 US, 1 RB, sales: 1 million)
  26. Fats Domino “The Fat Man” (2/18/50, 2 RB, sales: 1 million)
  27. Goree Carter “Rock a While” (1949)

Disc 3:

  1. Hardrock Gunter “Gonna Dance All Night” (1950)
  2. Arkie Shibley & His Mountain Dew Boys “Hot Rod Race” (1950)
  3. The Dominoes “Sixty Minute Man” (8/25/51, 17 US, 1 RB, sales: 1 million)
  4. Les Paul & Mary Ford “How High the Moon” (3/31/51, 1 US, 3 HP, 1 CB, sales: 1 million)
  5. Jackie Brenston & His Delta Cats “Rocket 88” (5/12/51, 1 RB)
  6. Charli Gracie “Boogie Woogie Blues” (1951)
  7. Big Mama Thornton “Hound Dog” (3/28/53, 1 RB)
  8. Charli Gracie “Rockin' an’ Rollin’” (1952)
  9. Lloyd Price “Lawdy Miss Clawdy” (5/17/52, 1 RB, sales: 1 million)
  10. The Dominoes “Have Mercy Baby” (5/24/52, 1 RB)
  11. The Clovers “One Mint Julep” (4/19/52, 2 RB)
  12. The Crows “Gee” (3/6/54, 14 US, 2 RB)
  13. Bill Haley & His Comets “Crazy Man Crazy” (5/23/53, 12 US)
  14. Ray Charles “Mess Around” (6/19/53, 3 RB)
  15. Clyde McPhatter & the Drifters “Money Honey” (10/31/53, 1 RB)
  16. The Johnny Burnette Trio “Honey Hush” (1953)
  17. Big Joe Turner “Shake, Rattle, and Roll” (5/8/54, 22 US, 1 RB)
  18. The Chords “Sh-Boom” (7/3/54, 5 US, 3 HP, 1 CB, 2 RB)
  19. Sunny Dae & the Knights “Rock Around the Clock” (1954)
  20. Ray Charles “I Gotta Woman” (1/22/55, 79 US, 78 HR, 1 RB)
  21. Hank Ballard & the Midnighters “Work with Me, Annie” (6/5/54, 22 US, 1 RB)
  22. The Robins “Riot in Cell Block #9” (1954)
  23. LaVern Baker “Tweedle Dee” (1/15/55, 14 US, 3 CB, 1 RB, sales: 1 million)
  24. Bo Diddley “Bo Diddley” (5/7/55, 6 US, 29 HR, 1 RB)
  25. Chuck Berry “Maybellene” (8/6/55, 5 US, 5 CB, 4 HR, 1 RB, sales: 1 million)
  26. Little Richard “Tutti Frutti” (11/26/55, 17 US, 10 CB, 2 RB, 29 UK)
  27. Carl Perkins “Blue Suede Shoes” (3/3/56, 2 US, 2 CB, 1 HR, 1 CW, 2 RB, 10 UK, sales: 1 million, airplay: 2 million)
  28. Elvis Presley “That’s Alright, Mama” (7/17/04, 3 UK, sales: ½ million)
  29. Bill Haley & His Comets “We’re Gonna Rock Around the Clock” (5/10/54, 1 US, 1 HP, 1 CB, 1 HR, 3 RB, 1 UK, 26 CN, 1 AU, sales: 25 million)
  30. Elvis Presley “Heartbreak Hotel” (3/3/56, 1 US, 1 HP, 1 CB, 1 HR, 1 CW, 3 RB, 2 UK, 1 CN, 3 AU, sales: 5 million, airplay: 2 million)

Total Running Time: 3:46:28

Rating:

4.685 out of 5.00 (average of 6 ratings)

Awards: (Click on award to learn more).

About the Album:

“Rock & roll as an American musical form is very much like a delta, collecting elements from jazz, blues, country, gospel, R&B, show tunes, and whatever else was floating around into a high-charged, rambunctious music that defined and drove pop culture…So where is the start of all this?” AMG “It’s an unanswerable question, but the search for rock’s origins digs up many a treat” AP via this three-disc collection. “It delves back to the middle of the first world war, raking through blues, country, gospel, R&B, jazz and showtunes in search of clues.” AP

“You could say that The First Rock and Roll Record is exhaustive to a fault.” AP “The first CD seems less interested in music than in semantics” AP as it “explores songs from the 1920s, ‘30s, and ‘40s that feature rocking and/or rolling in the lyrics.” AMG “You start to wonder if the compilers think that there was any music released in America in the ‘30s and ‘40s that didn’t have an influence on the birth of rock ‘n’ roll, up to and including Judy Garland’s The Joint Is Really Jumpin’ Down at Carnegie Hall and the Andrews Sisters’ Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy.” AP

It always seems to have referred to transcendence of one kind or another… For those attending 1916’s Camp Meeting Jubilee, it was all about fervent prayer. For Trixie Smith – a more forthright lady than you might expect to meet in 1922 – it involved the more straightforward matter of availing yourself of a man in possession of an enormous penis and limitless stamina: by the end of My Man Rocks Me, she’s apparently been having it off non-stop for a hugely impressive nine hours.” AP “Fans of Marc Bolan might find their jaws dropping at Georgia bluesman Tampa Red’s frantic 1927 debut single It’s Tight Like That.” AP

“Midway through the second CD, however, things become noticeably more linear.” AP It is packed with songs that “if they weren’t actually rock ‘n’ roll, sounded so much like it as to make the argument academic: Amos Milburn’s Chicken Shack Boogie, Stick McGhee’s Drinking Wine Spo-Dee-O-Dee, Fats Domino’s The Fat Man, the latter a fabulous, million-selling testament to the New Orleans’ singer’s qualities that suggests he might have got on a treat with Trixie Smith.” AP There’s also “Les Paul and Mary Ford’s timelessly amazing How High the Moon, the first single in the modern world to suggest the recording studio itself was a player in all this.” AMG

You also get a clear sense of how everything new owes a debt to the past. “Everyone who has read a little about rock’s origins knows Bill Haley’s Rock Around the Clock bore a suspicious resemblance to Hank Williams’ blackly comic 1947 tale of marital discord Move It on Over, or about the line that connects Robert Johnson’s handful of 1930s recordings to the musical explosion of the ‘60s.” AP

It wraps up appropriately with Elvis Presley and the first song he recorded after jumping from Sun Records to RCA for a then “unprecedented sum of $40,000.” BR As the King of Rock and Roll’s first ascension to the throne, Heartbreak Hotel is “as close to a template for the perfect rock & roll single as one is likely to find.” AMG The liner notes refer to it as “everything a rock and roll record should be.”

The compilers admit that they haven’t reached a definitive answer as to what the first rock and roll record is, but cheekily suggest that “whatever it is, it’s probably here.” In the end, though, this collection “is proof that sometimes, the evidence is more interesting than the verdict.” AP

Notes: The liner notes reference the Jim Dawson and Steve Propes’ book What Was the First Rock ‘n’ Roll Record?, noting that 37 of the 50 songs referenced in that book are included in this collection. A now dead link offers one the chance to download the other 13 songs, which are Jack McVea’s “Open the Door, Richard” (1946), Lonnie Johnson’s “Tomorrow Night” (1948), John Lee Hooker’s “Boogie Chillen” (1948), Professor Longhair’s “Mardi Gras in New Orleans” (1949), Muddy Waters’ “Rollin’ and Tumblin’” (1950), Hardrock Gunter’s “Birmingham Bounce” (1950), Hank Snow’s “I’m Movin’ On” (1950), Ruth Brown’s “Teardrops from My Eyes” (1950), Johnnie Ray with the Four Lads’ “Cry” (1961), Billy Haley & the Saddlemen’s “Rock the Joint” (1952), Hank Williams’ “Kaw-Liga” (1953), the Penguins’ “Earth Angel (Will You Be Mine)” (1954), and Johnny Ace’s “Pledging My Love” (1954).

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First posted 11/17/2020; last updated 2/5/2022.

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Saturday, June 9, 2001

50 years ago: “Rocket 88” hit #1 on R&B chart

Rocket 88

Jackie Brenston & His Delta Cats

Writer(s): Jackie Brenston, Ike Turner (see lyrics here)

Released: April 1951

First Charted: May 12, 1951

Peak: 15 RB, 6 DF (Click for codes to charts.)

Sales (in millions): --

Airplay/Streaming (in millions): -- radio, 3.8 video, 5.24 streaming

Awards:

Click on award for more details.

About the Song:

“Rocket 88” “has been officially anointed ‘the first rock and roll record ever made’ by generations of white male music journalists.” AH The song “addressed three subjects that would feature in many successful rock songs: cars, women, and liquor.” LW Saxophonist Jackie Brenston was from Clarksdale, Mississippi – the site of the crossroads legend in which bluesman Robert Johnson supposedly sold his soul to the devil in return for his guitar-playing prowess. LW

Ike Turner’s “rolling boogie-woogie piano…anticipated the style of Jerry Lee Lewis a few years later” LW and Little Richard repeated it nearly note-for-note as the intro to “Good Golly Miss Molly.” AH A damaged speaker cone on the guitar amp led to the distortion sound that became a common feature in future rock songs. LW

The earnings from the song also helped Sam Phillips set up Sun Records, which is the record company most associated with the beginning of rock and roll thanks to launching the careers of Johnny Cash, B.B. King, Jerry Lee Lewis, Roy Orbison, Elvis Presley, and Carl Perkins. It was King who suggested that Ike Turner contact Phillips, “a white man who was motivated by a deeply-felt anger at racial injustice, which expressed itself as a belief that if other white people could just see the humanity, and the talent, in black people the way he could, the world would be a much better place.” AH

Ike & His Kings of Rhythm went to Memphis to record with Phillips who incidentally saw the damaged amp as a good thing. He said it would sound different and different was always good. AH The song they performed was “Rocket 88,” a song written by Brenston. In reality, he didn’t so much write the song as reinvent “Cadillac Boogie,” a B-side for the Drops of Joy. AH To Ike’s horror, when the song was released it was credited to Jackie Brenston & His Delta Cats instead of Ike Turner & His Kings of Rhythm. AH

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First posted 3/24/2023; last updated 8/22/2023.

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