Rock n Roll: “The Most Brutal, Ugly, Degenerate, Vicious Form Of Expression.”

Turn it up!

Before Rock n Roll, things were calm in my America.

I remember playing in my front yard when I was seven years old in Miami, Oklahoma. I heard the sounds of Patty Paige’s Tennessee Waltz coming from the drive-in restaurant a few blocks away. I memorized the lyrics. I didn’t know any better.

But out in California, at the same time, the first Rock n Roll song, Jackie Brenston’s Rocket 88, was released in 1951. It was number one on the U.S. Billboard R&B chart. But I never heard it in Oklahoma when I was seven.

I never tasted pizza or Mexican food in Oklahoma either. My life was bland but enjoyable in that small town.

Los Angeles In the Fifties

My family moved to California in 1954, and my cultural life exploded. From 1956 on, there was new music on the radio created especially for me!

It was rough and suggestive. Its roots were in black blues, R&B, and country. The term rock-n-roll was also a slang word for sex or sexual intercourse in the late 1940s and early 1950s. But I wasn’t conscious of that. This white kid from Oklahoma had a new passion.

I devoured the music of Elvis Presley, Fats Domino, and Little Richard. Jerry Lee Lewis, Richie Valens, and Buddy Holly were on my turntable. Rock n Roll defined my life from 13 years old on — and for kids like me, there was one main attraction.

Our parents hated it!

And so did Frank Sinatra.

My only deep sorrow is the unrelenting insistence of recording and motion picture companies upon purveying the most brutal, ugly, degenerate, vicious form of expression it has been my displeasure to hear — Naturally, I refer to the bulk of rock ’n’ roll. — Frank Sinatra — Los Angeles Mirror News, 1957

Sinatra was one of the most influential music artists of the 20th century. And he was one of the best-selling music artists of all time. Rock critic Robert Christgau called Sinatra “The greatest singer of the 20th century.”

So it’s a shame to hear him bash rock n roll like this. But I can understand how he might have felt. A flood of untrained teenage musicians was taking over his Billboard charts.

Sinatra’s statement epitomized the disgust from many mainstream critics. Rock n Roll was not serious music, they complained.

The shock of the new is always hard to accept. But it was easy for teenagers in 1957. We now had music of our own we could understand. Music that spoke to the angst and rebelliousness lurking inside us.

Real rock n roll can only be created by the young. It sounds a bit silly coming out of Mick Jagger’s mouth at 75.

The first record I ever bought with my allowance was a 45 rpm. Elvis Presley’s Don’t Be Cruel was on one side, and Heartbreak Hotel on the flip side.

I remember the thrill of playing it on my parent’s RCA Orthophonic High Fidelity console. I wore out that 45.

Once I found two Little Richard 45’s in the mud of the LA river. I cleaned the mud off to play them. I’ll never forget the black and yellow Specialty Records label shining up from the mud. And the down and dirty howling of Little Richard. I loved it.

So did Elton John.

Starting with “Tutti Frutti” in 1956, Little Richard cut a series of unstoppable hits — “Long Tall Sally” and “Rip It Up” that same year, “Lucille” in 1957, and “Good Golly Miss Molly” in 1958 — driven by his simple, pumping piano, gospel-influenced vocal exclamations and sexually charged (often gibberish) lyrics. “I heard Little Richard and Jerry Lee Lewis, and that was it,” Elton John told Rolling Stone in 1973. — David Browne, Rolling Stone

Fifties parents especially hated Little Richard and Jerry Lee Lewis.

It’s difficult to explain how raw and calamitous Little Richard’s sounded at that time when rock n roll was new.

It’s the same with Jerry Lee Lewis. Popular TV shows such as The Ed Sullivan Show rejected the now-iconic rocker in 1957. I guess he was just too hot for a family show like Sullivan’s.

But late-night host Steve Allen invited Lewis to perform in 1957 after Lewis broke the piano and fell off the stage during his first performance. He was wild and uncontrolled, and the kids ate it up.

“Rock’ n’ roll In the ’50s: First Adults Called It a Fad, Then They Wanted It Banned.”

The chances are it is a temporary craze that will not take too long to run its course, but there is no excuse for letting it run completely wild. It is something that parents, youth organizations, and others should scan more closely to determine if any damage is being done to the moral structure of the newer generation. — The Akron Beacon Journal (Akron, Ohio) 1956

It was the same with TV, comic books, movies, and marijuana — there is always something that is damaging the moral structure of American youth. Now it’s social media.

I feel lucky to have been around for the birth of rock n roll. The first time I heard Buddy Holly’s That’ll Be The Day on the radio, a thrill went up my spine.

But I hardly ever listen to that music today. I am not the aging boomer who sits around lamenting that they don’t make records like that anymore, like in the fifties or the sixties.

Today you’ll find me listening to streaming stations like KCRW that play current pop, rock, and R&B.

But in 1957, you could find me at night in bed with my not-so-small transistor radio tucked under my pillow so I could listen to DJ Hunter Hancock spinning R&B music, or race music as the music industry called it then.

Stagger Lee by Lloyd Price, There Goes My Baby by the Drifters, Richie Valens, The Clovers, The Platters were all coming through my pillow late at night while my parents slept and my moral structure was being destroyed.

I’m so glad about that.

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