So Long Richard
By ice rivers
- 1087 reads
Twenty years ago, we had the pleasure of seeing Little Richard at the Highland Bowl. His band had taken the stage and everybody was waiting for Richard. Waitin waitin waitin. At long last he emerged seriously late and as if he was the only one on time, Richard started handing out little booklets of Biblical quotes to those nearest the grandstand. This went on for a little too long and the place was starting to get tense, hoping that this wasn't going to turn into some kind of pentecostal born again baloney. The band was just standing there during this phase, nearly motionless and emotionless. At last Richard sat down at the piano and screamed out "Bop Bop Aloo Bop A Bing Bang Boom". Simultaneously Richard pounded his piano on the down beat . "Tootie Frootie Aw Rootie". The band blasted into orbit as did the audience as did time and temperature and space and race and creed and religion and white and black and gay and straight young and old sad and beautiful sublime and earthy short and tall stout and thin commas punctuation spacebetweenwords and whatever else was hanging around at the time.....everybody moving, shaking, rocking, rolling, singing, screaming, stylin' profilin' flirtin and hurtin and testifyin' LIVIN'. I've been to many many concerts but NEVER saw an opening explosion like this one and never will again. To go from zero to a thousand in the space of eight nonsense words that aren't even words but that express everything everybody was waiting for and hoping for and thinking of and had thought of to that very instant and forever after. I am so glad that my 10 year old daughter Mary was with us to see, hear and feel authentic rock and roll at its most explosive. So long Richard. Thanks for everything.
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Comments
It's a sad day. I never had
It's a sad day. I never had the privilege of seeing him live, but the energy that comes out of the recordings themselves blows your socks off. Another great name gone.
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You capture the feeling of
You capture the feeling of the concert well.
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Good descriptive narrative,
Good descriptive narrative, Ice. I felt the explosive mania of the experience.Music can tame the savage beast or inspire men to charge headlong into combat.
JXM
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The morning before the news
The morning before the news came through to me that he had died my wife selected a rock'n'roll selection on Alexa in the kitchen, so I got in the mood for some rock'n'roll. A bit later in the morning I asked for Little Richard and had about 3 quarters of an hour or an hour listening to him very loudly in the kitchen, while I was doing things in the kitchen. I did think it was very strange when later that day I heard that he had died and he was all over the news. It was very strange that I had been playing him on that day of all days, probably the first time I had listened to him for at least a couple of months. Quite a coincidence I thought.
He was a great performer. I have never seen him perform, but he was one of the great rock'n'rollers and his memory is intact. I enjoyed your piece Ice Rivers, a very fitting remembrance!
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