1951 was a good year for the number 88 in the United States of America. General Motors reinvented the Oldsmobile Eighty Eight car by having it upgraded from 6 cylinders to Rocket V8s. However, it was a 2 minute and 48 second song recorded by singer-saxophonist, Jackie Brenston, and his Delta Cats [a.k.a. the Kings of Rhythm] keyboardist Ike Turner, guitarist Willie Kizart, drummer Willie “Bad Boy” Sims, and seventeen year old, second saxophonist, Raymond Hill at Sam Phillips’ Sun Studios and released on the Chess/Checker label, “Rocket 88” a #1 smash hit tune that took the USA by storm ‘til it shook.
It's Got A Backbeat, You Can't Lose It
Rock-n-roll would become the backbeat of the baby boomer generation. The soundtrack to an altogether too-real reality show: taking My Generation on a hand-held motion picture-like trip through the madness, mayhem, method, and murder of JFK, Kent State, Malcolm X, MLK, RFK, Vietnam, Woodstock and Watergate. Ironically, of course, it was Ike Turner’s wife, Tina, who would put it best when she'd turn John Fogerty’s Creedence Clearwater Revival tune on its head:
“You know, every now and then I think you might like to hear something from us, Nice and easy but there's just one thing, You see, we never ever do nothing nice and easy, We always do it nice and rough, So we're gonna take the beginning of this song and do it easy, Then we're gonna do the finish rough, This is the way we do 'Proud Mary' And we're rolling, rolling, rolling on the river, Listen to the story”.
