Wikipedia article
"'Rock Awhile'" is a song by American singer-songwriter Goree Carter, recorded in April 1949 for the Freedom Recording Company in Houston, Texas.
The song was released as the 18-year-old Carter's debut single (with "Back Home Blues" as the B-side) shortly after recording. The track is considered by many sources to be the first rock and roll song,[Robert Palmer, "Church of the Sonic Guitar", pp. 13-38 in Anthony DeCurtis, 'Present Tense', Duke University Press, 1992, p. 19. .][John Nova Lomax (December 2014), [http://www.texasmonthly.com/story/who-invented-rock-and-roll Roll Over, Ike Turner], 'Texas Monthly'][Roger Wood (2003), 'Down in Houston: Bayou City Blues', [https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=gdY5aJMVKkcC&pg=PA46 pages 46-47], University of Texas Press] and has been called a better candidate than the more commonly cited "Rocket 88", which was released two years later. The song features an over-driven electric guitar style similar to that of Chuck Berry years later.
The former New York Times pop critic, Robert Palmer, made this comment about the recording in 1995:"The clarion guitar intro differs hardly at all from some of the intros Chuck Berry would unleash on his own records after 1955; the guitar solo crackles through an overdriven amplifier; and the boogie-based rhythm charges right along. The subject matter, too, is appropriate -- the record announces that it's time to 'rock awhile,' and then proceeds to show how it's done."[[https://www.houstonpress.com/music/racket-6561005 Racket]]
Personnel
* Goree Carter vocals, electric guitar
* Lonnie Lyons piano
* Louis "Nunu" Pitts bass
* Allison Tucker drums
* Conrad O. Johnson alto saxophone
* Sam Williams tenor saxophone (rhythm)
* Nelson Mills trumpet (rhythm)
References
|