Even by the exaggerated requirements of rock ‘n’ roll, Jerry Lee Lewis was a person who lived dangerously and left chaos in his wake, and in ways in which weren’t at all times humorous. His nickname since his teenagers was “Killer,” and it implied an aggression that appeared to come back to him naturally. In 1958, Jerry Lee’s profession took a nosedive when, after a handful of hits like “Great Balls of Fire” and “Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On,” it was found his spouse was solely 13 years previous; including insult to harm, the previous Myra Gale Brown was his third bride, and Lewis hadn’t completed divorcing the second when he and Myra exchanged vows. His urge for food for liquor and tablets was the stuff of legend, and he had little persistence for members of his band or crew who did not wish to elevate Hell with him. In September 1976, Lewis was taking part in together with his gun when he shot his bass participant, Norman Owens, twice within the chest whereas aiming at a Coke bottle. Two months later, Jerry Lee was arrested exterior Graceland in Memphis, Tennessee when he drunkenly drove into the gate, staggered from the automobile with a pistol in his hand, and demanded to see Elvis Presley instantly. He almost died in 1981 from a extreme abdomen situation introduced on by years of alcohol and drug abuse. In 1983, his fifth spouse, Shawn Michelle Lewis, died below mysterious circumstances simply 77 days after they had been wed; a 1984 investigative piece in Rolling Stone stopped in need of saying she died as the results of foul play, whereas giving readers each motive to suppose it. And there have been numerous tales of Jerry Lee lacking gigs or blowing recording periods whereas on a bender, heckling his personal viewers, or showing on stage, taking part in a dismissive twenty minutes, after which strolling off because the promoters had been left to placate an indignant crowd. More than as soon as, Jerry Lee would proudly state the plain: “I’m a imply son of a bitch.”
So why did anybody hassle to concentrate to this man who, by all accounts, was as poor a task mannequin as rock ‘n’ roll has supplied us? Simple – the person was a genius. There had been only a few figures within the first period of rock ‘n’ roll (or ever) whose music was extra highly effective and engrossing than that of Jerry Lee Lewis. To hear Lewis in his prime was to listen to a person push barrelhouse piano to the purpose of superb insanity, performing with a mania that was held in test solely by the supreme confidence of the person on the keyboard. Lewis’s signature hits of the Nineteen Fifties – “Great Balls of Fire,” “Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On,” “Breathless,” “High School Confidential” – had been shot by means of with an depth that few of his friends may match, and like his fellow Louisiana piano man Little Richard, the music he made refused to sound quaint with the passage of time, sounding as feral within the twenty first Century because the day it was reduce. Along together with his excellent rock ‘n’ roll sides, within the late Sixties Jerry Lee skilled a profession revival on the nation charts, and whereas his C&W hits are much less readily remembered, the very best of them rank with the best arduous nation of the period. Lewis may summon an abject loneliness and heartbreak in songs like “Another Place, Another Time, “What Made Milwaukee Famous (Made A Loser Out Of Me,” and “She Still Comes Around (To Love What’s Left Of Me)” that spoke of a person who knew greater than just a little concerning the punishing morning that follows an evening of sin. And when Jerry Lee selected to get rowdy, he hadn’t misplaced the contact – his reside reveals had been a loopy mashup of nation, rock, boogie, blues, previous requirements, and the rest that popped into his thoughts. Jerry Lee was fond of claiming, “There have been many nice performers, however solely 4 nice stylists – Al Jolson, Jimmie Rodgers, Hank Williams, and Jerry Lee Lewis.” His expertise was sufficient to make the vanity of that assertion appear nearly cheap.
Jerry Lee was under no circumstances blind to his failings. He was raised within the Assembly of God Church, a Pentacostal denomination that was strict even by Fundamentalist requirements, and he by no means misplaced his religion despite the fact that he realized at an early age he was constitutionally incapable of dwelling by its strictures. He was only a boy when he first heard boogie woogie and rhythm and blues pouring out of roadhouses in his hometown of Ferriday, Louisiana, and the decision of the night time sank its hooks into him early. He attended a bible school in Waxahachie, Texas with a watch in the direction of changing into a preacher, however he found wine, ladies, and tune had been available in close by Dallas, and when he performed a model of “My God is Real” at a Sunday chapel assembly clearly knowledgeable by the sinful roadhouse sounds he liked, he was expelled and despatched again dwelling. Even as he grew to become one of many first nice exponents of rock ‘n’ roll, he was sure the music he performed was blasphemous, and wasn’t afraid to say so. His recording profession started at Sun Records, the Memphis-based label that was the crucible for rockabilly, introducing Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins, Billy Lee Riley, Roy Orbison, and plenty of extra to the world. There is a exceptional audio artifact from the night time in 1957 when Jerry Lee recorded “Great Balls of Fire” on the Sun Studios. He all of a sudden had second ideas concerning the tune – he believed the hearth of the title was a corrupt parody of the fiery imagery of the Pentecost, and he argued with producer and label founder Sam Phillips concerning the propriety of chopping the tune.
“It says, ‘Make merry with the Joy of God, solely,'” Jerry Lee declares, quoting scripture. “But in the case of worldly music, rock and roll, anythin’ like that, you’re on the earth, and also you haven’t come from out of the world, and also you’re nonetheless a sinner. And you’re a sinner. You’re a sinner except you might be saved and born once more, and be made as just a little baby, and stroll earlier than God, and be holy.” Phillips makes an attempt to take a extra reasonable place, saying, “Now look, Jerry, non secular conviction doesn’t suggest something resembling extremism.” Jerry Lee, nevertheless, holds agency, and when Phillips suggests a rock ‘n’ curler can save souls, he bitterly rejects the notion, and shouts, “Man, I’ve the Devil in me! If I did not have, I’d be a Christian!” Needless to say, Phillips received the argument, at the least to the purpose the place Jerry Lee recorded the tune that bought nicely over one million copies, however there are actually dozens of interviews with Lewis by which he bluntly declared he was sure he would go to Hell when he dies. As he as soon as advised Nick Tosches (who would later write the good and startling Lewis biography Hellfire), “I’m draggin’ the viewers to Hell with me. How am I gonna get them to Heaven with ‘Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On’? You cannot serve two masters; you may hate one and love the opposite.”
As a facet observe, it is value mentioning that Jerry Lee’s cousin was Jimmy Swaggart, the evangelist who was born in the identical 12 months and went on to a massively profitable profession in tv and radio. Jerry Lee clearly admired Jimmy, calling him “a powerhouse for God” and producing a few of his gospel albums. It could be tempting to see them as The Good Cousin and The Wicked Cousin if it weren’t for the actual fact Swaggart could be caught in a couple of intercourse scandal – the primary in 1986 – when it was found he was a frequent shopper of prostitutes, certainly one of whom bluntly described him by saying, “He was low-cost, however he was very fast.” Another of Jerry Lee’s cousins was Mickey Gilley, the nation star and nightclub proprietor who inherited a few of the household’s expertise with out their extra troublesome convictions and appetites, whilst he presided over Gilley’s, the world’s largest honky tonk, within the Seventies and ’80s.
The solely factor Jerry Lee believed in with the identical certainty of his Damnation was his expertise, and the file reveals his confidence had a foundation in actual fact. Another exceptional fly-on-the-wall recording from the Sun Studios got here from December 1956, when Elvis Presley, now signed to RCA and probably the most profitable new singer within the land, dropped by to say hello to Sam Phillips as Carl Perkins was within the midst of a recording session. Jerry Lee was sitting in on piano, months earlier than he scored his first hit and loved his personal stardom. The three had been quickly swapping songs, principally previous gospel tunes that got here from a shared childhood of singing in church, and engineer Jack Clement turned on the tape because it was occurring. An image was snapped in the course of the session, with Johnny Cash there together with Elvis, Carl, and Jerry Lee. They grew to become often known as “The Million Dollar Quartet,” despite the fact that Cash isn’t audible on the tape, which circulated as a bootleg for years earlier than it lastly noticed authorized launch in 1990. Elvis’s easy charisma and excellent voice places him at heart stage, Perkins cheerfully gives assist, singing concord and becoming a member of in on guitar. Jerry Lee, in fact, has little interest in being so well mannered. His vocals fly in circles round Elvis’s leads, his piano work is a subdued, churchy variation on his proudly pumping model, and it is instantly apparent he was out to impress Elvis whereas on the identical time proving to everybody he was probably the most gifted man within the room. If the scenario did not really provide him the chance to conquer Elvis, nobody can deny he made an impression.
And even when destiny was treating Jerry Lee with contempt, his music did not lose its energy. Jerry Lee and Myra Gale had been married for 5 months when, throughout his first tour of the United Kingdom in 1958, the press realized the lady accompanying the American rocker was his spouse, and that she wasn’t 15, as they’d initially been advised, however 13. Not unreasonably, the British press had been outraged, and the scandal ended his tour after just a few days, with Jerry Lee completely unapologetic concerning the scenario. His American profession crashed as rapidly as his stardom in England, and for the higher a part of ten years, he performed anyplace somebody would pay him for a gig, going from $10,000 to $250 an evening, grimly decided {that a} comeback awaited him. A take heed to the data he made throughout his years in obscurity reveals he was singing and taking part in with the identical power he possessed in the course of the peak of his fame, and Live on the Star-Club, Hamburg – a recording of a 1964 nightclub date in Germany – is likely one of the wildest and most intense reside albums you may ever hear, with Jerry Lee pounding the keys with unholy ferocity and howling like a sexy wolf, whereas his backing band (British rockers the Nashville Teens) battle to maintain up with the madman who has taken them on the journey of their lives. If you needed to decide only one album to outline what Jerry Lee may do when he felt he needed to show himself, it is the one to decide on; it has received a well-deserved status as one of many best of all rock ‘n’ roll reside albums. (Live on the Star-Club, Hamburg did not obtain an American launch on the time, and is at the moment out there within the United States as a part of the three-disc set The Killer Live [1964-1970], together with three different reside albums documenting Jerry Lee’s command of the viewers.)
By the mid-Eighties, Jerry Lee had skilled sufficient brushes with loss of life, monetary calamities, IRS repossessions, authorized issues, and comparable potential career-ending disasters with out trying out that it appeared like somebody must make a film concerning the man, and 1989’s Great Balls of Fire was an A-list manufacturing that seemingly honored the nice man’s significance within the historical past of music. Unfortunately, it wasn’t particularly good, and Dennis Quaid’s efficiency as Jerry Lee was cartoonish in its overwrought theatrics, however the comfort prize was the music – Jerry Lee had re-recorded all his hits for the soundtrack, and he gave the impression of he’d barely aged a day since he reduce “Crazy Arms” in 1955.
In 1995, Sire Records signed Jerry Lee, and Andy Paley produced his newest comeback album, Young Blood, which lacked focus and featured too many shifts of backing musicians, although the star of the present nonetheless sounded recreation. Jerry Lee’s final nice comeback as a recording artist got here when Steve Bing, a profitable movie producer, businessman, and philanthropist, made it his enterprise to remind the world his favourite musician nonetheless had the products. He helped Jerry Lee by means of some monetary arduous instances, and helped produce the 2006 album Last Man Standing. The periods noticed Jerry Lee performing alongside plenty of high shelf visitor stars, from Bruce Springsteen and Mick Jagger to George Jones and Willie Nelson, however the album belonged to Jerry Lee, and his performances, nonetheless muscular and impressed, had been exceptional, and arduous to think about they might be the work of a 71-year-old man. Two extra albums in the identical vein adopted – 2010’s Mean Old Man and 2014’s Rock & Roll Time – they usually confirmed Last Man Standing was no fluke, that Jerry Lee was nonetheless an artist who demanded respect.
Time appeared to lastly meet up with Jerry Lee in his final years; he grew frail, stop touring, and was hardly ever seen in public. On October 16, 2022, he was lastly inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame; it was stated his prickly status in Nashville and an notorious 1973 Grand Ol’ Opry efficiency by which he performed far previous his allotted time, threw a number of rock ‘n’ roll songs into his set, and dropped an F Bomb mid-show saved him from being honored sooner. Jerry Lee was too in poor health to attend, and a photograph was circulated of Kris Kristofferson presenting him with the award at his dwelling. A smiling Kristofferson stood subsequent to Jerry Lee’s mattress, because the Killer, trying extra like a wraith than a person, checked out him in sleepy disbelief. It was stated that Jerry Lee requested Kristofferson if he introduced him the pint he’d requested for; it was most likely a joke, however from a person who usually drained fifths in a single sitting within the Seventies, who may say for positive? Just twelve days later, Jerry Lee Lewis lastly handed on, with many mourning the passing of one of many final true pioneers of rock ‘n’ roll within the Nineteen Fifties, as others dutifully cited his varied misdeeds. If there was ever an instance of an artist whose life and music reminded us that typically one should separate the artist from the artwork, it was Jerry Lee Lewis. His physique of labor is wealthy and rewarding sufficient that the compromise appears worthwhile.