I Read a Book: Chuck Berry: An American Life by RJ Smith
Motorvatin' over the hill with a rock'n'roll poet and imperfect human being
There are stories in this book that will curdle your stomach. There is music described in this book that is as magnificent as any work of art ever made. There is the legacy of racism encountered, fought against, beaten down, reconfigured. There is shame and there is glory. There is beauty and there is pain. It’s all connected in the story of one man.
RJ Smith is among the handful of musician biographers who can dig deep into character and characteristics good and bad of the human beings behind the music without losing sight of the accomplishments which made them worth covering in the first place. (I’m sure there is a handful, but only Smith and Peter Guralnick come into my head right away.) He is also accomplished at placing individuals into the context of society and history. This book offers insight into the history of St. Louis and race, things which have not been common knowledge to those of us who have lived here for decades. In fact, throughout the book, Smith keeps race always in mind when describing things Berry did and which happened to him. He never makes Berry an innocent victim by any means, but he does add context.
The music did not spring from Berry’s mind like Athena from Zeus. Rock and roll was part of the changes taking place in African American music in particular during the 1950s, and Smith does a great job of showing how all those changes influenced Berry who then influenced more changes. The piano playing of Johnnie Johnson, itself influenced by blues and jazz and boogie woogie all around him, helped shape Berry’s guitar playing, which then sounded like nobody else on the instrument until nearly everybody else on the instrument sounded like it. The electric guitar was still fairly new when Berry took to it, and his playing did not have many specific rules or roles to worry about. It takes a long time, but Smith eventually points out Berry’s exceptionally long fingers which enabled him to easily play across many frets on the guitar that most people simply could not reach – I would really like to hear a lot more from jazz pianist Vijay Ijer on the discussion of Berry’s hands and experiences affecting the way he played.
Nat King Cole heavily influenced the way Berry sang, particularly his focus on diction. The songwriting came from a combination of blues and storytelling tradition and poetry. Berry was an originator – and Smith makes a point of showing how the originators of rock and roll (including Little Richard, Bo Diddley, and Jerry Lee Lewis) were different from everybody else who came after. Berry benefited financially from the British Invasion bands who performed his songs, but he never had much respect for them – it’s a little bit funny to think he referred to the Rolling Stones frontman as Dick Jagger quite a few years after everybody else in the world knew very well the proper name.
The chapter on Hail! Hail! Rock ‘n Roll is full of fascinating insight into an experience which I participated in by virtue of being at one of the two filmed concerts for that movie. But, then, a lot of that insight seems to come from extras included on the DVD reissue which I’ve never seen. I wish Smith could have learned about Berry’s triumphant appearance a few years after that event when he headlined at the same Fox Theater over Jerry Lee Lewis and gave the greatest performance I could possibly imagine. It was so good that I decided I would never again see Chuck Berry live, as I wanted that to be my final memory of the man on stage – it never occurred to me at the time that a 63-year-old would have another 25 years of performing in him.
The ugliness is investigated thoroughly. Berry’s notorious demands for money up front before he would walk on stages are shown to be a combination of his understanding of numbers and money as proof of worth as well as a need to retain control at all times. His frequent surliness to fans, admirers, and especially other musicians does not paint him in any kind of good light. But, of course, it is sex and fetishes that are the worst. Berry seemed to constantly require sex, and he mixed his desire with revenge for racists that wouldn’t let him even talk to white women and a shameful desire to be punished for crossing lines. The famous story of the 14-year-old girl he brought back to St. Louis from the Southwest, which led to his conviction under the Mann Act, leaves nobody looking good. It’s possible to have been unjustly singled out as well as to have acted dishonorably and awfully.
This comes up again with the truly infamous stories about his videotapes of women using the restroom and locker room in the restaurant he owned just over thirty years ago. Everybody looks terrible here, and it turns out it’s possible to still be shocked further than what I had been before. Berry was clearly guilty of terrible behavior as well as a victim of illegal searches and seizures in the rush to bring this to light. Smith’s research and descriptions in this chapter are unblinking and essential.
I never really met Chuck Berry, though he did walk out of Blueberry Hill by himself after midnight once in about 1984 when I was walking with a friend after work. “How ya doin’, fellas?” was the extent of my interaction with the man. But, starting with the fact that I went to high school with his son, I’ve got a lot of first-degree separations, and it’s fascinating the number of people I’ve known quoted and/or acknowledged in this book. I’ve read a lot of biographies in my life, but never one in which I can hear the speaking voices in my head of this many people offering ideas and anecdotes. That won’t be true for everybody who reads it, but it possibly at least partially colors my impression of the book, so I figured I should mention it.
The music of Chuck Berry, especially the singles created between 1955 and 1972 (from “Maybellene” to “Tulane”) remains totemic in my world. Smith does an incredible job of describing what makes Berry’s music so great. He even devotes a chapter that makes “My Ding-A-Ling” seem more than just a low point in his career (while also pointing out that the only number one hit record for Chuck Berry was basically stolen from Dave Bartholomew). It would be wonderful if the man who created so much truth and beauty could have been as nice as his music was free. But that’s not the way it was, and neither was any American Life.
I'm reading it now. He should have talked to us, hahaha! Well, as you said, we all have Chuck Berry stories, and he couldn't have possibly talked to all of us. (I did get to interview Chuck in person once, under bizarre circumstances, but it was very memorable--my mom, who moonlighted as a waitress, waited on Chuck and a "date" on at least one or two occasions. She said that he was a good tipper.
Need to finish it off--I'm only on page 150 (reading an Albert Ayler bio concurrently). It's REALLY good, but it's R. J. Smith!