July 27, 2020
Ribowsky (The Supremes) rips it up with raucous prose in this affectionate biography of Little Richard (1932–2020). Ribowsky chronicles the life of Richard Wayne Penniman from his childhood in Macon, Ga., to his death in May 2020 at his home outside Nashville, Tenn. When Richard was 10, Ribowsky writes, he would sing gospels to sick people and touch them, and they’d swear they felt better. (Indeed, throughout his career, Little Richard claimed his music could “make the blind see, the lame walk, the deaf and dumb hear and talk.”) Ribowsky recounts how Richard wrote some of his biggest hits—“Tutti Frutti,” “Long Tall Sally,” and “Good Golly, Miss Molly”—while washing dishes at the Macon Greyhound bus station, and chronicles the ups and downs of Richard’s early record deal with Specialty Records in 1955 and his later, brief relationship with Vee-Jay Records. At the core of the book is Little Richard’s legendary stage persona, which influenced Elvis, James Brown, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, and Otis Redding. Richard, Ribowsky astutely writes, combined gospel with the grittiness of blues and then amped it up with his fiery piano playing and singing. This entertaining, fast-paced biography will thrill fans of Little Richard and early rock and roll.
August 1, 2020
A breezy biography of one of rock's most flamboyant founders. Richard Penniman (1932-2020) was born in Macon, Georgia, a city with a lively music scene. His father, Bud, was a mason, bootlegger, bar owner, and sometime preacher. His mother, Leva Mae, was a churchgoing woman with whom her son identified at an early age, "painting his face with her makeup and dousing himself with her rosewater perfume. He would imitate her speech, in a girlish, high-pitched voice." Richard was singing at an early age, at first in church and gospel groups. One of his first influences was Sister Rosetta Tharpe, an important precursor of rock music. Ribowsky goes on to trace how Richard paid his dues in local R&B clubs and on the "chitlin' circuit" of venues catering to Black artists, sometimes wearing drag. A relentless self-promoter, he pushed his way into a couple of small record deals--with disappointing results--before finding his way to Specialty Records in New Orleans, where he recorded his first hits in 1955. The author follows Richard's career through a succession of hits, his surprise decision to quit his music career to become a preacher (a move repeated several times), and his latter-day status as a celebrity/provocateur on talk shows and in 1950s rock revivals. Ribowsky effectively conveys the ambiance of the era, bringing in many of the stars and other public figures with whom Richard interacted over the decades. His task was undoubtedly complicated by his subject's lifelong habits of embellishing facts and contradicting himself, and the musical analysis is not on par with some of Ribowsky's previous books. In the final chapter, the author summarizes Richard's impact on the many who came after him--a fitting tribute to a unique figure. An easy, bright read about a seminal figure in the soundtrack of modern music.
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