Song 511: This week the playlist recognizes Long Tall Sally by Little Richard, written by Enotris Johnson, Robert Blackwell and Richard Penniman, and you can find a YouTube video of it by clicking on the title. This particular lanky woman appears on the playlist today as a way to honor Little Richard, who sadly just passed away, but who did make it well past his 87th birthday. I first met this female incarnation via The Beatles, and I certainly enjoyed getting to know her. When the Fab Four rocked my world back in the winter of my seventh grade, I wrongly believed that they and their fellow British Invaders had created RnR, but I finally started digging deeper into the real story around the turn of the 1970s, when I arrived at college and got a subscription to Rolling Stone that began filling in the blanks for me, as did a 1950s revival that also happened on the radio during the same era. I soon came to appreciate the role that shouters like Little Richard had played in laying the groundwork for the music that had grabbed me, and I often concluded, with cuts like this one, that if I had heard the original versions, I would probably have become a fan of that pioneering bunch even before a certain February 1964 Ed Sullivan Show. In spite of the rough current unfolding reality that can make things feel all wrong, I urge folks to have some fun tonight listening to this track, and when you do, let it make you feel like everything’s all right.
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