This series looks at the songs Bob Dylan chose to cover in volume “The Philsophy of Modern Song” Links to the previous articles in this series are given at the end.
By Tony Attwood
Tutti Frutti by Little Richard (who died aged 87 in 2020) was released in 1955 and is an absolute classic rock n roll song of the era. It was written by Richard Penniman himself and Dorothy LaBostrie. You’ll know the former of course, but the latter is one of those songwriters who wrote vast numbers of songs but with only one or two now remembered. And indeed in this case her role was not to write the original, but to re-write the lyrics – the original lyrics being considered too suggestive for audiences of the day.
Perhaps of all her other songs, the most famous is “You Can Have My Husband But Please Don’t Mess With My Man”, which Irma Thomas recorded. As with so many songwriters of the era, her life was dogged by disputes over royalties, but it is reported that by the 1980s she was receiving regular payments for “Tutti Frutti”. She is also no longer with us, having passed away aged 79.
The famous line within the song “A-wop-bop-a-loo-mop-a-lop-bam-boom!” is said to come from the drum beat that Richard Pennyman created as the heart of the song.
As Little Richard’s first hit, this style and approach was copied as the style and approach for most of his subsequent records. Indeed, it can quite reasonably be argued that this one song had an enormous impact on the direction of rock ‘n’ roll thereafter. In fact, one can readily argue that the song had as much impact as “Rock Around the Clock”, by taking the beat and simplicity of that song and adding what has become known as a much more “driven” sound.
In 2007, the song itself was voted as number 1 in a poll of “The Top 100 Records That Changed The World,” and many commentators repeated the line subsequently that it was this song (rather than anything by Bill Haley and others) that created the sound of rock and roll. In recognition of this the Library of Congress National Recording Registry included the song as one that initiated a new era in music.
Indeed, what is particularly interesting is that prior to this recording, Little Richard had been making demos and sending them off to record companies without success, not least because the original lyrics appeared to relate to anal sex. Dorothy LaBostrie was then engaged to create the rewrite, but the music was kept the same. Copies of the original lyrics are available on the internet, but I’ll leave them to your imagination. Or not.
A dispute remains over whether there was a third writer (“Lubin”) involved with the song, but this has not been resolved, nor has the allegation that Little Richard did not write any of the song. But I would add that such allegations about rock songs from this era are commonplace and rarely proven.
Apparently, the song was revised and recorded by Little Richard in around 15 minutes on 14 September 1955. and it was of course, a hit in the USA, although not in the UK where it received no airplay on the BBC, in part because the record company chose to issue the song as the B side of “Long Tall Sally.”
But the song was not only a hit in its own right, it laid down the basis for what rock n roll could be, taking the music to a much more frenetic level than Bill Haley and the Comets created. Indeed, one only has to listen to a few bars of Rock Around the Clock to appreciate the difference.
As we can see from the video above, there were attempts immediately to constrain rock n roll in the Bill Haley form into a rehearsed and practiced style, to make it ever more acceptable to the TV stations.
What Little Richard did was to combine elements of the blues and gospel music into the beat of rock n roll, as well as upping the volume. With his music and the dancing that it encouraged, the whole situation moved away from the highly choreographed approach seen before, and moved into the improvised form of jive that was quickly adopted by those who felt able to dance to the music at this speed. (And believe me, as one who has enjoyed dancing jive for much of his life, dancing to the speed of the early rock n roll records needs practice, energy and strength, if you want to keep going at that speed.
For many commentators, Tutti Fruti is the origin of true rock n roll music, and ultimately it joined the Rolling Stone list of “The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time“.
As for Bob Dylan, he wrote in The Philosophy, “Little Richard was speaking in tongues across the airwaves long before anyone knew what was happening. He took speaking in tongues right out of the sweaty canvas tent and put it on the mainstream radio, even screamed like a holy preacher-which is what he was.”
But for anyone who actually gets hold of an original copy of the Little Richard release and dares play it (it is now worth a lot of money), you might find the B side a real disappointment – it’s a slow track with none of the excitement of the A side.
Wop-bop-a-loo-mop, alop-bom-bom Tutti frutti, oh Rudy Tutti frutti, oh Rudy Tutti frutti, oh Rudy Tutti frutti, oh Rudy Tutti frutti, oh Rudy Awop-bop-a-loo-mop, alop bom bom I got a girl, named Sue She knows just what to do I got a girl, named Sue She knows just what to do She rock to the east She rock to the west But she's the girl That I love best [Chorus] I got a girl, named Daisy She almost drives me crazy I got a girl, named Daisy She almost drives me crazy She knows how to love me Yes, indeed Boy, you don't know What she's doing to me [Chorus and repeats]
Previously in this series
- Cheaper to Keep Her
- CIA Man – the Fugs
- Detroit City
- Don’t let me be misunderstood
- Dirty Life and Times
- Detroit City
- Dirty Life and Times
- Don’t let me be misunderstood
- I’ve always been crazy
- Keep my Skillet Good and Greasy
- My Generation and Desolation Row
- Old Violin by Johnny Paycheck
- Please don’t let me be misunderstood
- Pump it up
- Saturday night at the movies
- Strangers in the Night
- Take Me from This Garden of Evil
- There stands the glass
- Tutti Fruiti
- Waist Deep in the Big Muddy
- Where or When
- Willy the Wandering Gypsy and Me
- Without a song