On a visit to the Louvre in Paris some years ago I was curious to see a huge crowd congregating around the Mona Lisa with each person pushing and shoving for a better view. Perhaps not surprising in itself - after all, it's probably the most famous painting in the world, but what was surprising for me was that the thing is set deep behind darkened, bullet proof glass, making a close up view impossible. Honestly, you'd literally be better off looking at a reproduction in a book.And yet in their clamour to gawp, the two Raphael's hanging openly either side were more or less ignored in the crush. Then again, you don't go to the Louvre to look at two obscure Raphael paintings do you? It's the big boy on the block they've all come to see, just to confirm both its and their own existence by viewing it with their own eyes. I think the point I'm trying to make is that when dealing with 'Great Balls Of Fire', there's a temptation to consider it more than just another song.
Probably moreso than either 'All Shook Up' or 'That'll Be The Day', 'Great Balls Of Fire' comes pre-packed with the baggage and weight of cultural significance and expectation. It is, after all, a cornerstone Sun Studio recording by a rock and roll pioneer of no small fame, giving it a lot to live up to just by virtue of what it is. And what it is is a title that even those who don't like all this wild rock and roll stuff will be able to recognise and source even if they've never actually sat down to listen to it, in the same way they'll be able to tell you that Da Vinci painted the 'Mona Lisa' when they probably couldn't name a single other painting hanging in a single other gallery. And when we're dealing with Jerry Lee Lewis, 'wild' is invariably considered a suitable adjective
Like Presley, Jerry Lee was part of the first wave of rock and roll performers who, unlike Buddy Holly, Chuck Berry, Little Richard et al did not write their signature tunes ('Great Balls Of Fire' is an Otis Blackwell/Jack Hammer composition). Whether this consideration was catalyst to the mix that spurred his lifelong rivalry with Elvis I don't know, but there was always something unhinged about Jerry Lee, something more than a bit strange about the driven by God Southern boy playing the devil's music in the manner of one possessed by the devil himself. That's the accepted view anyway, but taking 'Great Balls Of Fire' as an example then you'd struggle to find all that much satanic about either song or performer.
As a song, 'Great Balls Of Fire' shrugs off its chains of expectation with a good natured chuckle and sets about it's good time business; 'Great Balls Of Fire' is a party song through and through. Nothing fancy, there's a percussive beat throughout that keeps the 4/4 time signature as surely as a white line divides a road, but Lewis makes a mockery of its straightness by playing clear over the top with a left hand boogie woogie roll and a right hand that runs across the keys at random. Like a bad actor who doesn't know what to do with his hands, Lewis sounds like he can't keep still with the excitement of it all, that he can't wait to stop playing and telling us about his girl because he wants to go off and play with her himself. At less than two minutes long it still crams in two piano solos and a bolero building breakdown with Lewis's vocal modulating all the while with the unpredictability of a teenage voice on the brink of breaking .
If you try to view 'Great Balls Of Fire' as a milestone in culture and popular music then like as not you'll come away as disappointed. It's too slight for that. Lewis himself makes the song and busts a gut to make it what it is, but there's precious little going on around him. That label credit of 'Jerry Lee Lewis And His Pumping Piano' is absolutely spot on, and in isolation he could be any New Orleans boogie woogie merchant jacked up on too much bourbon on a Saturday night. But listen to the song as a whole cold and its fresh as a daisy, over the top spontaneity ("Well kiss me baba, woo-oooooo....it feels good") leaps out at you the same way it must have leapt out at parties and dances over the 1957 Christmas holidays. Timeless, in other words, or in other other words, the mark of a classic single.
But look at me - I could have said all that in one paragraph if I'd set my mind to it. I guess I'm just as crushed by the weight of expectation as the next man so I'll close before I'm hoisted any higher by my own petard.
No comments:
Post a Comment