The Great Twenty-Eight (1955-1965)

In the recent countdown exercise of hit songs I occasionally found myself chastised for various exclusions, inclusions, and perceived mistakes in emphasis, none of which particularly surprised me. I mean, 100 seems like a pretty big number, but it's finite, and I know already I'm a bit of a crank anyway. But in retrospect shutting out Chuck Berry seemed weird even to me, so I made a point of revisiting this essential collection of the best of his best. No question, this is the cream: the virtual invention of perhaps better than half of the most familiar rock 'n' roll guitar licks, Berry's guitar playing itself, clean and punchy, often underrated or forgotten, and of course his endless sly and biting wit, the winking, knowing references to staples of teen life (which sadly metastasized in his late visit to the charts, 1972's "My Ding-a-Ling," his biggest hit but thankfully not included here). On this latter score I think he is most underrated—"Brown-Eyed Handsome Man" alone, the deeply coded mid-'50s assessment of the state of racial relations, demonstrates that he pretty much always knows what he is saying and saying exactly what he means, e.g., "Arrested on charges of unemployment" (although the song distractingly doesn't appear to understand some of the most basic terminology used in the game of baseball, or maybe I'm missing something?). Some of the tracks leaping out at me on this tour have included "Too Much Monkey Business" and "Come On," almost perfect expressions of exasperation about the hassles of life. "Havana Moon" has a spooky stripped-down sound. "Beautiful Delilah" features a hilariously brisk, practically harried piano tinkling in a distant background. "Oh Baby Doll" is upbeat and on the attack. And what do you know, some of the hits sound as fresh and bracing as ever too, notably, at this moment, "School Days." To make it the complete package, there's even a mystifying omission—1964's "You Never Can Tell." But I would be less than honest if I didn't also mention the gulches of familiarity into which my car of pleasure drove as well, the places where maybe I need to accept that I have used up my lifetime supply now: "Maybellene," "Roll Over Beethoven," "Rock  & Roll Music," "Johnny B. Goode," so on and so forth. Is it possible to do anything about this? Does it even matter? Sometimes context may take a role—even what I like here usually sounds tired on the radio. Maybe judicious use in movie scenes might wake some of them up for me again? At any rate, I have to think those new to Chuck Berry can still hear them with the same delights I once found, even if that pool of listeners is likely shrinking all the time, inevitably hearing first the ever-increasing ancient oldness before anything else. And if I don't exactly feel the thrills still myself, at least I still have clear memories of them, "cruisin' and playin' the radio." Maybe hauling out the old shibboleths and saying nothing else is the best idea after all. Rock 'n' roll it will never die!