Song Nebula

“Blaze of Glory” (1989) – Joe Jackson * Written and produced by Joe Jackson * Single: “Blaze of Glory” / “Rant and Rave” * LP: Blaze of Glory * Label: A&M Records

Joe Jackson, the British singer-songwriter known for stylistic shifts and melodic pastiche, submitted a new articulation of the Johnny story in 1989. It was reminiscent enough of Bad Company’s “Shooting Star,” reshuffling its acoustic guitar-driven Is, Vs, and VIIbs, to seem like a slightly irritated attempt to fill some of that song’s psychological holes. What Bad Company didn’t tell us, according to Jackson, was that Johnny’s skill didn’t matter so much as a “look in his eye” and an ability to make “young girls cry.” Johnny was exploited, he misled legions of imitators, and someone should possibly pay.

His ghost also haunts Memphis, which means that Jackson is likely singing about Elvis and his lesser ilk, and that Jackson is therefore canceling out all elements of natural musical prowess so important to Chuck Berry’s version of the story. Maybe that’s his way of saying Berry misunderstood the true mechanics of Johnny’s world. But then this happens: the horns near the end start quoting “On Broadway,” the 1963 Drifters song where an African American declares determination to get his name in lights because he can “play this here guitar.” And we end up right back in Berry’s original dream.

“Johnny Hit and Run Paulene” (1983) * Written by John Doe and Exene * Produced by Ray Manzarek * LP: Los Angeles  * Label: Slash

X became the vibrant Los Angeles punk scene’s spokespeople, doing themselves a historiographical favor by calling their first album Los Angeles and getting LA rock icon Ray Manzarek (the Doors’ keyboardist) into the producer’s chair. They also had a memorability knack – the dual lead vocals of Exene and John Doe could sound arrestingly tribal, and the guitar work of Billy Zoom was as rock ‘n’ roll classicist as that of the Sex Pistols’ Steve Jones.  The song on the debut LP that stuck in most listeners’ heads was “Johnny Hit and Run Paulene,” a dutiful punk mangle-up of the Johnny myth, complete with a close-enough “Johnny B. Goode” guitar intro, in which “go Johnny go” had implications of drug-fueled sexual violence. It was a demonstration of how the iconoclastic turn, in rock ‘n’ roll, often serves traditionalism just fine.

“Gloria (live)” (1977) – The Cortinas * Written by Van Morrison * LP: For Fucks Sake Plymouth * Label: Bristol Archive Records

The Bristol punk gang of five called the Cortinas, who were done by 1978 after two singles and a neglected studio album, are captured in this live show with a nuanced understanding of how the “Johnny” myth functioned in rock ‘n’ roll. Punk may have declared decimation as its ultimate end, but in this live recording the Cortinas demonstrate the persistence of certain traditional mandates. It doesn’t matter if they’re being ironic. They end with Larry Williams’ “Slow Down,” quote Jimi Hendrix’s “Third Stone from the Sun,” and use a cover of Them’s “Gloria” to introduce the band. It won’t spoil anything to reveal that lead singer Jeremy Valentine, now a professor of cultural theory at Queen Margaret University in Edinburgh, introduces all five members (starting at 1:44) as “Johnny.” He puts his whole heart into each introduction. He seems to know that they too were bye-bye shooting stars and that rockers didn’t need to physically die to play out the Johnny pattern. When you think about it, the majority of all rock musicians are Johnnys who all die in metaphorical ways at least, and then get reincarnated. The Cortinas knew this.

“Shooting Star” (1975) – Bad Company * Written by Paul Rodgers * Produced by Bad Company * LP: Straight Shooter * Label: Atlantic/Swan Song

Chuck Berry’s “Johnny” saga got a contemporary reboot with Bad Company’s “Shooting Star,” which appeared at the heart of their Straight Shooter album. (It name checks “Love Me Do” and borrows the opening chord sequence for John(ny) Lennon’s “You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away.”) The “shoot” motif reminds us of the rat-tat-tat-tat-tat of the “Johnny B. Goode” riff, an allusion to powerful weaponry, the likes used by short-lived but legendary figures such as Scarface, Stagger Lee, or Jimi “Machine Gun” Hendrix. Lyrically, Bad Company vocalist and “Shooting Star” songwriter Paul Rodgers didn’t overextend himself in the analysis department. When he sings “Johnny died one night” we assume that he burned out far too young and had far too much of the booze and downers by his head. But maybe the basic info is all listeners needed in the by-then familiar post-Hendrix/ Joplin/ Morrison understanding that in pop music, the rise is the fall (and then the fall can be the re-rise).

The dice on the cover beg for numerological interpretation, so here goes. The 11 is a (Johnny-esque) “natural” that wins in craps on a coming-out roll. What about the serial number 3917? Its digits add up to 20 (3+9+1+7), which boil down to 2 (2+0, same as 1+1). I’ll interpret this 2 as an acknowledgment of a  second iteration of the Johnny story. You can interpret it your own way, because that’s how numerology works.

“Bye Bye Johnny” (1960) * Written by Chuck Berry * 45: “Bye Bye Johnny” / “Worried Life Blues” * LP: Rockin’ at the Hops * Label: Chess

“Johnny B. Goode” (1958) is both the official anthem of rock ‘n’ roll and its unofficial folk song, telling the story of a musical country boy hitting the big time. Like with so many of Berry’s songs, it’s hard to imagine something so all-encompassing being a documented human creation. Although it’s clear Chuck Berry was singing about a version of himself (he reports in his autobiography that “country boy” was first slated to be “colored boy”), part of its fascination has to do with him also narrating a version of the Elvis myth as it unfolded. As Dave Marsh wrote in The Heart of Rock and Soul, “if you could identify with either Presley or Berry” when listening, “there was a chance you could identify with both.”

The 1960 sequel “Bye Bye Johnny” appeared the same year Elvis returned from the Army, after which he’d focus on the “motion pictures out in Hollywood” phase of his career, just as Johnny was about to do. The “bye bye” sentiment in the title refrain referred directly to Johnny leaving home, but it had more to do, presciently and symbolically, with a sort of departure from pure musicality and therefore authenticity—the notion of “movie/TV stink” that’s arisen in these pages—that we would see in Elvis. With “Bye Bye Johnny,” Chuck Berry is singing about how the rise is the fall, the essential pop music success conundrum.

“Johnny B. Goode” (1958) – Chuck Berry * Written by Chuck Berry * Produced by Leonard Chess and Phil Chess * 45: “Johnny B. Goode” / “Around and Around” * LP: Chuck Berry Is on Top (1959) * Label: Chess * Billboard Charts: Hot 100 (#8); R&B (#2)

Pop music lyrics serve up “Johnny” stories galore. As early as 1904, the first published version of the song “Frankie and Johnny” gave us a prototype of the cheatin’ song, with Johnny as the wrong-doer. In its many versions, he ends up shot. The Johnny in Lesley Gore’s “It’s My Party” (1963) was also a cheater and certainly provided grounds for different lyrics than what she sang. Something like this, maybe?: “Johnny and Judy just walked through the door / I met them with my 44.” In John Leyton’s “Johnny Remember Me,” a ghostly 1961 UK number 1, we are led to guess that the girl who sings the “Johnny” refrain is dead, but it could be that Johnny the lead vocalist is the one who’s dead. Another gunned-down cheater maybe? Chuck Berry’s 1958 Johnny is a refreshingly different kind of figure, a “Goode” country boy who doesn’t cheat at anything and earns his way to success. That famous, much-copied guitar riff, though, signifies so much, including the commanding rat-tat-tat-tat-tat of an automatic weapon and the jackhammering of machinery (of the technological and business variety), things that bring faster results but foul up country-boy simplicity.