Watch Keith Richards, Jerry Lee Lewis and Mick Fleetwood play ‘Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On’
Today, we’re travelling all the way back to 1983, but we’re not slipping on our legwarmers and shuffling to some synth-pop records. In a particularly rare collaboration, Fleetwood Mac drummer Mick Fleetwood, Keith Richards of The Rolling Stones, and the salient rockabilly pianist Jerry Lee Lewis teamed up for a one-off Dick Clarke-hosted TV special.
During the performance, the three covered a few rock classics, including Hank Williams’ ‘Your Cheatin’ Heart’ and Chuck Berry’s ‘Little Queenie’. However, the most memorable moment of the evening was the rendition of Lee Lewis’ 1957 classic, ‘Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On’.
The origins of the rockabilly standard are disputed, but the lyrics are often credited to singer-songwriter Dave “Curlee” Williams and pianist James Faye “Roy” Hall.
“We was down in Pahokee, on Lake Okeechobee,” Hall once said of the song’s origin, per NPR. “Out on a damn pond, fishin’ and milkin’ snakes … This guy down there had a big bell that he’s ring to get us all to come in to dinner, an’ I’d call over [and] say, ‘What’s goin’ on?’ Coloured [sic] guy said, ‘We got twen’y-one drums, we got an old bass horn, an’ they even keepin’ time on a ding-dong.’ See, that was the big bell they’d ring to git us t’come in.”
Through the mid-1950s, Lee Lewis folded a piano-based cover of the standard into his live sets and in 1957, he decided to record it during a session for Sun Records. Initially, he was criticised for bringing such a song to the studio.
“We don’t do much country around here. We’re in the rock and roll business. You ought to go home and work up some rock & roll numbers,” sound engineer Jack “Cowboy” Clement was quoted as telling Lee Lewis by Sound on Sound.
Despite Clements’ best efforts, Lee Lewis was undeterred and cut the track for release in April 1957. “I knew it was a hit when I cut it. Sam Phillips thought it was gonna be too risqué; it couldn’t make it. If that’s risqué, well, I’m sorry,” Lee Lewis remembered in a conversation with NPR.
‘Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On’ became Lee Lewis’ first major hit reaching number three on the Billboard Hot 100. Just six months later, in October 1957, Lee Lewis released his next single, ‘Great Balls of Fire’, which compounded his position as an international rock star.
Watch Keith Richards, Jerry Lee Lewis and Mick Fleetwood perform ‘Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On’ in 1983 below.