For no particular reason, let’s take a moment to take remember of the inventors — the King, in my opinion — of Rock ‘n’ Roll. Offhand, what can I say? The man was a genius and a force on stage. He pretty much invented the double-bend (at least on electric guitar, for rock music), which you can hear throughout many of his songs, most notably the intro to Johnny B. Goode. It’s about the fourth…well, it’s not a note, so, three-four notes and then a two-string power chord sort of bend. Ba-da-da-*dah*-*dah* — it’s the last two. And believe me, a double bend is really a son of a bitching thing to do right, especially quickly. It hurts the hell out of your fingers.
Some trivia about Chuck — he started out, and always maintained that he could “fall back on”, painting houses. Also, the original recording of Johnny B. Goode does not contain the lyric, “little country boy”; it’s “little colored boy”, but the studio struck the word colored and replaced it with country for radio play (“Oh my but that little colored boy can play…” — the song is autobiographical). And, of course, there’s the Chuckwalk, or Duckwalk, which is kind of hard to play guitar while doing, and also does a real number on your knees.
Here’s Chuck from 1958:
