Little Richard - Interview

Nearly forty years have passed since the birth of rock 'n' roll, but there has never been a musician who has come within a stone's throw of Little Richard for sheer unadulterated outrageousness.

Born in Macon, Georgia, in 1932, one of twelve children, Richard Penniman began singing in church when he was a child. In his teens, he ran off to sell snake oil in a medicine show and then landed a steady gig with the B. Brown Orchestra in 1950, where the almost six-foot piano man was christened with the misnomer Little Richard. Defecting to join a traveling minstrel show, he occasionally performed in a dress and heels. He cut various records over the next four years, but it wasn't until he recorded the song "Tutti Frutti," a raunchy piano-bashing paean to the joys of copulation, in 1955 that Little Richard finally made his way into the hearts and libidos of America's youth.

Pioneering a raucous R&B-influenced rock sound before Elvis Presley even graduated high school, the self-proclaimed architect of rock 'n' roll drove audiences wild with his incendiary, gospel-style vocals, key-banging piano playing, and an androgynous look that combined flamboyant outfits, heavy makeup, and very tall hair. At the time, Little Richard was also a pioneer on the sexual stage, as a performer who was not afraid of being perceived as gay, and who was both loved and abhorred for his effeminate ways. He himself has since disavowed his homosexuality and now insists that his pseudo-drag queen persona was strictly a show-business necessity.

We recently met at Hamburger Hamlet--his choice--in Beverly Hills. The singer, who had just returned from a guest appearance on The Tonight Show, was wearing the subtlest trace of pancake and eyeliner to go along with his black blazer, baggy red pants with a jeweled applique down the side of each leg, and red high-heeled boots. Skirting any questions that might rightfully cast him as the forerunner to such iconoclastic contemporary performers as Boy George and Ru-Paul, Little Richard now sees rock 'n' roll merely as a way to make a living. Always a spiritual man, his real mission, as he repeatedly imparted to me with evangelical fervor, his eyes wide with passion and his large head of long black hair shaking back and forth, is "to be one of God's children and to follow Him and to show His love to a dying generation." To assist him in this endeavor, he passes out a religious book called Finding Peace Within to the many fans who come up and shake his hand and sing his praises--several of whom interrupted our dinner.

PETER GALVIN: First of all, I wanted to tell you how much I liked the song "Somethin' Else," your duet with Tanya Tucker on the Rhythm, Country & Blues album. I listened to it over and over today, and what's amazing to me is that your voice sounds as good now as it did in 1955.

LITTLE RICHARD: That song was very easy for me to do because it sounds just like one of my records, "Keep A Knockin'." Plus I love Tanya Tucker and I love country music. I also like the banging piano--that old good-time piano.

PG: Why do you think there are so few black people playing rock 'n' roll today, considering that you were there at the very beginning?

LR: When you sit down and think about what rock 'n' roll music really is, then you have to change that question. Played up-tempo, you call it rock 'n' roll; at a regular tempo, you call it rhythm and blues. There was nothing but black people in R&B when I came out: Fats Domino, Chuck Berry, Elmore James--they were just playing blues up-tempo. That's what Tina Turner did, too--sang blues up-tempo--and they called it rock 'n' roll. Now they have banging guitar and no bass and call it rock, but that's not what I call rock. To me, true rock 'n' roll has a lot of bottom in it.

PG: I was wondering if the reason you were attracted to making rock 'n' roll when you were younger was because it offered you freedom of expression, a kind of expression that maybe you felt you had no outlet for in other aspects of your life.

LR: Yes. Rock 'n' roll offered me a platform to speak what I felt. It also offered me a platform to support my mama and my brothers and sisters--twelve children. It was a way out of poverty. It was a way to success. It was a way to education. And it was a way to a brighter day for me.

PG: The reason why I asked about freedom of expression was because I read in your book that you did some crazy things as a kid, and I wondered if being able to go out on stage and get wild and crazy was an extension of that behavior.

LR: What book are you speaking of?

PG: Your authorized biography, The Life and Times of Little Richard. I call it your book because a lot of the text is made up of long quotes that came straight from you.

LR: There is a lot of stuff in there that I had nothing to do with--people said what they wanted to say. A lot of their thoughts are not my thoughts.

FEMALE FAN: [handling a piece of paper to LR] Would you sign this? I know I'm sort of intruding, but you're one of my idols.