TERRY GROSS, HOST:
This is FRESH AIR. I'm Terry Gross. Let's continue our week of interviews from our archive with R&B, rockabilly and early rock 'n' roll musicians and songwriters. Up next, we have Carl Perkins, one of the originators of rockabilly. Perkins' singing, guitar playing and songwriting brought together country and rock 'n' roll. He recorded at Sun Records, the label that also launched the careers of Elvis Presley, Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash and Roy Orbison.
Perkins was best known for writing the song "Blue Suede Shoes." In 1956, his version of "Blue Suede Shoes" was a pop, rhythm and blues and country hit. Soon after, Elvis had a huge hit with the song. Perkins also wrote "Honey Don't," which was covered by the Beatles. Later on, Perkins' songs were recorded by Dolly Parton, the Judds and George Strait. I spoke with him in 1996 after he'd written a memoir. He died two years later at the age of 65. Here's Perkins' recording of his best-known song, "Blue Suede Shoes."
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "BLUE SUEDE SHOES")
CARL PERKINS: (Singing) Well it's one for the money, two for the show, three to get ready. Now go, cat, go. But don't you step on my blue suede shoes. You can do anything but lay off my blue suede shoes. Well, you can knock me down, step on my face, slander my name all over the place and do anything that you want to do. But, uh-uh, honey, lay off of my shoes. Don't you step on my blue suede shoes. You can do anything but lay off of my blue suede shoes.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR CONTENT)
GROSS: Carl Perkins, welcome to FRESH AIR.
PERKINS: Thank you, Terry. It's a pleasure to be here.
GROSS: I'd love to hear the story of how you wrote "Blue Suede Shoes."
PERKINS: Well, I'd love to share it with you. It was October the 21st, 1955. I was playing what we called back in those days a honky-tonk. They call them clubs now. But it was a honky-tonk where people get together and scream and holler and dance and have a good time. And I had not owned a pair of blue suede shoes at this point. I'd seen a few of them around my hometown in Jackson, Tennessee. But at the end of a song, this couple had been dancing, a very attractive young lady and a cat that had on a pair of blue suedes. And at the end of the song he said, uh-uh, don't step on my suedes.
And it bothered me, you know. Not having owned a pair, I didn't realize that, you know, if you step on them, you kind of - you got to brush them off a little bit. It discolors the toe of them. But the thing that bothered me was he thought that much of a pair of stupid shoes to actually hurt her feelings. So I went home that night and I just could not go to sleep. I mean, I just kept seeing her face. And she said, oh, I'm sorry. And she really was. And I laid there, and I thought of the old nursery rhyme, one for the money, two for the show, three to get ready and four to go. I got up, went down the concrete steps.
I was living in a government project house. And I got my guitar down and I said, well, it's one for the money, ta-dum, dum, two for the show. And I never will forget, I couldn't find any paper to write on because we had two small children, my wife, Valda, who thank God is still with me after 44 years. All of our folks lived close by, so I guess we had no need to have, you know, writing paper. So I took three Irish potatoes out of a brown paper sack.
GROSS: (Laughter) Oh, no.
PERKINS: I did. And bless her heart, she saved that sack. The original words to "Blue Suede Shoes" is hanging in my den in Jackson, Tennessee. And I never will forget. I called Sam Phillips at Sun Studios down here in Memphis, who had a boy by the name of Elvis who had a couple of records already out at that time. And I said, Mr. Phillips, I wrote me a good song last night. He said, what is it? I said, I guess we'll call it, maybe, "Blue Suede Shoes." He said, is it anything like "Oh, Dem Golden Slippers"?
GROSS: (Laughter).
PERKINS: I said, no, man. This is about a cat that don't want nobody stepping on him. He said, it sounds interesting.
GROSS: Now, as you pointed out, the nursery rhyme is three to get ready and four to go.
PERKINS: And four to go, yeah.
GROSS: So how did it become go, cat, go?
PERKINS: Well, the original line there that I came up with, I said three to get ready, now go, man, go. I wrote the song go, man, go. And the first attempt I made at recording it, I said go man. And then I got excited because I could tell through the glass control window that Mr. Phillips was liking this song. And I got excited and forgot the word man. On my original record, there is a slight pause. I said three to get ready now go, cat, go, but don't you. The word cat flew in there instead of man. And after I got through with it, he said, that's it. I said, Mr. Phillips, I made a terrible mistake. I called that man a cat. He said, I heard you, and he's going to stay a cat.
(LAUGHTER)
GROSS: Now, this was the first rock 'n' roll record to top the pop charts, rhythm and blues charts and country charts at the same time.
PERKINS: Yeah, it was.
GROSS: And a lot of people made their own recordings of "Blue Suede Shoes," Lawrence Welk among them.
(LAUGHTER)
PERKINS: Yeah, he sure did. Pee Wee King and the Golden West Cowboys. There was every kind of version. And, you know, to this day, Terry, this song still gets put on albums all around the world. It's amazing. You ought to hear it in the Japanese language.
(LAUGHTER)
GROSS: Yeah.
PERKINS: Yeah.
GROSS: Now, of course, Elvis Presley...
PERKINS: Oh, bless his heart.
GROSS: ...Did a version of your song.
PERKINS: Yeah.
GROSS: How did he end up doing it?
PERKINS: When my record came out January 2, 1956, "Blue Suede Shoes," RCA Victor contacted Elvis. They had bought him from Sun Records at that point. And they said, Elvis, there's a hit song out there. We want you to get in the studio and record it. He said, there's a lot of hits out there. What are you talking about? And Steve Sholes, allegedly was the man who recorded Elvis back in the early part of his career at Victor, said the song is "Blue Suede Shoes." He said, yes, sir, you're right. I think it's a hit song myself. But that's my friend Carl Perkins. And that's a Sun record.
And he didn't want to do that song at the time they wanted him to, which was in January of 1956. He waited until April of that year, letting my record do what it was going to. And then he recorded it. And that was the kind of guy he was, you know? He could've jumped on it first, and nobody would've ever known Carl Perkins existed. But because of the nature of this fine individual human being named Elvis, he wanted me to have success with it, and he thought I would have if he stayed off of it, and that's what he did.
GROSS: What do you think of his version?
PERKINS: I loved it. You know, I fell into the trap. Elvis did it faster than I did. And I love - in the music industry, we call it the groove. The beat that he put to it was up-tempo from mine quite a bit. And I loved his so much till I drifted into doing it like he did - you know, faster. And when I met The Beatles in 1964 in England, and they - we was at a party, and they wanted me to do, you know, "Blue Suede Shoes," and I did. And Harrison said, why don't you do it like you did it? I said, well, I think I am. He said, no, you're not. My record was, (singing) well, it's a one for the money (imitating music).
A definite two stops, you know? And Elvis was, (singing) well, it's a one for the money, (imitating music) two for the show (imitating music).
It was a one-lick, and Harrison was really disturbed with that. He said, man, you do it different than anybody ever did, and now you're doing it like everybody else. But I really liked Elvis' record of it. I still to this day do. And I catch myself unconsciously speeding it up to the very groove he had it.
GROSS: Did you think of yourself as trying something new? Bringing together rock and roll and country?
PERKINS: Well, we didn't know exactly what we were doing, Terry, but we did know that it was different. We did know that instead of leaning back and sitting comfortably in their theater seats or wherever we were playing, these people were scooting around, moving. Some were getting up, shaking. Young people were dancing in the aisles. And we knew that we were causing a stir with this, and it wasn't - as far as I was concerned, or any of the guys in the early days, we didn't feel like it was anything wrong with what we were doing.
GROSS: Did you develop that style playing in honky-tonks?
PERKINS: Oh, yeah. You move there because of a flying bottle or an ashtray flying at some cat's head close to the stage. Yeah, you were on your toes playing in those places. And even, you know, back in those years, I was playing the same kind of music that was later recorded in Memphis in '54. I started playing the tonks when I was, gosh, 16, 17 years old. And I played - I did Roy Acuff's "Great Speckled Bird" or "Wabash Cannonball." But I - you know, I said, (singing) what a beautiful thought. Lord I'm thinking (imitating music).
That old upright bass, we - my daddy used to tell me, he'd say, son, put that guitar back on the nail. You are messing up Mr. Acuff's song. He don't do it that fast, and there ain't no need in you doing it. And rest my mama's soul, it was her who would say, Buck, leave the little fellow alone. He's not hurting Mr. Acuff's song. And because of what she would say to him, he backed off of me. And I just always felt good playing my songs up-tempo because that's the music I heard in the cotton fields. I picked cotton with many, many Black people, and we'd start singing. They would. And I'd start singing with them, 2 or 3 o'clock in the afternoon with the sun beating down on you. You know, I can hear Uncle John Westbrook saying (vocalizing). About 10 rows over, Sister Juanita, (vocalizing). And now, my little blood would start boiling. I'd say, wow, they fixing to sing. (Singing) Going to lay down my burdens (imitating music).
The ones who didn't know the words used their voices, (vocalizing). And to this day, Terry, I can vividly hear that up-tempo gospel music. Then I'd go home at night and get my old beat-up guitar off of the wall from the nail, and I tried to make the strings, you know, sound like the voices I was hearing. When I'd do (singing) some glad morning, my bass string would go (imitating music). That was filling in for the sounds of the voices I heard in the cotton fields.
GROSS: We're listening back to my 1996 interview with Carl Perkins. We'll continue the interview after a break. This is FRESH AIR.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "BLUE MOON OF KENTUCKY")
ELVIS PRESLEY: (Singing) Well, I said blue moon of Kentucky, just keep on shining. Shine on the one that's gone and left me blue. I said, blue moon of Kentucky, keep on...
GROSS: This is FRESH AIR. Let's get back to my interview with Carl Perkins, one of the originators of rockabilly. He wrote and recorded "Blue Suede Shoes," which was also recorded by Elvis, and "Honey Don't," which The Beatles later recorded.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR CONTENT)
GROSS: There's a great story about how you ended up going to Memphis to record at Sun Studios. Your wife heard Elvis Presley on the radio, singing...
PERKINS: Yeah.
GROSS: ..."Blue Moon Of Kentucky."
PERKINS: Right.
GROSS: And she called you and she said, look, there's someone on the radio who sounds like you, because you and Elvis were both putting together country music, rhythm and blues and...
PERKINS: That's right.
GROSS: ...And rock and roll. And when you heard that, you went right to Memphis, to the Sun Studios to see if Sam Phillips would record you too.
PERKINS: You're right about that.
GROSS: So was he willing to give you a shot right away? Did you have to work hard to convince him?
PERKINS: If I hadn't have felt that was my only opportunity, I would have - I wouldn't even turned around. I'd have put it in reverse and backed back to Jackson because he wasn't there when I walked in. My brothers were sitting out in the car. And I went into the little front office there, and a lady by the name of Marion Keisler (ph), who was Sam Phillips' secretary - who was really the lady who found Elvis Presley - she told Sam about this good-looking boy and how unique he sang. He came in to make a record for his mama, paid $3 for it. It was called Memphis Recording Service then. But I walked in, and I guess she could tell by looking at me that I was a hungry guitar picker. And she said, if you've come to audition, you're out of luck because we got this boy, Elvis, and he's more than we can handle. Mr. Phillips is not listening to anybody. I said, well, I appreciate it. Is it all right if we sit out front for a while till he gets here? And just a few seconds after, or a few minutes, really, after that, he pulled in. And he got a little close to my old Plymouth 'cause I was in his parking place and - right in front door. And he whipped in there in that two-tone '54 Cadillac Coupe de Ville. I never will forget it. It was dark blue and light blue. And he got out, and he had on a dark blue pair of pleated pants with a light blue coat. I said, wow. That's either Elvis Presley or the cat that owns this place.
GROSS: (Laughter).
PERKINS: And I beat him to the front door. I had my foot in the door. I said, Mr. Phillips, I'm Carl Perkins. That's my brother sitting there in the car. And I was talking 90 miles an hour. We come down, we want to make a record for you. He said, I just - I'm too busy, man. I just - he told me after that, he said, Carl, I don't know why I listened to you. I had no intentions. I was wrapped up with what I was going to do to get records pressed of this boy, Elvis. But you look like your world would have ended. And I said, Mr. Phillips, it might have 'cause my heart was - I was just aching to get in that studio. I just felt, you know, with encouragement from my wife, I thought, I can't let Val down. I got to get in there, and we did.
GROSS: So Sam Phillips gave you a shot. What did he do, ask you to play a lot of your songs?
PERKINS: My brother Jay had a couple of songs that he'd written. So Jay started doing one that he'd written, and he stopped him after about one verse. He said, no, got anything else? He did another one and got about that far, and he stopped him again. Jay liked a country singer by the name of Ernest Tubb and had developed a style like him 'cause he loved him so much, and he sounded a little bit like him. And I never will forget. Mr. Phillips said, boy, there's already a Ernest Tubb. You need to forget about him. Your song's pretty good. But I can't use you guys.
And I didn't realize - well, we didn't know the microphone was still on, and he was back in the control room. I said, boys, don't put them - they started to put their instruments, you know, back in the cases. And I said, don't put them up. I'm going to do him one of mine. We can't leave here. But he was hearing this, and he heard a convicted, little, old skinny-arm boy by the name of Carl Perkins that when I got the shot, he walked back through there. I said, Mr. Phillips, will you listen to one of my songs? He said, yeah, take off.
So he stood there. But I got real nervous 'cause after I got past the first verse, he hadn't stopped me (laughter). And I thought, oh, Lord, he's going to listen to the whole song. And I got to jumping around. And the first thing he said to me after I did that, he said, that's a cute song, and I like it. He said, can you sing standing still? He said, you're going to have to because if you ever make a record, you're going to have to stand still. I said, yes, sir, I can do whatever you tell me to. And he said, well, I like that song. Go home and write you another one in that vein, and we'll talk about putting a record out. So on the way back to Jackson in a '40 model Plymouth, I must have written 10 or 15 songs on the dashboard. And I called him back in a couple of weeks. I had a thing he liked. It was a country song called "Turn Around." And that was my first record.
GROSS: Well, why don't we hear "Turn Around," your first recording. And this is different from what we've heard. This isn't - this is more of a country ballad than an up-tempo rockabilly song.
PERKINS: Yeah. Now, the song on the other side was a rockabilly country thing called "Movie Magg." But he liked - I'll tell you what, he told me, he said, this boy Elvis is doing - I know where your heart is, but he's got that ball and going with it, and I can't have two of you cats sounding a lot alike and singing this up-tempo - we call it feel good music. There was no word, no name for it at that point. Some of the hillbillies in Nashville, I think rockabilly sprang out of there. They said, you know, them boys in Memphis are rocking our music. So it got called rockabilly, and it kind of stuck there. But he didn't feel like - that he had room for Elvis and I doing the same kind of music. So he told me, he said, I'm going to put out this song "Turn Around." And then he sold Elvis to RCA Victor, and he said, now, you can rock. So that's when I came up with "Blue Suede Shoes" and "Honey Don't."
GROSS: Oh, that's interesting. Well, why don't we hear the country ballad that you...
PERKINS: All right.
GROSS: ..."Turn Around."
PERKINS: OK.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "TURN AROUND")
PERKINS: (Singing) When you're all alone and blue, and the world looks down on you, turn around. I'll be following you. When you feel that love is gone, and you realize you're wrong, turn around. I'll be following you. Turn around. I'll be waiting behind you with a love that's real and never ever dies. If you feel your love will last and you'd like to live your past, turn around. I'll be following you.
GROSS: We're listening back to my 1996 interview with Carl Perkins. We'll hear more of it after a break. This is FRESH AIR.
(SOUNDBITE OF CYRUS CHESTNUT'S "SUSPICIOUS MINDS")
GROSS: This is FRESH AIR. Let's get back to my interview with Carl Perkins, one of the early rockabilly performers. He wrote and recorded "Blue Suede Shoes," which was later recorded by Elvis, and he wrote and recorded "Honey Don't" was later recorded by The Beatles.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR CONTENT)
GROSS: After the rockabilly era, sometime in the early '60s, your music wasn't doing that well commercially anymore, and you decided...
PERKINS: Right.
GROSS: ...To give up music...
PERKINS: Right.
GROSS: ...Back then. Why did you want to give it up?
PERKINS: Well, I was drinking a lot. I was drinking because I thought - I don't really - I really can't pinpoint why I got so deep into alcohol. I thought it was erasing memories. It was causing me maybe to dodge the real problems that were out there for me, and that was the crowds were falling off. My music was suffering. But alcohol was causing most of this. Thank God I had a good church-going wife who kept raising my children in the right direction and praying that I'd see the light. And one day, I did. And life's been wonderful ever since. But it got bad for a while. It sure did.
GROSS: Now, after you started feeling forgotten and neglected in America, you became a real hero in England.
PERKINS: Yeah.
GROSS: The Beatles did some of your songs, including...
PERKINS: Right.
GROSS: ..."Honey Don't."
PERKINS: Yeah.
GROSS: How did you end up getting so popular there? Did you tour England? What...
PERKINS: Yeah, I did. I went over, 1964, with Chuck Berry, who had not been to England at that time. And the tour was very, very successful. And this was before The Beatles came to America, a month or two before they came. And I met them over there, and come find out, you know, they told me that they'd been listening to a lot of my old Sun records and liked what I did and kind of inspired them. I think the inspiration I gave The Beatles was the fact that I wrote my own songs, I played my own lead guitar and sing my own songs, and this is what they were doing. And if I inspired them, it was in that way.
I don't think, and never will think, that it was my quality of music. Although, they're - George Harrison does hit a little lick or two that I used on some of my earlier records, but he does it so much better than I ever did. But you're right. I have been pretty successful in England, and I still go over every year. And most of the years, I'll do a couple of tours over there. Rockabilly music has held up real well. And for some reason or another, old Carl Perkins just feels good over there with those kids. They won't sit down. And I just, you know, I come alive and rock with them.
GROSS: Well, I'm glad you're still recording. I really enjoyed this. Thank you...
PERKINS: Thank you.
GROSS: ...So much for talking with us.
PERKINS: Oh, it's been a treat, girl. Any time, just holler. Carl Perkins will be on this end of the line. Thank you so very much.
GROSS: My interview with Carl Perkins was recorded in 1996. He died two years later at the age of 65.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "HONEY DON'T")
PERKINS: (Singing) Well, how come you say you will when you won't? You tell me you do, baby, when you don't. Let me know, honey, how you feel. Tell the truth now. Is love real? Uh-uh. Oh, honey, don't. Well, honey, don't.
GROSS: Tomorrow on FRESH AIR, we'll continue our R&B, rockabilly and early rock and roll series with Sam Phillips - whose Sun record label was the first to record Elvis Presley, Carl Perkins, Jerry Lee Lewis and Johnny Cash - and will feature my interview with Johnny Cash. I hope you'll join us. Our interviews and reviews are produced and edited by Phyllis Myers, Ann Marie Baldonado, Lauren Krenzel, Therese Madden, Monique Nazareth, Thea Chaloner, Susan Nyakundi, Anna Bauman and John Sheehan. Our digital media producer is Molly Seavy-Nesper. Our consulting visual producer is Hope Wilson. Roberta Shorrock directs the show. Our cohost is Tonya Mosley. I'm Terry Gross.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "HONEY DON'T")
PERKINS: (Singing) Well, sometimes I love you on Saturday night. Sunday morning, you don't look right. You've been out painting the town. Uh-huh, baby, been stepping around. So huh-uh, hey, honey, don't. Well, honey, don't (vocalizing). Honey, don't (vocalizing). Honey, don't. Well, honey, don't. Say you will when you won't? Huh-uh, honey, don't.
(SOUNDBITE OF CYRUS CHESTNUT'S "LOVE ME TENDER") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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