Robert Gordon (1947-2022). He started out in punk music, but embraced the spirit of rockabilly. His record labels didn’t know what to do with him. That was their trouble. He was all about 1950s rock and roll, and that’s all there was to it. He should have been as big as Brian Setzer and the Stray Cats.
Miss him already!!! Saw him twice in concert. Once in 1981 with Danny Gatton in Hamilton, Ontario and once in the 90's with Chris Spedding. Loved him from the beginning.
In Montréal back in the late 70's and early 80's Rockabilly was big. Robert Gordon was my ideal and not least because I looked a lot like him. I used to go hunting through church rummage sales and old dying shops along rue Notre-Dame for 50's clothing then come Saturday we would all go out to the rockabilly clubs. We looked so chic. The girls with their huge skirts and beehives, the boys in slim tight silk suits and those horrible pointed shoes (we all bandaged our baby toes first) and then jive and twirl all night long.
Robert and the Best Guitarplayer Chris Spedding! Das waren geile Zeiten die early 80 in Hamburg, i hear this good Music and i drive a Pontiac Chieftain bj.1953 in Mint Green.
I played in a band once and opened up for Robert Gordon and the Royal Crowns. I drove altogether 5 hrs in a snowstorm, got 2 beers, 10 bucks and Chinese food with a pubic hair in it, BUT! I met a King of Rock and Blues and it was a great time.
I found Robert Gordon in the sale bin back in the 1970's for 79 cents...I'd never heard him before...still listening... I was just out of the Army getting back into the civilian version of make-believe life.
Robert had a good career and was modestly successful, but I still don't know how he never got as big as the Stray Cats did during the late-70's/early-80's rockabilly re-surgence era.
I know NEXT to NOTHING about this Genre, but, ¿could it be due to the CATS being a BAND, and GORDON a SOLO singer? I mean, I have the feeling that, at the time, a FULL BAND was seen by youngsters (conscious, or unconsciously) as the "MODERN" format, whereas the SOLO singer figure might have been perceived as PASSÉ. If that was the case (and it´s only a guess), The STRAY CATS would have appealed to, both, 50s revivalists & mainstream audiences; whereas GORDON would have been seen as "TOO 50s" by the general public.
Well, it's a rock, rock, rockabilly boogie A rock, rock, rockabilly boogie A rock, rock, rockabilly boogie A rock, rock, rockabilly boogie A rock, rock, rockabilly boogie tonight Well, I know a little spot on the edge of town Where you can really dig 'em up and set 'em down It's a little place called, The Hideaway You do the rockabilly till the break of day Well, it's a rock, rock, rockabilly boogie A rock, rock, rockabilly boogie A rock, rock, rockabilly boogie A rock, rock, rockabilly boogie A rock, rock, rockabilly boogie tonight Well, they kick off their shoes, gettin' ready to bop They're gonna rockabilly wearin' their socks You wiggle your hip, feel the thrill So come on, little baby, do the rockabilly-bill Well, it's a rock, rock, rockabilly boogie A rock, rock, rockabilly boogie A rock, rock, rockabilly boogie A rock, rock, rockabilly boogie A rock, rock, rockabilly boogie tonight Well, there's little ol' Suzie, turnin' seventeen Well, everybody knows her as a rockabilly queen And there's Ol' Slim, as quiet as a mouse He grabs Ol' Suzie, they'll tear up the house Well, it's a rock, rock, rockabilly boogie A rock, rock, rockabilly boogie A rock, rock, rockabilly boogie A rock, rock, rockabilly boogie A rock, rock, rockabilly boogie tonight
Fantastic Stuff! Two points, though. I have all the original albums. First, the album and song are actually called "Rock Billy Boogie." Second, this was Gordon's first album without Link Wray. Chris Spedding is the guitar player.
I remember seeing him at N.Y.C. Lone Star on 5th avenue with his sister and Susan Cohen my girlfriend at the time. In the audience Blondy, Robert Fripp from King Crimson. All these people were there for him. The year well late 70s. I think.
Being 70 (ha trying to find my age on this) sounds like what I grew up; with with none of the fake genre add on stuff. I accept what he puts down... And damn that lead sounds good!
I'm not a musician, so forgive my ignorance for using the wrong terminology but Spedding is the the lead, but what makes this song great is the background guitar, rythem guitar, whatever you call it, playing that great "up and down" sound throughout the song, and as you say thats the sound all rockabilly bands copy today, but in the video Spedding is not playing that guitar up and down sound, so on the actual recording is Spedding be playing that as well, is that the "fills" as you put it?
