He called himself “the Killer,” and he lived up to the name, if not literally then figuratively.
Jerry Lee Lewis was one of rock and roll’s founding fathers, a piano-pounding boogie-woogie rocker with a piled-high pompadour and a smirk that said he didn’t give a shit if you liked him or not. He was a Sun Records original, alongside Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash and Carl Perkins, churning out hits that included signature romps like “Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On” and “Great Balls of Fire.”
But while his fellow Sun rockers maintained favorable public profiles, Lewis was the bad boy, unpredictable except for the fact that you could count on him to stir up trouble wherever he went. He trashed pianos, crashed cars and once shot his bass player.
But Lewis scandalized rock and roll like few others when he married his 13-year-old first cousin once removed in 1957. The news didn’t come out until the following year, and when it broke, his career was all but finished.
By the time 1950s rock and roll had its revival in the early '70s, the world had moved on and Lewis was able to make a comeback. He staged it in Britain in 1973, where a new breed of electric guitar players were holding court. Lewis saw them as the key to his revival, and he courted them for his rather clumsily named album The Session...Recorded in London with Great Artists.
Certain rock and roll legends are a pale imitation of their stage image. Jerry Lee was almost 99 percent full Technicolor!"
— Rory Gallagher
For guitarists and lovers of guitar rock, the record is notable for hosting appearances by British and Irish players like Albert Lee, Peter Frampton and Rory Gallagher. Lewis was attempting to stay relevant by connecting with the artists of the day in the hope that their cool would rub off on him.
It certainly didn’t hurt: The Session became his highest pop-charting album since his 1964 Golden Hits retrospective. It put his career back on track.
But as Gallagher revealed, the Killer was anything but an easy hang.
“He was pretty friendly with everyone, but you had to be one step ahead of him — you know, his sort of sense of humor,” Gallagher said of the sessions. “One minute he’s lifting the Steinway up on one foot, and…” He drifted off, leaving it to the reader to imagine what calamity might have followed.
Gallagher performed with Lewis on his cover of the Rolling Stones’ (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction.” Apparently, the Killer had never heard the 1965 hit before.
Gallagher’s brother Donal recalled that Lewis, having read through Mick Jagger and Keith Richards’ words for the tune, wasn’t sure if the song was real or a well-contrived joke to make old Jerry Lee look frustrated and out of touch.
“A bit bamboozled at the lyrics and a bit embarrassed at not really knowing of the song, Jerry’s paranoia kicked in and thought he was being ‘wound-up,’” Donal told Rolling Stone.
"Annoyance flashed on the Killer’s face, as his wild eyes scanned the studio, fixing on Rory. ‘I trust you boy. Without looking at anyone else but me, tell me truthfully, is there a song called ‘Satisfaction’? If so, you start teaching me.’”
Despite the melodrama, Rory appreciated that Lewis lived up to his legend.
“You know, that was the beauty of it,” he said. “You meet certain rock and roll legends and they’re a pale imitation of their stage image, or their legend is a kind of a dull version of it. But Jerry Lee was almost 99 percent full Technicolor!”
Dave Davies was considerably less generous in his estimation of the pianist. The Kinks cofounder was among the British guitarists — including Brian May — who performed with Lewis in London at a 1989 all-star tribute to the ‘50s rocker called Jerry Lee Lewis and Friends. Growing up in the 1950s, Davies considered Lewis “a big hero” alongside original rock guitarists like Chuck Berry.
But the tribute show changed all that.
“That was a big mistake,” Davies told Classic Rock in 2011. “I soon realized that Jerry Lee Lewis was an arsehole. A complete arsehole.
“He had a terrible personality. He didn’t treat people well at all. Maybe he was like that because he was surrounded by arseholes himself. You know, he could win all the accolades he wants, but on his deathbed he’ll have to look at himself.”
Davies and Gallagher at least had the advantage of being successful guitarists in their own right. Poor Ritchie Blackmore was a complete unknown when he began working with Lewis in 1963.
“Every time Jerry Lee Lewis would come to England, I was hired as his guitar player,” he told Guitar Player in 1996.
Like many artists of the day, Lewis would tour alone and use pickup bands and musicians for gigging. Blackmore, then performing with his group the Outlaws, was a frequent hire. But as he explained to GP, he had to endure a trial by fire at his first rehearsal with the Killer.
“The first time I played with him I’d just turned 18, and we were supposed to have a week’s rehearsal,” Blackmore explained. “The week before the tour he hadn’t turned up. Two days before the tour, still nothing. We were going to open in Birmingham, and he turned up the afternoon of the gig.
“I was shitting myself because I’d heard from all these bands that if you played a wrong note, Jerry would beat the shit out of you — he’d punch you in the face.
"I was a big fan, but I was very frightened of him.
“About an hour before the show, Jerry turns up, sits down at the piano and starts fiddling around. I’m petrified. I have no idea what this guy’s going to play, and we’re about to do a big show to a sold-out theater.
“He plays his intro and then turns around to us and says, ‘C’ [Blackmore sings a driving rock and roll groove]. The bass player’s giving me the nod for when we’re changing, because I still don’t know what we’re playing.
“Suddenly, Jerry Lee stops, says ‘F,’ and he’s into something else.
Now he leaves the piano and starts to walk over to me. I’m absolutely petrified, looking at him, waiting for that punch."
— Ritchie Blackmore
“Now he leaves the piano and starts to walk over to me. I’m absolutely petrified, looking at him, waiting for that punch.
“And he goes, ‘Play, boy,’ in that very southern way.
"I start taking my solo, sweating. ‘He’s going to hit me! I know it’s coming.’ He’s standing there with his hands on his hips, looking right at me.
"I came to the end of the solo, and he put his hand out: ‘Good, boy.’
“I was just relieved that he didn’t hit me!”
Blackmore went on to play many dates with Lewis, during which he and the Killer got better acquainted.
“After that we became the best of friends,” Blackmore said. “He wanted to bring me back to Memphis, but that was in ’63, and I was only 18.”
Over his 70-year career, Lewis would go on to work with many other guitar greats, including Jimmy Page, Keith Richards and B.B. King, whom he corralled for his star-studded albums. He continued his 12-bars-with-guitar-stars approach that worked so well for him back in 1973 right up until 2014, eight years before the Killer breathed his last on October 28, 2022.
