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Once you lock
into what he’s doing, you began to wonder what the point is of doing
it differently. One has the same experience with good blues, if you listen
right: why make any more records at all after Howlin’ Wolf has cut
“Smokestack Lightning”? Chuck Berry proceeds from a formula so
simple that even the dullest ear has caught on to it within the time it
takes to hear three or four songs, five tops: open with a guitar lick, bring
a little drum in while the guitar finishes its four-bar salvo, then let
the rest of the band hop on board like they’d just heard something
real cool going on and can’t resist coming along for the ride. After
a maximum of thirty-two bars’ worth of intro, you get your verse-chorus-verse-chorus-solo-verse-chorus,
with occasional tweaking of the chorus placement (as in “Roll Over
Beethoven” and “School Days,” where the proper chorus doesn’t
come around until the end or very near it) for variety’s sake. It’s
a lot like your basic blues structure, except that lyrically it’s not
tethered to the line/repeat line/rhyme-line structure that’s the hallmark
of a blues song, and it favors an upbeat mood. Simple enough, right?
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