Lonnie Donegan’s speeded-up version of Rock Island Line helped trigger the skiffle craze in the UK
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13 July marked the 65th anniversary of the day Lonnie Donegan and a band of musicians entered Studio 2 at the Decca recording complex in West Hampstead, London and cut a song that would alter the face of British music for good. ‘King Of Skiffle’ Donegan’s game-changing recording of American folk song Rock Island Line would set in motion a skiffle revolution that ushered in – and melded with – the rock’n’roll sound to give the Brit scene its own unique flavour and inspire a legion of musical greats to follow.
It was the popularity of teen flick Blackboard Jungle and, in particular, its theme – Rock Around The Clock – that led to Rock Island Line being pushed as a single – and it captured the zeitgeist and shot up the charts. “Donegan’s incendiary delivery is like a spark in a forest of dry timber,” noted diehard Donegan nut Billy Bragg in The Guardian.