The heart of LITTLE RICHARD’S music career says Steve Van Zandt have him as long as we did, ” and tunes. We were lucky to colourful, groundbreaking life and eyewitnesses recall his rock’n’roll, while collaborators one of the founding fathers of Stephen Deusner honours his influence was profound. music career was brief, but says Steve van Zandt

Steve Van Zandt

11 ESSENTIAL LITTLE RICHARD SONGS

“TUTTI FRUTTI”1985 His first single on Specialty Records boasts one of the greatest intros in rock’n’roll history: "A-wop-bop-a- loo-bop-a-wop- bam-boom!"

TONG TALL SALLY"(1956) Co-written by a teenager named Enotris Johnson to pay for her mother’s medical treatment, the song makes the sexual undercurrents of Little Richard’s music all the more blatant. tw > itup "( i 956) Continuing his run of earth-shaking singles,

"Rip It Up (1956) Continuing his run of earth-shaking singles, “Rip It up” recounts a wild Saturday night on the town, although that chorus “I’m gonna rip it up… I’m gonna ball it up” doubles as a musical manifesto.

THE GIRL CANT HELP IT (1956) In the first rock movie shot in colour, Little Richard gets three performances - including the title track-and steals the film from the flamboyant Jayne Mansfield.

“GOOD GOLLY MISS MOLLY (1964) Little Richard heard that phrase from a New Orleans R&B DJ and (by his own admission) stole a piano theme from Ike Turner’s “Rocket 88”, but the result sounds like nobody else, IMAGES from his orgasmic delivery to the coded lyrics about prostitutes.

“RIDE ON, KING JESUS” (1962) fleeing pop for gospel, he sounds almost unrecognisable on his relatively staid religious records from the early 1960s. But there are a few spirited highlights from this era, including his barely contained interpretation of this popular African- American spiritual.

“GOODNIGHT IRENE” (1964) ™ Wellintohiscomeback, Little Richard took on the old folk standard, popularised by Lead Belly and The Weavers, andvampsovera groove that ’ s funkier for sounding sooff the cuff and possibly inebriated.

“GREENWOOD, MISSISSIPPI" (1970) Thisslabof Southern funk wasn’t the biggest hit off his comeback albu m The Riil Thing ("Freedom Blues" scratched the Top 50), but it ’ s one of his best from an era when Richard and his fleers were enjoying unprecedented comebacks.

"MONEY IS" (1972) Little Richard teamed with Quincy Jones on the soundtrack to the heist flick $ (also known as Dollars ). While he’s hemmed in by Jones’slick orchestration, he still sounds like he’s having ahigh time rolling around in cash. "My mind starts relaxin " he shouts, "when my pocket is full of Jacksons! ”

GREAT GOSH A ’ MGHTYKlTSA MATTEROF TIME)" (1986) Anchoring the soundtrack to Paul Mazursky’s Down And Out in Beverly Hills," Great Gosh A ’Mighty" gave him his biggest hit in nearly 30 years. The production is pure ’ 80s, but he barrels through it with a punkish intensity

“OLD MacDONALD” (1992) If he built his career playing for teens, Little Richard aimed this later studio LP at an even younger crowd. On Shake It All About he takes on a doen children’s tunes, and turns “Old MacDonald” into a rambunctious rave-up

‘‘THE thing about Little Richard, he always made an entrance,” says David T Walker, a session guitarist who recorded with the rock’n’roll icon in the early “He’d enter a club with fanning him with feathered fans. It didn’t where he was. It could be just a small gig, and he’d red carpet. He was Little Richard every day. Always was always himself.”