Hail Hail: Chuck Berry The Asshole

If you know anything about the history of Rock and Roll, than you know old Chuck Berry was there right towards the beginning and to many is considered the first true guitar god. Today at the earthly age of 87, Chuck Berry is considered a living legend; one of the few early greats still with us.


Chuck in 2007 doing his famous duck walk

In 1986 a tribute concert and documentary were planned to honor the Rock and Roll icon. Rolling Stones guitarist Keith Richards, and devoted follower of Chuck's music, put together a superb backing band and secured special guests like Eric Clapton, Julia Lennon, and Joe Walsh for the show. The documentary builds up the final concert with interviews from famous musicians about Chuck's legacy, a look into his personal life, and most importantly the band practices. Overall it's a solid documentary, affectionately paying dues to one of rocks greats and though Berry does come off as an obstinate perfectionist during rehearsals (notably cruel to Richards who idolizes him) those lumps are forgive by blockbuster performance Berry gives in the final concert showing, outshining all the special guests. The documentary should additionally gives Chuck's old bandmate Johnnie Johnson his long neglected due. Johnnie was a fabulous early Rock and Roll pianist who co-wrote many of Chuck's most famous compositions (though he received credit on few), and following the documentary was able to restart his musical career, playing on albums with Bob Weir, Eric Clapton, and George Thurogood, until his passing in 2005.

So with all these positives, why is this blog entry titled "Hail Hail: Chuck Berry The Asshole?" Well if you only watch the main documentary you'll most likely come away with a positive view towards Chuck and note that he put on a fantastic concert in 1986, but if you watch the shorter making of documentary that accompanies the DVD release of Hail! Hail! Rock N Roll, you'll undoubtedly have a different outlook.

You might find it strange that there's a documentary chronicling the making of a documentary about a tribute concert, and indeed the behind the scenes bonus documentary was not planned. Instead the film's director Taylor Hackford kept the cameras rolling before and after planned shots because he feared the movie would never actually be finished and wanted to make a sort of video diary chronicling the frustration he and the producers faced in putting this project together. This frustration came solely from one person, Chuck Berry, the film's obstinate star. The behind the scenes footage began when Chuck repeatedly failed to show up to planned shots; Chuck refused a ride to locations from the production staff. Worst still, after making the entire film crew wait hours for him to arrive, Chuck would call the producer and demand a bang of cash before he would appear. Yep a bad full of money, he wouldn't except a check, and he did this again and again throughout production demanding additional sums of money despite the fact that he was paid a large sum initially before the filming had even begun. The film makes it obvious that Chuck cares far more about bleeding the producers for as much money as possible than he does about showcasing his legacy or putting on a memorable concert.

This lack of desire to put on a quality show and instead focus solely on getting paid seems to transcend to Chuck's regular concert as well. As show in both documentaries, Chuck does not have a touring band instead forcing venues to provide one for him to perform with the instruction that they know all of his hit songs. No other information is given, like a setlist of the song order, and Chuck shows up to the concert five minutes before curtain (if your lucky) and leaves immediately after the shows conclusion. The show begins and ends purely on Berry's whim, and the supporting band simply tries to stay in tune with him. Of course since Chuck never meets with or warms up with his house band, making the shows notably jagged and uneven as the back up performers try to figure out what Chuck is playing. While the chance of seeing a legend is always tempting, when they put so little into their performance (Berry frequently forgets the lines to even his most famous songs) it's sad and disheartening.

 I could go on about how much of a dick Chuck is in the movie to the director, the producers, Keith Richards, and the rest of his band, but you can check that out for yourself if you are so inclined to see a legend being an asshole. Instead I feel I have to talk about the tribute concert the movie ends with. As I stated earlier, it is the highlight of the film where Berry kicks it into high gear and shows his superstar followers how rocking is done. The sad thing about it, that we learn from the behind the scenes documentary, is that it's all fake. Yep, the final concert is actually the best moments of two concerts. See they played the tribute concert as planned but immediately afterwards the producers (and the band members) realized that Chuck didn't know half the lyrics to his songs, and that his voice sounded horribly horse. Chuck had played an outdoor State Fair concert the night before without informing the production team and had strained his voice. Knowing that the film rested heavily on a big concert finish, the production team did a second concert the following night and provided cue cards for Chuck to read the lyrics off of. Chuck of course demanded a bag of cash to do this second concert, even though the event was only staged to make him look good and competent as a performer. Unfortunately for the producers, even with cue cards Chuck's voice still sounded like shit, so a few weeks later they had Chuck come into a recording studio to overdub his lyrics and guitar play. Of course they had to pay him to do this as well. So the final concert you see of Chuck Berry rocking the stage and performing all of his classic songs wonderfully is a lie; a product of Hollywood to make a tired star look brighter than he really was.

I rented the film Hail! Hail! Rock N Roll a couple of years ago after Chuck Berry cancelled a concert at Black Bear Casino. I was really excited for the show, spending the last couple weeks getting to know Berry's canon of music better, and thought the DVD would be the best substitution for missing the show. Turns out Chuck might have done me a favor in cancelling that show, saved me $60 plus the pain of seeing an old guitar legend make a fool of himself.