Rocket 88

"Rocket 88" (originally written as Rocket "88") is a rhythm and blues song that was first recorded in Memphis, Tennessee, on March 3 or 5, 1951 (accounts differ). The recording was credited to Jackie Brenston and his Delta Cats, who were actually Ike Turner's Kings of Rhythm.

The record reached no. 1 on the Billboard R&B chart. Many experts acknowledge its importance in the development of rock and roll music, with several considering it to be the first rock and roll record.

Original version

The original version of the twelve-bar blues song was credited to Jackie Brenston (Ike Turner's saxophonist) and his Delta Cats, which hit number one on the R&B charts. The band was actually 19-year-old Ike Turner and his Kings of Rhythm band, who rehearsed at the Riverside Hotel in Clarksdale, Mississippi. Brenston sang the lead vocal and was credited with writing "Rocket 88". The song was a hymn of praise to the joys of the Oldsmobile "Rocket 88" automobile which had recently been introduced, and was based on the 1947 song "Cadillac Boogie" by Jimmy Liggins. It was also preceded and influenced by Pete Johnson's "Rocket 88 Boogie" Parts 1 and 2, an instrumental, originally recorded for the Los Angeles-based Swing Time Records label in 1949.

Jackie Brenston

Jackie Brenston (August 24, 1928 or 1930 – December 15, 1979) was an American R&B singer and saxophonist, who recorded, with Ike Turner's band, the first version of the pioneering rock and roll song "Rocket 88".

Biography

Brenston was born in Clarksdale, Mississippi, United States. Returning to Clarksdale from army service in 1947, Brenston learned to play the tenor saxophone, linking up with Ike Turner in 1950 as sax player and occasional singer in his band. The local success of Turner’s Kings of Rhythm prompted B. B. King to recommend them to studio owner Sam Phillips in Memphis, Tennessee, where the band made several recordings in early March 1951, including "Rocket 88", on which Brenston sang lead and was credited with writing.

Phillips passed the recordings on to Chess Records in Chicago, who released "Rocket 88" as by "Jackie Brenston and his Delta Cats", rather than under Turner's name. The record soon reached #1 on the U.S. Billboard R&B chart and stayed at that position for over a month. Phillips' later claimed that this was the first rock and roll record, this has often been repeated by others, although there are numerous other candidates. Phillips used the success of the record to start Sun Records the following year.

Ike Turner

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Izear Luster "Ike" Turner, Jr. (November 5, 1931 – December 12, 2007) was an American musician, bandleader, songwriter, arranger, talent scout, and record producer. An early pioneer of fifties rock and roll, he is most popularly known for his work in the 1960s and 1970s with his then-wife Tina Turner in the Ike & Tina Turner Revue.

Turner began playing piano and guitar when he was eight, forming his group, the Kings of Rhythm, as a teenager. He employed the group as his backing band for the rest of his life. His first recording, "Rocket 88", credited to "Jackie Brenston and his Delta Cats", in 1951 is considered a contender for "first rock and roll song". Relocating to St. Louis, Missouri, in 1954, he built the Kings into one of the most renowned acts on the local club circuit. There he met singer Anna Mae Bullock, whom he renamed Tina Turner, forming The Ike & Tina Turner Revue, which over the course of the sixties became a soul/rock crossover success.

Rocket

A rocket (Italian rocchetta‚ "little fuse") is a missile, spacecraft, aircraft or other vehicle that obtains thrust from a rocket engine. Rocket engine exhaust is formed entirely from propellant carried within the rocket before use. Rocket engines work by action and reaction and push rockets forward simply by expelling their exhaust in the opposite direction at high speed, and can therefore work in the vacuum of space.

In fact, rockets work more efficiently in space than in an atmosphere. Multi-stage rockets are capable of attaining escape velocity from Earth and therefore can achieve unlimited maximum altitude. Compared with airbreathing engines, rockets are lightweight and powerful and capable of generating large accelerations. To control their flight, rockets rely on momentum, airfoils, auxiliary reaction engines, gimballed thrust, momentum wheels, deflection of the exhaust stream, propellant flow, spin, and/or gravity.

Rockets for military and recreational uses date back to at least 13th century China. Significant scientific, interplanetary and industrial use did not occur until the 20th century, when rocketry was the enabling technology for the Space Age, including setting foot on the moon. Rockets are now used for fireworks, weaponry, ejection seats, launch vehicles for artificial satellites, human spaceflight, and space exploration.