Go Cat Go: the Life and Times of Carl Perkins

One of the pioneers of rock `n' roll and the composer of such hit songs as "Blue Suede Shoes" offers a candid look back at his life, from his early tours with Elvis Presley to his private battle with alcoholism.

The man who wrote "Blue Suede Shoes," and who will forever be associated with the seminal early rockabilly of Memphis's Sun Records label, has always raised a question mark in rock histories: Why, when his lead-guitar playing was so extraordinary and his songwriting talent so obvious, did he never become a celebrity on the magnitude of his label-mates Jerry Lee Lewis, Roy Orbison and Elvis? In this unusually pricey amalgam of biography and autobiography (on which McGee holds sole copyright), Perkins and McGee (a music journalist making his book debut) continually play at that puzzle. Born in 1932 as a sharecropper's son in Tiptonville, Tenn., Perkins had a perfect primary education in American roots music: he grew up picking cotton alongside his family, internalizing field spirituals, and as a teenager made music with his brothers in rough-hewn "tonks." When his "Blue Suede Shoes" single sold a million copies in 1956, Perkins found himself singularly unequipped for stardom: married with two children, he disliked mob scenes and had no PR sense. As the Sun years fade, the narrative spins ever faster: the ten years 1969-1979 are dealt with in as many pages. Ultimately, the Perkins/ McGee collaboration hinders narrative flow, with McGee's third-person prose, full of historical and critical insight, frequently disrupted by Perkins's unilluminating homilies about death, love and self-reliance. Photos, discography not seen by PW. Author tour.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

For deep-dyed fans of the 1950s hybrid of honky-tonk country music and black country blues called rockabilly, no one does it better than Carl Perkins. McGee gives us a compelling life of the guitarist-singer whose "Blue Suede Shoes" is the quintessential rockabilly hit. Perkins epitomizes a phenomenon that has passed into history--the poor farm boy rising to stardom. Born in 1932 to a sharecropping family in west Tennessee, Perkins started picking cotton at age six--and also plucking a guitar. Teen years spent playing in eye-gouging honky-tonks preceded any hit recordings, and then his rocket to stardom was aborted by a car crash that killed his rhythm guitarist--his brother Jay--and sent him deep into the bottle. He kept working, though (famously with Johnny Cash), writing songs McGee praises rather fulsomely, recording prolifically, and raising his family with his one and only wife, Valda. With the help of God, he mastered his alcoholism, which is just one of the stories he tells so well that McGee often turns the narrative entirely over to him. Ray Olson

A rock journalist for Rolling Stone and other publications, McGee based this "autobiography" of early rock'n'roller Carl Perkins on hundreds of hours of interviews with his subject. Beginning with Perkins's impoverished youth in Tennessee, he accentuates the early career: Perkins's initial interest in music, his experience in honky-tonks, his rise to fame with "Blue Suede Shoes," and his friendships with such Sun Records label-mates as Elvis Presley, Roy Orbison, Jerry Lee Lewis, and Johnny Cash. The author also deals with the singer/guitarist's fall from popular favor and his successful fights against alcoholism and cancer. Though never revealing any shockingly new material, McGee offers an engaging book written in a breezy, easygoing style. He succeeds at portraying Perkins as an honest, self-effacing, religious, family-oriented man molded by his humble upbringing. Recommended for all rock fans.?David Szatmary. Univ. of Washington, Seattle
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.