There is no denying Ike Turner’s place in musical history. While the general public may know about his heyday with the Ike & Tina Turner Revue during the ‘60s (a meteroic rise to fame that peaked with their early ‘70 hits “Proud Mary” and “Nutbush Ci [+]There is no denying Ike Turner’s place in musical history. While the general public may know about his heyday with the Ike & Tina Turner Revue during the ‘60s (a meteroic rise to fame that peaked with their early ‘70 hits “Proud Mary” and “Nutbush City Limits”), only hardcore Ike fans and jump blues enthusiasts are aware of him spearheading the formative years of rock ‘n’ roll with the 1951 hit “Rocket 88”(cut in Memphis by his Kings of Rhythm but issued on Chicago’s Chess Records label under the name Jackie Brenston and his Delta Cats). Few know of Turner’s role as a kind of super talent scout of the South during the 1950s for both the Chess brothers of Chicago’s Chess Records or the Bihari brothers of Los Angeles’ Modern/RPM Records. Fewer still know of Ike’s participation on several early ‘50s RPM recordings by B.B. King (including his piano accompaniment on King’s 1951 hit “Three O’Clock Blues” and his 1952 follow-up “You Know I Love You”), his playing second guitar on classic 1958 Cobra sessions for Buddy Guy and Otis Rush (including Rush’s signature pieces “Double Trouble” and “All Your Love (I Miss Loving)”), or hammering the 88s behind the likes of Howlin’ Wolf, Muddy Waters, Elmore James, Little Walter, and Willie Dixon during the 1950s.
While playing as a house pianist in West Memphis "blacks only" blues clubs, Ike often snuck in a young white truck driver to sit next to the piano to study Ike's boogie style and dance moves: that kid was Elvis Presley.
In the 1960's, Ike's influence on several of the most recognized names in Rock continued: Janis Joplin sought Turner for vocal coaching, and a young Jimi Hendrix played in Ike's Kings of Rhythm for a time. As a teenager, Bonnie Bramlett was briefly a member of the Ikettes, prior to starting her own rise to stardom a few years later.
In retrospect, Ike’s early innovations seem to have been overshadowed by his notoriety in later years. Following the breakup of Ike & Tina in 1976, Turner entered a dark period of self-imposed exile marked by his heavy cocaine addiction. “I just went into a 15-year party,” is how he put it. The ‘90s were further marred by his incarceration for cocaine possession at the outset of the decade and the public besmirching of his name by the 1993 movie What’s Love
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