Wednesday, July 8, 2026

Shake, Rattle and Roll - Sam Cooke

Shake, Rattle and Roll - Sam Cooke
3:24
Night Beat, 1963
Written by Charles Calhoun, 1954

Elvis made this song popular with the white kids, although Big Joe Turner recorded the sly, buzzy original.  Cooke's smooth vocal delivery makes the lyric less a sleazy come-on, so the words, when you discern them, come as rather a surprise.  There's a lascivious verse that the King eschewed: "Ah, you're wearing them dresses / The sun come shining through / I can't believe my eyes / All of that belongs to you."  And a later refernece to a "one-eyed cat / peeping in a seafood store" strikes me as a pretty sly innuendo.

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