UPDATE, MAKE THAT SAD UPDATE:
From the Rockabilly Hall of Fame website:
"Billy Lee Riley R.I.P.
One of the greatest original Sun recording artists, peacefully passed away on Sunday August 2nd, 2009 at 5:20 AM. His family was at his bedside."
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[The following was written before his death.] Not to sound like a complete jerk, but here's a novel idea: Before another legendary early rocker passes away, and the requisite "woe-is-me" eulogizing pours out of a thousand blogs (guilty here too), let's help a ailing rocker live. Billy Lee Riley has stage four bone cancer, and he's broke..
Why you should care: Riley was in the early crop of Sun Records artists, and was never fully given his due. Though revered among rockabilly fanatics and record geeks everywhere, he's practically unknown to John Q. Gotta-Lotta-CDs. Few know that he and his band, the Little Green Men, were the studio house band at Sun. And Riley, a solo artist as well, literally coulda been a contender. "Red Hot", the closest he ever got to a hit, was passed over by Sam Philips so he could promote Jerry Lee Lewis. As the story goes, Riley was in the Sun office when Phillips cancelled advance orders of 30,000 copies of "Red Hot," telling distributors to push "Great Balls of Fire" instead. Riley then did what any self-respecting rocker would do: he went out and got loaded, returning later to demolish the studio..
Whether or not every part of the story is true, it does speak to Riley's refusal to be a patsy. His disillusionment with the label would later force his exit, landing at Brunswick for a short time, before starting his own label. In the PBS produced documentary, Good Rockin' Tonight: The Legacy of Sun Records, while in conversation with other early Sun artists, Riley was the only one that mentioned getting the short end of the Sun stick. Meanwhile, the others hemmed and hawed about the good ol' days.
Bottom line, gang, is that he is part and parcel of the reason rock n' roll exists. Even if you whittled his career down to his two best known songs ("Red Hot" and "Flying Saucers Rock n' Roll," both essential fuel in the original fire), we would owe him a debt. But he was one of the Sun second-stringers, slightly wilder (ergo less marketable), who kept the stars from getting too, well, soft, during their tenure at Sun.
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He's racked up big medical bills. He and his wife, Joyce, are having a tough go of it. For the love of whatever rocks you, help Billy Lee Riley live. Here's his address:
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Billy Lee Riley
723 Crest Drive
Jonesboro, Arkansas 72401
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Or you can donate via PayPal at the Rockabilly Hall of Fame home page
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(w/Jerry Lee Lewis on piano)
(One of the earliest recorded whammy bars)
Billy Lee Riley's bio, in his own words at Delta Boogie
(NOTE: Scroll halfway down the page)
(NOTE: Scroll halfway down the page)
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