“Bye Bye Johnny” (1960) * Written by Chuck Berry * 45: “Bye Bye Johnny” / “Worried Life Blues” * LP: Rockin’ at the Hops * Label: Chess
“Johnny B. Goode” (1958) is both the official anthem of rock ‘n’ roll and its unofficial folk song, telling the story of a musical country boy hitting the big time. Like with so many of Berry’s songs, it’s hard to imagine something so all-encompassing being a documented human creation. Although it’s clear Chuck Berry was singing about a version of himself (he reports in his autobiography that “country boy” was first slated to be “colored boy”), part of its fascination has to do with him also narrating a version of the Elvis myth as it unfolded. As Dave Marsh wrote in The Heart of Rock and Soul, “if you could identify with either Presley or Berry” when listening, “there was a chance you could identify with both.”
The 1960 sequel “Bye Bye Johnny” appeared the same year Elvis returned from the Army, after which he’d focus on the “motion pictures out in Hollywood” phase of his career, just as Johnny was about to do. The “bye bye” sentiment in the title refrain referred directly to Johnny leaving home, but it had more to do, presciently and symbolically, with a sort of departure from pure musicality and therefore authenticity—the notion of “movie/TV stink” that’s arisen in these pages—that we would see in Elvis. With “Bye Bye Johnny,” Chuck Berry is singing about how the rise is the fall, the essential pop music success conundrum.