SONG TITLE: SWEET LITTLE SIXTEEN
PERFORMER: CHUCK BERRY
SONGWRITER: CHUCK BERRY
YEAR OF RELEASE: 1958
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SONG TITLE: HONKY TONK WOMEN
PERFORMER: THE ROLLING STONES
SONGWRITER: JAGGER-RICHARDS
YEAR OF RELEASE: 1969
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SONG TITLE: HONKY TONK MAN
PERFORMER: JOHNNY HORTON
SONGWRITER: JOHNNY HORTON-TILLMAN FRANKS-HOWARD HAUSEY
YEAR OF RELEASE: 1956
Basic recipe: blues shuffle plus hedonistic abandon and you get rock and roll. Among others developing the territory in the mid 50s were Chuck Berry and Johnny Horton.

Johnny Horton came into this most obviously through the lineage of Hank Williams. Hank beefed up the early blues stylings of Jimmie Rodgers with harder rhythms and quicker tempos. Johnny Horton turned it fully electric. In terms of being a barrom dance song for the old jukebox, "Honky Tonk Man" has it over anything by Hank. Let that thought marinate for a dozen years, add Charlie Watts, and you get "Honky Tonk Women" [and Exile on Main Street]- another quantum leap in country dance music technology.

Uncle Chuck came into this through the Louis Jordan side. To somewhat massively oversimplify it, Berry's basic style could be thought of as souped up, debauched Jordan. The harmless mild comic discontent of, say, the "GI Jive" became the amped up leachery of "Sweet Little Sixteen." Chuck's song, by the way, should qualify as the most wickedly sinful of all of these - particularly considering that Berry was already 30 something when he wrote this lingering, lovingly detailed appreciation of an underage girl/upcoming groupie.

Ten years of hard living later, the burgeoning 16 year old slut of the Berry classic has become Mick Jagger's honky tonk woman. She's way past the coy flirtations of a supposedly innocent schoolgirl. She's now simply a "gin soaked barroom queen in Memphis."

Berry commonly and rightly gets credit for being a basic influence on the style and sound of the Rolling Stones. Less than proper credit usually is given to the importance of country blues. "Honky Tonk Women" is Exhibit A for this influence. Besides the musical style, start with the title. He's heading for a white working class honky tonk, not a trendy London discotechque.