Was Chuck Berry the strangest man in the history of rock?

Of all the figures who built rock and roll back in the 1950s, Chuck Berry was arguably the most influential and certainly the strangest. In a new biography, which could never have been written when he was alive, R.J. Smith tells a story which is still hard to believe. His conversation with David Hepworth includes:

how the nerd Charles Berry discovered the key to impressing women
How a reckless streak a mile wide saw him put away as a teenager
How a comic turn developed into the greatest act in rock and roll
How he never listened to what his daddy told him about white women
How his record company’s landlord ended up co-writing “Maybelline”
His Mann Act conviction and imprisonment
His rebirth in Britain with the help of the Beatles and Stones
Why he needed a copy of the FT every day
Why he never said thank-you
The part played in his life by Lanchester Poly
His last and most tawdry court case
What was going on in his head all that time

Chuck Berry: An American Life by R.J. Smith is out now.

https://amzn.to/3IE7K7q

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