{"id":16825,"date":"2012-12-05T10:25:03","date_gmt":"2012-12-05T15:25:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/?p=16825"},"modified":"2012-12-05T10:25:03","modified_gmt":"2012-12-05T15:25:03","slug":"happy-birthday-little-richard","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/happy-birthday-little-richard\/","title":{"rendered":"Happy Birthday, Little Richard!"},"content":{"rendered":"<iframe class='youtube-player youtuber' type='text\/html' width='425' height='355' src='http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/jsv_YinE_Yo?rel=0&amp;fs=1&amp;ap=%252526fmt%253D18' webkitAllowFullScreen mozallowfullscreen allowFullScreen frameborder='0'><\/iframe>\n<p>As Townsman Al pointed out, <strong>Little Richard<\/strong> is 80 years old today. Happy birthday! Although he&#8217;s alive he seems to be a bit forgotten as the rock legend he was. These days early rock &#8216;n roll seems thought of more in terms of Chuck Berry, Elvis, and a few semi-obscuro figures who make us feel high minded. Has Little Richard&#8217;s legacy shifted to more of a cultural icon for his influence on our age&#8217;s more fluid notions of sexuality? So be it. That in itself is a significant contribution to this world.<\/p>\n<p>My uncle turned me onto him as a kid, and I always found him fascinating on both musical and cultural levels. There&#8217;s some concert movie from the early &#8217;70s my uncle took me to see the culminated in an All-Star Jam among these early rock &#8216;n roll titans. Maybe it was the movie from which this clip was pulled. I remember Richard winning a fierce battle by scaling a tower of monitors in a white cape, or something like that. Baby, that&#8217;s rock &#8216;n roll! My uncle also owned a few of his gospel albums. He told me stories about seeing Richard pre- and post-ministerial days. After high school my uncle briefly entered a seminary. He&#8217;s always straddled the lines between rock &#8216;n roll and religion. He clearly identified with that part of Richard&#8217;s story. Does that part of his story still mean anything to people, or is he just a shadow of the caricature he played so well in <em>Down and Out in Beverly Hills<\/em>?<\/p>\n<p>Kids, take a moment before it&#8217;s too late to tune into all the power and glory that was Little Richard.<\/p>\n<iframe class='youtube-player youtuber' type='text\/html' width='425' height='355' src='http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/aLN9igZKgco?rel=0&amp;fs=1&amp;ap=%252526fmt%253D18' webkitAllowFullScreen mozallowfullscreen allowFullScreen frameborder='0'><\/iframe>\n<p><!--nextpage--><iframe class='youtube-player youtuber' type='text\/html' width='425' height='355' src='http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/CTd34XnFuQ0?rel=0&amp;fs=1&amp;ap=%252526fmt%253D18' webkitAllowFullScreen mozallowfullscreen allowFullScreen frameborder='0'><\/iframe><\/p>\n<iframe class='youtube-player youtuber' type='text\/html' width='425' height='355' src='http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/IyACslxjLbk?rel=0&amp;fs=1&amp;ap=%252526fmt%253D18' webkitAllowFullScreen mozallowfullscreen allowFullScreen frameborder='0'><\/iframe>\n<nav class=\"page-links\"><strong>Pages:<\/strong> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/happy-birthday-little-richard\/\" class=\"post-page-numbers\"><span class=\"page-num\">1<\/span><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/happy-birthday-little-richard\/2\/\" class=\"post-page-numbers\"><span class=\"page-num\">2<\/span><\/a><\/nav>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As Townsman Al pointed out, Little Richard is 80 years old today. Happy birthday! Although he&#8217;s alive he seems to be a bit forgotten as the rock legend he was. These days early rock &#8216;n roll seems thought of more in terms of Chuck Berry, Elvis, and a few semi-obscuro figures who make us feel <a href='https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/happy-birthday-little-richard\/' class='excerpt-more'>[&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[342],"tags":[737,580],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16825"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16825"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16825\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16825"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16825"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rocktownhall.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16825"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}