The Bigger Picture

Bo's Gone Home

by Matt Hendrickson

The weekend begins at, of all places, a T.G.I. Fridays in Gainesville, Florida, nestled in the middle of a stretch of every imaginable chain restaurant, strip malls and Wal-Mart. At a table crammed against the back wall, over plates of steak, salad and fajitas, members of Bo Diddley’s backing band and his managers of more than 25 years wistfully trade stories of the man they knew simply as “Bo.”

“He was on the Ed Sullivan show [click on the link to see the performance] for the first time in 1955. He was in the dressing room just messing around playing Tennessee Ernie Ford’s ‘16 Tons.’ Sullivan happened to walk by, came in the room and told Bo he wanted him to play that song. After Ed left, Bo looked around and said ‘Fuck him, I’m playing my song.’ And he went out and played ‘Bo Diddley.’ Sullivan banned him from the show and Bo always said he didn’t care.”

Bo Diddley passed away on June 2 and it’s easy in the afterglow of his death to bestow him with lofty titles. But the reality is that Diddley was the godfather of rock & roll, the most influential figure in the history of popular music. Muddy Waters and Chuck Berry were straight up blues, but Diddley was different: something more primal, evil, and dangerous. The Bo Diddley beat – bonk, ba donk, donk, donk donk – is the most plagiarized riff off all time, showing up in songs such as Buddy Holly’s “Not Fade Away” (later done by the Rolling Stones) to George Michael’s “Faith.” Elvis Presley copped his stage moves from Bo. Sure, Berry was a monumental figure in rock & roll, but his keyboardist Johnnie Johnson wrote many of his hits. The Stones wouldn’t exist without Bo Diddley and even John Lennon, when asked what he wanted to do when he arrived in the America for the first time, said: “I want to meet Bo Diddley.” The Clash asked him to tour with them. U2 adored him. Only Little Richard comes close to Diddley’s significance and until the good Reverend passes on, let’s just anoint Bo as king.

But Diddley never reaped the full benefits of his influence. He signed away his publishing for a $10,000 down payment on his first house, a bitter pill that he swallowed to his death. He once famously said: “Never trust anyone except your mama, and even then, look at her real good.” Up until his stroke in April 2007 after a show in Omaha, Diddley played more than [tk] dates a year, each a lesson in the theatrics of rock & roll with a ruckus of high-kicks and searing work on his custom-made square guitar.

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