Rocker Gone; ‘Louie Louie’ Lives On Songwriter Richard Berry Dies At 61

Richard Berry, the rhythm and blues pioneer whose song “Louie Louie” launched a generation of garage bands, livened up frat parties and was even proposed as a state song in Washington and Oregon, has died at age 61.

More singers have covered the three-chord standard, written in 1955 as a Jamaican love song, than any pop tune besides the Beatles’ “Yesterday,” estimated Eric Predoehl, a filmmaker working on a television documentary of Berry’s life.

Berry died in his sleep Thursday at his home in South Central Los Angeles, possibly of complications from an aneurysm, said John Kim, who was working with Berry on a feature film biography.

While the lyrics were rumored to be obscene when the Kingsmen’s version of the song was played slowly, federal investigators said, “We found the record to be unintelligible at any speed we played it.”

Berry’s original lyrics told of finding true love in Jamaica:

“Louie Louie, me gotta go. Louie Louie, me gotta go.

A fine girl, she wait for me. Me catch the ship across the sea.

I sailed the ship all alone. I never think I’ll make it home.

Louie Louie, me gotta go …”

Racier versions spread by word of mouth. Some schools banned the song and the bands that played it.

Iggy and the Stooges recorded a dirty version, according to The Rolling Stone Illustrated History of Rock & Roll.

Berry sold the rights to all his work, including “Louie Louie,” in 1956 for $750, said Predoehl.

“He was just a tremendously kind and generous man, and he experienced a tremendous amount of hardship,” Kim said. “A black man growing up in L.A. in the 1950s, and he had his most famous song taken away for a paltry sum of money.”

In 1986, an artists’ rights group helped Berry recover royalties worth about $2 million. He continued to live in South Central, performing from time to time.

Berry recorded “Louie Louie” in 1957 with the Pharoahs on Flip Records. It was intended as the B-side of “You Are My Sunshine.”

Rockin’ Robin Roberts, according to legend, found the disc in a 10-cent bin at a Tacoma store and recorded it with the Wailers in 1960. It became a regional hit in the Seattle-Tacoma area, and other Northwest bands like Paul Revere and the Raiders were quick to put it in their repertoire.

The hit version - the version copied by bar bands everywhere - was recorded by the Kingsmen in 1963. Blame the drunken-sounding lyrics on the primitive studio - singer Jack Ely had to scream the words at a microphone suspended 12 feet over his head.

With a reedy electric organ intro that gives way to a three-chord guitar thrum even beginners could play, the hip party tune rose to No. 2 on the Billboard charts in December 1963.

Ely still remembers when he first heard the Wailers’ soul version, on a jukebox in a club in Oregon where his band had performed.

“All of a sudden all of these kids put down their pencils and got up and started dancing,” he said. “They didn’t care about who was their partner, boys, girls …”

“I turned to the drummer standing next to me and said, ‘We got to learn that song.’ From the moment we started playing it, it had that same effect.”

The song enjoyed a revival following the 1978 parody of college fraternity life, “National Lampoon’s Animal House.” In 1987 and 1989, Oregon lawmakers proposed making the Kingsmen’s version the official state rock song.

“Everybody can play it, basically,” said Jeff Riedle, who has collected about 1,000 versions of the song. “It’s three-chord rock ‘n’ roll. It defined what garage rock ‘n’ roll was about.”

Born in Extension, La., Berry lived in Los Angeles from age 1. At Jefferson High School, he started singing doo-wop music, later joining the Flamingos and other groups.

As a singer, he was known for his range and style, sometimes taking bass and tenor parts on the same song. “Even if this man never wrote ‘Louie Louie,’ he should go down in history as one of the great pioneers in American rhythm and blues,” Predoehl said.

Berry sang the lyrics on the original “Riot in Cell Block No. 9,” and sang counterpart to Etta James on her recording of “Roll With Me Henry.”

Until 1986 and the copyright victory that allowed him to live more comfortably, Berry struggled, performing where he could.

“I don’t think that he cared whether everybody knew that much about him,” said Ely. “He hated to fly. Because of that, he didn’t have very much of a career music-wise.”

Berry suffered an aneurysm in 1994.

Berry met the Kingsmen in the early 1980s at a Tacoma “reunion” concert that included the Wailers, said Dick Peterson, the Kingsmen’s drummer.

Two years ago, he was honored in a commemorative plaque at the building where the Kingsmen recorded “Louie Louie.”

Berry is survived by his mother, Bertha Harris, and six grown children: Pamela, Richard Marcel, Stephanie, Karen, Linda and Christy, who all use the Berry surname. Richard and Christy are also musicians.

Funeral arrangements were still being made.

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