LARRY DONN "ROCKIN' THE WORLD FROM ARKANSAS"

LARRY DONN GILLIHAN

June 7, 1941 – May 1, 2012

LARRY DONN GILLIHAN

We had the regret to tell you about the passing of Bono’s (Arkansas) rock and roller Larry Donn who recorded terrific sides for “Vaden”, atiny record label located in Arkansas.

On September 6, 1955 that’s Elvis that came in that 311 inhabitants town driving its new yellow 1954 Eldorado convertible Cadillac in which Sam Phillips took out an insurance policy. Almost 1200 folks came to see the Hillbilly Cat and Larry was among them with its friend Betty Craft. He will later try to practice Elvis’ moves in front of a mirror after a domestic accident started to play guitar. Until Elvis coming at Bono, all what Larry had heard on radio was country and he had no idea what rock’n’roll was. Still in 1955, he also enjoyed a show by Sonny Burgess & The Pacers at its school gymnasium and was hooked by rock and roll. Bono being a regular stop for Sun artists, Larry enjoyed to meet Roy Orbison, Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins. After meeting Billy Riley in Jonesboro (Arkansas), Larry began to sing his song starting with “Pearly Lee”. On August 13, 1958, after Billy Lee Riley had invited Larry to go to Sun record, a first version of “That’s What I Call A Ball” and another song were cut but never issued. The very same year, Larry was singled out of school for having his collar turned up and top buttons of his shirt unbuttoned. He was a fan of most of the Sun artists, Chuck Berry, Gene Vincent and Eddie Cochran. Most of Little Richard recordings and some of Fats Domino’s were also among his favorites.

April '58 Fontaine Churchhouse

In 1959, Arlen Vaden, the owner of Vaden record, offered a recording deal to few artists. A session was set to KLCN radio (Blytheville – Arkansas) and Larry put on wax “Honey Bun”/”That’s What I Call A Ball” (Vaden 113), a fabulous double-sider. That record get great action locally on jukeboxes and radio beating Elvis’ own releases and enough to raise interest from Bobby Lollar who recorded two live versions of “Honey Bun” around the same time. Larry gave credit to his band for that regional success thinking “Honey Bun” had words that sound like they were written by an amateur, and they were. In April 20 and 21, 1959, Larry played in Trumann (Ark) and Searcy (Ark) with Carl Perkins. Teddy Redell, Johnny Moore and Joyce Green were there probably to promote them records with Jimmy Haggett. If right it makes these Vaden 110 to 113 releases definitively from around March 1959. On Larry Donn’s own word, no alternate take of any “Vaden” recordings were kept or should be in existence. Small record label, like Benton, used to rewound the tape and record over it for a re-cut. If a recording was so bad that they had to do it over, they wouldn’t keep the bad one. Mister Vaden never planned to do anything big with any of these records, so all he wanted was the master tape of each song. He wouldn’t have wanted to be bothered with tapes that he didn’t intend to use. These guys were not collectors … they did business!

  In 1960, Larry joined force with Sonny Burgess having a record issued on Ad-Bur 100 “The Girl Next Door”/”Today” in 1963. He also worked as DJ on KNEA, Jonesboro, and KLCN, Blytheville. Larry’s musical journey doesn’t end here and he came in England in April 1989. Larry had a regular feature in the monthly UK magazine “Now Dig This” from December 1990  until December 2007. That’s what I call a long run. Larry Donn had kept the faith in rock and roll music even if he was hurt by the low sales of his 2007’s  CD “Burning” were he goes on the classic Piano Red “Rock Me” and some original like “Angel”, “The Great American Superstar” or “An Old Hillbilly Cat”. His long time friend Bobby Brown tried to help but nothing really happened even if some DJs played “Angel” as far as Australia and The Nederland. The last good exposure Larry got in magazine was in “Oxford American” in 2009. The same year, in September, Larry was found with lymphoma and started chemo treatments.

I think Larry would have liked to be remembered on his own words like these from 2008:

I think ’58 was maybe when I first heard the name “rock-a-billy”. Later, they started writing it without the hyphens, as one word “rockabilly”. I think it started probably in ’57, when the Sun artists were hot all over the country. As rock’n’roll was so hot, but the rock’n’roll of the northern states and big cities … Bill Haley and the Comets, for example … was a different kind of rock’n’roll than what was being played in the south, somebody came up with a new name for the south’s rock’n’roll. None of the musicians I knew then called it “rockabilly”. It was rock’n’roll to us, and it still is.

“Honey Bun” and “That’s What I Call A Ball” are clearly rock’n’roll, with not a bit of “hillbilly” in them, so they cannot rightly be called “rockabilly”. I have never thought of myself as a “rockabilly” artist. I am a rock’n’roller. I was a rock’n’roller when I started, and I’ll still be a rock’n’roller when I’m done, which is about now, since I don’t play much anymore.

 Here are some words I like to add by myself:

When issued on Flip record “Rockabilly Gal” by Jonathan Craig and The Colby-Wolf Combo was reviewed as “a bluesy rocker with no particular originality” so I still wonder why that song was picked at Sun records for Hayden Thompson and Hayden Thompson. Hayden himself told in “Blue Suede News” magazine he doesn’t recall having heard the word Rockabilly until the word started coming back from Europe. Elvis and Carl Perkins Sun recordings were not tagged Rockabilly in 1956 and it seems Sam Phillips and Colonel Parker don’t dig much that word. Memphis Mike Metzger once used the word Rockabilly in Sam’s presence, in 2001, relate its reaction like that: “With a look of disgust in his eyes and disdain in his voice he said, “Rock-a-BILLY” … that’s the dumbest word I’ve ever hear man! It’s just Rock & ROLLLLLLLLL man”. J.M Van Eaton, a legendary Sun musician, said he thought  rockabilly was when used by someone like Bill Justis a “slang put down” word in the 50’s and very, very few people would accept that word. Sam Phillips used, as many, Rock’n’Roll to definite his artists work at 706 Union Avenue. Jack Earls said in a recent interview: Back in the 50’s, Rockabilly? We called it Rock and Roll. Sonny Burgess, another Sun legend, quoted: I never heard the term “rockabilly” back then.We never really pinned it down, where that term come from. When people asked what music we played, we were rock ‘n’ rollers. We don’t think about “rockabilly”. We were rock ‘n’ rollers.”

Now Larry is gone but rock’n’roll will live forever. Listen to my advice, friends: don’t be late to pay your respect to our original rockin’ friends. Buy them records, send to them letters and emails, come to enjoy concert before they will be all gone. If want to have a ball … that’s right now!

Dominique “Imperial” ANGLARES.