Bo Diddley and The Rock and Roll Triumvirate of Hooker, Diddley and Petty

Although I’m certain that I saw Bo Diddley’s classic performance on the Ed Sullivan show in November 1955, I was only 3 and too young to remember. My first memory of Ellis "Bo Diddley" McDaniel (adopted name, born Blake) was in the summer of 1959 on Bandstand. I remember it well because my mom was pregnant with my sister and we had just gotten a new console Black and White TV. His band included a white bass player, a black woman rhythm guitarist and a black drummer, certainly cutting edge for the time. My dad who was uncharacteristically home from work on a Saturday morning, walked through the room and in his Southern Illinois farm-boy ignorance proclaimed, "I didn't buy that TV to watch a bunch of jungle boogies play n***er music in my house". Those word ring clearly in my archival gray matter as the defining moment when I developed a deep love for "Rock and Roll" and the promise it held to be a source of vexation for my father and those of his generation.

The last time I saw "Bo Diddley" was in April 1999 when my brother called me up to tell me that he had broken up with his girlfriend and wasn't going to use the tickets he had for four nights of Tom Petty at the Fillmore. My wife, Glo and I attended all of the shows. On the Friday night show Petty announced a special guest, his favorite pioneer of Rock and Roll, "Bo Diddley" . A surreal moment at the least was then raised to the psychedelic when Bo approached the mike and said that the person responsible for him taking up the guitar "John Lee Hooker" was in the house. There I was 50 feet away from my favorite all time rocker, Petty, on stage with his all time favorite rocker Bo Diddley, with his mentor the blues great "John Lee Hooker" sitting about 8 feet above me in the mezzanine level of the Fillmore. Wow it still gives me chills just thinking about it. The Rock and Roll Triumvirate.

I remember clearly the day in June 2001 when during rehearsal with the blues band Greg Barker and Highway 61 bass player, Joe Graham announced that Hooker was dead. We all simultaneously looked over at the Fender Twin Reverb Amplifier Greg Barker was playing through each knowing that just two years earlier Hooker had played through that same amplifier during an impromptu performance at the Hayward Blues festival. Trancelike we tore into Boogie Chillin' as a spontaneous tribute to the king of the bay area blues.

Now comes the news that the second in the triumvirate of Rock and Roll has passed. Bo Diddley was a true innovator and almost single-handedly shifted the musical paradigm of a generation. Typical of a genuine ground breaker Diddley did not receive the accolades thrust upon his better known contemporaries. Self-promotion was typical of the Rock and Roll vanguard, but not of Diddley. While his musical lineage is securely ensconced in the technique of those who consciously and unconsciously emulate his shave and a haircut, hambone style. One can only hope that future generations will take the time to listen to the many recordings of the many incarnations of Bo Diddley and understand how he influenced the music of their contemporaries.

Tom Petty, the last of the Triumvirate, appears to have many good years ahead of him with no signs of slowing. His resurrection of Mudcrutch in 2007 and continuation of a 2008 tour with the Heartbreaker's insure that the direct lineage of Hooker, Diddley and Petty can still be experienced in a live venue.