Album Details

• Artist: Jerry Lee Lewis
• Album: Last Man Standing
• Label: Artist First
• Year of Release: 2006
• ME Rating:
• Reviewed by: patchen on 2007-07-30

And who would have thought that he would be the last one standing? If anyone this side of Keith Richards defines the Rock Death Wish, it is the Killer. But with Elvis and Carl Perkins in the ground, Little Richard doing Geico commercials and Chuck Berry in some kind of sex scandal limbo, here is the Man, still on the road and still as raw as ever. I saw him play in a tent about eight years ago, and he stopped the show several times in order to cuss out the crowd, and threaten to come down into it to kick some ass. During a lull in the show, someone yelled out, "Play some rock, dammit!" JLL stood up, walked to the edge of the stage, and said, "I AM Rock & Roll, motherfucka!" Hard to imagine any early rocker saying that even in their prime, and even harder to think of anyone outside of someone in Oasis or Bono in delusion daring to make such a claim today. But for the Killer, it is no boast. This is a CD/DVD set of the same show; on the video we see Lewis joined by disciples like John Fogerty, Solomon Burke and Ron Wood, who mostly keep to the background and let the big star own the stage. Friends like Kris Kristofferson and Willie Nelson also contribute. The arrangements are loose, and Jerry Lee sounds tired, but his piano playing is still crazed and he can hold on to you through every song, even if there is nothing surprising in the set list. You know the songs, you think you know the man, and if you aren’t moved by his gritty take on "Honky Tonk Woman," you have a concept of soul that I just can’t comprehend.

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