A Riot Inspired Ringo Starr to Cover ‘Rock Around the Clock’
Ringo Starr‘s “Rock Around the Clock” was inspired by a riot. Notably, Ringo had fond memories of the riot. In addition, the original version of the song had a major impact on music in the United States.
Ringo Starr fondly remembered a riot in a movie theater showing the classic movie ‘Blackboard Jungle’
According to a 2021 article from Ultimate Classic Rock, Ringo said he was in the hospital with tuberculosis when he was a teenager. “I had been there a year or so and was doing pretty good,” Ringo recalled. “I had my seventh day in the hospital on my 14th birthday, and I didn’t want to spend my 15th there.”
Ringo’s mother arranged for him to leave the hospital so he could go to the movies. He saw Blackboard Jungle. The movie includes Bill Haley & His Comets’ “Rock Around the Clock.”
The crowd went wild. “I’m sitting there — I’d been in the hospital, don’t know much about what’s going on lately — and they ripped up the cinema,” he recalled. “They just threw the chairs, went crazy. I said, ‘Wow, this is great!’ I remember that moment like it was yesterday.”
Ringo Starr wanted his cover of ‘Rock Around the Clock’ to sound different from all the others
This experience inspired him to cover “Rock Around the Clock” for his 2021 EP Change the World. “It was just one of those moments I was sitting around, and I thought, ‘Hey, I’m gonna do ‘Rock Around the Clock’ for all these good reasons,'” he said.
“I did sort of a brushes version of it, old-school,” Ringo said. “Then I thought, ‘No, put the sticks on.’ Then it rocked. Then I called Joe Walsh [Ringo’s brother-in-law], and he rocked, and it’s a [different] solo. You listen to covers of ‘Rock Around the Clock,’ and everybody plays the same solo.”
How the original ‘Rock Around the Clock’ performed on the pop charts in the United States and the United Kingdom
The original “Rock Around the Clock” became a massive hit. According to The Billboard Book of Number 1 Hits, the song topped the Billboard Top 100 for eight weeks. It was not the first rock ‘n’ roll song, nor did it invent the term “rock ‘n’ roll.” Despite this, it helped bring the genre into the mainstream in the United States, creating a musical revolution that is still being felt in the world today.
Notably, “Rock Around the Clock” was also a big hit in Ringo’s native United Kingdom. According to The Official Charts Company, the song topped the U.K. chart for five weeks, staying on the chart for 36 weeks in total. It was Haley’s only No. 1 single in the U.K.
“Rock Around the Clock” changed the world and it had an impact on Ringo.
