Why I consider Elvis Presley and Olivia Newton-John the most influential people in the history of Portland, Oregon

If not the city, certainly the Trail Blazers franchise

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Let’s take you back to 1957. Rock 'n' roll was in its infancy, a baker’s dozen of years before a Trail Blazer ever set his sneakers down upon the hardwood at Memorial Coliseum.

On Labor Day, September 2, 1957, a 22-year-old Elvis Presley set his stage up over the top of second base at Portland’s Multnomah Stadium. Playing to a crowd of about 12,000, all Elvis had for sound was a weak amp and a couple of small box speakers with him up on the stage.

Yet Elvis was a star. Something the world had never seen before.

Across the pond in Great Britain, Elvis had already seeped into the cultural milieu.

Tastes in the UK were certainly different than back in the States. A lot of imitation, if not downright aping of American pop culture.

For instance, there were the Teddy Boys (and Teddy Girls) who set the tone of Britain’s youngsters.

Teddy Boys?

Think James Dean in Rebel Without a Cause or Marlon Brando in The Wild One.

The “D.A.”—duck’s a**—hairstyle was prominent in British circles as it was with early American rock stars.

However, there emerged a fracture in youth culture toward the end of the 1950s. The Teddy split commenced the future clash between those holding on to the old—the “Rockers”—and those who embraced the new—the “Mods.”

The American motorcycle gang aspect of the Teds was something Rockers appreciated. The Edwardian fashion, pushed by Teddy Boys and British haberdashers alike, favored the Mods.

Rockers fancied themselves in the mold of Elvis Presley, wore black leather, and rode powerful motorcycles like Triumphs and the legendary Vincent Black Lightning.

Rockers dug the musicianship of cats like Bill Haley and His Comets, Buddy Holly, Eddie Cochran, and Presley.

Mods, on the other hand, cottoned to jazz, Caribbean, and rhythm & blues music. They rode Italian scooters and tended to wear suits.

Mods figured themselves more in touch with the times than the Rockers, while Rockers saw Mods as effeminate snobs.

The Beatles bridged the gap between Mod and Rocker in the first part of their career. In 1964’s A Hard Day’s Night, Ringo Starr answered a reporter’s question about whether he and the lads were Mods or Rockers.

Neither, joked the drummer, I’m “a Mocker.”

But we haven’t even got to that point in history yet.

We’ll move ahead to 1958 when the biggest rock 'n' roll act in Britain was Cliff Richard and the Drifters. These fellas were Rockers.

Cliff Richard wore a coif like Elvis Presley and his music borrowed from Presley’s early rockabilly material. Richard, at this point, was considered by many to be Britain’s answer to Elvis.

For a little background on Richard…

He was born on October 14, 1940, as Harry Rodger Webb in what was then known as British India. After India gained its independence, the Webb family moved to England in the late 1940s.

Soon thereafter, young Harry Rodger started to rock.

The skiffle craze inhabited the British Isles in the 1950s. Skiffle had its roots in American music, primarily folk and blues from the South played by African American musicians. Another defining factor in skiffle was that the music was performed largely with homemade instruments.

Lonnie Donegan—the “King of Skiffle”—was the first British artist to score a hit in the genre and it took off like wildfire in the islands, influencing all the young artists who would eventually become a part of the “British Invasion” in the early 1960s.

John Lennon, Paul McCartney, and George Harrison first played in a skiffle band known as the Quarry Men. Ringo played in skiffle outfits the Eddie Clayton Skiffle Group and the Darktown Skiffle Group.

Eventually the Quarry Men morphed into the Fab Four after ditching the rest of the bandmates and adding Ringo to the mix.

Highly influential genre to say the least.

Young Harry Webb was a skiffle artist before he formed the Drifters.

Harry Webb, however, was not a name of a future rock 'n' roll star, so young Harry decided on the first name “Cliff” to bring out connotations of “Rock” and the surname “Richard” as a tribute to his musical hero at the time, Little Richard.

The Drifters soon became the Shadows to avoid confusion with an American band of the same name.

In fact, three of the Shadows in its most “famous” lineup—Hank Marvin, Tony Meehan, and Jet Harris—got their starts as performers in the Vipers Skiffle Group.

Cliff Richard’s song, “Move It,” which Lennon and other British writers and rock musicians said was “the first true British rock record,” quickly moved up to Number 2 on the UK Singles Chart. With the producers unaware of Move It’s potential, the track was originally the B-side of Richard’s first single “School Boy Crush.”

Move It was written by Richard’s guitarist at the time, Ian Samwell, who eventually became a notable songwriter and record producer, influencing rock music into and after “The British Invasion” era.

Samwell worked with such acts as John Sebastian, Frank Zappa, Al Jarreau, the band America (“A Horse with No Name” was his biggest commercial success), and The Grateful Dead.

Perhaps this is a time to note that Cliff Richard is currently the 3rd top-selling artist in UK Singles Chart history. Richard has been enormously successful and is one of the UK’s most enduring pop singers of all-time.

And what of this backing band, the Shadows, you ask?

Well, the Shadows dominated British popular music in the late-1950s and early-1960s (both with and without Cliff Richard). Of course, most of this was all pre-Beatles.

Lennon said, “Before Cliff and the Shadows, there had been nothing worth listening to in British music.”

The Shadows as a standalone band are currently 5th in UK Singles Chart history!

The list:

• 5. The Shadows

• 4. Madonna

• 3. Cliff Richard

• 2. The Beatles

• 1. Elvis Presley

The Shadows are cited by some serious guitarists as having a major influence on their own work. Such virtuosos include:

• Brian May of Queen

• Mark Knopfler, notably of Dire Straits.

• Andy Summers of the Police and the former bandleader of Dennis Miller’s short-lived syndicated late-night show.

• Ritchie Blackmore of Deep Purple.

• And Eric Clapton.

About a month ago, we wrote about “The most impressive music festival you’ve never heard of,” the so-called Knebworth 1990 Festival.

Not only did Knebworth 1990 feature Clapton and Knopfler, Cliff and the Shadows performed a set as well.

This was the British rock 'n' roll pantheon in action.

The most impressive music festival you’ve never heard of