Fats Domino, RIP

Fats Domino died on October 25, 2017. He was 89.

Fats was the pioneer of rock and roll. People who came of age after 1954 forget this. Actually, my generation never knew it. “The Fat Man” was released in December 1949. It eventually sold a million copies. But it did not sell to the likes of us in 1950. It was not called rock and roll in 1949. It was called race music. It did not get onto pop music radio. From the day I heard it in 1956 at age 14, when I worked in a West Coast record store, I...