Guitarist with the Kingsmen, best known for a hit that was investigated by the FBI
When the Kingsmen went into a makeshift studio in Portland, Oregon, in April 1963 to record a raucous song with indecipherable lyrics called Louie Louie, Mike Mitchell and his band mates inadvertently created an entire genre of visceral guitar noise. Scuzzy and unsophisticated but imbued with a raw energy, it came to be known as garage rock, which in turn gave birth to the insurrectionary sound of punk.
At only two minutes and 42 seconds long, the song was crudely recorded in a single take with a solitary microphone dangling from the ceiling. The record cost $36 to make and was littered with mistakes. At one point lead singer
Jack Ely comes in several bars too early and has to wait for
Mitchell and the rest of the band to catch up.
Although posterity has deemed that the errors are part of the record’s charm, at the time Mitchell, who has died of a heart attack, aged 77, and the group were unhappy with the sloppiness and asked to do another take. Their manager said it was fine and in any case the song was only intended as an audition demo for a cruise ship job.
In the event the cruise line hated the song and the Kingsmen did not get the gig. However, when Louie Louie was released as a single on an obscure record label based in Seattle, it took on a life of its own. With Mitchell’s wild guitar solo adding a crazed edge to the unintelligible vocals, the single was picked up by a radio station in Boston, where a DJ called it the ‘‘world’s worst record’’ and began playing it repeatedly as a joke.
Listeners fell in love with the number’s raw, unrefined energy and it was soon being played by other stations. By the end of 1963 the Kingsmen’s recording was No 2 in the Billboard chart and had sold a million copies.
The success of Louie Louie caused a nationwide scandal. Although the undecipherable lyric was totally inoffensive, rumours grew that the words were obscene. The governor of Indiana denounced the song as ‘‘pornographic’’ and the FBI began an investigation.
‘‘I strongly believe the easy accessibility of such material cannot but help to divert the minds of young people into unhealthy channels and negate the wholesome training they have been afforded by their parents,’’ J Edgar Hoover wrote, although the bureau’s 445-page report concluded that the song was ‘‘unintelligible at any speed’’.
The influence of Mitchell’s feral guitar solo and the raw primitivism of the recording was immeasurable. Among those who covered Louie Louie were the Kinks, Lou Reed, Frank Zappa, Motorhead and Iggy Pop, while Joe Walsh of the Eagles was one of many who were inspired to take up the instrument after
‘‘. . . the easy accessibility of such material cannot but help to divert the minds of young people into unhealthy channels.’’ J Edgar Hoover
hearing the Kingsmen’s recording.
More than 40 years after the song’s release, Mojo voted Louie Louie No 1 in its list of ‘‘100 singles you must own’’ and Rolling Stone
placed the Kingsmen’s recording at No 5 in its list of ‘‘40 songs that changed the world’’. It features in countless films including Quadrophenia and My Best Friend’s Wedding.
Yet the record’s success took the original group by surprise and by the time Louie Louie
became a hit, only Mitchell and Lynn Easton remained from the original quintet. A new line-up was hastily assembled and the Kingsmen toured with the likes of the Rolling Stones and the Beach Boys.
Michael Mitchell was born in 1944 in Portland. His father, who played in a country and western band, taught him guitar and by the age of 13 he was in a group with Easton, a classmate at David Douglas High School.
As they added further members they named themselves after a bottle of Mitchell’s after-shave lotion that bore the words ‘‘Kings Men’’.
By then he had a day job with a food distribution company, ‘‘borrowing’’ his employer’s Volkswagen van to transport the band’s equipment. The Kingsmen cut their teeth playing high school proms, fashion parades and supermarket openings.
Eventually they became the house band at a Portland nightclub called The Chase. Louie Louie, originally written by the R’n’B singer Richard Berry in 1955, was discovered on a jukebox in a now forgotten version by Rockin’ Robin Roberts. With a new arrangement it became the centrepiece of their live show.
With numerous personnel changes, Mitchell continued to play with the group until his death. He is survived by his two children, Samantha and Max.
After Louie Louie, Mitchell and the Kingsmen scored further minor and forgettable hits with Little Latin Lupe Lu and The Jolly Green Giant. Yet they will forever be remembered for two minutes and 42 seconds of gloriously primitive noise that changed the sound of rock’n’roll for ever. – The Times
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