Rock ’n’ roll grandma

The First Lady of Rockabilly can still rock the house

BY GLEN STARKEY

Imagine it’s 1956. You’re a little Oklahoma gal with a big voice who’s just graduated high school. You’ve been singing on the radio since age 12, doing shows on the weekends with Hank Thompson, about the biggest thing in Oklahoma. You’ve got a couple of hit records out so you get sent on the road … with Elvis Presley!

Welcome to the life of Wanda Jackson, who, when she hits the stage at Atascadero’s Bonnema Brewing this Saturday, will bring to bear more than half a century of performing experience–and what a life it’s been, from Elvis paramour and hard-rockin’ honey to born-again Christian, from one-time darling of Europe (where she sang phonetically in other languages!) to rediscovered and venerated national treasure.

Jackson was, according to some accounts, the very first woman to sing rock ’n’ roll–encouraged by none other than Elvis himself.

"I worked with him, off and on, on some pretty long tours for a couple years," explains Jackson in a husky, twanging drawl. "He just had a sense that [rock ’n’ roll] was the next big music. I was doing strictly country, but he kept saying, ‘You can do this,’ and my Daddy said , ‘Yes, you can do it.’ So with his encouragement and my daddy’s, I started singing like that, too."

But there was more to the Jackson-Elvis alliance than just good rockin’. "Then we started dating," says the 60-something grandmother. "On tours, we’d get to town early, and Elvis, he was a real movie buff, so we’d find a matinee, hang out together during the concert that night, then after, we’d find a place to have hamburgers or get something to eat. If it was a small town, word would get out fast where Elvis was, and we’d have to drive off in a hurry.

"He gave me his ring, asked me to be his girl. I wore it around my neck about a year. I still have that ring. My mother kept it for me. Now when I play the House of Blues during its Elvis Birthday Bash, I wear the ring and tell that story. People seem to like to know that something of Elvis’ is there in the room with them."

Hard road through a man’s world

Because of her early success, Jackson’s youth was filled with hard work and long hours. Every day after school, she’d go do her radio show. On the weekends, she’d play concerts or make TV appearances. She had her first recording contract with Decca at age 16, then switched to Capital two years later.

"They once had problems with someone who was underage before and wouldn’t sign me until I was 18," Jackson recalls. "Well, a friend of mine went to the principal’s office and told them about it, and they announced it over the school PA system. The whole school broke out in applause."

Jackson’s blossoming career soon became a family affair. "My father helped me, traveled with me–I was an only child," she says. "And my mother made my stage clothes. She was a professional seamstress and made the most beautiful clothes, which fit me like a glove."

Did she have any idea she was trailblazing, laying the groundwork for a whole crop of future female rockers from Chrissie Hynde to Rosie Flores?

"At the time, I didn’t think a whole lot about it," she says. "I didn’t think about going out and turning things around. The way I was raised, you’d have a career until you were married, then you’d settle down and raise a family, become a housewife. Truly, I never knew I was blazing trails."

Jackson was working in a man’s world, and audiences weren’t always sure what to think about her music.

"When I started singing rock ’n’ roll, America wasn’t ready for a girl to do that," she says, "so I went back to country, and about that time ‘Let’s Have a Party’ [her early rock hit] took off. If you look at my discography, I go from country to rock, back to country pop–it covers the whole gamut. I was just trying to keep my records out there, trying to get disc jockeys to play ’em, trying to keep working. By that time I had a lot of people dependent on me."

That dependence created some weird category-jumping. "I remember when calypso became popular, so I rushed into the studio to make a calypso record," Jackson says. "Well, wouldn’t you know it, calypso died the day before its release, so I had to run back into the studio and do something else right quick."

In the early years, rock ’n’ roll was a dangerous affair filled with menacing characters who had bad reputations. Was there any hard living or regrettable behavior on Jackson’s part?

"Kind of, at one point, I did get a little rebellious," she admits. "I’d been hurt a few times, got mad at the world, did my own thing for awhile. But it didn’t take long for me to settle down and realize some of these things that were troubling me might be my fault."

On a musical mission from God

Somehow during her crazy schedule, Jackson even managed to get hitched. "I was always fearful I’d be in some foreign country and meet some guy and fall in love," she says, "which would be a little scandalous you know, marrying a foreigner! But I ended up meeting Wendell [Goodman] and we wound up marrying six months after."

Jackson actually stole Goodman from a friend of hers. "I actually met Wendell in mother and daddy’s living room," Jackson confesses. "My girlfriend Norma Jean, who was also a singer, was going with him. She didn’t have any hit records, so she wasn’t out on the road just then. One time between tours, I was back home and I called her and told her to bring that new boyfriend over for me to meet him. I was to tag along on their date–I’m sure Wendell didn’t appreciate that! I said, ‘Don’t worry, I’ll pay for myself.’

"Well, she got an offer to be on Porter Wagner’s TV show, which was a real big break for her, so she had to leave town, and before she left she said, ‘Now Wanda, Wendell’s kinda new in Oklahoma City and he’s kinda shy, so maybe you could show him around and be nice to him.’ Well, I thought, he’s sure got you snowed, honey! He was a good-looking guy who drove a red Pontiac convertible and I’m sure he had no problem getting attention."

Over the years, Wanda and Wendell’s love story certainly had some twists and turns, and at one point things were looking bleak for the couple, but they both experienced a religious epiphany in 1971 that changed the course of their relationship and Jackson’s career. For a time, Jackson stopped performing in nightclubs.

"I thought it would be forever," says Jackson of her no-nightclubs policy, "simply because I was getting a lot of opportunities to do gospel concerts. It didn’t seem right to come to a town and play a local honky-tonk or dance hall and then the next night play a church. It just didn’t jive."

Jackson began a 15-year ministry career, a sort of revival meeting in churches where she was invited to perform and offer her testimony. "Everyone got to know our testimony, so the requests weren’t coming in," she says. "Then a small record company in Sweden called up."

Jackson was asked to record some old and some original rockabilly for the label, and a four-week tour was to follow, but she and Goodman were torn. After 15 years of singing for the Lord, was this what she should be doing?

"We prayed about it. We didn’t understand what was going on," Jackson says. "What did God want? He seemed to be telling us to go on and do it, so we did, and now I’ve gone back to Sweden every summer for 17 years in a row. We usually do a four- to six-week tour, and we’ve found a second home in Germany, too. And France and Switzerland."

Rockin’ with the Lord and Rosie

Suddenly Jackson was the darling of Europe and her career was flying high again. Her image was scattered through European newspapers, headlines heralding her arrival from city to city.

"The press was just phenomenal, and they were interested in my Christianity," Jackson says. "It finally dawned on my husband and me that they wanted to know my testimony. The Lord was using rockabilly music and my popularity to spread the good word."

Jackson still takes a few minutes at every show, whether here in the States or overseas, to tell the audience about that day on June 6, 1971 when she received Jesus Christ as her personal savior.

Jackson’s domestic career got a shot in the arm in 1995 when Rosie Flores, arguably the hottest female act of the current rockabilly crowd, asked her to appear on one of her records.

"She asked me to record a couple of songs, me and Janis Martin [who’s been called the female answer to Elvis]," says Jackson. "I told her, ‘When the record comes out, if I can help you promote it just let me know.’ "

While signing copies of the CD at a California record store, Jackson soon discovered that a whole crop of fans didn’t realize she was still performing. The overwhelming response led to a five-week tour.

"We played places like Bimbo’s in San Francisco to the Bottom Line in New York City," the legendary singer says. "I found that all these great kids just loved rockabilly. They dressed it, lived it, had the classic cars–it was like a cult following. And I must say, I’ve never seen anyone out of line or unruly at the shows. They come for the music because they’re really into it, so I feel OK about being in those places."

Jackson now plays a lot of festivals and shows across the country. Twice nominated for Grammy Awards, she also has two box-sets of her work available and was recently included on the compilation Rebels and Outlaws: Music from the Wild Side of Life–the only female performer on the disc. Did she know just how dangerous she was?

"I never thought so, but I guess that was my image," she says. "I think what the deal was, because I sang so hard and growly like a defiant female–before it was popular to do that–I just got that reputation. I had a writer once say about me, ‘She’s a real sweet lady with a nasty voice.’ I guess that sums it up pretty well." Æ

Glen Starkey’s sideburns are longer than a pole cat’s.