Christmas Eve, 1954. Blues singer Johnny Ace though it would be a damn fine idea to sit down at the table and take part in a game of Russian Roulette. He was between sets at a gig in Houston at the City Auditorium. When his turn came, fear most likely got a hold of him and he played around, pointing the gun at his girlfriend. He pointed the gun at another woman in the room. Lastly, he pointed the gun at himself. Some people thought he was really murdered. They thought his record company offed him because he wanted to up his contract. Big Mama Thornton was there though. She said he pulled the trigger himself, so that's good enough for me. Put the gun to his head and did the deed and that was that.
5000 people came to his funeral.
Merry Christmas
I was reading a magazine
And thinking of a rock and roll song
The year was nineteen fiftyfour
And I hadn't been playing that long
When a man came on the radio
And this is what he said
He said I hate to break it to his fans
But Johnny Ace is dead, yeah, yeah, yeah
Well, I really wasn't
Such a Johnny Ace fan
But I felt bad alI the same
So I sent away for his photograph
And I wait untill it came
It came all the way from Texas
With a sad and sim-ple face
And they signed it on the bottom
From the Late Great Johnny Ace, yeah, yeah, yeah
It was the year of The Beatles
It was the year of The Stones
It was nineteen sixtyfour
I was living in London
With the girl from the summer be-fore
It was the year of The Beatles
It was the year of The Stones
A year after J.F.K.
We were staying up all night
And giving the days away
And the music was flowing amazing
And blowing my way
On a cold December evening
I was walking through the Christmas tide
When a stranger came up and asked me
If I'd heard John Lennon had died
And the two of us went to this bar
And we stayed to close the place
And every song we played
Was for The Late Great Johnny Ace, yeah, yeah, yeah
Paul Simon - The Late Great Johnny Ace
