Vintage Rock charts the creation of Route 66, an enduring Bobby Troup-penned R&B classic covered by Chuck Berry and The Rolling Stones and written in tribute to the most iconic roadway in North America – Words by Neil Crossley
Bobby Troup was sitting behind the wheel of a 1941 Buick, driving from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, to Los Angeles, when the idea for (Get Your Kicks On) Route 66 first came to him. It was February 1946 and Troup, a singer, jazz musician and tunesmith, was heading West to try to make it as a Hollywood songwriter. Sitting beside him was his wife Cynthia.
Troup had already penned one hit song, entitled Daddy, a No.1 single on the US Billboard chart for Sammy Kaye and his Orchestra in 1941. As Troup and his wife left Pennsylvania behind them, the idea for a song documenting their road trip began to take shape in Troup’s mind. They were headed West to Chicago, where they would pick up the 2,448 mile-long US Highway Route 66, which would take them all the way to Los Angeles.
“I had talked about writing a song about Highway 40,” Troup explained to Susan Croce Kelly in her 1990 book Route 66: The Highway And Its People. “But Cynthia suggested Get Your Kicks On Route 66. I thought that was a cute title.”
Get Your Kicks
It was also an inspiring one. Empowered by Cynthia’s new title, Troup wrote the song during the trip, namechecking places that they passed through en route. “I finished the song with a map after we got to Los Angeles,” recalled Troup. “I wasn’t aware of what a great lyric I had written.”
(Get Your Kicks On) Route 66 would go on to become a massive hit in 1946 for Nat King Cole, whose sultry jazz inflections and intoxicating swing feel gave the song a lush, easy resonance.
Fifteen years later the song would be completely reinvented for a whole new generation. Chuck Berry gave it a much leaner R&B feel on his 1961 album New Juke Box Hits, before The Rolling Stones completely transformed it into a raw, driving rocker on their eponymous 1964 debut album. The song would become a staple of their concerts, as heard on their electrifying 1965 EP Got Live If You Want It!
It’s now almost 80 years since Troup wrote (Get Your Kicks On) Route 66 and four decades exactly since US Highway Route 66 was officially decommissioned by the US government. But the song that it inspired remains an enduring, evocative and intoxicating R&B classic.
When Troup and his wife set off for California back in 1946, he had recently been discharged from the US Marine Corp. While they didn’t know it, he and Cynthia were part of an exodus of former GIs and their families who were loading up their belongings for better lives and work opportunities out West. During that era an estimated 3.5 million people from this post-war generation headed for California.
Sonic Travelogue
As soon as they arrived in the land of palm trees, Troup wasted no time in tracking down Nat King Cole backstage at Hollywood’s Trocadero nightclub. The song was only half-finished, but Cole was sufficiently impressed by Troup’s sonic travelogue that he pushed all other songs aside. He asked Troup to finish the song and bring it back.
On 15 March 1946, Cole and his King Cole Trio walked into Radio Recorders at 932 N. Western Avenue and laid down (Get Your Kicks On) Route 66. On 22 April 1946, Capitol Records released it as a single.
The public loved the song, which tapped into the widespread desire for a better future out West. (Get Your Kicks On) Route 66 reached US R&B No.3 and No.11 on the Billboard pop chart. Troup and Cynthia bought a California ranch house with the royalties. They called it the house that Route 66 built’. And that could have been where the story of (Get Your Kicks On) Route 66 ended, had it not been for Chuck Berry…
Routes Of Rock
Chuck recorded the song for his fifth album New Juke Box Hits and injected his raw R&B sensibilities into it. Turning the track on its head he, in one fell swoop, distilled down Cole’s jazz chord inflections into a straight three-chord 12-bar blues across an A7-D7-E7 chord progression.
From the outset, Berry and the band cook up a strident rhythm, which has remnants of Cole’s swing feel but is far more staggered, with pronounced offbeats on the snare. The piano is pretty much full-on vamping to the finish line with the exception of the stops, the first at 0:47 punctuated by a solid thwack of the snare.
Berry’s vocals are cool, nonchalant and soaked in echo, but it’s his guitar that really stands out. Firstly, there’s the introduction of a riff, which is doubled up with the piano. Then there’s the solo, which kicks in at 1:22. Just as he did on Maybellene back in 1955, Berry’s solo here is visceral and exhilarating, with a heavily overdriven tone, heaps of bends and some beautifully judged blues-style playing throughout.
Berry’s take on Route 66 was never released as a single but it’s a defining version, and it would prove hugely influential, most noticeably 3,960 miles due east of Chicago, in the bustling English market town of Dartford, Kent.
Rolled Gold
Nine months after Chuck Berry recorded Route 66 at Chess’ Ter-Mar Recording Studio, art student Keith Richards and London School of Economics student Mick Jagger had their now legendary chance meeting on platform two of Dartford Railway Station. It was 17 October 1961, and one of the records that Jagger was carrying under his arm that day as he stepped into the railway carriage where Richards was sitting was Berry’s fourth album, Rockin’ At The Hops.
Inspired by Berry’s rendition of (Get Your Kicks On) Route 66, Jagger and Richards made sure it was the opening song on the self-titled debut album by their new band, The Rolling Stones. In January 1964, the five Stones walked into Regent Sound Studios at 4 Denmark Street, London, and briskly set about recording tracks for their first LP. For them, the song had it all – a powerful blues underbelly with the intoxicating allure of America.
Highway Stars
It was the Stones who would transform the song into a raw, pacey straight-ahead 4/4 rocker. Gone was any semblance of swing or groove, this was a driving, propulsive slice of electric R&B, short, powerful and thrilling. Clocking in at an impressively lean two minutes 20 seconds, it hurtled along at 148bpm with the band sounding taut and riveting.
“The Stones’ [take] remains the most famous rock version of the song,” wrote music critic Richie Unterberger of AllMusic. “One of the best songs on The Rolling Stones’ debut album, and one of their most popular in-concert numbers on their early tours.”
A short, punchy snare fill from Charlie Watts kicks the whole thing off and in the Stones’ hands, Chuck Berry’s riff has now been honed and elevated into the song’s defining, memorable hook. Richards’ and Brian Jones’ guitar parts meld effortlessly, and Bill Wyman’s deft walking bassline weaves the whole thing together. Jagger had already fashioned a workable mid-Atlantic drawl that melded its way effortlessly around names such as Amarillo, Winona and San Bernardino.
Keith Richards once declared that the Stones’ debut album was so rushed by their managers/producers Andrew Loog Oldham and Eric Easton that it sounds like an LP full of rough mixes. But perhaps that’s what makes this version so good. There’s a carefree attack and abandon to the recording, which only fuels its excitement. The only nod to pop sensibilities is the high-in-the-mix handclaps, that sound like they might have been dropped into the track at the 11th hour.
Got Live If You Want It!
(Get Your Kicks On) Route 66 is a highpoint on The Stones’ debut LP and it rapidly became a staple of their setlists, as heard on their electrifying live EP Got Live If You Want It!, recorded and released in 1965. It’s an exhilarating performance on which the screaming fans only heighten the giddy and intoxicating euphoria of the performance.
“Woah, let me hear you say, ‘Yeah’,” bellows Jagger as the crowd erupts and Richards launches into the song’s electrifying riff. After six bars the whole band kicks in. It’s raw, invigorating and everything that a great concert performance should be.
Charlie Watts’ drums sound magnificent – huge and resonant, with the ride cymbal driving the band forward and cutting through the sonic fug. When the searing guitar solo starts up, Wyman’s bass soars up and down the octaves, elevating the song to real heights. And throughout, the young Mick Jagger goads and cajoles the audience while delivering Bobby Troup’s lyrics with utter conviction and aplomb.
Hit The Road Jack
By the time the Stones recorded Route 66, Bobby Troup had established himself as a songwriter and artist in his own right, performing the song as far away as Japan with his second wife, Julie London. Troup always knew that the song was adaptable enough to ensure longevity. “The fortunate thing I did when I wrote that song, it’s blues,” he said in Susan Croce Kelly’s book. “That’s why all the rock groups do ’66. They know blues.”
When Troup wrote the song back in February 1946, he inadvertently tapped into the post-war optimism of a generation seeking better lives and opportunities elsewhere. Across the decades, (Get Your Kicks On) Route 66 has immortalised that highway’s cultural significance and continued to evoke wanderlust imagery of hope, freedom, opportunity and the abiding allure of the American West.
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