Although Ronnie Hawkins never had much success on record, he was one of rock’n’roll’s greatest showmen and certainly its wittiest advocate. “Ninety per cent of what I made went on women, whiskey, drugs and cars,” he once told me, “I guess I just wasted the rest.”
Ronnie Hawkins was born in Huntsville, Arkansas, on 10 January 1935, although he was raised in Fayetteville. His father, Jasper, was a barber and his mother, Flora, a teacher. “My dad was a champion redneck, liked to drink, chase women, fight and do all those things that rednecks like. My mother was the complete opposite – she was a religious fanatic who never missed church in 40 years and used to give 10 per cent of all she earned to the church, which really p****d my dad off.”
