Wasted Words: The 442nd Greatest Song of All Time

 

In September of 1957, Little Richard released the song "Keep A-Knockin'." It spent 18 weeks on the charts and got up to Number 8.

It's a short song. The recording clocks in at two minutes and sixteen seconds.

However...

It's amazing the song goes on for even that long, seeing as how there are only three phrases sung in the whole thing:

       1. Keep a-knockin' but you can't come in
       2. You said you love me but you can't come in
       3. Come back tomorrow night and try it again

Sure, those words are sung over and over (and over), but that is the total content of the song's message. No glimmer of hope that the situation will change whatsoever; no promise of a future together; no hint that things are gonna get better.

Could have saved everybody a lot of time and effort by just saying, "Beat it."

But that would have stolen Michael Jackson's thunder, I suppose.