The Botched Recording That Helped Make A Garage-Rock Classic

In 1963, the garage-rock band the Kingsmen headed into a small studio to record their version of "Louie Louie." Credited with helping to invent punk rock, the crashing, smashing, vocally slurred, and rambunctious song — a remake of a mildly jaunty R&B tune from the '50s — was riddled with errors. The session went by so fast and finished so quickly that many mistakes were made as the Kingsmen tore through the song. So much of what made their take on "Louie Louie" such a notable recording and a classic was completely unintentional on the group's part.

In 1956, Richard Berry wrote and cut "Louie Louie," a simple, three-chord song that tells the story of a sailor from Jamaica complaining about his loneliness to a sympathetic bartender. It caught on in the burgeoning Seattle scene and plenty of bands covered it, including Ron Holden and the Thunderbirds, Little Bill and the Bluenotes, the Frantics, Tiny Tony and the Statics, Merilee and the Turnabouts, and Rockin' Robin Roberts and the Wailers. Jack Ely, lead singer of the Kingsmen, a Portland garage rock band that earned acclaim, was familiar with the latter's recording, and he convinced his group to do it, too. After they inadvertently captured rock magic and made the definitive "Louie Louie," it became one of the most covered songs of the '60s.

The Kingsmen's "Louie Louie" is sloppy, raucous garage rock, but that wasn't the intention. "We were in a hurry, so ours ended up sounding like hard rock. It was a mistake," band leader Jack Ely told Portland Monthly. The group recorded "Louie Louie" — live, with everyone playing at once — in a morning session at a Portland studio in April 1963. The studio owner balked because the producer had set all the levels very high, so he was worried they'd fry the board. That producer got the owner out of the way and went about his business; high levels are part of why "Louie Louie" sounded so rough and fuzzy.

The musicians tried to play the song once before rolling tape, only for the producer to make them start again. They were under the impression that they were practicing, but they'd been recorded. They only got one take to make "Louie Louie." "We thought it was horrible: mushy, with more low end than anything we'd ever heard. The vocals were a complete mess. The producer kept telling us that all made it great," Ely recalled.

About 900 copies of "Louie Louie" were sent out across the country, and it took about six months before it got major airplay. A huge hit in Boston radio, the popularity of "Louie Louie" spread quickly, and in December 1963, it went all the way to No. 2 on the pop chart.