The song title was also used for the 1989 biopic about Lewis that starred Dennis Quaid. Case also included the song in the 1957 movie Jamboree, which was about a new craze called Rock 'n' Roll. He showed the song to songwriter Peter Case who liked the title but not the music, so Case asked hit songwriter Otis Blackwell to write a new version but give half of the credit and royalties to Burroughs. The version of 'Great Balls of Fire' that was recorded by Jerry Lee Lewis and is one of the greatest selling singles of all time - it sold a million copies within 10 days - is reportedly not the song that Burroughs wrote. Cover of Burroughs' single 'Kissin' Twist' He would write almost 150 songs throughout his career.
It was in the Big Apple where he started his music career as a master of ceremonies at the Baby Grand Theatre.īurroughs began writing songs around that time, including 'Fujiyama Mama,' which later became a hit in Japan for Wanda Jackson, the Queen of Rockabilly.
His family posted the news:īorn in 1925 in Georgia, Burroughs moved to Oakland as a child, where he grew up until he moved to New York in the 1950s. Just in the grander scale and kinda like a heart attack. It's the heavy nerve shaking like the nerve buzz, nerve quake. It's often describe as the symptom of the Internal Tremors, aka inner tremor. But as far as just the jack hammering goes. The news was made public on his Facebook page, which Burroughs was posting on until January of this year. It felt like getting captured and tortured by some invisible enemy.
Earl Solomon Burroughs, more widely known as the singer 'Jack Hammer' and the co-writer of the hit song 'Great Balls of Fire,' died this week of heart failure in his hometown of Oakland.
