Jerry Lee Lewis

Sometimes legends live better through memory, if they live at all. Jerry Lee Lewis performed several days ago on Letterman. He was introduced as a true rock and roll legend. He performed "Great Balls of Fire." If you ever saw Lewis at his height, in his prime, performing this song, then his appearance on Letterman was sad and pathetic. The energy was gone, the loose folds of skin on his arms jiggled as he played, he seemed truly to be going through the motions and even then having difficulty doing so. I don't blame this man for being old. But no one who watched his performance on Letterman would ever understand why he was there.

But Jerry Lee understands why he was there. He's a phantom these days. People remember Buddy Holly and Elvis and Johnny Cash but the Killer has faded. He always made himself difficult as an icon--the rumors about how some of his wives died, the stories about Jerry Lee waving a pistol at the gates of Graceland, trying to get in, one evening in the months before Elvis died. As those of us who grew up in the 50s and 60s get older and the importance of those memories grow less relevant, as we die off, the icons fade. When my students mention the country singer Hank Williams, they mean Hank Williams III, or at best Hank Williams Jr. When we're gone, Jerry Lee will be a bizarre footnote.

Walk the Line reintroduced Jerry Lee Lewis to a generation that has largely never known about him. The Killer doesn't want to be forgotten. He doesn't want to be a footnote. A last feeble ember of the old rage rekindles. So he performs on Letterman, jiggling arm and errant voice, flailing feebly at the keyboard, raging against the dying light.