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Delta Roadhouse: The King of Clubs and the Growth of Rockabilly in Arkansas  

By Krystle Perkins and Malinda Huntley

Presented at the 2002 Arkansas Undergraduate Research Conference

            Rock ‘n’ roll as we know it today is the result of a mixture in the late 1940s and early 1950s of black blues and rhythm and blues music with elements of swing and country music.  One of the key places where this fusion occurred is the area known as the Mississippi Delta, a landform in eastern Arkansas, western Tennessee, and western Mississippi, along with several other states touched by the Mississippi River.  Memphis is one of the places most often associated with the rise of rock ‘n’ roll, especially its early form known as rockabilly.  This form drew from the country or “hillbilly” side of rock ‘n’ roll, thus the name “rockabilly,” but also drew heavily from the African-American musical traditions of Memphis, the most important city in the history of rock ‘n’ roll.1 “It was Mecca,” said Wesley Ketz, a longtime fan and promoter of rockabilly music.2

Many in the record-buying public did not appreciate the mixing of black and white music styles and did not always accept artists emerging in the rockabilly genre during the early fifties.  But three forces aided up-and-coming artists in rockabilly music in this period.  One was Sun Records of Memphis, Sam Phillips’ famous company.3  Another was radio.  The other was the roadhouse.  These three forces, which launched so many musicians into the entertainment world, nurtured each other’s existence.  An aspiring musician would cut a record for a company such as Sun, which would distribute it to the radio stations to play it on the air.  If listeners enjoyed what they heard, they would call the record shops to order the single.  After being promoted by the record companies and disk jockeys, performers came to be in high demand to play live at places such as the King of Clubs.  This triangular interrelationship of record companies, radio stations, and roadhouses helped many artists achieve their success.4

One of the most important of the roadhouses was and still is on Highway 67, just north of Swifton, Arkansas, named the King of Clubs.  Other clubs and dance halls played a roll in helping get rockabilly started, but the King of Clubs was instrumental in many ways in the spread, acceptance, and success of rockabilly music.5

To mark the fiftieth anniversary of the King of Clubs in September 2001, owners Bob and Evelyn King agreed to share some of the personal stories from their experiences in the music and entertainment business with a group of students from the Recent Southern History class at Lyon College during the fall of 2001.  What those students found was that the King of Clubs is a little world of its own.  From the outside it is nothing exceptional, just a plain white building with a simple sign and a gravel parking lot.  It is doubtful that it turns the heads of many of the drivers traveling the highway that passes in front of it; however, if they know the history of the establishment, certain kinds travelers certainly take notice of it.  Knowledgeable tourists stop in to look it over, for this ordinary building has hosted hundreds of musicians, many of whom attained enormous stardom after their performances in the King of Clubs and other small music halls around the South.  Most of the stars who have visited Bob and Evelyn King’s roadhouse can be seen in photographs adorning the walls of the club, where Mrs. King serves as the manager and bouncer and Mr. King serves as the host.  They can be seen there every night the club is open, something they have been doing since it first opened in 1951!

Fifty years later, when a group of novice oral historians entered the roadhouse, they stepped into a different world.  The majority of the building is a large, dark room with a low-hung ceiling.  Aligning the back wall are some old pool tables.  Framing the small tiled dance floor is a horseshoe of small square tables and chairs.  At the head of the dance floor is a wooden stage that is elevated no more than a foot above the dance area.  The most popular place in the entire building is a two-by-two piece of concrete flooring at the head of the dance floor about ten feet in front of the stage.  This piece of floor has attracted hundreds of tourists from places as far away as Europe and Japan, its fame due to Elvis Presley, just one of the vast numbers of performers to appear at the King of Clubs.6 

In December 1955, the Kings hired Elvis Presley to play a show at the King of Clubs and another one at the Swifton School for $450.  An unknown Johnny Cash came along, and Presley asked King if he would give Cash $10 to sing a song.  King said he told Presley, “I’ll tell you what I’ll do.  I’ll give him $20 to sing three songs.”  Mr. King could not remember which songs Cash sang, but he said that when Presley appeared at the King of Clubs, he sang “Heartbreak Hotel,” and announced to the crowd, “This will be my first hit.”  According to Mr. King, Presley appeared in Swifton on a Tuesday and made his famous debut on the Ed Sullivan Show in New York the following Sunday night, after which his international fame was assured.  When the Kings constructed a new dance floor, they saved the block of concrete that Elvis had stood upon when he performed.  Over the years, according to Mr. King, many museums and business people have offered large sums of money for that block, but he prefers not to part with it.7

Many of the performers in addition to Presley who appeared at the King of Clubs went on to become stars, internationally famous artists such as Roy Orbison, Carl Perkins, Johnny Cash, and Conway Twitty, as well as many rockabilly figures who are not necessarily well known across the United States but who are very highly regarded in Europe as well as in the Arkansas Delta, musicians such as Billy Lee Riley and Sonny Burgess and the Pacers.  At the time that most of these musicians performed at the King of Clubs, they were far from being international celebrities, but their appearance at the club surely helped to kick off their careers.8

Another major catalyst that promoted the success of many unknown artists was radio.  Local radio stations had more freedom to play new artists during this time than they are allowed presently.  This freedom allowed many musicians to be heard by thousands of listeners who created the demand for new music.  Mr. Nelson Barnett was interviewed by the class about the influence rock-n-roll music had on his adolescence.  He mentioned the importance of the radio and how, though the family car did not have a tape player or an air conditioner, it surely had a radio! 

A radio station that we liked to listen to was WMPS in Memphis.  Memphis always had good music, and I had a cousin who was particularly interested in radio, and he would keep me up to date on what was on the radio, and WMPS was the station to hear popular music.  There was not much FM.  It was all pretty much AM then so you had to put up with the static and that kind of stuff, but WMPS was the station to get the best music on. . . .  And we played the radio, usually pretty loud!  I can remember my parents getting in the car and starting the car and having the radio blare out at them, and they would fuss at us for playing the radio so loud.9

 The popularity of the radio launched many musicians’ names into daily conversation, further increasing their fame and building on the interrelationships they had with the record companies and the local clubs where people could hear live music.

            Wesley “Butch” Ketz, in an interview for the class project, called Sun Records the “Holy Grail” because of its importance in creating early rock ‘n’ roll, but he too acknowledged the crucial role played by radio in making people want to buy the music and hear it played live.  “You’d hear a new record…and it would really fire you up!  Record shops would sponsor an hour or two and then they’d sell these 45s by mail.  You would write [to] Randy’s Record Shop [in Batesville] . . . to buy your records because it was hard to find those records.  It took forever for me to find an Elvis record after he [made an appearance] in Batesville.”10

One of the factors in this musical success story was the availability of the King of Clubs as a place where musicians could give their fans the music they wanted to hear, and one of the factors in the success of the King’s Delta roadhouse was the support Mr. and Mrs. King gave so many performers when they were getting their careers started.  Over long years in the dance hall business, the Kings earned a reputation for generosity and good judgment.  They loaned money to struggling musicians, counseled them on career decisions, and gave them their reactions to new songs the musicians were working on.  They seldom had trouble booking acts into the club.  Musicians sought them out because of the reputation for treating artists well.  As Mr. King put it, “It always seemed like they liked us.”  The Kings benefited from the fact that many acts that played the King of Clubs later became famous, which meant that many lesser-known bands wanted to play there, if only to be to say that they had or possibly in the hope that they would find the same good fortune that Jerry Lee Lewis and others found after playing the King of Clubs.11

They also benefited from their location.  The fact that Jackson County was one of the few places in Northeast Arkansas that allowed the sale of alcohol meant that it had a large number of clubs, which meant that a large number of musicians came through the area.  As Mr. King put it, “Jackson County’s always been pretty loose. . . .  All of these people who went with Sun [Records] came out of Mississippi and came over to Jackson County.  [There was] always somebody playing up and down this road here.”  Musicians would “come from Memphis, and they [brought] everybody with them.”12

The King of Clubs attracts people from all walks of life.  Even after fifty years of music and dancing, this little roadhouse keeps on rocking and will most likely continue for many more to come.  It and the Kings have been instrumental parts in the start of many musical careers and key supporting forces in popularizing rockabilly music in general, and they have done these things with a remarkable lack of self-consciousness or concern with the terminology and categorization of the music business or of scholarship.  Asked if the term “rockabilly” meant much to him, Mr. King said, “No.  I’ve probably heard of it.”  His term for the music of Elvis Presley and others was just “rock ‘n’ roll.”  Asked what he calls the King of Clubs, he just said it was a club.  He did not use the expression “roadhouse,” a term most often heard today coming from scholars.  In discussing the fact that most King of Clubs customers who come from outside Jackson County come from neighboring dry areas, especially Jonesboro and Craighead County, in other words, mostly from communities in the Arkansas Delta, Mr. King again showed a lack of concern for the terminology of scholars and other outsiders.  He seemed completely uninterested in the expression “Delta,” one that has attracted a great deal of government and scholarly attention.13

What the Kings are interested in doing is hosting live music.  Interviewed the day before his seventy-seventh birthday, Mr. King said, “I’m here seven days a week . . . .  It’s just a habit.  I don’t know how long I’ll hold up to it, but I think as long as I try to do it I’ll live a lot longer.”14  Music lovers and historians alike have Mr. and Mrs. King and the King of Clubs to thank for helping to create such musical legends and a rich history to entertain generations to come.