Steve Miller talked to Rolling Stone about the death of Chuck Berry. He first played with Berry in 1967 in San Francisco, a show that was recorded for Berry's first live album. Here is some of what Miller had to say:
- "When Chuck Berry came along, what he did was more rock & roll than it was blues. It was more exciting. He was like the next step. I thought his first single, 'Maybellene,' was the greatest song in the world."
- "From the time I was 12 until I was 21, Chuck Berry was my favorite artist."
- "There was one great song after another. He was such a clever writer. He was as clever as John Lennon and as good as The Beatles and as good as T-Bone Walker at the guitar, but he made it his own."
- "We played a lot of gigs (over two years), but we finally had a fight... One night he started bad-mouthing the band onstage... We came offstage and I said, 'Chuck, if you ever do that again you can get your own band, your own amp, your own stuff. You can't talk that way to my musicians on the stage, ever!' He stopped it and from that time on we were great friends."
- "As an artist, he was great. As a human being in his life, it was very tough and very hard. A lot of times you meet artists you just love and when you meet them personally, you realize it was very hard for them to do it. That sums up Chuck's life."
Berry died on March 18th at the age of 90.