Initially posted on MissBackInThe Day USA
Kenner’s music and songs are traditional and beat to the rhythm of any era. In 1961, this collaboration produced “I Like It Like That”, his first and largest hit, peaking at #2 within the Billboard Scorching 100 chart (lined in 1965 by the Dave Clark 5), and “One thing You Obtained” (lined by Wilson Pickett, Alvin Robinson, the Ramsey Lewis Trio, Chuck Jackson, Earl Grant, Maxine Brown, Bobby Womack, the Moody Blues (on their 1965 debut album), the American Breed, Fairport Conference and Bruce Springsteen). “I Like It Like That” bought over a million copies and was awarded a gold disc by the RIAA.
Kenner was a New Orleans R&B singer and songwriter, finest recognized for 2 hit singles within the early Nineteen Sixties that grew to become staples within the repertoires of many different musicians.
Born within the farming group of Kenner, Louisiana, upriver from New Orleans, Kenner sang gospel music along with his church choir. He moved to New Orleans when he was in his teenagers. In 1955 he made his first recordings, for a small label, Baton Data, with out success. In 1957 recorded his “Sick and Drained” for Imperial Data; Fat Domino lined it the subsequent yr, and his model grew to become successful. “Rocket to the Moon” and “Life Is Only a Wrestle”, each minimize for Ron Data, had been different notable songs Kenner recorded on this interval.
Transferring to a different New Orleans label, Instantaneous, he started to work with pianist and arranger Allen Toussaint. In 1962 he produced his most enduring tune, “Land of a Thousand Dances”, which was lined by varied artists, together with Cannibal & the Headhunters, Thee Midniters, Wilson Pickett, the Motion, and Patti Smith.
Kenner continued to document for Instantaneous and for different small native labels, together with lots of his lesser-known songs from the Nineteen Sixties, resembling “My Spouse”, “Packing Up” and “They Took My Cash”. He launched an album, Land of a Thousand Dances, on Atlantic Data in 1966; the Collectors’ Alternative label reissued it on CD in 2007.
In 1968 Kenner was convicted of statutory rape of a minor and spent three years in Louisiana’s Angola jail.
Kenner died from a coronary heart assault in 1976, on the age of 46. wiki
