Rock Awhile

{{Short description|1949 single by Goree Carter}}

{{Infobox song

| name = Rock Awhile

| cover = Image:Rock Awhile (fixed).png

| alt =

| caption = A-side

| type = single

| artist = Goree Carter & His Hepcats

| album =

| B-side = Back Home Blues

| released = 1949

| recorded = April 1949

| studio = ACA Studios

| venue =

| genre = {{hlist|Rock and roll|electric blues|Jump Blues}}

| length = {{Duration|m=2|s=38}}

| label = Freedom Recording Company

| writer = Goree Carter

| producer =

| prev_title =

| prev_year =

| next_title = I'll Send You

| next_year = 1949

| misc =

}}

"Rock Awhile" is a song by American singer-songwriter Goree Carter, recorded in April 1949 for the Freedom Recording Company in Houston, Texas.

The song was released as the 18-year-old Carter's debut single (with "Back Home Blues" as the B-side) shortly after recording. The track is considered by many sources to be the first rock and roll song,Robert Palmer, "Church of the Sonic Guitar", pp. 13-38 in Anthony DeCurtis, Present Tense, Duke University Press, 1992, p. 19. {{ISBN|0-8223-1265-4}}.John Nova Lomax (December 2014), [http://www.texasmonthly.com/story/who-invented-rock-and-roll Roll Over, Ike Turner], Texas MonthlyRoger Wood (2003), Down in Houston: Bayou City Blues, [https://books.google.com/books?id=gdY5aJMVKkcC&pg=PA46 pages 46-47], University of Texas Press{{cite web

|url=https://www.houstonchronicle.com/local/gray-matters/article/Houston-s-music-history-needs-to-be-preserved-9450597.php

|title=Uncovering Houston's lost music history

|accessdate=May 22, 2018

|publisher=Houston Chronicle }} and has been called a better candidate than the more commonly cited "Rocket 88", which was released two years later.{{cite book|author=Palmer, Robert|author-link=Robert Palmer (American writer)|page=12|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ubWAht7N7zsC&pg=PA12|title=The Rolling Stone Illustrated History of Rock & Roll:The Definitive History of the Most Important Artists and Their Music|publisher=Random House|year=1992|accessdate=August 13, 2013|isbn=0-679-73728-6|display-authors=etal}} The song features an over-driven electric guitar style similar to that of Chuck Berry years later.

The former New York Times pop critic, Robert Palmer,{{cite web |url= https://www.texasmonthly.com/arts-entertainment/roll-over-ike-turner/ |title=Roll Over, Ike Turner |date=December 1, 2014 |work=Texas Monthly |access-date=19 December 2022 |quote=Citing its unmistakable resemblance to Chuck Berry’s later work, its lyrical instruction to “rock awhile,” and the way the guitar crackled through an overdriven amp}} made this comment about the recording in 1995:

"The clarion guitar intro differs hardly at all from some of the intros Chuck Berry would unleash on his own records after 1955; the guitar solo crackles through an overdriven amplifier; and the boogie-based rhythm charges right along. The subject matter, too, is appropriate -- the record announces that it's time to 'rock awhile,' and then proceeds to show how it's done."{{Cite web|url=https://www.houstonpress.com/music/racket-6561005|title=Racket|first=John Nova|last=Lomax|website=Houston Press}}