Criminal - I Fought the Law

Episode Date: April 9, 2021

The song “I Fought the Law” by the Bobby Fuller Four reached number 9 on the Billboard Charts in the week of March 12, 1966. Just months later, Bobby Fuller was found dead. The mystery of what happened to him has been called “the rock and roll version of John F. Kennedy’s assassination.” We speak with Miriam Linna and Dalton Powell. We made a special playlist of music discussed in this episode. Learn more in Miriam Linna and Randell Fuller’s book, I Fought the Law: The Life and Strange Death of Bobby Fuller. Say hello on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Sign up for our occasional newsletter, The Accomplice. Follow the show and review us on Apple Podcasts: iTunes.com/CriminalShow. We also make This is Love and Phoebe Reads a Mystery. Artwork by Julienne Alexander. Check out our online shop.  Episode transcripts are posted on our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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worth your attention, and they call these series essentials. This month, they recommend Wondery's Ghost Story, a seven-part series that follows journalist Tristan Redman as he tries to get to the bottom of a ghostly presence in his childhood home. His investigation takes him on a journey

involving homicide detectives, ghost hunters, and even psychic mediums, and leads him to a dark secret about his own family. Check out Ghost Story, a series essential pick, completely ad-free on Apple Podcasts. This episode contains references to suicide. Please use discretion.

There is a famous bar in Juarez, where in 1957, blues players like Mong John Hunter and Little Joe Washington began performing. The lobby, the legendary lobby, it was a bar just across the bridge in Juarez, Mexico. At the lobby, the music didn't stop until the sun came up. Long John Hunter once said, it was a party from 8 o'clock till please go home in the morning. He was famous for hanging from the ceiling rafters with one hand and playing guitar with the morning. He was famous for hanging from the ceiling rafters with one hand and playing guitar with the other. Everybody went to the lobby.

I mean, in those days, you just walked across the bridge. You didn't have to talk to anybody or anything. So it was easy for the young guys to go over there, and there weren't really any venues to hear that kind of music in El Paso. So we all went over there. Etta James reportedly went to the lobby to see Long John Hunter. So did James Brown and Buddy Holly.

And there was a high school student from El Paso who was a regular there. He wanted to be a rock star more than anything. He could play every instrument. People called him a prodigy. His name was Bobby Fuller. Oh, well, you know, he was an ambitious guy. And his parents backed him all the way, so he had everything he wanted. He had his hot rod and his drums and the nice clothes. And it showed, you know, and he had an ego to go along with it.

But we all knew that someday Bobby wanted to be a rock star. This is Dalton Powell. I live in Texas, and I've been a drummer most of my life. And when did you first hear Bobby Fuller's music? First time I ever heard Bobby was at a football game at my high school. At halftime, the marching bands all came out, and at halftime they rolled a platform out onto the field with a set of drums on it. And Bobby came out and did a drum solo with the marching bands.

And that was the first time I ever saw him play, so we knew he could play drums. Dalton Powell had a band of his own and asked Bobby Fuller to play with him. But we always knew that Bobby, you know, he had higher aspirations. He wanted to play guitar and write and sing and be a rock star. So that's how I got hooked up with Bobby. He was my drummer before I was his. Dalton Powell became the drummer for the band that would become the Bobby Fuller Four. There are many iterations of the band, but in the early days, and again at the end,

it was Dalton, Bobby, a guitar player named Jim Reese, and Bobby's younger brother, Randall Fuller. Bobby and Randall Fuller's parents, Lorraine and Lawson Fuller, did everything they possibly could to support their son's music ambitions. They were a slightly older couple, and they were very supportive parents. This is Miriam Linna. She's been researching Bobby Fuller for decades. She's also a musician. She was a founding member of the punk band The Cramps and she runs Norton Records. The Fullers lived on Album Avenue in El Paso and Bobby created what was by all accounts a very impressive recording studio inside the house. His mother said there were cables and wires all over. He was really into that. He was really technically, I believe, a genius as well with engineering and so on.

And yes, I was at that house and Mrs. Fuller showed me the cutout window in the wall behind a painting in the den. That was a window that looked right into the little garage compartment that two people could barely stand in. That was the engineer booth. They would set up, move the furniture aside in the den. They'd set up there and through the glass, they had the setup to be able to record. So this was really, really pretty far out at the time for anybody to do. And nobody's parents, I mean, I grew up, you know, years later, and it was like, turn that racket down. And it's like, rock and roll has got to go. And it feels like there was this unusual dedication to mastering this craft. You know,

Bobby seemed almost obsessive about figuring out exactly what was possible, studying how to become the best, you know, down to the most minute detail. Absolutely. And not only playing, recording, and writing, but also starting a record label, starting two record labels to be able to issue the music that his group recorded and also to issue music by other local groups that he thought were strong. He was very generous in that way. He wasn't a person who was totally self-centered and thinking, well, it's all me. He could recognize talent anywhere. And that was really that do-it-yourself kind of an attitude that few people had at that time. And that is that I admire so much about Bobby Fuller.

Bobby Fuller was obsessed with a fellow Texas musician who was six years older and already a huge star, Buddy Holly. Buddy Holly had been opening for Elvis when Bobby Fuller was 12. One of Bobby Fuller's bandmates, Jim Reese, later said that if Buddy Holly wore one red sock and one blue sock, then Bobby Fuller would too. He figured that the only way to accomplish whatever Buddy Holly had accomplished was to be as much like him as possible, Jim Rhee said. By 1957, Buddy Holly had a hit song with That'll Be the Day. And then, in 1959, Buddy Holly was on a small plane with musicians J.P. Richardson and Richie Valens. They'd each had their own hits, with Chantilly Lace and La Bamba. Their plane crashed into a snowy field in Iowa, killing all three and the pilot.

Buddy Holly's wife was reportedly watching the news, and that's how she learned about her husband's death. She was pregnant and miscarried the next day. The careless handling of the news contributed to a change in the way that authorities disclose information to the media, attempting to withhold names until family members have been notified. Bobby Fuller was living with his parents in El Paso,

playing live as often as he could. Dalton Powell remembers they did a lot of Buddy Holly covers. Here's Bobby. We had a request to sing Peggy Sue, an old Buddy Holly song from West Texas. Buddy Holly. This is Peggy Sue Right now I'm looking at a poster from 1962 and he's already declaring himself on the poster. It says, Big Dance starring Bobby Fuller, rock and roll king of the Southwest

with his internationally famous instrumental group at the Bassett Center in El Paso. And, you know, it takes a lot of gumption to be able to, you know, declare yourself the king of the Southwest when you're a high school kid. Bobby's mother and father helped him get a bank loan to open his own rock club. He named it Bobby Fuller's Teen Rendezvous. No booze, just chips and soda. They played there a few nights a week, and the other nights they played clubs all over the Southwest. And then, in 1964, Bobby and his bandmates

set up in the studio in his parents' living room and recorded a song called I Fought the Law. And the rest is history. Here's that original recording. I'm breaking rocks in the hot sun I fought the law and the law won I fought the law and the law won The song was written by a guy named Sonny Curtis, and it had already been recorded by Buddy Holly's band, The Crickets.

But Bobby Fuller's version became a hit. The El Paso Herald-Post ran a story in September of 1964 with the headline, England has Beatles, but El Paso has Bobby. Less than two years later, he was dead. And his death has not been resolved. The mystery of what happened to Bobby Fuller has been called the rock and roll version of John F. Kennedy's assassination.

I'm Phoebe Judge. This is Criminal. Bobby Fuller and his bandmates signed a deal with a record label called Delphi Records. It was owned by a man named Bob Keene. Bob Keene was an aggressive type of record mogul. He saw Bobby's talent right away and put a lot of muscle behind it. He had originally had the great Richie Valens, you know, and Richie, of course, perishing. And having that dashed, I think that Bob probably saw something of the star quality that he saw in Richie Valens. He saw it also in Bobby Fuller. Bob Keene had encouraged Bobby and his bandmates to move to Los Angeles,

where he could book them on American Bandstand and other TV variety shows with names like Hullabaloo and Chivalry. Bobby thought it was a good idea. And moved lock, stock, and barrel at that time, and Mrs. Fuller in tow. They drove from El Paso to Los Angeles in Mrs. Fuller's blue Oldsmobile. Bob Keene got them on the radio in Los Angeles. He booked them at popular clubs. One was called It's Boss. Bob Keene was in charge of everything, and Bobby wasn't used to that. So there are stories that Bobby would go into the studio after hours and change things after they had been quote-unquote finalized by Bob Keene. So Bobby would go in there, and it might not have caused the big, huge fuss in the studio while Bob was there, but he would go in there after hours and make it right.

So, you know, he wasn't a guy who was going to back down on his old sound. This was music that he wrote, created, played on, and he knew how it was supposed to sound. They re-recorded I Fought the Law for Bob Keene to release, and the song went all the way to number nine on the Billboard charts in March of 1966. In the same week, the Beatles song, Nowhere Man, was at number seven. People tried to suggest that Bobby Fuller was in some way influenced by the Beatles, but he always pushed back on that. He said, you know, I do my own thing. You know, when they talked about British invasion

stuff, he said, let them do what they want to do. I'm making Texas music. And he redefined Texas music and rock and roll coming out of El Paso into California. He definitely fed in a totally new sound. As the band got more famous, it seems like there became increasing tension about Bobby getting a lot of the credit. And Bobby being wined and dined by the music industry executives and the band members, especially his brother. Randall's saying, what's the deal here? Yeah, that is true. But Bobby had a way of speaking with people. You get the feeling that Bobby was just ready with the answers. He was ready and eager to talk about music and his career and what was happening.

He wasn't afraid of that. He understood it. Not only did members of the band feel increasingly like Bobby's backup band, they also felt that Bobby was having meetings and making plans without looping them in. You've been in bands. Is this a constant battle, the lead singer gets all the glory? You know, I don't know if it's a constant battle, but yeah, I mean, I never felt that, you know, as the lowly drummer. But, you know, with other people,

and especially with guitar players and so on like that, yeah, I think that, you know, just observing that, that there might be some tension there because people just know to go to the singer. And yes, it was Bobby, Bobby, Bobby. And there was tension at one point in time, I should say at many points in time, where the group did grouse about the fact, exactly as you said, why does he get all the attention? Well, they knew why.

You know, that's just the way that it is. And Bobby was like electric in more ways than one. He had an incredible future. Everybody knew that. Thank you. Support for Criminal comes from Apple Podcasts. Each month, Apple Podcasts highlights one series worth your attention, and they call these series essentials. This month, they recommend Wondery's Ghost Story, a seven-part series that follows journalist Tristan Redman as he tries to get to the bottom of a ghostly presence in his childhood home.

His investigation takes him on a journey involving homicide detectives, ghost hunters, and even psychic mediums, and leads him to a dark secret about his own family. Check out Ghost Story, a series essential pick, completely ad-free on Apple Podcasts. Hey, it's Scott Galloway, and on our podcast, Pivot, we are bringing you a special series about the basics of artificial intelligence. We're answering all your questions. What should you use it for? What tools are right for you? And what privacy issues should you ultimately watch out for? And to help us out, we are joined by Kylie Robeson, the senior AI reporter for The Verge, to give you a primer on how to integrate AI into your life. So tune into AI Basics, How and When to Use AI, a special series from Pivot sponsored by AWS, wherever you get your podcasts.

In 1966, Bobby Fuller was living in an apartment on Sycamore Avenue in Los Angeles with his brother Randall and their mother. And drummer Dalton Powell remembers that things were getting more tense. You know, typical friction, you know, in any band. I don't want to play that song, or you're too loud, you know, that kind of stuff. But it started coming apart when our management started deciding what kind of music we should do. And Bobby didn't like that. He wanted to do his music, his way. Bob Keene at the record label was pushing Bobby to innovate. He hired Barry White to produce a song for them called The Magic Touch.

And it was a cool song, but it wasn't Bobby at all. And he didn't want to go in that direction. So there was a little friction there. And if he felt that possibly there was another label that could do better, he thought that he would explore that. Who was Morris Levy? Morris Levy is one of the most notorious names in 20th century pop, rock and roll music history. He goes way back, but at the time, and with the element of Bobby Fuller and so on, Morris was really running the rackets.

He started as a nightclub owner in New York City and was known for getting his way in various ways and kind of strong-arming musicians and club owners and everybody else in his vicinity. Very talented man, but a much-feared man as well. Morris Levy's record label was called Roulette Records. People said it was supported by organized crime, and that if you tried to leave, you could get hurt, or worse. As one record executive once said,

you make a deal with Morris, that's it. You don't go back. Bobby definitely met with Morris Levy. Absolutely. Bob Keene went with him and Randall was also there. And everybody likes to think, oh, well, if something happened that was awful in music history, blame Morris Levy. I'm not of that mind at all because I do admire everything that he did. It's just that he was involved with certain criminal elements and that's the music business. In Los Angeles, in New York, in Chicago, everywhere

there was always someone who was on the take and on the make. And they could see talent and they wanted it. Labels were constantly on the move trying to find the next big stars and as many of those next big stars as they could. The curious thing with Bobby Fuller and with Morris Levy's label, which was Roulette, and I don't mind saying this because it's factual, is that in the discography, in the listing of songs that are assigned a catalog number and are released by date,

every label has them. And there is a blank space where the Bobby Fuller release, I believe, was meant to be. So the empty spots in the catalogs are perhaps proof that Bobby was making a deal with Morris Levy. No, no, not that Bobby was, no. I think that that was most likely being done by Bob Keene. Bobby's contract with Bob Keene was reportedly coming to an end.

So it's unclear whether, if Bob Keene was making a deal at all, he was making it in good faith. This is stuff happening real fast. And right on top of that is the fact that his contract was going to be up. So what was going to happen? You know, this had to be cleared up. You know, he can't be, he definitely had arguments going with Bob Keene about it, about what's going on with my career. You know, you can't be doing this right now.

I mean, we've got to plan this thing out and that thing out. That's where everything starts to come to a head. Bobby Fuller went to Bob Keene's office. He went in, was very stormy about things. He came back out. The band wasn't really talking to him and so on. They didn't like this whole privacy element again. You know, it was like different things going on.

Being left a bit in the dark about what was going on. So Bobby felt that Bob Keene was keeping him in the dark, and the rest of the band felt like Bobby was keeping them in the dark. Everyone's unhappy. That's right. That's right. We had had a meeting and the band had broke up. Drummer, Dalton Powell. Jim Reese got his draft notice, our guitar player, and Bobby just decided he didn't like what was happening as far as his

music and the management went. So he was just kind of wanting to get off on his own for a while. And he had told Jim and me and probably Randall about it. And so, as far as we were concerned, the band was pretty much over anyway. On top of everything else, the Rolling Stones were in Los Angeles recording, and bands like the Yardbirds, with a more psychedelic sound,

were rising in popularity. The Bobby Fuller Four, with their clean-cut look and meticulously styled hair, didn't have the same appeal they'd had even the year before. California is absolutely being overrun by super talented people making unbelievable records that would last through all eternity as great records alongside Bobby's great sound. It was almost like all of the different aspects were colliding and he was alone. In my mind at that time that he's trying to settle all of this in his mind and make things happen his way, it was a clash. Bob Keene, he owns the label. He had you under contract. He

feels that he did a lot for you. And what, you're going to walk now? Really? You know, and don't you appreciate me? I mean, you can understand that things could get rather heated. And I'm sure Bobby was furious and angry and upset about things, and so was Bob Keene on his end. Randall was also, and so were Bobby's parents. They knew that there was something really, really troubling their son. On the evening of Sunday, July 17th, 1966, Bobby was at home at the apartment on Sycamore Avenue. His mother was home too.

Randall had gone out for the night. The whole band had an appointment to meet at Bob Keene's office at 9.30 the next morning to discuss their future. So that night, Bobby gets a phone call. It's late. His mom is still up. Hears him go out. Doesn't really know what's going on. Just assumes that he's going out for, you know, get a can of pop or something from a store nearby or something like that. But he's gone. And in the morning, she goes to look out the back window, wondering, where is Bobby? Did he go out early this morning again or whatnot?

And the car was not there. Her blue Oldsmobile was gone. She said she was sure. But then she said sometime later, the car was back. And the length of time between when she saw that the car wasn't there and when the car was there is debatable. At least a few hours. But then she looked out, she saw the car.

She ran out to the car to see what the heck was going on there. And there was her son. And he had appeared to have been beaten. There was a strong odor of gasoline that was in the front seat area. He was slumped over and his face and skin appeared to be bruised and broken. He was still wearing slippers, which appeared to be dragged in some kind of a way because they were damaged. The police arrived. Bob Keene arrives. The band members come circling. There's a big crowd. Oh my gosh, Bobby Fuller, he's dead. And there starts the really curious part of the story. Dalton Powell, along with the rest of the band, showed up at Bob Keene's office for the 9.30 meeting. But Bobby wasn't there.

Bob Keene reportedly made a joke about the prima donna being late. And they rescheduled the meeting for 3.30. Bobby still didn't show up. So Dalton says they all left and that he and Jim Reese walked over to Bobby's.

And we saw his mom coming down the sidewalk the other way. And we met her right in front of their apartment, and she was hysterical. So Jim took her on up to their apartment, and I went over to his mom's car to see what the hell was wrong. And that's when I looked in there, and I saw Bobby stretched out across the front seat. And his head was under the steering wheel. And his clothes were disheveled. And there was a can of gasoline on the floor in the front of the car. There are several ideas about what that was about.

I have no idea. You know, I know back in the early days, some of the kids used to sniff gasoline to get high. And somebody tried to say that's what he was doing, which is bullcrap. You know, Bobby didn't do that. Bobby didn't really do drugs either. And if you were a rock and roll musician, you didn't have to sniff gasoline to get high. He could have got any kind of drugs he wanted. There was no reason for him to sit in his car at night and sniff gasoline. So that was one rumor that was totally ridiculous. And the police didn't even really look into it. Unfortunately, what was happening at that very time is that Police Chief Parker, who had been the chief of police

for decades, had suddenly died of a heart attack, coronary, and all of the entire Los Angeles police force was thinking about one thing. They'd lost their chief at a funeral what was in the orphan. This happened, it was one day apart with what happened with Bobby. So when people are talking about, like, oh, why didn't they investigate? You know, it was bad timing.

People were distracted. Yes, people were distracted. I think the police department was distracted. The circumstances were so strange that just nothing really made any sense. Are you looking to eat healthier, but you still find yourself occasionally rebounding with junk food and empty calories? You don't need to wait for the new year to start fresh. New year, new me. How about same year, new me? You just need a different approach. According to Noom, losing weight has less to do with discipline and more to do with psychology.

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The last person who claimed to see Bobby Fuller alive was his apartment building superintendent, who said they were drinking beer late at night and that Bobby was in good spirits. He was found dead late in the afternoon the next day, July 18, 1966, in his mother's Oldsmobile, covered in gasoline. He was 23. The Associated Press reported that police said a can of gasoline and a plastic hose were found on the car seat, but the cause of death was listed as undetermined, pending an autopsy.

His mother said that her son had been depressed. The Los Angeles Times implied that Bobby Fuller had died by suicide. A friend of Bobby's said that the police, quote, didn't seal the scene off, didn't use police tape, didn't take fingerprints, didn't look for evidence, didn't do a thing except say, get the hell out of here. Someone claimed they saw a plainclothes police officer take the gas can from the Oldsmobile and throw it away. There were conflicting reports about whether the keys were in the ignition.

The autopsy report said they were not there, but Bobby's mother swore that they were. The medical examiner wrote a question mark next to the box that read suicide and he also wrote a question mark next to the box that read accident Blood tests concluded that Bobby Fuller was not on drugs and no alcohol was detected The official cause of death is listed as

asphyxiation from inhalation of gasoline You know, that coroner's report clearly shows that there was something abnormal that happened to kill this young man. There have been many theories over the years. Very few people who knew him believe that Bobby Fuller died by suicide. Bob Keene said he'd seen Bobby the day before, cheerful. Randall Fuller said that Bobby was excited about the prospect of going solo and seeing what was next.

He was also excited about a Corvette he'd arranged to buy. Someone said Bobby told them he was going out to buy LSD that night and that perhaps if he was going out to buy LSD that night, and that perhaps if he was on drugs, he might have gotten confused and tried to drink gasoline. Others said no, that Bobby didn't like LSD, and that the LSD theory wouldn't explain why it seemed like he'd been beaten up. His chest and shoulders were bruised. Someone said the index finger on his right hand looked like it had been bent backwards and broken.

There was a rumor that Bob Keene had an $800,000 life insurance policy on Bobby Fuller. That was never proven. People said it could have been Charles Manson. But Charles Manson was in prison in 1966. There were rumors that it was a romantic relationship gone wrong. People even said that Bobby Fuller shouldn't have been hanging around with Nancy Sinatra. He and his band had been in a movie with her called The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini,

and that Frank Sinatra didn't like it. Someone joked the Beatles did it. Over the years, some of the band members have been accused. What do you make of that? I mean, speculated. What do you make of that? No, that's ridiculous. We were harmless. We were a bunch of kids playing rock and roll music.

We were harmless. We were a bunch of kids playing rock and roll music. We were harmless. Many, many efforts have been made to solve the case from all different angles. There's been no proof. And unfortunately, all of the records referring to this case in Los Angeles, vanished years ago. There are no files for Bobby Fuller. Many people believe that the reason the investigation never went anywhere was because the mob was involved. Miriam Linna says it's an important detail that Bobby chose to leave the apartment in the early morning hours, in his slippers. Why did he go that night? We don't know.

Incidentally, that can of gas was not something that was brought in there to force him to drink or anything because, you know, the situation was that that can of gasoline was in the car because the gas gauge on the mom's car was broken. And they always had a can of gas in the back of the car in case they ran out of gas because the gauge didn't work, you know. And the coroner's report says that the body had apparently been in the car, you know, on a very, very hot California morning and afternoon. I had been in there for hours. This causes me again, and every time I think about it to wonder, was Mrs. Fuller mistaken? That first time she looked out the window and said the car was missing. Because, you know, to try to make that fit, you've got a car that's there.

Then it's gone. And then it's there. Then it's gone, and then it's back again. And the degree of rapid decomposition that had already occurred on Bobby indicates that he had been in that car there for quite a long time. And the coroner's report says that his lungs smelled strongly of gasoline and so did his internal organs. And this all indicates a certain passage of time for that to have happened. That's where the real puzzle comes in. Not only the question about who done it, but the question of how did this all transpire in that period of time? Now, you want to know what I think? I was just going to ask, what do you think happened?

Well, you know, I don't mean to laugh about Bobby because I love his music very sincerely, and I feel almost that he's part of my DNA at this point in time. But what I believe happened, and without mentioning names again, although we've gone through a couple of names, I believe that he was being pressured. Now, my belief is that the pressure was about signing with a new entity, or maybe somebody was vengeful, jealous. He knew them because he went. I think that it was intended as a threat. I think it was to show him, hey, look, you can't do this kind of a stuff.

Smarten up. Scare them. Scare tactics. But the scare tactics went wrong. And when you've got your windows rolled up and you're in the car and you pass out and there's gas in the car, things can happen. He was definitely more than just a little roughed up as well, you know, but I don't think that they intended to kill him. If they had, why would they bring it? Why would they endanger themselves to bring the car back into the lot? It just doesn't make sense. So much of it doesn't make sense.

So you think someone maybe called him to draw him away from home late at night? Right. And he knew them, and so that's why he went, a colleague or a woman maybe. And he gets there. They put the pressure on him. It might have been a ruse to get him there. They beat him up, maybe more than they thought they had planned to. That's why he's bruised. And the injuries in some way and the gasoline fumes in the car, it all leads to his death.

Right. Whether he was able to drive home or not is still something that I can't wrap my head around. The suggestion is, and someone has said, there was one report or maybe two at the time that was never seriously taken into consideration that someone was seen leaving the area of the car before Mrs. Fuller spotted the car. And if that was the case, then maybe somebody drove it back and positioned him in that way.

I mean, it's out there. It is out there. Do you think someone out there knows something and may come forward? Definitely. I absolutely think so. I absolutely think so. I mean, there's people to this day who believe that they know, but they won't come forward and say. It boils down to hearsay, and it boils down to, hey, that was a long time ago.

But I believe that it will happen. I honestly believe that. Bob Keene died in 2009. Morris Levy of Roulette Records died in 1990. Many of the musicians Bobby worked with have died. Randall Fuller declined to talk with us. In the past, he's told reporters that he didn't feel comfortable talking about his brother's death. If it was foul play, he told the El Paso Times, then the guy who did it is still running loose.

I don't know. To tell you the truth, I think it was an accident. I think somebody accidentally killed him and staged a little scene there that didn't really work very well. But my opinion is that somebody accidentally killed him and just, I don't think it was an intentional murder for any financial gain or anything like that. I just don't believe it was. I think it was an accident. Could have been anybody. So we may never know what happened. What's your life like now?

Do you still play the drums? No, I got a little bit old for that. I still play them. I just don't pack them up and move them anymore. I kind of outgrew that. But if there's a set around somewhere, I'll bang on them a little bit. Today, when you're in a store or watching a movie or driving in your car, wherever it might be, and you hear I Fought the Law or Letter Dance, what does that feel like?

Oh, you know, it's always kind of a little warm, fuzzy feeling in there. But, you know, it's been so long that I really just don't even think about it anymore you know it's just it's impresses me that people still want to hear the old song after all these years you know most most of the kids nowadays that have no idea who Bobby Fuller is but if you say I fought the say, oh yeah, everybody's heard the song, they just don't know who did it. In the spring of 1966, Bobby and Randall Fuller were interviewed in a magazine called Hit Parader. Bobby would die a few months later that July. He tells the interviewer that he'd like to visit Hawaii. He says, I'd like to conduct a symphony just one time, like the William Tell Overture.

I like Stravinsky, Maurice Ravel's Bolero. When I hear that, I go in another room and try to add to it. He said his fans range in age from 13 to 30 years old. He said, no matter how old they are, they all react the same. In Los Angeles, he said, they're getting more excited. I'm getting more excited. We made a special playlist featuring music discussed in this episode. You can find a link to it in the show notes. Criminal is created by Lauren Spohr and me.

Nadia Wilson is our senior producer. Susanna Robertson is our producer. Audio mix by Rob Byers. Special thanks to Mike Arnold. Julian Alexander makes original illustrations for each episode of Criminal. You can see them at thisiscriminal.com. We're on Facebook and Twitter at Criminal Show. Mary M. Linna's book about Bobby Fuller, written with Randall Fuller,

is called I Fought the Law, The Life and Strange Death of Bobby Fuller. Criminal is recorded in the studios of North Carolina Public Radio, WUNC. We're a proud member of Radiotopia from PRX, a collection of the best podcasts around. I'm Phoebe Judge. This is Criminal. Radiotopia. from PRX. is a prescription medicine used to temporarily make moderate to severe frown lines, crow's feet, and forehead lines look better in adults. Effects of Botox Cosmetic may spread hours to weeks after injection causing serious symptoms. Alert your doctor right away as difficulty swallowing, speaking, breathing, eye problems, or muscle weakness may be a sign of a life-threatening condition.

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