When Little Richard burst onto the scene in the early 1950s, he was utterly unique. Drenched in sweat, screaming, hollering and pumping his piano, he made all who followed sound tame. His stage act was so explosive that for years people assumed the real man could never match the flamboyant public image.

Little Richard made himself a star through sheer talent and personality, breaking racial and sexual taboos on his way to becoming the primal force of Fifties rock'n'roll.

Using Richard's own words, Charles White chronicles a staggering career that spanned the very inception of rock'n'roll, the rise of The Beatles, tussles with God and the Devil, and an erratic series of comebacks.