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1. History of Rock Music
1.1
Prehistory
The prehistory of rock music was not just an underground phenomenon, confined to
the back streets and byroads of blues and country music. Besides such unsung characters as
Goree Carter, Hardrock Gunter and the Harlem Hamfats, the list of rock forerunners includes
such household names as Bing Crosby, Roy Rogers and Ella Fitzgerald. (Birnbaum 4)
I have long been curious about the origins of rock music and skeptical about the
prevailing ideas on the subject. Since I began researching and writing ’Before Elvis’,
my enthusiasm for the book has only grown. Over the last decade or so, there has
been a surge of publishing activity in the fields of blues, jazz, country and other
genres that fed into the development of rock. (6)
It is widely believed that rock music is derived from the blues and that the blues, based
on dimly remembered African models, began in the Mississippi Delta. In fact, the evidence
for Delta origin of the blues is tenuous and the connection between rural blues and early rock
is oblique, mediated by jazz and country music. (7)
Bibliography
Birnbaum, Larry: Before Elvis: The Prehistory of Rock ‘n’ Roll, United Kingdom, Scarecrow
Press, 1992. Print.
Birnbaum, Larry, Web. < http://musictomes.com/larry-birnbaum-explores-the-prehistory-ofrock/>
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1.2
Rock and Roll
Mick Fleetwood states that “Rock and roll is commitment. Rock and roll is passion
and spirit.” (14)
Rock 'n' Roll has been influenced by many different types of music and has paved the way for
originality, self expression and free thought. (Tosches 19)
Rock ‘n’ roll music wasn’t taken seriously by critics or scholars at its inception and
when was finally taken seriously, the notion who hold that rock, had suddenly burst
upon the scene when white artists like Bill Haley and Elvis Presley began singing
rhythm-and-blues songs. After the British Invasion, guitar-band rock was linked to the
blues, but rock critics had little use for jazz and failed to see the relationship between
jazz and rock. (Birnbaum 4)
Rock 'n' roll has influenced cultures in different parts of the world, especially Europe.
Rock 'n' roll has many different forms, from heavy metal to classic rock, punk, alternative,
and grunge. In 1951, Alan Freed coined the term rock ‘n’ roll. Freed was a disc jockey from
Cleveland, Ohio. Although the term was referenced in songs from the 1940s, Freed used the
term to talk about the genre of music. (Birnbaum 15)
Bibliography
Birnbaum, Larry: Before Elvis: The Prehistory of Rock ‘n’ Roll, United Kingdom: Scarecrow
Press, 1992. Print.
Fleetwood, Mick: History of Rock and Roll, 1976. Print.
Lennon, John, Web. <http://www.dailycelebrations.com/rockroll4.htm/>
Tosches, Nick: Country: the twisted roots of rock 'n' roll, Da Capo Press, 1985. Print
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1.3
Heavy Metal.
Robert Walser argues that, alongside blues and R&B, the "assemblage of disparate
musical styles known as 'classical music' ", has been a major influence on heavy metal since
the genre's earliest days. He claims that metal's "most influential musicians have been guitar
players who have also studied classical music. Their appropriation and adaptation of classical
models sparked the development of a new kind of guitar virtuosity that changes the harmonic
and melodic language of heavy metal."
Heavy metal is loud and aggressive popular music. An offshoot of traditional bluesbased rock and roll, heavy metal musicians took the instrumentation and structures of
rock to a rhythmic and technical extreme, employing distorted guitar and super-fast
drumming. Heavy metal is known for its dark lyrical themes, which has gotten the
genre in some trouble over the years. Not all heavy metal bands are the same,
however, and different subgenres have popped up all over the world. (Gilmore 1)
Critic Simon Frith claims that the metal singer's "tone of voice" is more important than the
lyrics. (5)
Heavy metal is traditionally characterized by loud distorted guitars, emphatic
rhythms, dense bass-and-drum sound, and vigorous vocals. Pareles writes, "In the taxonomy
of popular music, heavy metal is a major subspecies of hard-rock, the breed with less
syncopation, less blues, more showmanship and more brute force." (New York Times, art.1)
Bibliography
Frith, Simon: The Sociology of Rock, 1978. Print.
Gilmore,
James
(eHow
Contribuitor),
Web.
<http://www.ehow.com/heavy-metal-
music.html>
Pareles, Jon: "Heavy Metal, Weighty Words" The New York Times, July 10, 1988. Print.
Walser, Robert: "Heavy metal", Grove Music Online. Print.
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2. First British Rock Bands
2.1
The Beatles
Robert Greenfield compared the Beatles to Picasso, as "artists who broke through the
constraints of their time period to come up with something that was unique and original. In
the form of popular music, no one will ever be more revolutionary, more creative and more
distinctive”. (Gross 3)
In their initial incarnation as cheerful, wisecracking mop tops, the Fab Four
revolutionized the sound, style, and attitude of popular music and opened rock and
roll's doors to a tidal wave of British rock acts. Their initial impact would have been
enough to establish the Beatles as one of their era's most influential cultural forces,
but they didn't stop there. Although their initial style was a highly original, irresistibly
catchy synthesis of early American rock and roll and R&B, the Beatles spent the rest
of the 1960s expanding rock's stylistic frontiers, consistently staking out new musical
territory on each release. (Schinder & Schwartz 160)
Through the years 1963 and early 1964, the New Yorker Michael Braun wrote a true book
about The Beatles. Lennon stated "He wrote about how we were, which was bastards. You
have to be a bastard to make it, man. That's a fact and The Beatles were the biggest bastards
on earth." (Braun 1)
Bibliography
Braun, Michael, The Penguin paperback - Love Me Do: The Beatles' Progress. Print.
Gross, Doug: "Still Relevant After Decades, The Beatles Set to Rock", 2009. Print.
Schinder, Scott and Schwartz, Andy: Icons of Rock: An Encyclopedia of the Legends Who
Changed Music Forever. Print.
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2.2
The Rolling Stones (The Strolling Bones)
Tom Wolfe stated “The Beatles want to hold your hand, but The Stones want to burn
your town.” (1)
Being in The Stones is like living in a goldfish bowl, everyone is looking at you and it
is sometimes a little difficult to see the big picture. I asked Richard to write a
commentary of his own to add perspective and objectivity to the book. In particular,
his outside take on our recordings and tours provides a more balanced view than I
would probably be able to give. (Havers 10)
In London, The Stones were the new potentates. Their hairstyles, their attitudes, their
clothes were aped by every young man with aspirations to style - from elegant, leisured
aristocrats to schoolboys barely out of short trousers. It is hard to remember now what a big
influence they were. No other musicians in history had wielded such power for social
revolution. (Sanchez 2)
Mick, Keith, Charlie & Ronnie from The Rolling Stones state that their "Fifty" book is "a
story of fifty fantastic years". They started out as a blues band playing the clubs and recently
they have filled the largest stadiums in the world with the kind of show that none of them
could have imagined. (Jagger, Richards, Watts and Wood 1)
By the time The Rolling Stones began calling themselves the World's Greatest Rock
& Roll Band in the late '60s, they had already staked out an impressive claim on the title.
The Stones always flirted with the seedy side of rock & roll, but as the hippie dream began to
break apart, they exposed and reveled in the new rock culture. (Phelge 15)
Bibliography
Wyman, Bill with Havers, Richard: Rolling with the stones, 1965. Print.
Sanchez, Tony: Up and down with The Rolling Stones, 2010. Print.
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Jagger, Mick ; Richards, Keith ; Watts, Charlie ; Wood, Ronnie: The Rolling Stones “50”,
2012. Print.
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2.3
Led Zeppelin
According to musicologist Robert Walser, "Led Zeppelin's sound was marked by
speed and power, unusual rhythmic patterns, contrasting terraced dynamics, singer Robert
Plant's wailing vocals, and guitarist Jimmy Page's heavily distorted crunch". (Walser 10)
Led Zeppelin are widely considered to be one of the most successful, innovative and
influential rock bands in the history of music. Led Zeppelin - talented, complex,
grasping, beautiful and dangerous - made one of the most enduring bodies of
composition and performance in the twentieth-century music, despite everything they
had to overpower, including themselves. (Gilmore 7)
Hundreds of British bands followed in The Beatles' wake. The Dave Clark Five, Herman's
Hermits, The Rolling Stones. Finally, by the end of the sixties, the raw, back-breaking music
of Led Zeppelin evevated the rock revolution to an absolutely manic pitch. (Cole 12)
The members of Led Zeppelin are major deities in the pantheon of rock gods. The
first and heaviest of the heavy metal monsters, they violenty shook the foundations of rock
music and took no prisoners on the road. Their tours were legendary, their lives were exalted
and in an era well known for sex and drugs, the mighty Zeppelin set an unattainable standard
of excess and mythos for any band that tried to follow them. They were power, they were
fantasy, they were black magic. No band ever flew as high as Led Zeppelin or suffered so
disastrous a fall. (Davis 3)
Bibliography
Davis, Stephan: Hammer Of The Gods (The Led Zeppelin Saga). Print.
<http://www.ledzeppelinguitar.com/led-zeppelin-books>
Gilmore, Mikal: The long shadow of Led Zeppelin, 28 July 2006. Print.
Walser, Robert: Running with the Devil: Power, Gender, and Madness in Heavy Metal
Music, London: Wesleyan University Press, 1993. Print.
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3. The British Rock Invasion
3.1
Queen and Its Beginnings (The Smile Band)
According to Nick Weymouth, Queen is one of the most bootlegged bands ever, because
bootleg recordings have contributed to the band's popularity in certain countries where
Western music is censored, such as Iran.
Their music was incredibly original in blending hard rock and pop in a way that had
never been done before. Obviously, they wrote a lot of catchy tunes that will probably
be around forever. They seem to be that kind of band that created that rock/pop
anthem that you hear at every sports arena. So, yeah, I think they are a fairly pinnacle
band. What I really like about them is that they just didn't give a shit. They're so
ridiculous and musically they are really phenomenal. Freddie Mercury was just a
beautiful singer and they are all so great as musicians and have so many great
moments where it's like, oh my God, here's a band that didn't hold back.
(Lee and Coyne 50)
Freddie Mercury states “We're a very expensive group; we break a lot of rules. It's unheard of
to combine opera with a rock theme, my dear.” (5)
At Live Aid, held at Wembley on 1985, Queen performed some of their greatest hits.
Bob Geldof thought about Queen's performance that they "were absolutely the best band of
the day", because they went and smashed one hit after another and "it was the perfect stage
for Freddie: the whole world".
Bibliography
Lee, Geddy and Coyne,Wayne: Queen: The Ultimate Illustrated History of the Crown Kings
of Rock, Voyageur Press, 2009. Print.
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Mercury, Freddie: Freddie Mercury: The Great Pretender. Print.
Weymouth, Nick: "People Watch", Fort Worth Star-Telegram, 2004. Print.
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3.2
Iron Maiden and Their Demonic References
Iron Maiden is frequently using the slogan "Up the Irons" in their disc liner notes, and the
phrase can also be seen on several t-shirts officially licensed by the band. It is a paraphrase of
"Up the Hammers," the phrase which refers to the London football club. Iron Maiden's
distinct logo has adorned all of the band's releases since their debut. (Harris 7)
M. Shadows of Avenged Sevenfold states that Iron Maiden "are by far the best live
band in the world and their music is timeless", while Trivium singer Matt Heafy comments
that "without Iron Maiden, Trivium surely wouldn't exist." Iron Maiden's sound "influenced
generations of newer metal acts, from legends like Metallica to current stars like Avenged
Sevenfold" with Metallica drummer Lars Ulrich commenting that he has "always had an
incredible amount of respect and admiration for them." (Shadows and Bienstock 5)
Iron Maiden was formed on Christmas Day 1975 by the bassist Steve Harris, shortly
after he left his previous group, Smiler. Harris attributes the band's name to a film adaptation
of The Man in the Iron Mask from the novel by Alexandre Dumas, which he saw around that
time and which had a verbal connection to the iron maiden torture device. (Barton 1)
The band always denied the notion that they are Satanists. They said it was mad.
People completely got the wrong end of the stick. They obviously hadn't read the
lyrics. They just wanted to believe all that rubbish about them being Satanists. "The
Number of the Beast" was inspired by a nightmare Harris had after watching Damien:
Omen II. (Wall 228)
Bibliography
Barton, Geoff: "Blood and Iron", 27 October 1970. Print.
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Harris, Steve: West Ham's Top Ten Most Famous Fans, And "The making of Maiden
Heaven”. Print.
M., Shadows and Bienstock, Richard: "Maiden Voyage", Voyageur Press. Print.
Wall, Mick: Iron Maiden: Run to the Hills, the Authorised Biography, Sanctuary Publishing,
2009. Print.
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4. Social Effects of Rock Music
Althea Thompson states that “in the mid-1930, rock and roll music went mainstream
and caught the attention of listeners around the world. Rock and roll artists became wildly
successful in the late 20th century and the music has had a profound influence on U.S, U.K
and global culture.” (2)
The popularity and worldwide scope of rock music resulted in a powerful impact on
society. Rock and roll influenced daily life, fashion, attitudes and language in a way
few other social developments have equaled. The rock and roll lifestyle has popularly
been associated with sex and drugs. Many stars are known as hard-drinking, hardliving characters. Of the many rock musicians who have taken drugs, some underwent
drug rehabilitation programs, but others have died. (Zinn 450)
Rock music and fashion have been inextricably linked. In the mid-1960s of the UK, rivalry
arose between "Mods" (who favoured 'modern' Italian-led fashion) and "Rockers" (who wore
motorcycle leathers), each style had their own favored musical acts. Long hair, torn out jeans,
long T-shirts, satanic necklaces, tattoos, leather jackets, pierced body and all accessories that
normally parents call indecent are typical rock style. Rock is all about being rebellious.
Rockers want to look tough both physically and mentally. Listeners want to look like their
favourite rock stars. (Reames 3)
Some religions believe that values are lost in various rock and roll music lyrics. Rock
song lyrics may have a theme of rebellion and lawlessness. Phrases like "No one can tell you
how to live your life" and "I don't care what you say anymore, this is my life", are ideas used
in many rock and roll music lyrics. These messages contradict the belief of some religious
people, that God is in active control of an individual's life. (Cobain 4)
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Bibliography
Zinn, H.: “A people's history of the United States”. Print.
Thompson, Althea: “Rock Eras: Interpretations of Music and Society”, Popular Press. Print.
Reames, Doug: “Rock Music: Culture, Aesthetics and Sociology”. Cambridge University
Press, 1990. Print.
Cobain, Kurt: Rock 'n' roll Wisdom: What Psychologically Astute Lyrics Teach About Life
and Love, Duke University Press. Print.
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