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The History of Rock and Roll

Rock and roll has developed a long way throughout the years from a dance craze in the ass’s too political and cultural landscape that Is recognized worldwide. Rock and roll has come to define the roots of teenage rebellion, people who don’t follow the norms, and have disrespect for authority. The style of rock and roll itself is a melting pot of music, a combination of sounds that include jazz, country, blues, ragtime, gospel, swing, classical, and ethnic music. It can be a simple variation of three chords to a complex chromatic scale combination.

It can convey emotions such s love, hate, fear, lust, sadness, joy, disillusion, or a strong sense of reality. Many things can be said about rock but the fact Is that It Is the most widely diverse of all music genres. The earliest roots of rock and roll can be seen in jazz and blues music. Jazz was most often played with big bands but smaller combinations of bands started to evolve late in the music era that included guitar, stand-up bass, piano, drums, and a horn section. These bands soon created a Jazz and blues hybrid sound.

One of the first musicians to combine Jazz and blues was Louis Jordan who originated the “Jump lees”, an up-tempo, hard driving, blues-based dance music (Killeen 14), Cordon’s lump blues Inspired many musicians Including Wantonly Harris, an R singer that Is credited with pioneering rock in roll in 1947. Shortly after jump blues bands started playing their music it evolved into something closer to rock. Bill Haley officially made the new genre “rock” music when his song “(Were Goanna) Rock Around the Clock” appeared in the movie Blackboard Jungle in 1955, breaking rock Into the mainstream (Killeen 14).

Although Haley is credited for bringing rock to mainstream, other black artists such as 8. . King, Little Milton, Howling Wolf, and Eke Turner were the true pioneers of the rock music style but were not as popular because of their race. After the success of Haley, a Memphis studio owner, Sam Phillips was desperately looking for a rock artist that could become mainstream, Sam had previously recorded for other talented black artists but their music wasn’t getting as much attention because of racial prejudice.

Phillips’ dream of promoting a rock musician became true when a young man named Elvis Presley recorded a demo In his studio In 1954 (Killeen 18). Shortly after recording, Presley recruited a band and created a new fresh sound no one had heard so far. Elvis broke into the mainstream with his hit “Heartbreak Hotel,” changing the course of music forever. Other artists such as Jerry Lee Lewis capitalized on the sound of Elvis but did not achieve the designated place in history.

From the sounds of Elvis many other important bands of the sixties were inspired, even people a thousand miles away from America. One of these Important bands was the Beetles. The Beetles took the rock sound and added more lyrical and musical complexity to the sound. The Beetles were the starters of the “British Invasion” in 963 when they released “l want to Hold Your Hand” (Killeen 31). After their first single they had immense success with other hits such as “She Loves You” and “Woo! The Beetles continued to reinvent their music on the various other albums throughout the sixties delving Into complex, heavy existential concepts and The Rolling Stones were the second most successful band of the British invasion and dived into the mainstream with their hit “(l Can’t Get No) Satisfaction. ” The Rolling Stones had a more aggressive style with loud guitar tones and driving rhythms. And while The Beetles touched on more clean-cut topics, the Stones hocked people with songs about casual drug use and careless sex.

Other influential bands of the British Invasion include The Who, Cream, and The Kinks who are now some of rocks greatest legends. At the end of the early sixties rock led into a new direction heavily influences by drug use called the “psychedelic era” of Rock. The leader of this stage in rock was the Grateful Dead. The Grateful Dead fused country, blues, Jazz, and bluegrass on electric instruments and held “acid tests” where LSI was given to thousands of people and a concert was held all day. Janis Joplin was also a major part of the psychedelic era. Uses also heavily influenced Janis, who greatly admired the female blues singer Dotted (Killeen 65). Janis is most remembered for her heavily emotional voice in songs such as “Piece of My Heart” and “Ball and Chain” where she sang with her face contorted, sometimes stamping her feet, clutching the microphone with one hand, and a whiskey bottle with the other. Of all the artists of the psychedelic era, Jim Hendrix was the most influential. Jim took inspiration from the soulful guitar of blues players and developed his own style from it.

Jim was left-handed and played his Cotoneaster guitar upside down while reading unearthly sounds that humbled other guitarists of the time. Hendrix was unknown until playing at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967 where he played an amazing array of songs and then lit his guitar on fire at the end of the show (Destructs 133). Although Jim seemed like a very wild and unpredictable person on stage he Nas actually a focused musician, that part of Ism’s personality is explained in this quote by Ernie Sisley: “The best musicians are very observant.

They hold their arms Enid, willing to embrace suggestions; they study their craft, and Jim certainly did all that. (Lankan 102) But as several of the psychedelic artists did, Hendrix died accidentally while he was drunk and overdosed on sleeping pills. Although Hendrix only released four albums in the four years of his career he is considered the greatest guitarist of the twentieth century. The artists that progressed after the psychedelic era were known as the “Monsters of Rock. ” One of these Artists was Led Zeppelin.

Zeppelin was famous for its offstage excesses in drugs and groupies but they also had one of the most amazing live performances ever. The combination of Robert Plant’s screeching vocals, Jimmy Page’s searing guitar, John Paul Joneses solid bass, and John Bantam’s arena- shattering drums could not be denied. The group fused blues into a harder driving music that relied on distorted guitar tones but also had clear acoustic and classical elements. Led Zeppelin has created some of the most memorable rock songs dealing Ninth mythology, the occult, and fantasy related genres.

The group also laid a foundation for hard rock, thrash, and heavy metal styles. Another “Monster of Rock” was the more extravagant Pink Floyd. Pink Floyd started out as a group that sounded similar to the Beetles but with more psychedelic topics. He band changed after their drug-doomed lead guitarist and Singer Sad Barrett was their groundbreaking album Dark Side of the Moon. Pink Floyd touched audiences Ninth deep thought provoking lyrics, melodic tones, and intensely moving guitar solos. He group toured relentlessly in the ass’s and even created a giant wall onstage for their album The Wall. Although the band broke up in the early eighties the bands album The Dark Side of the Moon has become the longest and best selling album of all time (Killeen 78). Another huge band, inspired by the Beetles, which took rock into a darker territory, Nas Black Sabbath. Black Sabbath created a heavy sound all their-own by using distorted tones and low guitar tunings. The front man of the band, Oozy Osborne, had a charismatic stage presence and did wild stage antics.

With the combination of Cozy’s haunting vocals and Tony limo’s heavy guitar riffs, Black Sabbath generated the first sound of heavy metal. The importance of Black Sabbath to metal was monumental and is expressed by System of a Down guitarist Darn Mammalian: ‘There’s no metal band out there that hasn’t touched Sabbath. It wouldn’t be metal otherwise. ” (Cherry 101) The early eighties spat out some of the most different genres of rock to date. One of these genres was punk rock.

Punk was very different from past rock for the basic fact that it contained no guitar solos, consisted of a variation of about three to four chords, and had front men who slurred or screamed lyrics. The first widely known punk band was the Sex Pistols. The Sex Pistols were not as widely known for musical talent as they were for rebellious lyrics, crude behavior, and major attitudes. The Pistols sung about abortion, anarchy, violence, fascism, and apathy. They even sung a song totally savaging the revered Queen of England called “God Save the Queen. Many other bands developed the punk attitude and style of rock including the Ramose, Black Flag, and the Dead Kennedy’s, Husker Du, and Bad Religion. Another genre of the eighties was heavy metal. Black Sabbath pioneered metal, and after lead singer Oozy Osborne was kicked out, he continued to write metal songs alongside guitarist Randy Rhodes. In 1981 Oozy released The Blizzard of Oz, one of the most highly revered metal albums of all time. Other bands such as Judas Priest, Defy Leopard, and Iron Maiden played their own brands of metal.

Later in the eighties other harder and faster bands arose such as Slayer, Anthrax, and Painter, ailing their genre of music “thrash metal. ” Other less serious “hair metal” bands also arose in the eighties and were characterized by their long hair and make-up Nearing tendencies. Bands such as Poison, Rat, Motley Cure, and Guns and Roses all fitted into the hair metal genre, although Guns and Roses was the most original. After the popularity of hair metal started to fade, a new style of music driven by sludgy guitars and melancholic vocals raised; this music was “grunge. The grunge movement started with the band called Soundboards, headed by vocalist Chris Cornell. The band used sarcastic but compelling and soulful lyrics of angst and guttural guitar tones that gave them their signature sound. Although Soundboards Nas greatly enjoyed by music critics, a band called Nirvana brought grunge into the mainstream with their album Nevermore. Nirvana appealed to the youth sick of hair metal and looking for a type of music that was heavy sonically and lyrically. Lead guitarist and singer Kurt Cabin wrote about disorientated youth, twisted views of Pearl Jam.

With their debut Ten, they became as widely known as Nirvana. As Nirvana Nas mostly driven by lyrics, Pearl Jam was driven by the powerful vocals of Eddie adder. Most grunge artists shunned media attention and were even, in the case like Kurt Cabin’s, more emotionally unstable because of it. On April 8, 1994, Kurt Cabin committed suicide for that reason and various others (Architects 85). After grunge’s absence, the music was adapted and transformed into a new type of music varied in style clumped up into a genre called nu-metal.

The band Helmet Nas a vital pioneer of the style that incorporated several different sounds into heavy rock. Although Helmet was not widely known, they influenced several bands with their music. The major band that they influenced was Koran. Koran was a heavy band that wrote songs about the disillusion of childhood innocence, abuse, drugs, the underground life and lust. Koran is still making influential records to this day, constantly pushing the boundaries of rock.

Modern rock today is so varied in styles from death metal to retro rock. Bands such as Thursday, Taking Back Sunday, and Bleeding Through are bands of a new breed of rock called memo (for emotional rock). Other bands such as The Darkness, Jet, and The Vines are reviving the sounds of ass’s and ass’s rock. Whether or not rock recycles its genres will be told by time. One thing can be said though; rock is a instantly changing music that has so many different and unique messages to convey to people around the whole entire world.

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