Portal:Rock music

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Rock is a broad genre of popular music that originated as "rock and roll" in the United States in the late 1940s and early 1950s, developing into a range of different styles from the mid-1960s, particularly in the United States and the United Kingdom. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, a style that drew directly from the genres of blues, rhythm and blues, and from country music. Rock also drew strongly from genres such as electric blues and folk, and incorporated influences from jazz and other musical styles. For instrumentation, rock is centered on the electric guitar, usually as part of a rock group with electric bass guitar, drums, and one or more singers. Usually, rock is song-based music with a ⁴
₄ time signature using a verse–chorus form, but the genre has become extremely diverse. Like pop music, lyrics often stress romantic love but also address a wide variety of other themes that are frequently social or political. Rock was the most popular genre of music in the U.S. and much of the Western world from the 1950s to the 2010s.

Rock musicians in the mid-1960s began to advance the album ahead of the single as the dominant form of recorded music expression and consumption, with the Beatles at the forefront of this development. Their contributions lent the genre a cultural legitimacy in the mainstream and initiated a rock-informed album era in the music industry for the next several decades. By the late 1960s "classic rock" period, a few distinct rock music subgenres had emerged, including hybrids like blues rock, folk rock, country rock, Southern rock, raga rock, and jazz rock, which contributed to the development of psychedelic rock, influenced by the countercultural psychedelic and hippie scene. New genres that emerged included progressive rock, which extended artistic elements, and glam rock, which highlighted showmanship and visual style. In the second half of the 1970s, punk rock reacted by producing stripped-down, energetic social and political critiques. Punk was an influence in the 1980s on new wave, post-punk and eventually alternative rock.

From the 1990s, alternative rock began to dominate rock music and break into the mainstream in the form of grunge, Britpop, and indie rock. Further fusion subgenres have since emerged, including pop-punk, electronic rock, rap rock, and rap metal. Some movements were conscious attempts to revisit rock's history, including the garage rock/post-punk revival in the 2000s. Since the 2010s, rock has lost its position as the pre-eminent popular music genre in world culture, but remains commercially successful. The increased influence of hip-hop and electronic dance music can be seen in rock music, notably in the techno-pop scene of the early 2010s and the pop-punk-hip-hop revival of the 2020s. (Full article...)

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The following are images from various rock music-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1Tommy Steele, one of the first British rock and rollers, performing in Stockholm in 1957 (from Rock and roll)
Image 2Drum notation for a backbeat (from Hard rock)
Image 3Led Zeppelin live at Chicago Stadium, January 1975 (from Hard rock)
Image 4Nirvana were at the forefront of the 1990s grunge era. (from Hard rock)
Image 5Golden Earring receives a gold record in 1970. (from Hard rock)
Image 6Original member Izzy Stradlin' on stage with Guns N' Roses in 2006 (from Hard rock)
Image 7Wolfmother, 2007 (from Hard rock)
Image 8"There's No Romance in Rock and Roll" made the cover of True Life Romance in 1956. (from Rock and roll)
Image 9Kiss onstage in Boston in 2004 (from Hard rock)
Image 10Rush on stage in Milan, Italy, 2004 (from Hard rock)
Image 11Poison, seen here in 2008, were among the most successful acts of the 1980s glam metal era. (from Hard rock)
Image 12Buddy Holly and his band, the Crickets (from Rock and roll)
Image 13Sign commemorating the role of Alan Freed and Cleveland, Ohio, in the origins of rock and roll (from Rock and roll)
Image 14Elvis Presley in a promotion shot for Jailhouse Rock in 1957 (from Rock and roll)
Image 15The Who on stage in 1975 (from Hard rock)
Image 16Baker, Bruce and Clapton of Cream, whose blues rock improvisation was a major factor in the development of the genre (from Hard rock)
Image 17Aerosmith performing at Quilmes Rock in Buenos Aires, Argentina on April 15, 2007 (from Hard rock)
Image 18Foo Fighters performing an acoustic show in 2007 (from Hard rock)
Image 19Big Joe Turner and Pete Johnson's record "Roll 'Em Pete" is regarded as a precursor to rock and roll. (from Rock and roll)
Image 20Chuck Berry in 1957 (from Rock and roll)
Image 21Little Richard in 1957 (from Rock and roll)
Image 22Bill Haley and his Comets performing in the 1954 Universal International film Round Up of Rhythm (from Rock and roll)

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The Rolling Stones are an English rock band formed in London in 1962. Active for over six decades, they are one of the most popular and enduring bands of the rock era. In the early 1960s, the band pioneered the gritty, rhythmically driven sound that came to define hard rock. Their first stable line-up consisted of vocalist Mick Jagger, guitarist Keith Richards, multi-instrumentalist Brian Jones, bassist Bill Wyman, and drummer Charlie Watts. During their early years, Jones was the primary leader. Andrew Loog Oldham became their manager in 1963 and encouraged them to write their own songs. The Jagger–Richards partnership became the band's primary songwriting and creative force.

Rooted in blues and early rock and roll, the Rolling Stones started out playing covers and were at the forefront of the British Invasion in 1964, becoming identified with the youthful counterculture of the 1960s. They then found greater success with their own material, as "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction", "Get Off of My Cloud" (both 1965), and "Paint It Black" (1966) became international number-one hits. Aftermath (1966), their first entirely original album, is often considered to be the most important of their early albums. In 1967, they had the double-sided hit "Ruby Tuesday"/"Let's Spend the Night Together" and experimented with psychedelic rock on Their Satanic Majesties Request. By the end of the 1960s, they had returned to their rhythm and blues-based rock sound, with hit singles "Jumpin' Jack Flash" (1968) and "Honky Tonk Women" (1969), and albums Beggars Banquet (1968), featuring "Sympathy for the Devil" and "Street Fighting Man", and Let It Bleed (1969), featuring "You Can't Always Get What You Want" and "Gimme Shelter".

Jones left the band shortly before his death in 1969, having been replaced by Mick Taylor. That year they were first introduced on stage as "the greatest rock and roll band in the world". Sticky Fingers (1971), which yielded "Brown Sugar" and "Wild Horses" and included the first usage of their tongue and lips logo, was their first of eight consecutive number-one studio albums in the US. It was followed by Exile on Main St. (1972), featuring "Tumbling Dice" and "Happy", and Goats Head Soup (1973), featuring "Angie". Taylor left the band at the end of 1974 and was replaced by Ronnie Wood. The band released Some Girls in 1978, featuring "Miss You" and "Beast of Burden", and Tattoo You in 1981, featuring "Start Me Up". Steel Wheels (1989) was widely considered a comeback album and was followed by Voodoo Lounge (1994). Both releases were promoted by large stadium and arena tours, as the Stones continued to be a huge concert attraction; by 2007, they had broken the record for the all-time highest-grossing concert tour three times, and they were the highest-earning live act of 2021. Following Wyman's departure in 1993, the band continued as a four-piece core, with Darryl Jones becoming their regular bassist, and then as a three-piece core following Watts' death in 2021, with Steve Jordan becoming their regular drummer. Hackney Diamonds, the band's first new album of original material in 18 years, was released in October 2023, becoming their fourteenth UK number-one album.

The Rolling Stones' estimated record sales of more than 250 million make them one of the best-selling music artists of all time. They have won three Grammy Awards and a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1989 and the UK Music Hall of Fame in 2004. Billboard and Rolling Stone have ranked them as one of the greatest artists of all time. (Full article...)

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Philip David Ochs (/ˈoʊks/; December 19, 1940 – April 9, 1976) was an American songwriter and protest singer (or, as he preferred, a topical singer). Ochs was known for his sharp wit, sardonic humor, political activism, often alliterative lyrics, and distinctive voice. He wrote hundreds of songs from the 1960s to early 1970s and released eight albums.

Ochs performed at many political events during the 1960s counterculture era, including anti-Vietnam War and civil rights rallies, student events, and organized labor events over the course of his career, in addition to many concert appearances at such venues as New York City's Town Hall and Carnegie Hall. Politically, Ochs described himself as a "left social democrat" who became an "early revolutionary" after the protests at the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago led to a police riot, which had a profound effect on his state of mind.

After years of prolific writing in the 1960s, Ochs's mental stability declined in the 1970s. He had a number of mental health problems, including depression, bipolar disorder and alcoholism, and died by suicide in 1976.

Ochs's influences included Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, Buddy Holly, Elvis Presley, Bob Gibson, Faron Young, and Merle Haggard. His best-known songs include "I Ain't Marching Anymore", "When I'm Gone", "Changes", "Crucifixion", "Draft Dodger Rag", "Love Me, I'm a Liberal", "Outside of a Small Circle of Friends", "Power and the Glory", "There but for Fortune", "The War Is Over", and "No More Songs". (Full article...)

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No Line on the Horizon is the twelfth studio album by Irish rock band U2. It was produced by Brian Eno, Daniel Lanois, and Steve Lillywhite, and was released on 27 February 2009. It was the band's first record since How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb (2004), marking the longest gap between studio albums of their career to that point. The band originally intended to release the songs as two EPs, but later combined the material into a single record. Photographer Anton Corbijn shot a companion film, Linear, which was released alongside the album and included with several special editions.

U2 began work on a new album in 2006 with record producer Rick Rubin but shelved most of the material from those sessions. In May 2007, the group began new sessions with Eno and Lanois in Fez, Morocco, while attending the World Sacred Music Festival. Intending to write "future hymns"—songs that would be played forever—the group spent two weeks recording in a riad, with the producers involved in the songwriting process. The exotic musical influences that the group were exposed to in Fez inspired them to pursue a more experimental sound, but as the sessions unfolded, the band decided to scale back the extent of those pursuits. Having grown tired of writing in the first-person, lead singer Bono wrote his lyrics from the perspective of different characters. Recording continued at several studios in the United States, United Kingdom, and Ireland through December 2008. The group had intended to release No Line on the Horizon in November, but after composing 50 to 60 songs, they delayed the release to continue writing.

Prior to the album's release, U2 claimed that their time in Fez, as well as Eno's and Lanois' involvement, had resulted in a more experimental record than their previous two albums. The band compared the shift in style to that seen between their albums The Joshua Tree (1987) and Achtung Baby (1991). Upon release, No Line on the Horizon received generally favourable reviews, although many critics noted that it was not as experimental as previously suggested. The album debuted at number one in 30 countries but did not sell as well as anticipated; the band expressed disappointment over the relatively low sales of five million copies, compared to previous albums. Following the release of No Line on the Horizon, the band discussed plans to release a meditative follow-up album, Songs of Ascent, but the project has not come to fruition. The supporting U2 360° Tour from 2009 to 2011 broke the record for the highest-grossing concert tour in history, earning over $736 million. (Full article...)

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"Strawberry Fields Forever" is a song by the English rock band the Beatles, written by John Lennon and credited to Lennon–McCartney. It was released on 13 February 1967 as a double A-side single with "Penny Lane". It represented a departure from the group's previous singles and a novel listening experience for the contemporary pop audience. While the song initially divided and confused music critics and the group's fans, it proved highly influential on the emerging psychedelic genre. Its accompanying promotional film is similarly recognised as a pioneering work in the medium of music video.

Lennon based the song on his childhood memories of playing in the garden of Strawberry Field, a Salvation Army children's home in Liverpool. Starting in November 1966, the band spent 45 hours in the studio, spread over five weeks, creating three versions of the track. The final recording combined two of those versions, which were entirely different in tempo, mood and musical key. It features reverse-recorded instrumentation, Mellotron flute sounds, an Indian swarmandal, and a fade-out/fade-in coda, as well as a cello and brass arrangement by producer George Martin. For the promotional film, the band used experimental techniques such as reverse effects, jump-cuts and superimposition.

The song was the first track the Beatles recorded after completing Revolver and was intended for inclusion on their forthcoming (as yet untitled) Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. Instead, under pressure from their record company and management for new product, the group were forced to issue it as a single and they followed their usual practice of not including previously released singles on their albums. The double A-side peaked at number 2 on the Record Retailer chart, breaking the band's four-year run of chart-topping singles in the UK. In the United States, "Strawberry Fields Forever" peaked at number 8 on the Billboard Hot 100. To the band's displeasure, the song was later included on the US Magical Mystery Tour LP.

Lennon viewed "Strawberry Fields Forever" as his finest work with the Beatles. After Lennon's murder in New York City, a section of Central Park was named after the song. In 1996, the discarded first version of the song was issued on the outtakes compilation Anthology 2; in 2006, a new version was created for the remix album Love. Artists who have covered the song include Richie Havens, Todd Rundgren, Peter Gabriel, Ben Harper, and Los Fabulosos Cadillacs featuring Debbie Harry. In 1990, a version by the Madchester group Candy Flip became a top-ten hit in the UK and Ireland. The song was ranked number 7 on Rolling Stone's updated 2021 list of "The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time". (Full article...)

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Credit: Achim Raschka

Simon Neil of Biffy Clyro performing at Rock am Ring 2013.

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Did you know (auto-generated)

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... that during his tenure as Governor of Central Java, Muhammad Ismail banned rock music concerts and car rallies?
... that raw material waste from the West influenced a generation of rock music in China?

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Garage rock (sometimes called garage punk or '60s punk) is a raw and energetic style of rock music that flourished in the mid-1960s, most notably in the United States and Canada, and has experienced a series of subsequent revivals. The style is characterized by basic chord structures played on electric guitars and other instruments, sometimes distorted through a fuzzbox, as well as often unsophisticated and occasionally aggressive lyrics and delivery. Its name derives from the perception that groups were often made up of young amateurs who rehearsed in the family garage, although many were professional. (Full article...)