Speaking of the world-famous bands since the birth of rock music , I believe many people who do not listen to rock music have heard of it.
For example, the famous Beatles and Rolling Stone in the 1970s and 1980s Queen(Queen ), Guns N' Roses (gulls and roses, which are commonly known as gun flowers) , and GreenDay (green day band) , which has a deep influence on the younger generation.
But if these bands are marked with their style positioning, most people may be a little confused.
For example, Gunhua is called Hard Rock ( Hard Rock ). The tag of Queen's early days of its establishment was Gorgeous Rock ; while Green Sun is a young trend punk band .
How do these tags come about? How are each style formed? With so many style categories, how can we distinguish them?
Don’t worry! Starting today, we will focus on rock bands and systematically spread the important and common rock music styles of to for you in three issues, so as to help you have a deeper understanding of band culture and have clearer cognition and ideas when listening to music.
Today's content will focus on the birth of rock music and focus on explaining the origins and characteristics of the styles such as folk rock , hard rock, heavy metal , psychedelic rock , avant-garde rock and other styles derived from this basis.
1 The birth of rock music
Rock music was born in the United States in the 1950s.
At that time, with the development of technology, electroacoustic instrument had been born and used in music performance. The fresh and exciting tone was refreshing and laid the technical foundation for the birth of rock music.
On the other hand, after experiencing World War II , the US economy gradually recovered and people's lives became increasingly prosperous. As the pace of life accelerates, people are tired of the seriousness and length of classical music and tend to pursue a more relaxed and enjoyable cultural trend; and for teenagers who grow up in peacetime and are full of rebellious hearts, they are more willing to seek a more exciting music type.
The lyrics are simple and fresh, with a strong rhythm. There is a huge demand for rock music.
The source of rock music is actually complex and extensive. Early rock music was mainly influenced by blues , country music , gospel music, jazz , etc. usually believes that rock music is the product of the combination of rhythm and blues and country music .
951, an American radio announcer named Alan Fried first used the word "Rock'n'Roll" before playing music, and named this music "rock'n'Roll".
955, a singer named Bill Harry covered and recorded a blues song called "Rock Around the Clock" ( "Day and Night Rock" ), and stayed at the number one position in the billboard in the United States for eight weeks, causing a huge sensation. And as the song's influence spreads overseas, the concept of "rock" has been further promoted globally.
Harry also formed his own band - "The Comet Band". The band first used country music as its main style, and later began to perform black music in full. A large number of their later songs were created with blues as a template, using a lot of syncopation and fast rhythms, which sounded dynamic.
▲ Comet Band's exaggerated performance style is very popular
Comet Band Use electric guitar to replace piano and wind music to become the band's main instrument . bass cooperates with drums to create a strong rhythm, lyrics like catchy slogans and sonorous singing ... These all create a classic paradigm for rock , and we can still find these elements in today's rock music.After
, Harry and his "Comet Band" also became the first international rock stars.
At the same time, the attempts and changes of popular singers such as Elvis Presley (Elvis Presley ), Barty Hawley and other popular singers on Bruce Music have further brought rock music into the public.
Just like that, the first group of rock stars explored and created a new music style of "rock" with flexible and bold expressions and passionate rhythms based on music such as R&B, and have been followed by people for the next few decades.
Although rock music was born in the United States, in the 1960s, rock music belonged to the United Kingdom. The emergence of Beatles and Rolling Stone has captured the hearts of a large number of young people all over the world.
These two old British rock bands are based on American blues, rhythm and blues and early rock music. At the same time, different elements are also integrated in the creation process, such as Bob Dylan 's folk style, psychedelic music , Indian music , etc., making immeasurable contributions to the development, growth and innovation of rock music.
2 The style of rock bands evolved
From the birth to development of rock music, it itself is a history of continuous absorption, reference and innovation. Each band is constantly integrating various styles and absorbing different ethnic cultures. Therefore, in later development, rock music gradually produced complex and huge style branches.
Let’s first introduce several important and common rock music styles that were born in the 1960s.
. Folk rock
Folk rock grew stronger in the 1960s and was mainly influenced by folk music from the British Isles.
Folk rock combines the simple and direct melody of folk music with the strong beat of rock music, and uses rock instruments such as electric guitar , electric bass and drums to perform, and uses popular means to express the philosophical song theme.
965, Bob Dylan, known for his folk song, underwent a huge change in his musical style.
During a folk music festival performance, Bob followed by a band with drum and electro-acoustic instruments - he began to try rock-style folk songs.
In the same year, Bob Dylan released the album "Sweeping Back", one of the popular singles is "The Secret Nostalgia Blues" (also known as "Underground Nostalgia Blues") , which is a work that combines folk and rock.
At the same time, many rock bands were also using rock to cover Bob Dylan's previous folk songs, such as the Ashes of Birds' cover of Bob's "Mr. Tambourine", which was more popular than his own traditional folk version.
The combination of folk and rock in "The Secret Nostalgia Blues" and "Mr. Tambourine" covered by Asuka Band marks the birth of a brand new rock style at that time - folk rock.
▲Flying Bird Band
In the 1970s, folk rock singers focused more on personal emotional expression and sang the resonance of most people. Folk rock style remained popular until the early 21st century.
. Hard rock and heavy metal
Hard rock and heavy metal vocabulary seem to appear together and are often exchanged in general. The common characteristics of the two are noisy, powerful and aggressive, and they are easily confused, but in fact they have different musical origins and are quite different overall.
Hard rock is closer to the origins of blues and folk rock. hard rock singers can usually sing lyrical songs , and sing intense, noisy heavy rock, and also use bands such as acoustic pianos and acoustic guitars. Therefore, there is a wider audience.
heavy metal music is developed from the Blues Revival music based on complex (which can be understood as a small brainwashing melody) . often uses extreme and distorted sound effects to express the ultimate emotions .
Heavy metal music often contains noisy and sharp guitars, powerful chords, and heavy blows on drums. The theme of the song is usually to emphasize the fear of death, destruction, or evil. In the 1960s, some heavy metal bands' songs would be anti-war theme, showing extreme rebellion and anger.
Because many people are worried that heavy metal concerts will have a negative impact on young fans, this music style has been criticized since its birth. But these critical voices did not hinder the development and popularity of heavy metal music. They attracted generations of rebellious young people with an extreme emotional venting method.
▲British heavy metal band, Iron Lady band
. Psychedelic rock
Psychedelic rock appeared in San Francisco, USA.
In the mid-to-late 1260s, the issue of war and the civil rights movement made young people at that time believe that love, freedom and the value of individuals did not receive the attention they deserved. This desire to return to the origin of humanistic value gave birth to a new culture (or counterculture) in San Francisco , and this group is called " hippie ".
▲Hippises in the United States in the 1960s
They advocated peace and free love, liked to be innovative and unconventional and loose and casual clothes, and took LSD, a psychedelic drug that can change the mental state (this drug was not judged illegal until 1966) .
The music that hippies like is called psychedelic rock. musicians try to recreate the illusory, dreamlike feeling after taking psychedelic drugs in music, helping people escape from the outside world.
The wave of psychedelic rock reached its peak in the late 1960s, and a large number of distinctive psychedelic rock bands emerged from Britain and the United States. Such as the Grateful Death Band, the Jefferson Aircraft Band, and so on, had a profound impact on the rock bands at that time and later.
▲Jefferson Aircraft Band
. Avant-garde rock
In the late 1960s, a new branch of rock music emerged - avant-garde rock.
Avant-garde, that is, the meaning of progress and progress. It can be seen from the naming of this style that this is an ambitious rock genre. Avant-garde rock musicians are trying to find a musical style that can get away from the limitations of the two major music genres of rock and pop, and expand rock music from pop art to higher-end fields.
The final expression is to integrate rock music with classical music, jazz and even Indian music .
The popular avant-garde bands at that time, such as Genesis, added the orchestral instrument or the synthetic sound effects of orchestral instruments to create a unique musical style; some bands that had received classical music training, such as Yes, wrote rock music works in multiple movements.
▲Genesis Band
In short, Avant-garde rock is a kind of fusion of music, combining various styles, methods and genres, and a wider culture of avant-garde art, classical music and folk music .
This style was first born, and was criticized by the critics, believing that rock music has its own value and there is no need to cling to other art types, but the novel and rare avant-garde rock music is still loved and sought after by music fans.
Until the 21st century, new avant-garde rock bands are still reviving.
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Due to space issues, today's rock music style will be introduced here. In the next issue, we will continue to talk about the styles of punk, reggae, New Wave, etc. that everyone is more familiar with.
Finally, I would like to emphasize again. We have always been unwilling to classify and divide music. The reason why we have subdivided styles to explain one by one is just to help everyone better understand and remember the historical background of the birth of each music style, so as to better understand music and understand the connection between each style.
You should know that even if there are so many style categories developed by rock music, they are often intertwined or even overlapping, including the creation and performance of many bands themselves changing back and forth between different styles. Therefore, there is no need to memorize the definitions and concepts of each style by rote. As long as you can further understand the content of the music through these introductions.
OK, see you next time~
