From the UK Observer's website (therefore more than a bit of a Brit
slant):
Fifty years of pop
Rock'n'roll has come a long way in the half-century since Elvis first
stepped up to the microphone at Sun Studios. Here we choose 50
moments that shaped popular musical history - and in the process
changed our lives
Sean O'Hagan
Sunday May 2, 2004
The Observer
This year, pop - or, more accurately, rock'n'roll, a term which
suddenly seems almost quaint - is 50 years old. Its date of birth,
like its trajectory, is difficult to define. What is indisputable is
that Elvis Presley, a Southern white boy inhabiting a black form, was
the first, and perhaps the most dynamic, expression of a music that
was raw and primal, charged with a sexual tension that was best
measured by the shrill din of the adult voices attempting to shout it
down.
At that moment the notion of youth, both as a culture and a
demographic, was born; it defines our culture now to a degree that we
no longer question. In the transition, rock'n'roll has lost much of
its power to shock and to galvanise, has become both fragmented and
ubiquitous. Yet it endures.
The following is a collection of moments from the last 50 years of
pop, some of them obvious, some of them, I hope, not so, all of them
possessing some deeper cultural relevance. I have tried to be
objective but, at times, could not resist the urge to be utterly
subjective. I have left out Sgt. Pepper, for instance, because it
sounds to me like a period piece and, I confess, I am tired of the
canonical received wisdom that prevents us from seeing the Beatles -
and the Sixties - clearly. Conversely, I have included the Spice
Girls, not out of any fondness for their music or antics, but because
they are unquestionably a modern pop phenomenon. You, of course, are
bound to disagree. Already, I do.
The 50s
1954
Elvis Presley records 'That's All Right Mama' at Sun Studios, Memphis
Rock'n'roll's big bang. A 19-year-old truck driver fulfils producer
Sam Phillips's dream of finding 'a white guy who sings like a negro'.
There were rock'n'roll records before this one, nearly all of them by
black artists, but this is the moment when the embryonic form found
its perfect embodiment.
1955
Chuck Berry's 'Maybellene' is released
'Maybellene' was Berry's first paean to cars and girls, two of the
constants of American rock'n'roll. His guitar and songwriting style
permeated the music of the Beatles, Bob Dylan, the Rolling Stones,
the Beach Boys and Bruce Springsteen.
1958
Elvis joins the army
When he was drafted at 23, Elvis's blatant sexual energy was still
the cause of mass moral pandemonium. When he emerged from the army
two years later, he sounded old-fashioned and emasculated. 1960's
inflated tearjerker 'It's Now or Never' was the moment the first rock
rebel turned MOR entertainer.
The 60s
1961
The miracles' 'Shop Around' is released
The first hit bearing the Tamla Motown imprint. The pop-soul label
owned by Berry Gordy and operating from downtown Detroit produced
more than 100 singles by the likes of Stevie Wonder, the Supremes and
the Temptations. Dubbed the Hit Factory, it defined the pop decade
more than any other label.
1962
Phil Spector invents the Wall of Sound
Spector was the first producer as creative artist - and tyrant -
treating his vocal groups as just another component in the production
process. On multilayered 'wall of sound' songs such as the
Crystals' 'He's a Rebel' and the Ronettes' 'Be My Baby', he was the
first person to make pop sound epic.
1962
James Brown: Live at the Apollo
The first million-selling r'n'b album, and a dynamic snapshot of the
greatest soul act ever to tread the boards. Brown's influence on
modern music is immeasurable, beginning with his impact on Sixties
Mod groups and continuing apace with his presence in contemporary
urban music.
1964
The Beatles take America
Already the most popular pop group in Europe, the Beatles appeared on
Ed Sullivan's television show in early 1964. The following month, 'I
Wanna Hold Your Hand' shot to the top of the US charts, swiftly
followed by their four previous singles. In March 1964, they occupied
the top five chart positions in America. Beatlemania was born.
1964
Bob Dylan turns the Beatles on
The Beatles met Dylan at the Hotel Delmonico in New York on 28
August. He offered to roll a joint, and the Fab Four had to admit
they had never partaken before. 'Until then we'd been scotch and Coke
men,' McCartney would say later. 'It sort of changed that evening.'
1965
LSD hits the streets
Errant chemist Augustus Stanley Owsley III, completed his first batch
of home-made LSD in May 1965. The hallucinogen would dramatically
transform pop culture over the following two years, making San
Francisco the centre of hippydom and begetting Sgt. Pepper's, Pet
Sounds and an entire genre called acid rock.
1965
Bob Dylan releases 'Like a Rolling Stone'
As momentous in its way as Presley's first single, Dylan's great
stream-of-consciousness song clocked in at six minutes and
singlehandedly ended the era of the formulaic sub-three-minute pop
single. Dense, elliptical and caustic, it marked the high point of
Dylan's most intensely creative period - January 1965 to July 1966.
The birth of the modern rock song as we know it.
July 1965
Dylan plays the Newport Folk Festival
In leather jacket and shades, Dylan walked on stage clutching an
electric guitar, and all hell broke loose. As a statement of intent,
it was direct and provocative and, while the audience jeered and Pete
Seeger tried to chop though the power cables, Dylan blasted the
protest-folk era into pop prehistory.
1965
The Who: 'My Generation'
The Who were the most aggressive - and the artiest - British pop
group of the mid-Sixties. Pete Townshend dressed in Union Jack suits,
smashed his guitar and wrote songs that perfectly caught the rising
tide of teen frustration. The stuttered teen snarl of 'My Generation'
remains one of the key moments in British pop, and the most potent
evocation of Mod elitism and amphetamine-fuelled aggression ever
committed to vinyl.
1965
The Rolling Stones' '(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction' is released
Keith Richards creates the most famous riff in rock and a still
youthful Jagger sounds suddenly bored and petulant. The moment the
group transcended their American influences and broke America. In
retrospect, an omen of all the indulgence and dissolution that was to
come.
1966
The Beatles record 'Tomorrow Never Knows'
Forget the inflated period piece that is Sgt. Pepper's - this was the
moment when the Beatles went psychedelic. Tucked at the end of
Revolver , 'Tomorrow Never Knows' was an acid trip turned into a pop
song. It still sounds startling in its sonic invention.
1966
Brian Wilson makes Pet Sounds
While the rest of the Beach Boys toured their greatest hits, Brian
Wilson stayed at home in his studio and created pop's enduring
masterpiece - and his swansong. Sad songs tied to the most intricate
arrangements, it baffled the rest of the band though their vocal
harmonising has never sounded so sublime. It was followed by 'Good
Vibrations' which still sounds as close to perfection as a pop single
has ever come.
February 1967
The Redlands drug bust
The Rolling Stones enshrined their reputation as rock'n'roll outlaws
when Mick and Keith were arrested in the latter's Surrey mansion for
possession of hash and amphetamines. In court, Richards was given a
one-year jail sentence and Jagger three months, prompting the famous
Times editorial, 'Who breaks a butterfly on a wheel?' On appeal, they
were both acquitted.
1967
The Velvet Underground and Nico LP is released
Recorded in new York in 1966 but released the following year, the
Velvet Underground's debut album was the antithesis of the LSD-
fuelled optimism that characterised West Coast rock. Musically, it
merged avant-garde experimentalism with pummelling, repetitive rock,
while the often graphic songs touched on outré subjects such as
heroin use and sadomasochism. Produced by Andy Warhol and wrapped in
his now famous banana sleeve, the album was reviled on initial
release, but is now regarded by many as the most influential rock
record ever made.
1969
Jimi Hendrix Plays 'The Star Spangled Banner' at the Woodstock
Festival
Woodstock, which attracted half-a-million rock fans, was the most
dramatic mass flowering of the hippy ideal and, as with all defining
moments, the beginning of the end of that same ideal. Hendrix's
startling assault on the American national anthem was interpreted at
the time as a political statement against the Vietnam war but in
retrospect can be read as a swan song for the era of peace and love,
and for Hendrix himself. He died in his sleep the following year.
1969
The Rolling Stones play Altamont
It seems somehow fitting that the Rolling Stones, by then the self-
styled Satanic Majesties of rock indulgence and excess, should hold
the wake for the death of the Sixties. Altamont was the antithesis of
Woodstock, culminating with the murder of Meredith Hunter, a young
black man who was bludgeoned to death by members of the Californian
Hell's Angels who had been hired to provide security. The end of the
hippy era.
1969
The Stooges' first album is released
The greatest and most influential garage band ever, Detroit's the
Stooges made stripped-down, dumb and dirty rock'n'roll like no one
else. Fronted by Iggy Pop, the most outrageously self-destructive
showman rock has yet thrown up, their debut album, though dismissed
in its day, remains the template for punk rock in all its
manifestations, from the Sex Pistols to the White Stripes.
The 70s
1970
Black Sabbath release their first album
Though rock critics pinpoint the Kinks' 'You Really Got Me' from 1964
as the first proto-heavy metal single, this is the moment the form
was defined in all its loud, lumpen, pounding glory. Four hairy lads
from Brum sing improbable songs about Satan, death and apocalypse
over mind-numbingly repetitive riffs. A genre is born.
1971
Marvin Gaye: What's Going On?
One of the few instances of an artist having total creative control
and producing a masterpiece. Dismissed by Berry Gordy, Gaye's boss at
Motown, as commercial suicide, the first soul concept album tackled
Vietnam, racism and inner-city strife. A huge hit, it paved the way
for the radical Seventies soul of Sly Stone, Curtis Mayfield and
Stevie Wonder.
1971
King Tubby and Lee Perry create the template for modern dance music
Osbourne Ruddock, aka King Tubby, was an engineer who experimented
with echo and tape delay as far back as the mid-Sixties when he ran
one of Jamaica's many mobile sound systems. His innovation was to
strip a song down just to the bass pulse, then fade the vocals and
instrumentation in and out at will, leaving space for the toasters -
or DJs - to extemporise over the top. Dub was born and found its most
innovative producer in Lee Perry, who is as influential in his way as
Brian Wilson or Phil Spector. Modern dance music as we know it begins
here.
1972
David Bowie creates Ziggy Stardust
In January, Bowie told an interviewer: 'I'm gay, and always have
been.' Whatever the truth of the statement, it announced the imminent
arrival of his androgynous alter ego, unveiled the following June on
Ziggy Stardust & the Spiders from Mars . The first of Bowie s many
exotic personae, and the moment that launched glam rock. Perhaps the
most influential album of the decade.
1973
Gram Parsons dies at the Joshua Tree Inn
It is debatable whether Parsons invented country rock, but he remains
its most visionary exponent. Only 26 when he died from a heroin
overdose, he left his stamp on three classic albums: Sweetheart of
the Rodeo (1968), The Gilded Palace of Sin (1969), and Grievous Angel
(1973). Thirty years on, he remains the defining presence in
America's thriving alternative country scene.
1974
Kraftwerk release 'Autobahn'
Kraftwerk signalled the coming of the machine age, creating sleek
computerised pop in their state-of-the-art Düsseldorf studio. This 22-
minute opus to the monotony of the German motorway system reached the
US and British charts in an edited version, and subsequently became a
huge influence on hip hop, house and techno.
1975
Bob Marley & the Wailers: 'No Woman, No Cry' released
Bob Marley & the Wailers' first hit single, and the beginning of
Marley s reign as an international reggae star. As important a
catalyst as Dylan or Lennon, he remains the only reggae artist to
achieve iconic status. His death in 1981 robbed the music of its one
and only global icon.
1975
Patti Smith: Horses
Bearing one of rock's most iconic images - Robert Mapplethorpe's
stark portrait of Smith in an oversized white shirt - Horses merged
mysticism, beat poetry and proto-punk rock, transcending the sum of
its influences by sheer force of will. It remains remarkable in its
lyrical ambition and raw musical simplicity, and signals the coming
punk era even as it harks back to the Romantics. One of rock's great
leaps of faith.
1977
Saturday Night Fever goes on general release
Travolta and the Bee Gees bring disco overground. The film, though
cack-handed and corny in its evocation of New York s downtown disco
scene, propelled a struggling white actor and an unhip vocal group
into the forefront of a global dance phenomenon. The biggest-selling
soundtrack ever.
1977
n 'God Save the Queen' goes to 'Number One'
The last and greatest outbreak of pop-based moral pandemonium, and
punk's crowning glory. Released at the height of the Queen's Jubilee
celebrations, the Sex Pistols' single was deemed so unspeakable that
workers in a record plant refused to press it and official chart
compilers refused to acknowledge its chart-topping position. It
sounds gloriously irreverent now; back then it was nothing short of
incendiary.
1978
Brian Eno releases Ambient 1: Music for Airports
The moment when texture rather than song becomes an essential element
in modern pop. Music for Airports is Eno's first experiment with the
notion of ambience - modern mood music. His influence, like the music
he produced, was slow and pervasive, but is detectable in everyone
from U2 to Massive Attack.
The 80s
8 December 1980
The murder of John Lennon
Mark Chapman's shooting of John Lennon on the doorstep of the star's
New York home shocked the world. That Chapman was a fan, and someone
who craved celebrity himself, only added to the chilling unreality of
the moment. 'The world is not like the Sixties,' Lennon said in the
last interview before his death. 'The world has changed.' The first,
and most chilling, manifestation of the dark side of our obsession
with celebrity.
1981
'Ghost Town' goes to Number One
The Specials were the last and greatest flowering of the socially
conscious pop that emerged in Britain in the immediate wake of punk.
They invented the short-lived but vibrant Two Tone movement, whose
merging of reggae rhythms and punk lyricism reflected the
multiculturalism of urban Britain. 'Ghost Town' was a lament for
their beleaguered home town, Coventry, an anti-Thatcherist song that
topped the pop charts at the very moment the country was torn by
inner-city riots. Pop as on-the-spot reportage.
1981
Grandmaster Flash's 'Adventures on the Wheels of Steel' is released
Rap's first landmark single, and the first record to use samples.
Snippets of songs by Queen, Blondie and Chic were collaged into one
long seamless groove by DJ Flash. 'The Message', released the
following year, was a chart hit on both sides of the Atlantic, and
broke new ground by replacing the usual lyrical boasting with
trenchant social commentary.
1981
The launch of MTV
The pivotal moment when the pop video became as important as the pop
single. The first television channel devoted totally to music, MTV
has grown into a global brand as all-pervasive as Coca-Cola or Nike,
colonising and dulling the collective pop consciousness with the
tyranny of the rotation play.
1982
Michael Jackson: Thriller released
The biggest-selling pop record of all time, Thriller made Michael
Jackson a global icon. Then only 25, he had made his debut at the age
of four and had his first hit at 12 sharing the charts with the likes
of Jimi Hendrix and the Doors, and was already the subject of much
media speculation concerning his eternal childhood. In the light of
all that has happened since, it is worth remembering that he was once
a pop genius.
1983
The Smiths: 'This Charming Man'
Their second single and first hit, 'This Charming Man' had a
signature sound that would establish the Smiths as the most important
British group of the Eighties. Johnny Marr's chiming guitar and
Morrissey's odd, genderless lyrics combined to give a new spin to
what was essentially a classic rock sound. Quintessentially English,
they singlehandedly reclaimed guitar pop in a decade when it had
almost been consigned to the dustbin of history.
1983
New Order: 'Blue Monday'
A pivotal moment in British pop, and the bestselling British 12-inch
single ever. New Order were the first indie band to absorb the
technical innovations of American dance music. 'Blue Monday' merged
their trademark detached vocals with a futuristic, computer-driven
beat that harked back to disco, and had a huge influence on the
sample-driven hip hop and house music that would emerge from New
York, Chicago and Detroit later in the decade.
1984
Ronald Reagan co-opts Bruce Springsteen's 'Born in the USA'
Generally regarded as the world's greatest living rock'n'roll star,
Springsteen's most successful song was also his most bombastic. The
lyrics are about a Vietnam veteran on the poverty line, but it was
the rousing, anthemic chorus that attracted Ronald Reagan, who used
it during his 1984 re-election campaign. Springsteen was appalled.
His music, thankfully, has never sounded so strident since.
1985
Madonnna's 'Material Girl' is released
The single that propelled Madonna beyond the mainstream and made her
the most successful pop brand of modern times. Tied to a video in
which she mimicked Monroe, it was the first and most audacious of her
various self-inventions, a song that caught the consumerist thrust of
the Eighties, even as it supposedly parodied the same.
1985
Live Aid
A great moment for charity, a dreadful moment for pop. Two all-star
concerts organised by Saint Bob Geldof and beamed live into millions
of homes worldwide, the event raised £50 million for charity. One of
the greatest philanthropic events of all time, but the moment when
pop became enshrined as pure showbiz entertainment.
1987
Prince's 'Sign 'O' the Times'
Prince was the most prodigiously gifted singer-songwriter and multi-
instrumentalist to emerge in the Eighties. Momentarily ditching the
sexual thrust of his earlier music, he created the most perfect
merging of dancefloor funk and social commentary since the heyday of
politically conscious Seventies soul.
1988
Madchester and the second summer of love
The moment that dance culture moved from the clubs of Chicago and
Detroit into the heart of British pop culture and the beginning of
the era of the superstar DJ. Clubs such as London's Shoom and
Manchester's Hacienda became the new temples of ecstasy-fuelled
hedonism, and by the summer illegal raves were attracting druggy
revellers in their thousands. Manchester became the centre of post-
rave British pop, producing the Stone Roses and Happy Mondays, two of
the most crucial bands to emerge from the post-acid house scene.
1988
NWA: '***** tha Police'
The birth of gangsta rap. A record so extreme it was banned by radio
and MTV and brought the record company, Ruthless, a warning from the
FBI. It kickstarted the career of Dr Dre, the most successful rap
producer ever, and made Los Angeles rather than New York the centre
of hip hop. The machismo and nihilism that fed this record reached an
apogee of sorts with the murders of Tupac Shakur and Biggie Smalls.
The 90s
1992
Nirvana: 'Smells Like Teen Spirit'
The single that catapulted Nirvana into the mainstream. A heady mix
of metal and punk, with a structural dynamic that alternated Cobain's
whisper with his guttural scream, it said all there was to say about
America's lost 'Generation X', defining a strain of solipsistic angst
that continues to echo through white American rock music.
1995
Blur v Oasis
Britpop's big stand-off. Orchestrated by their respective record
labels - and hyped by the pop and mainstream media - Blur and Oasis
went head to head, releasing singles on the same day. Neither were
any good, but Blur's 'Country House' was spectacularly bad. It went
straight in at Number One.A couple of years later, when Oasis had
eclipsed Blur as the biggest band in Britain, Noel Gallagher would be
summoned to a New Labour victory party in Downing Street. The
beginning of the end of Britpop and the hype that was Cool Britannia.
MAY 1995
The Spice Girls meet Simon Fuller
The Spice Girls were the most unlikely teen-pop phenomenon of the
Nineties, not least because they were the first all-girl band in an
era dominated by manufactured boy bands. They fused pop, rap and a
strident, if inconsistent, 'girl power' message, and their meteoric
rise was overseen by Simon Fuller, perhaps the most influential
player in modern British pop. In retrospect, their first
single, 'Wannabe', was a harbinger of all that followed, from Posh to
Pop Idol .
The 00s
2000
The birth of Napster
A word that still strikes fear into the heart of music business fat
cats. Launched by 19-year-old Shawn Fanning from his uncle's garage,
Napster was the download service that provided free music to an
estimated 100 million users in 2000.Now legal, downloading marks the
end of traditional music formats as we know them.
2001
George Bush declares Eminem 'The biggest threat to American youth
since Polio'
At the height of his notoriety Eminem, who had singlehandedly made
rap a medium for the kind of solipsistic whining usually expressed by
pampered white guys with guitars, received the kind of endorsement
even the biggest promo budget could not buy. Two years later, a poll
of American parents found that 53 per cent agreed that 'America's
youth find more truth in Eminem than George Bush'.
October 2003
Beyonce and the triumpth of R&B
Last October, for the first time since the dawn of rock'n'roll 50
years ago, none of the artists in the official Billboard American Top
10 was white. The ascendancy of rap and contemporary R&B as the music of choice for young Americans, black and white, was total and
irrefutable (most notably Alicia Keyes, 50 Cent and OutKast). If the
music has a figurehead, it is Beyoncé Knowles, the only woman in that
Top 10 and currently the biggest pop star of the new century.
50 Years of Pop
Moderator: SMLCHNG