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Post by Kapitan on Nov 13, 2022 16:15:39 GMT
The strangest things come into a person's head at random times. I was showering this morning and began wondering what artist of the 70s might be best considered to "own" that decade in the way the Beatles did the 60s. But rather than answer the question (though I did have a few candidates in mind), I thought about the idea of defining decades in the history of rock and roll (loosely defined).
Rather than dive into that specific question, then, I thought maybe we could take a look, decade by decade, at the history of the popular music we generally think of as rock and roll. While arguments can be made to the contrary, I think the 1950s are most commonly considered at least the practical genesis of the genre, and so we'll start there. Most of us don't remember the 50s, but we know a thing or two about them, anyway. (And some of us aren't familiar with the more recent decades, either; but hey, we can all chime in whenever and however we'd like.)
The idea is: what comes to your mind when you consider a decade? Approach it from any angle: what artist(s) "owned" the decade? What were the dominant styles? How did it fit into popular culture and larger trends? If you were around, how did you consider it then (and how has your opinion changed to now)? What are the greatest artifacts of the decade?
When I think of the '50s, I think...
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Post by kds on Nov 14, 2022 13:51:31 GMT
When I think 50s, I think of the great early pioneers of rock and roll - Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis, Elvis Presley, etc.
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Post by jk on Nov 14, 2022 14:01:37 GMT
Nice idea, sir. Well, I think of the generation gap, with some great music on either side.
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Post by Kapitan on Nov 14, 2022 14:05:36 GMT
When I think of the 50s, I think of ... the nostalgia for the 50s! Probably like a lot of people roughly my age, the 50s were delivered to us via the latter 70s and early 80s, mostly. Growing up, the 50s were more "Happy Days," American Graffiti, Grease, and the Stray Cats than Little Richard, Eddie Cochran, Elvis Presley and Fats Domino.
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Post by kds on Nov 14, 2022 14:10:36 GMT
And, how could I forget, my window into the 1950s as a kid was through the movies Back to the Future and Stand By Me. In fact, I used to have a tape of the Stand by Me soundtrack that I played pretty regularly.
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Post by Kapitan on Nov 14, 2022 14:26:32 GMT
And, how could I forget, my window into the 1950s as a kid was through the movies Back to the Future and Stand By Me. In fact, I used to have a tape of the Stand by Me soundtrack that I played pretty regularly. Oh yeah, those would definitely go for me, too.
There was also a chain of restaurants--I don't know whether this was a smaller regional chain or a national one--called Ruttle's Bar & Grill that had that retro style. The food, decor, and music were all very 50s inspired. You would get a burger, fries, and an old-fashioned malt.
Meanwhile, throughout all of these shows, restaurants, movies, etc., there was the constant commentary from my parents: "you could get a McDonald's hamburger for five cents in those days," etc. That drove me nuts ... and now I find myself doing the same thing. "you could get a Subway 6-inch sub for $1.99"...
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Post by kds on Nov 14, 2022 14:29:37 GMT
And, how could I forget, my window into the 1950s as a kid was through the movies Back to the Future and Stand By Me. In fact, I used to have a tape of the Stand by Me soundtrack that I played pretty regularly. Oh yeah, those would definitely go for me, too.
There was also a chain of restaurants--I don't know whether this was a smaller regional chain or a national one--called Ruttle's Bar & Grill that had that retro style. The food, decor, and music were all very 50s inspired. You would get a burger, fries, and an old-fashioned malt.
Meanwhile, throughout all of these shows, restaurants, movies, etc., there was the constant commentary from my parents: "you could get a McDonald's hamburger for five cents in those days," etc. That drove me nuts ... and now I find myself doing the same thing. "you could get a Subway 6-inch sub for $1.99"...
It's funny how that works isn't it? I can't say I recall Ruttle's, but I remember a place called Johnny Rockets that had a bit of a 50s theme.
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Post by lonelysummer on Nov 14, 2022 20:49:14 GMT
Ruttles? I thought that was a British Invasion band? Twist and Rut, Rut Me Do, Please Rut Me... When I think 50's, I think Little Richard, Fats Domino, Elvis, Chuck Berry, Carl Perkins - I think of the beginnings of rock and roll. I also think of how much they changed the culture. The U.S. was still very segregated, and conservative. It blows my mind that someone as outrageous and different as Little Richard could become a star in that time. People were outraged by Elvis Presley dancing and moving to the music, that seems tame to me compared to a young black man with mile high hair wearing makeup and screaming at the top of his lungs! Being a baseball fan, I also think of the black players that emerged after Jackie Robinson - Willie Mays, Ernie Banks, Henry Aaron, Frank Robinson - and how they quickly rose to the top of the sport. It must have been an exciting time to be alive and see all the changes happening.
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Post by Sheriff John Stone on Nov 15, 2022 0:13:12 GMT
What comes to mind when I consider a decade? I usually think of two things - music and sports (teams AND players). Movies would be a distant third. I also tend to break the decades in thirds (early, middle, and late) or in halves.
One quirky thing about the 1950s - I usually start at around 1954-55 and rarely start at 1950. Again, maybe because of early rock & roll?
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Post by jk on Nov 15, 2022 12:45:20 GMT
I suppose one aspect of the fifties for me was the difference between music my parents allowed us to hear on the speaker set up in our bedroom (novelty stuff, Danny Kaye and the like -- no problem with that) and music that got turned off the second it started (Bill Haley suffered the most). Happily, we went to this annual local fair where the likes of Elvis, Tommy Steele and Cliff Richard were blasting out. And, where others actually liked what they were hearing! But yes, that was the attitude at home -- "howling apes clutching guitars"!
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Post by Kapitan on Nov 15, 2022 13:42:35 GMT
If forced to choose a musician/band who "owned the '50s," is the choice Elvis Presley? I think in terms of impact on culture, it seems it probably has to be him ... or is that just the mythology? I'm curious what you all think.
Obviously this wouldn't be to say nobody else was massively important, any more than saying the Beatles owned the '60s would mean Dylan, the Beach Boys, etc., were irrelevant. But if you HAD to name just one name ... is there anyone but Elvis?
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Post by kds on Nov 15, 2022 13:52:32 GMT
If forced to choose a musician/band who "owned the '50s," is the choice Elvis Presley? I think in terms of impact on culture, it seems it probably has to be him ... or is that just the mythology? I'm curious what you all think.
Obviously this wouldn't be to say nobody else was massively important, any more than saying the Beatles owned the '60s would mean Dylan, the Beach Boys, etc., were irrelevant. But if you HAD to name just one name ... is there anyone but Elvis?
It terms of impact on pop culture, it's probably Elvis. But, here's a dirty little secret of mine. I'm..not really a fan. I get how influential he was, and all that, and appreciate that he released a lot of iconic music. But, just to my hears, it doesn't do a ton for me. With the exception of some of his Christmas music. If I had to pick one personally, I'd probably go with Chuck Berry.
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Post by jk on Nov 15, 2022 14:44:08 GMT
It terms of impact on pop culture, it's probably Elvis. But, here's a dirty little secret of mine. I'm..not really a fan. I get how influential he was, and all that, and appreciate that he released a lot of iconic music. But, just to my hears, it doesn't do a ton for me. With the exception of some of his Christmas music. If I had to pick one personally, I'd probably go with Chuck Berry. Interestingly, Chuck was the only pop/rock musician to make it onto the Voyager Golden Record. (Louis Armstrong's there too but as a jazz musician in the 1920s.) So no Elvis -- and no Beatles. All that aside, if I had to name just one name in this thread, it would be Elvis. Basically, he paved the way for how young people relate to music these days. Greater names would follow, needless to say, but he opened the floodgates.
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Post by Kapitan on Nov 15, 2022 14:53:07 GMT
Yes, I think that whatever one thinks of Elvis specifically as a musician himself, he took a kind of music that was not going to otherwise be truly mass-market level popular in the U.S. at that time (because one major strain of it--the R&B or blues aspect, as opposed to the C&W aspect--was largely performed by black musicians, and the country still had a Jim Crow south and frankly a pretty segregated and racist everywhere else) and exposed white teenagers to it. White people became an audience for more black musicians, and white people started playing that kind of music in greater numbers.
That's a simplified narrative, as all "grand narratives" end up being. But I think it's probably largely true, too.
Some people I know hate Elvis with a passion, thinking he was a virulent racist because he stole black people's music and performed it for his own credit and benefit rather than promoting those original musicians. I'm not so sure about that. I've got no idea whether or to what degree he was racist (though being a man of his time, it wouldn't surprise me at all if he were at least somewhat racist compared to what most people think today), and yes, perhaps he could have promoted black musicians more vociferously throughout his career. But then you'd also have to think about whether the music would have taken off as it did, and opened doors as it eventually did. It might have just relegated him to footnote status, frankly, rather than the Ed Sullivan show and such. Let's say he played in an integrated band and championed the often-black composers of the music...would it have been a tree falling in the woods with nobody to hear it?
So in that way, I think his influence was massive. Yes, he probably got more credit than he deserved in some ways, just as the white popularizer of largely black music; but he also took a lot of arrows from white America for playing that music.
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Post by The Cincinnati Kid on Nov 15, 2022 15:27:08 GMT
I guess the obvious answer would be Elvis. He's certainly back at the forefront for everyone with the movie that came out earlier this year (which was very good, btw). I'm surprised nobody has really mentioned Bill Haley and his Comets. Maybe it wasn't always this way (and may not be again with the way early rock and roll is viewed), but growing up in the 00s, Rock Around the Clock was always taught in my music classes as the first rock and roll song. It being the opening song for the first (and maybe second?) season of Happy Days surely influenced me as well.
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