This course, part 1 of a 2-course sequence, examines the history of rock, primarily as it unfolded in the United States, from the days before rock (pre-1955) to the end of the 1960s. This course covers the music of Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry, Phil Spector, Bob Dylan, the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Jimi Hendrix, Cream, and many more artists, with an emphasis both on cultural context and on the music itself. We will also explore how developments in the music business and in technology helped shape the ways in which styles developed. Rock emerged in the mid 1950s as a blending of mainstream pop, rhythm and blues, and country and western--styles that previously had remained relatively separate. This new style became the music of the emerging youth culture and was often associated with teen rebellion. We will follow the story of how this rowdy first wave of rock and roll (1955-59) was tamed in the early 60s but came roaring back with the Beatles and the Rolling Stones and then went psychedelic by the end of the decade.
The Kinks and the Who
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From the course by University of Rochester
History of Rock, Part One
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From the lesson
The Beatles and the British Invasion (1964-66)
The Beatles transform the UK music scene and then invade America. Other Beatles-type British bands. The London blues scene and the Rolling Stones. Other Stones-type bands. The Who and the Kinks.
Meet the Instructors
John CovachProfessor of Music and Director
Institute for Popular Music
Of The Beatles, The Stones, The Beatles-type groups and The Stones-type
groups, there are two groups that really can't be figured in easily to either The
Beatles-type or The Stones-type. And that's The Kinks and The Who, both of
whom had very big success in the UK during this period we're thinking about,
'64 though '66. The Kinks actually had some success in
the US too but it's surprising how little success The Who had in the US despite
the, the presence of songs that we now think must have always been hits in this
country. So I don't want to get ahead of my story.
the thing about the, about The Kinks and The Who, one of the reasons why they
don't fit into this classification is because they both depend on powerful and
aggressive music. And its the powerful and aggressive kind
of thing that that makes them seem like there might be a little bit more like the
rolling stones in the sense of a blues influence and the power and the guitar
domination. And you know the, they're really so
strong and aggressive kind of music but then both groups have got clever.
And thoughtful lyrics where there's an emphasis on sort of developing a real
sort of sort of songwriterly kind of approach to lyrics.
And that seems to fit more with The Beatles and John Lennon and Paul
McCartney and really less with Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, and so they
blend these two kinds of things together. The songwriterly component, either it's
Ray Davies for the Kinks or Pete Townsend for the Who together with the kind of
an,sort of a powerful approach to the music and kind of blend together
qualities of the Stones and the Beatles to to, to create their own style that
doesn't really fit easily into The Beatles type or The Stones type.
Now as I said before neither group really broke as strongly in the States as The
Beatles or The Stones. and The Kinks had, had more singles
success. They had a little bit of a problem
supporting their success in the United States because they somehow managed to
get themselves banned [LAUGH], from the country.
I think they were kind of like a wild bunch.
I think they got themselves into trouble while they were here and the, the
immigration people said that they weren't interested in giving them visas to come
back, and without the ability to come back and really promote the music in this
country, they were a little bit hamstrung in terms of their sales here.
The Who, never really had much success, it wasn't really until a song called I
Can See For Miles from 1967 that got to number nine that they really had any
success. Their success in this country really
starts with Tommy, and that's outside of the consideration of, of this week's
class. We'll deal with that when we talk about
Psychadelia. Tommy is from 1969.
We think about Kinks tunes, I think about tracks like You Really Got Me which was a
number one hit in the U.K., number seven in this country in 1964.
A very sort of strong and aggressive kind of tune starting with a guitar lick that
maybe a little bit influenced by something like Louie Louie.
You Really Got Me was covered later by Van Halen in the late 1970's.
All Day And All Of The Night- Very, very similar to You Really Got Me if you're a
guitar player, you'll realize that the kind of moves you have to make to play
You Really Got Me are really only changed a little bit to play All Day and All of
the Night. And so here's an element that we see of
the craftsperson kind of thing. They, The Kinks had something that
worked. With You Really Got Me.
So they changed it just a little bit and came back with almost the same thing with
All Day and All of the Night. And as frequently happens in the popular
music business. The first one You Really Got Me went to
number one in the UK charts. And the second one got to number two.
So they were both hit singles. The second one also, getting to number
seven in this country in 1964. Tired of Waiting for You also uses a
chord progression very similar to You Really Got Me and All day and All of the
Night although now its arpeggiated out so its changed a little bit so the
similarity is not as obvious. that one went to number one in the UK,
number six in this country in 1965. And Till The End of the Day uses a lot of
the same kinds of features going to number six in the UK in 1965 and not
charting in this country. Ray Davies was to go on and, and it, as
John Lennon's lyrics start to turn more philosophical, and as Dylan became an
important performer in the summer of 1965, his lyrics would start to get much
more philosophical reflecting on society and sort of beginning to turn against the
status quo. A well respected man for example is a
good example of him offering critique of, of conformity and everyday expectations
people who are inauthentic and weren't really being who they.
Who, who they needed to be in order to be true to themselves and and true to one
another and so this kind of critical thing that you see it with the group like
Ballad of a Thin Man from Bob Dylan or Nowhere Man from John Lennon you see as
well from Ray Davies. We turn our attention now to The Who, a
group that really is in many ways, a real collection of very colorful figures.
Pete Townsend, the guitarist, a great songwriter and the guy who you know sort
of writes and thinks of all the big ideas for the group, but does only some of the
singing, some of the harmony singing every now and again some lead singing.
The singing is given over to Roger Daltrey.
Who many ways as, as Jimmy, or as Robert Plant would become later into the late
1960s and the 1970s. Kind of a sexy lead singer kind of guy
who, who just did nothing but sing the tunes.
Maybe in many ways it kind of very much a kind of a Mick Jagger or Elvis Presley,
kind of a figure. You've got this wild drummer by the name
of Keith Moon and a virtuosic bass player by the name of John Entwistle.
And between the four of them, you'll get this power trio with vocals, doing
powerful music with increasingly sophisticated lyrics and concepts behind
it. the, the first big hit that we think of
when we think of The Who, is My Generation.
Went to number two in the UK in 1965, but many people are surprised to find out
that that was never a hit in 1965 in the US.
In fact, it never even made the charts. We think that it, we often think that it
did because The Who got so big in the 70s.
That all of those early '60s hits got played on the radio, all the time.
And now, they've been rolled into the classic rock radio format.
So, it's like they've always been hits. But at the time, "My Generation" was not
a hit. Not only was it not a hit, but "I Can't
Explain", another tune that we hear all the time, was number eight in the UK in
'65. It was never a hit in this country.
"Substitute", another big song from 1965, number two in the U.K., nothing here.
And as I said before I Can See For Miles was the first kind of breakthrough, but
already that's 1967 for The Who. As I said before the big breakthrough is
going to be Tommy in 1969. The thing about The Who is that they were
part of a, a movement that happened in the UK, that never really caught on in
this country called The Mods. if you've ever seen the movie
Quadrophenia. you should check it out.
Sting plays in the movie, it's a, it's an it's an interesting film.
It's a kind of a movie interpretation of the of The Who, a concept album,
Quadrophenia. But, it's set in Brighton Beach, where
there was a famous riot between two groups, two groups of young people who
had very different values. The Rockers, who were kind of you know,
the you know, the leather jacket greased back hair type you know, chains, big
motor, big sort of, big Harley motorcycle types and the Mods, who were very sort of
well coiffed and, and, hygienic, and you know, didn't, didn't, didn't so much
drive big motorcycles as they drove like little Vespa scooters and that kind of
thing, much more sort of Pop Dandy's. In a certain kind of way, anyway they
sent, one weekend they ended at Brighton, they ended up down at Brighton Beach and
got into a fight. It was a riot that took over the whole
city and it made all the papers and it was mod, the Mods versus the Rockers.
Well it turned out The Who were the band of choice for the Mod movement.
We never really had a Mod movement in this country, but the Mods used to like
to and, listen to Motown records. They danced a lot and The Who was their
sort of iconic band. They were part of this Mod thing.
The Mod and Rocker situation in the UK, shows up in the Beatles Hard Days Night
by the way. There's one place in the movie where
their being asked a rapid flurry of questions and so they say things like to
John Lennon how did you find America and he says turn left at Greenland and they
asked Ringo are you a Mod or are you a Rocker?
Referring of course to this Brighton Beach thing.
And he says, I'm neither. I'm a mocker.
Of course, nobody in 1964 in this country had any idea what they were talking
about. But it would have been funny, and it
would've it would've been something that the people in the UK would have
understood immediately if they knew anything about the popular culture that
was going on there at that time. So, The Who are the band that's
associated with The Mods and it's, it's that association sort of drives them to
the top of the charts, or at least, it's part of it.
The driving to the top of the charts in the UK because there was no Mod movement
here. Their music never really made the
transition to America. Well, now we have talked about the Kinks
and The Who. And it's time for us to reflect for a
minute on what we've talked about during this in, this entire week of lectures.
The British invasion, as it turns out, opened up new opportunities for British
artists in the UK. And in the, and the, and this
Not only in the UK but in the US, and this had the American music business
shaken up by these new arrivals. The fact, this is, this is, actually kind
of a repeat of something that we've seen already, when all of a sudden, in 1955,
1956, 1957, all of these records from independent labels, started to cross over
into the mainstream pop charts. And they were edging out records by major
labels. And the major labels were scrambling to
be able to produce their own versions of these records.
there was a real sort of shock that went through the industry, and we see how that
turned out in the end. There were the payola hearings and all
that and by 1959 into 1960. These powers that be had taken it over
again. Well it all starts to happen again in
this country when in early 1964, the Beatles and all of these British acts
start to come and and have a tremendous amount of success.
There's a another, kind of threat that goes on there and so, the story is often
told that the British invasion totally shook up the American music business as
if everybody had to stop what they were doing and do something else.
Well, that's not really of course what happened.
But it wasn't a significant shock. in some ways, some parts in the American
music business continued as they were, as I've mentioned last week.
Phil Spector had a hit with ah,the Righteous Brothers, You've Lost that
Lovin' Feelin' in 1964. and, the, the, the if you, if you track
the progress of Motown Records through the 60's, Motown Records really starts to
hit its stride in '64, at almost the same time as the Beatles show up in this
country. If you track, for example, the hits of
the Beatles and the hits of The Supremes during the period between 1964 and 1966,
The Supremes, really, stay stay step for step with the Beatles.
And what are the Supremes, if not a girl group?
I thought the British invasion displaced the girl groups.
Well, not so much. See, they're a girl group from Detroit,
not one from New York, not from the [UNKNOWN], but still, it's a girl group
kind of thing. So there is a continuity from what was
happening before, but it's true. The Beetles and the British invasion did
shake up the music business, but by the summer of 1965, the American bands would
be back. It would be folk rock, it would be Dylan,
it would be The Byrds it would be a new kind of southern California kind of sound
and and focused in the music business. And it's to that American response to the
British invasion that we turn in next week's lectures.
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