Taking Sides: Rock N Roll VS. Rock.

I was thinking about how Pink Floyd is "rock music" but that there's basically nothing about them that can be called "rock and roll." Was trying to pinpoint what that is - a spirit or attitude I guess. It's not like they don't have any blues or R&B roots, it's more that, like, rock and rolling isn't what they're about.

The ‘& roll ‘ s dropped when you can’t dance to it IMO.

I was just wondering if the Byrds were the first "rock" band, but the liner notes to their first album make a point of describing the dancing at their shows. The Mothers or Cream, maybe?

yeah that seems simple enough. I guess in that sense a lot of hippie rock bands can still be called rock and roll bc people did in fact dance to them - the Jimi Hendrix Experience, the Dead, etc. So can a lot of punk rock. Whereas prog is not, regardless of tempo. Is there such a thing as "prog rock and roll"?

Also would Syd-era Floyd still constitute rock and roll? Seems like it probably would.

Some American bands like Kansas or early REO Speedwagon would do prog-flavoured songs on the same records with more roots or traditional rock. Plus All Good People by Yes, Are You Ready Eddy? by ELP, the ending of Too Old to Rock 'n' Roll by Jethro Tull.
I'd say the bridge of Money (sax and guitar solos over a blues shuffle) is more rock 'n' roll than anything Syd ever did!

it's rock and/or roll

That first Floyd acetate is right on rock and roll, Lucy Leave/King Bee.

All Good People is the least rockin' rock and roll song ever. And Money is in seven.

The bridge of "Money" is in 4/4.

This discussion made me realize an interesting paradox: blues was one of the original components of rock 'n' roll (1955-1965), but the moment when it makes a strong appearance in popular music made by whites is the same time that the music becomes straight rock. I mean there's objectively a lot more blues in Cream and Paul Butterfield than Buddy Holly, whatever your opinion of the music.
That implies that one of the defining characteristics of early R'n'R was an abandonment of the adult stance and pretentions of the blues, which only reappeared in white popular music in about 1966. This proves that Muddy Waters and Roger Waters are the same person.

I mean, "Stairway to Heaven" and "Come Sail Away" were huge slow dance songs, right?

Stairway was "our song" at my wedding

which is weird cos i"m not married

They make the children really ring

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QOD0VjuPwx8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aVWhVSPngBw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KwrpNVBVjKA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q3XfCvU2lxE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V2TdxOyId3I

It seems to me that the original rock 'n roll was more inspired by post-WW2 electric blues, jump blues, or rhythm & blues (however you classify it) i.e. Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Ike Turner, Elmore James... whereas what happened in the mid-'60s was white rockers discovering earlier acoustic blues from the Delta like Skip James, Robert Johnson, Charlie Patton et al which of course was in the lineage that had led to electric blues etc.

Is there such a thing as "prog rock and roll"?

yknow, I've been wanting to talk about this distinction here for years, but ILM doesn't seem to look kindly on discussions of the demise of rock, etc etc…

seems to me when you took the roll out, then you had "rock music." Self serious, aspiration to significance, Dylan, the Who, late beatles, prog, "this is the classical music of now," all the way through "rappers aren't musicians," "Dua Lipa and Megan thee Stallion are sluts," "what happened to real music?" Chiefly, "rock music" is what was marketed to white baby boomers and successive generations via major labels and was considered the center of global music culture…until when, exactly? 20 years ago?

there is a considerable case to be made that rock and roll is the disreputable music centered around african american performers and concomitantly influenced as such since, what, 1945-1955? concerning partying, fucking, doing drugs and all manner of very fun things. and the music that does that now is hip-hop… the people that I know who are not particularly attuned to music culture with kids around 8-15 most lament that those kids listen to this music that disrespects women and celebrates mindless consumerism… and many many musicians (not very accomplished ones, mind) and many self-identified music lovers are, like, Trump supporter-level angry that rock-styled or music made with traditional instruments are no longer prioritized… like, kids should experience music exactly the way they did 30/40/50 years ago.

All Good People is the least rockin' rock and roll song ever. And Money is in seven.

― longtime caller, first time listener (man alive), Monday, January 18, 2021 10:30 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

well yeah, the first half isn't very rockin' but the second half is straight boogie-woogie

Rock n roll vs. rock and roll vs. rock 'n roll vs. rock & roll. I like rock and roll the best.

veronica moser - Does this suggest that "rockism" was inevitable with the rise of rock? I'm sure many Elvis and Chuck Berry fans in 1957 hated Beethoven, jazz and Perry Como, but they presumably did so unpretentiously. A lot of older rap fans (not all of them white) hate newer rap as well.

VM: don't see how say Highway 61 Revisited and Blonde on Blonde aren't rock and roll records drawing on the tradition you're talking about?

But there's also a strain of anti-rock and pro-rock-and-roll rockism imo, the Lester Bangs school. Maybe less relevant today. Maybe better called "rock-and-rollism"?

That's true! But you needed the pretensions of Rock to have something to work against. Can you imagine Bangs writing "gonzo rock crit" in 1958, in Billboard or some teen mag?

anti-rock rockism could be called punkism or proto-punkism but it ended up entrenching the worst pretentions of rock in spite of itself

and punk is more rock than rock and roll since most of it doesn't swing

so what makes soft rock 'soft'? is distortion allowed at all?

Highway 61 Revisited, Blonde on Blonde and eleventy billion jillion other records I love are prized by rockist for rockist reasons, and are also rock and roll records as I set up. Sure! But the way many of those eleventy billion rock and roll records are received are not as rock and roll, but as ROCK. Bob Dylan is a great example of an artist that becomes more and more fun to listen to when you think of him as a rock and roller, like say, Young Thug or 21 savage rather than, I dunno, Baudeliare or some shit…I admit that part of my motivation is that I personally don't want to say that rock and roll is over, and that personages no less than ex ILM big shot M M**** ahs postulated that hip-hop is as profound a break from rock and roll as rock and roll was from Broadway music in 1956…

Have we worked out that Sgt Pepper was responsible for Brexit yet?

I don't really want to stop the show
But I thought that you might like to know
We will not continue to play
If anybody here votes "Remain"

People totally danced at math rock gigs btw. Even Rush crowds weren't exactly sedate during "Spirit of Radio".

...which features Jerry Lee Lewis/Little Richard piano pounding!

britpop recycling/decontextualisation of sgt pepper aesthetics (among others) is responsible for brexit imo

Approximately 85% of British rock/pop music by white people is weaponized nostalgia.

Since when, do you think?

The mid '60s. My version of "would you kill baby Hitler?" is "would you kill Ray Davies?" because I feel like a vast proportion of toxically nostalgic English pop-rock can be directly traced back to the fucking Kinks.

I know you don't like them, but Village Green Preservation Society and Arthur are actually about the perils of nostalgia, not a celebration of it.

i for one support kinkshaming itt

spacemen 3 are actually about the perils of taking drugs, not a celebration of it