When You Hear 'Rock & Roll', What Does That Mean To You?

Damn, Blowtorch is here doing a pre gig inspection!!

 

I think once you define it, or say it is or isn't this or that, it starts to get boring.

 

I think of the Rolling Stones.

 

If it doesn't make you move or tap your foot, it ain't rock n roll. It's all about that beat, I don't understand why there's so much confusion here. Rock n roll has always been easily definable to me. It's just rockabilly/blues/country played loud, fast and with more frantic energy.

 

I tend to think of the Stones as well. "Respectable" for example.

Hard to say what it is. Easier to say what it isn't...or rather I notice the things that can take the rock and roll out of something entirely – no matter what else is happening on stage.
• Nobody sweating on stage
• Lyric/music stand on stage
• Orthodontist guitars (anything with a blue quilted maple top or similar)
• Shorts on a performer (I suppose Angus Young gets a pass on this one and so would a kid fronting a punk band)

 

I think of Rock n' Roll as an idea and song styling of the 50's that spawned lots of rock, hard rock, soft rock and other. A lot of the Southern Rock has pretty much nothing in common with with Rock and Roll and is more blues/soul related. It's really hard to nail this stuff down...

Even a ton of Rolling Stones fits other genres better than R&R...

 

Here you go! Definition straight from the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum. HeHe...which will lead to more debate

http://rockhall.com/blog/post/10154_the-roots-and-definition-of-rock-and-roll/

 

P.S. My mind also immediately thinks of the Stones when I read or hear this term.

 

'Rock & Roll' was a euphemism for sex, as was 'Reggae'.
'Jazz' was a euphemism for a man's 'precious bodily fluids'.
Is there a pattern here?

 

I too think of the Stones. Playing loud music AND giving the finger to the establishment is mandatory in my book...

 

Two words...Chuck Berry.

He's where all the elements of rock and roll first came together...the boogie rhythm on the guitar's bass strings, the heavy back beat, the stop and start thing, the lyrics that rap and rhyme and the guitar lead as we know it. Oh yeah, the stage presence thing with the duck walk etc. too...attitude!

He's #1 on the Rock and Roll Mt. Rushmore.

That move starting at 1:16...that's rock and roll. I think it was Keef who said that rock and roll happens below the waist.

 

An interesting article, but Hall & Oates?! Isn't that elevator easy listening rock or something? I keep going back to Rolling Stones as the R'nR standard definition. Pretty much the thinking by Honest Charley.

 

Often thought about this. On the one hand, it's Elvis, Little Richard and Bill Haley. On the other, it's the Stones, The Black Crowes, Dave Edmunds, The Faces.

Two meanings for the same term.

 

Rock and Roll means the same thing as saying Classical or Big Band or Easy Listening, it's just a generic term that means nothing until you get down to the sub-divisions and sub-sub-divisions then you can wax poetic to your hearts content.

 

Rock 'n Roll is the '50s in my head. Just plain rock is everything else under the sun.


That right there is rock 'n roll.

 

I can tell who on this thread either read Nick Tosches, or would like to. I tend to agree with them. By the time Elvis moved past those first Sun sessions, Rock n' Roll had come and gone. Bill Haley lost the Rock n' Roll by the time he cut Rock Around the Clock.

Doesn't mean I don't love a lot of music since, but It Ain't Rock 'n Roll to me. Yeah, I'm looking right at you, Billy Joel - it's decidedly NOT all Rock n' Roll.

 

Nick Tosches YES

MilwMark when you are right, you are absolutely square on

What the r n r hall of lame has to say about anything is absoutely irrelevant to rock n' roll