Portal:Rock music

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Rock is a broad genre of popular music that originated as "rock and roll" in the United States in the late 1940s and early 1950s, developing into a range of different styles from the mid-1960s, particularly in the United States and the United Kingdom. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, a style that drew directly from the blues and rhythm and blues genres of African-American music and from country music. Rock also drew strongly from genres such as electric blues and folk, and incorporated influences from jazz and other musical styles. For instrumentation, rock has centered on the electric guitar, usually as part of a rock group with electric bass guitar, drums, and one or more singers. Usually, rock is song-based music with a ⁴
₄ time signature using a verse–chorus form, but the genre has become extremely diverse. Like pop music, lyrics often stress romantic love but also address a wide variety of other themes that are frequently social or political. Rock was the most popular genre of music in the U.S. and much of the Western world from the 1950s to the 2010s.

Rock musicians in the mid-1960s began to advance the album ahead of the single as the dominant form of recorded music expression and consumption, with the Beatles at the forefront of this development. Their contributions lent the genre a cultural legitimacy in the mainstream and initiated a rock-informed album era in the music industry for the next several decades. By the late 1960s "classic rock" period, a number of distinct rock music subgenres had emerged, including hybrids like blues rock, folk rock, country rock, southern rock, raga rock, and jazz rock, which contributed to the development of psychedelic rock, influenced by the countercultural psychedelic and hippie scene. New genres that emerged included progressive rock, which extended artistic elements, and glam rock, which highlighted showmanship and visual style. In the second half of the 1970s, punk rock reacted by producing stripped-down, energetic social and political critiques. Punk was an influence in the 1980s on new wave, post-punk and eventually alternative rock.

From the 1990s, alternative rock began to dominate rock music and break into the mainstream in the form of grunge, Britpop, and indie rock. Further fusion subgenres have since emerged, including pop-punk, electronic rock, rap rock, and rap metal. Some movements were conscious attempts to revisit rock's history, including the garage rock/post-punk revival in the 2000s. Since the 2010s, rock has lost its position as the pre-eminent popular music genre in world culture, but remains commercially successful. The increased influence of hip-hop and electronic dance music can be seen in rock music, notably in the techno-pop scene of the early 2010s and the pop-punk-hip-hop revival of the 2020s. (Full article...)

General images - load new batch

The following are images from various rock music-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1Big Joe Turner and Pete Johnson's record "Roll 'Em Pete" is regarded as a precursor to rock and roll. (from Rock and roll)
Image 2Led Zeppelin live at Chicago Stadium, January 1975 (from Hard rock)
Image 3Nirvana were at the forefront of the 1990s grunge era. (from Hard rock)
Image 4Wolfmother, 2007 (from Hard rock)
Image 5Rush on stage in Milan, Italy, 2004 (from Hard rock)
Image 6Original member Izzy Stradlin' on stage with Guns N' Roses in 2006 (from Hard rock)
Image 7"There's No Romance in Rock and Roll" made the cover of True Life Romance in 1956. (from Rock and roll)
Image 8Elvis Presley in a promotion shot for Jailhouse Rock in 1957 (from Rock and roll)
Image 9Little Richard in 1957 (from Rock and roll)
Image 10Aerosmith performing at Quilmes Rock in Buenos Aires, Argentina on April 15, 2007 (from Hard rock)
Image 11Tommy Steele, one of the first British rock and rollers, performing in Stockholm in 1957 (from Rock and roll)
Image 12Foo Fighters performing an acoustic show in 2007 (from Hard rock)
Image 13Golden Earring receives a gold record in 1970. (from Hard rock)
Image 14Drum notation for a backbeat (from Hard rock)
Image 15Buddy Holly and his band, the Crickets (from Rock and roll)
Image 16Sign commemorating the role of Alan Freed and Cleveland, Ohio, in the origins of rock and roll (from Rock and roll)
Image 17Baker, Bruce and Clapton of Cream, whose blues rock improvisation was a major factor in the development of the genre (from Hard rock)
Image 18Bill Haley and his Comets performing in the 1954 Universal International film Round Up of Rhythm (from Rock and roll)
Image 19Kiss onstage in Boston in 2004 (from Hard rock)
Image 20The Who on stage in 1975 (from Hard rock)
Image 21Chuck Berry in 1957 (from Rock and roll)
Image 22Poison, seen here in 2008, were among the most successful acts of the 1980s glam metal era. (from Hard rock)

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Audioslave was an American rock supergroup formed in Glendale, California, in 2001. The four-piece band consisted of Soundgarden's lead singer and rhythm guitarist Chris Cornell with Rage Against the Machine members Tom Morello (lead guitar), Tim Commerford (bass/backing vocals), and Brad Wilk (drums). Critics first described Audioslave as a combination of Soundgarden and Rage Against the Machine, but by the band's second album, Out of Exile, it was noted that they had established a separate identity. Their unique sound was created by blending 1970s hard rock and 1990s alternative rock, with musical influences that included 1960s funk, soul and R&B. As with Rage Against the Machine, the band prided themselves on the fact that all sounds on their albums were produced using only guitars, bass, drums, and vocals, with emphasis on Cornell's wide vocal range and Morello's unconventional guitar solos.

In their six years together, Audioslave released three albums, received three Grammy nominations, sold more than eight million records worldwide and became the first American rock band to perform an open-air concert in Cuba. They disbanded in February 2007 after Cornell issued a statement announcing that he was leaving the band. Later that year, Cornell and Morello released solo albums, and Morello, Commerford, and Wilk reunited with Zack de la Rocha for the Rage Against the Machine Reunion Tour.

Audioslave reunited to perform at Prophets of Rage's Anti-Inaugural Ball, which took place on January 20, 2017. Cornell's death later that year precluded any chance of further reunions. (Full article...)

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Tina Turner (born Anna Mae Bullock; November 26, 1939 – May 24, 2023) was a singer, songwriter, and actress. Known as the "Queen of Rock 'n' Roll", she rose to prominence as the lead singer of the husband-wife duo Ike & Tina Turner before launching a successful career as a solo performer.

Turner began her musical career with her future husband Ike Turner's band, the Kings of Rhythm, in 1956. Under the name Little Ann, she appeared on her first record, "Boxtop", in 1958. In 1960, she debuted as Tina Turner with the hit single "A Fool in Love". The Ike & Tina Turner Revue became "one of the most formidable live acts in history". The duo released hits such as "It's Gonna Work Out Fine", "River Deep – Mountain High", "Proud Mary", and "Nutbush City Limits" before disbanding in 1976.

In the 1980s, Turner launched "one of the greatest comebacks in music history". Her 1984 multi-platinum album Private Dancer contained the hit song "What's Love Got to Do with It", which won the Grammy Award for Record of the Year and became her first and only number-one song on the Billboard Hot 100. Her chart success continued with "Better Be Good to Me", "Private Dancer", "We Don't Need Another Hero (Thunderdome)", "Typical Male", "The Best", "I Don't Wanna Fight", and "GoldenEye". She embarked on the Break Every Rule World Tour (1987–1988), which became the top-grossing female tour of the 1980s and set a Guinness World Record for the then-largest paying audience in a concert (180,000). Turner also acted in the films Tommy (1975) and Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (1985). In 1986, she published her autobiography I, Tina: My Life Story, which was adapted for the 1993 film What's Love Got to Do with It. In 2009, Turner retired after completing her Tina!: 50th Anniversary Tour. In 2018, she was the subject of Tina, a jukebox musical.

Turner sold more than 100 million records worldwide, becoming one of the best-selling recording artists of all time. She received 12 Grammy Awards, which include eight competitive awards, a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award and three Grammy Hall of Fame inductions. She was the first black artist and first woman to be on the cover of Rolling Stone. Rolling Stone ranked her among the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time and the 100 Greatest Singers of All Time. Turner has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and on the St. Louis Walk of Fame. She was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice: with Ike Turner in 1991 and as a solo artist in 2021. She was also a 2005 recipient of the Kennedy Center Honors and the Women of the Year award. (Full article...)

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Station to Station is the tenth studio album by the English musician David Bowie, released on 23 January 1976 through RCA Records. Regarded as one of his most significant works, the album was the vehicle for Bowie's performance persona the Thin White Duke. Co-produced by Bowie and Harry Maslin, Station to Station was mainly recorded at Cherokee Studios in Los Angeles, California, in late 1975, after Bowie completed shooting the film The Man Who Fell to Earth; the cover art featured a still from the film. During the sessions, Bowie was dependent on drugs, especially cocaine, and later said that he recalled almost nothing of the production.

The commercial success of his previous release, Young Americans (1975), allowed Bowie greater freedom when he began recording his next album. The sessions established the lineup of guitarist Carlos Alomar, bassist George Murray and drummer Dennis Davis that Bowie would use for the rest of the decade, and also featured contributions by guitarist Earl Slick and pianist Roy Bittan. Musically, Station to Station was a transitional album for Bowie, developing the funk and soul of Young Americans while presenting a new direction influenced by the German music genre of krautrock, particularly bands such as Neu! and Kraftwerk. The lyrics reflected Bowie's preoccupations with Friedrich Nietzsche, Aleister Crowley, mythology and religion.

Preceded by the single "Golden Years", Station to Station was a commercial success, reaching the top five on the UK and US charts. After scrapping a soundtrack for The Man Who Fell to Earth, Bowie supported the album with the Isolar Tour in early 1976, during which he attracted controversy with statements suggesting support for fascism. At the end of the tour, he moved to Europe to remove himself from L.A.'s drug culture. The styles explored on Station to Station culminated in some of Bowie's most acclaimed work with the Berlin Trilogy over the next three years. Positively received by music critics on its release, Station to Station has appeared on several lists of the greatest albums of all time. It has been reissued multiple times and was remastered in 2016 as part of the Who Can I Be Now? (1974–1976) box set. (Full article...)

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"You Know My Name" is the theme song of the 2006 James Bond film Casino Royale, performed by American musician Chris Cornell, who wrote and produced it jointly with David Arnold, the soundtrack's composer. The film producers chose Cornell because they wanted a strong male singer. Cornell and Arnold tried to make the song a replacement theme for the character instead of the "James Bond Theme" reflecting the agent's inexperience in Casino Royale, as well as an introduction to Daniel Craig's grittier and more emotional portrayal of Bond.

The track was leaked onto the Internet on September 20, 2006, and later released as an official single on November 13, 2006 through Interscope Records. It charted in many countries, notably peaking at No. 7 on the UK singles chart. It sold 148,000 copies in 2006 in the UK, and has sold 323,000 digital copies and garnered 3.5 million streams in the U.S. as of 2017. Reviews of the song were positive; it won the Satellite Award and the World Soundtrack Award, and was nominated for a Grammy Award. It was not included in the Casino Royale soundtrack, but appeared on Cornell's second solo album, Carry On. (Full article...)

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Credit: Ines Zgonc

Watercolour portrait of David Bowie by Ines Zgonc.

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Did you know (auto-generated)

... that before charting on the UK Albums Chart with Are We There Yet?, the indie rock musician James Marriott had made a career of mocking other YouTubers' music?
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... that the heavy metal band Cradle of Filth released a T-shirt that was so offensive that several people were arrested for wearing it?
... that heavy metal band Judas Priest took their name from Bob Dylan's song "The Ballad of Frankie Lee and Judas Priest"?
... that raw material waste from the West influenced a generation of rock music in China?
... that the British rock musician Hannah Grae went viral online with an anti-sexual harassment parody of Aqua's "Barbie Girl"?

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Progressive rock (shortened as prog rock or simply prog) is a broad genre of rock music that primarily developed in the United Kingdom through the mid- to late 1960s, peaking in the early 1970s. Initially termed "progressive pop", the style was an emergence of psychedelic bands who abandoned standard pop traditions in favour of instrumentation and compositional techniques more frequently associated with jazz, folk, or classical music. Additional elements contributed to its "progressive" label: lyrics were more poetic, technology was harnessed for new sounds, music approached the condition of "art", and the studio, rather than the stage, became the focus of musical activity, which often involved creating music for listening rather than dancing. (Full article...)