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When did Rock-N-Roll become Rock?

batmonbatmon 27,574 Posts
edited September 2006 in Strut Central
I always wondered if there was an album that caused the name change. Was it a music critic's declaration? Simple slang?A combination? A particular song/songs that rendered the term passe? One artist who caused a paradigm shift? Late 60's/Early 70s? Musical shift or hipster coinage?Rockists explain pleez?

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  • The_NonThe_Non 5,691 Posts
    I would think it would have something to do with:
    A) Being said on the radio and conserving time for a punch in (rhythm and blues became r&b)
    B) Hard rock dudes who said Rock N ROLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL!!!!!!!!! were too winded from being high and just get out ROCKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK!
  • batmonbatmon 27,574 Posts
    I would think it would have something to do with:
    A) Being said on the radio and conserving time for a punch in (rhythm and blues became r&b)
    B) Hard rock dudes who said Rock N ROLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLL!!!!!!!!! were too winded from being high and just get out ROCKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK!

    Simply slang.
  • pickwick33pickwick33 8,946 Posts
    I always wondered if there was an album that caused the name change. Was it a music critic's declaration? Simple slang?A combination? A particular song/songs that rendered the term passe? One artist who caused a paradigm shift? Late 60's/Early 70s? Musical shift or hipster coinage?

    Rockists explain pleez?

    Two major reasons I can think of:
    (a) "Rock & roll" can be a mouthful, so just saying "rock" saves time (as somebody just implied up above)
    (b) The earliest references I've seen to "rock" are from the late-sixties psychedelic era, so I guess it makes sense...even now, I'll refer to a Jimi Hendrix as rock while a fifties cat like Link Wray is rock & roll...
  • batmonbatmon 27,574 Posts
    When did musicians call themselves a Rock band as opposed to RockNRoll? Post-Psych rock?
    Jefferson Airplane - Rock?
    YardBirds - Rock n roll?
    Byrds?
    Hendrix - Rock?
    Frampton - Rock?
    Genesis - Rock?

    I know its noy linear but more so wave pattern. Just wondering?

    Perhaps I'm not presenting my question clearly....
  • pickwick33pickwick33 8,946 Posts
    When did musicians call themselves a Rock band as opposed to RockNRoll? Post-Psych rock?
    Jefferson Airplane - Rock?
    YardBirds - Rock n roll?
    Byrds?
    Hendrix - Rock?
    Frampton - Rock?
    Genesis - Rock?

    This sounds about right to me, although you're right, it's NOT linear and there is no exact timeline...the Byrds, the Yardbirds, punk, and the more psychedelic tracks on the Nuggets box sets could go both ways, to me. (Remember: "...TO ME!" 'Cause I know if this thread progresses any further, somebody's gonna think of an artist that's gonna fuck up ALL our definitions! Just covering my ass, here...)

    But Little Richard...Carl Perkins...Charlie Feathers...Sam the Sham...the Sir Douglas Quintet...Dick Dale...the Trashmen...most retro garage, surf, and rockabilly bands...rock AND roll, as far as Pickwick is concerned. Later stuff like Edgar Winter, BTO, Metallica, Anthrax, the Melvins, Nirvana, Stone Temple Pilots (I know that is a random list but bear with me)...I consider that "rock" because it's not as rootsy. (LET THE ARGUMENTS BEGIN!!!)[/b]

    Perhaps I'm not presenting my question clearly....
    Made perfect sense to me. Your question up above kinda backed up what I was saying. What's up, you didn't get the answers you were expecting?
  • tonyphronetonyphrone 1,500 Posts


    This sounds about right to me, although you're right, it's NOT linear and there is no exact timeline...the Byrds, the Yardbirds, punk, and the more psychedelic tracks on the Nuggets box sets could go both ways, to me. (Remember: "...TO ME!" 'Cause I know if this thread progresses any further, somebody's gonna think of an artist that's gonna fuck up ALL our definitions! Just covering my ass, here...)

    But Little Richard...Carl Perkins...Charlie Feathers...Sam the Sham...the Sir Douglas Quintet...Dick Dale...the Trashmen...most retro garage, surf, and rockabilly bands...rock AND roll, as far as Pickwick is concerned. Later stuff like Edgar Winter, BTO, Metallica, Anthrax, the Melvins, Nirvana, Stone Temple Pilots (I know that is a random list but bear with me)...I consider that "rock" because it's not as rootsy. (LET THE ARGUMENTS BEGIN!!!)[/b]

    Perhaps I'm not presenting my question clearly....

    Made perfect sense to me. Your question up above kinda backed up what I was saying. What's up, you didn't get the answers you were expecting?
    I AGREE WITH YA.

    BIG UPS TO THE TRASHMEN AND THE SIR DOUGLAS QUINTET!
  • batmonbatmon 27,574 Posts
    Stevie Wonder.....Rock-N-Roll or Rock?

    Little Stevie R-n-R

    Stevie - Rock
  • nzshadownzshadow 5,518 Posts
    Stevie Nicks: Rock

    Shakin Stevens: Rock n Roll
  • volumenvolumen 2,532 Posts
    More blues = Rock and Roll.
    More power chords = Rock
  • johmbolayajohmbolaya 4,472 Posts
    I always wondered if there was an album that caused the name change. Was it a music critic's declaration? Simple slang?A combination? A particular song/songs that rendered the term passe? One artist who caused a paradigm shift? Late 60's/Early 70s? Musical shift or hipster coinage?

    Rockists explain pleez?

    Some say 1967, when pop combos would be called "rock" on a regular basis. When "Rolling Stone" came to be. When The Beatles grew mustaches and tried to make things serious. As Iggy Pop would say, rock'n'roll isn't meant to be serious. The band The Mummies had their own label called Pre-B.S., claiming that they were inspired by the era before the bullshit started happening.
  • RockadelicRockadelic Out Digging 13,993 Posts
    I pretty much agree with Pickwick...I think once Rock & Roll started to splinter off into different genres the word "Rock" started to be used.....up until the British Invasion it was all called Rock & Roll and around '65-'66 the word "Rock" was tacked on to a variety of genres.....Garage Rock, Psychedelic Rock, Hard Rock, etc. and I think it was just an abbreviation that was easier than "Hard Rock & Roll"
  • batmonbatmon 27,574 Posts
    Were there any artist who consciously refered to themselves as Rock N Roll, to go "against the grain"/"remain Traditional"?

    "Fuck all this Rock stuff, were Rock n Roll"

    Or cats who might have rolled w/ catagory but didnt really embody the new "Rock" connotation?
  • LaserWolfLaserWolf Portland Oregon 11,517 Posts
    Were there any artist who consciously refered to themselves as Rock N Roll, to go "against the grain"/"remain Traditional"?

    "Fuck all this Rock stuff, were Rock n Roll"

    Or cats who might have rolled w/ catagory but didnt really embody the new "Rock" connotation?

    Around 70 or so, the Rolling Stones started calling themselves "The Greatest Rock and Roll Band in the world".

    Rockadelic beat me to it, but here is the list I was going to write:
    Jefferson Airplane - Psychedelic Rock
    YardBirds - British Rock
    Byrds Folk Rock
    Hendrix - Hard Rock
    Frampton - Power Rock
    Genesis - Progressive Rock

    Rock criticism started about 1967, some guy named Gleason or something, and Rolling Stone mag. Before then you had teen rags, with out any serious criticism, and the mainstream press only covered rock and roll as a cultural pheonem, not as music. Once you had critics, they started putting things into catagories, and thus all the stupid names, and thus rock.
  • RockadelicRockadelic Out Digging 13,993 Posts
    Were there any artist who consciously refered to themselves as Rock N Roll, to go "against the grain"/"remain Traditional"?

    "Fuck all this Rock stuff, were Rock n Roll"

    Or cats who might have rolled w/ catagory but didnt really embody the new "Rock" connotation?

    The first ones that come to mind are The Flamin' Groovies....roots firmly planted in the 50's
  • batmonbatmon 27,574 Posts
    Were there any artist who consciously refered to themselves as Rock N Roll, to go "against the grain"/"remain Traditional"?

    "Fuck all this Rock stuff, were Rock n Roll"

    Or cats who might have rolled w/ catagory but didnt really embody the new "Rock" connotation?

    The first ones that come to mind are The Flamin' Groovies....roots firmly planted in the 50's

    Were they from that era and stuck to thier guns, or were they retro for the 70's?
  • volumenvolumen 2,532 Posts
    Were there any artist who consciously refered to themselves as Rock N Roll, to go "against the grain"/"remain Traditional"?

    "Fuck all this Rock stuff, were Rock n Roll"

    Or cats who might have rolled w/ catagory but didnt really embody the new "Rock" connotation?

    The first ones that come to mind are The Flamin' Groovies....roots firmly planted in the 50's

    Were they from that era and stuck to thier guns, or were they retro for the 70's?

    On a related note......I've heard Lemmy say fuck this heavy metal stuff we're a Rock and Roll band.
  • pickwick33pickwick33 8,946 Posts
    Were there any artist who consciously refered to themselves as Rock N Roll, to go "against the grain"/"remain Traditional"?

    "Fuck all this Rock stuff, were Rock n Roll"

    Or cats who might have rolled w/ catagory but didnt really embody the new "Rock" connotation?

    The first ones that come to mind are The Flamin' Groovies....roots firmly planted in the 50's

    Were they from that era and stuck to thier guns, or were they retro for the 70's?

    I think this San Francisco started out during the mid-sixties garage-rock era as "the Chosen Few" (almost every American city had a band by that name in the sixties), before changing their name around '67 or '68. Even though (and possibly because) they were in the hippie-jamming Bay Area, like Creedence they held on to their rock & roll roots for dear life, when all the other bands were bogged down with the psychedelic influence.
  • luckluck 4,077 Posts
    The term "Rock" was initially a clever way of skirting trademark law. When Cleveland DJ Alan Freed coined the term to describe the genre in the early 50s, the "King of the Moondoggers" attempted to capitalize on the musical trend by claiming legal rights on the phrase. Though it had been used at least since the early 20s in popular nomenclature and song titles, Freed underwent the process to become the legal owner of the term. Industry heads and musicians, seeing this as a roadblock to their livelihood, began to use the truncated "Rock" as a skirting measure to describe their style of music. It is hypothesized that some at the time believed that "Rock" was a term that was too general to be legally claimed. Freed eventually dropped his legal pursuit of the term once local and national backlash - as well as pressure from several large music labels - began to hit him hard. In 1962, when the Payola Scandal hit the music industry, Freed was once again thrust into the national spotlight after he pled guilty to commercial bribery. He died just three years later at the age of 43.











































    Just kidding.
  • asstroasstro 1,754 Posts

    Rock criticism started about 1967, some guy named Gleason or something, and Rolling Stone mag. Before then you had teen rags, with out any serious criticism, and the mainstream press only covered rock and roll as a cultural pheonem, not as music. Once you had critics, they started putting things into catagories, and thus all the stupid names, and thus rock.

    Yeah, I always put it down to a combo of this, and artists taking themselves too seriously because of critics trying to make the music seem like serious business.

    Rock'N'Roll = Fun
    Rock = Art
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