quote:

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their importance—both to the direction of contemporary music and more generally to pop culture—can hardly be overstated

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quote:

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Originally posted by St. Gwladys:
The Police - bridged the gap from Punk with good musicianship and clever lyrics.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Sioni Sais:

The only band to rival the Beatles for material, skill and variety has to be The Rolling Stones, and they have longevity on their side too.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Dafyd:
Some bands are influential. But that's not importance.

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Um, what? Influence defines importance within the context of this discussion.
 

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Posted by Palimpsest (# 16772) on :
 
I can't imagine what "important" means? How do you compare across time periods and genres? Number of people? Passion of Fans? Influence on other Musicians? Most money made by the record company? Most money made by the musicians? Longest lived career? Bands which matter to the Boomer generation?


Uncredited but influential, The Wrecking Crew played a huge number of hits as anonymous studio musicians.

The DVD is finally coming out in March but the website has the trailer.
 

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Posted by Timothy the Obscure (# 292) on :
 
To me, "important" means that music wouldn't be the same if they'd never existed. there are plenty of good bands who aren't that important in that sense. The Beatles are certainly the most important in my lifetime, in that they saved rock & roll from near-fatal doldrums (without them it could very well have proved to be just a fad), invented the band as collective rather than star-and-sidemen, revolutionized the role of the recording studio in popular music, and more. Before them, I'd point to the Benny Goodman Orchestra of the mid-1930s, Louis Armstrong's Hot Five, and I suppose (though it makes me shudder slightly) the Original Dixieland Jazz Band. the Carter Family in country music.

Kraftwerk were important in a way, but their impact was delayed about 20 years, and electronica remains a peripheral subgenre, however passionate some people are about it. They didn't really change the course of mainstream popular music in any major sense--the increased use of synthesizers did not happen because musicians wanted to imitate "Autobahn."
 

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Posted by no prophet's flag is set so... (# 15560) on :
 
It's hard to single it down. The Beatles and Beach Boys were competing with each other re new sounds. All the 1960s and 70s people always credit Elvis and Bob Dylan. But if most important equate with staying with us, I agree with the Beatles and Stones.

It is interesting that I cannot think of a song name let alone a tune for some of the bands mentioned. Re BTO (and The Guess Who), Randy Bachman has a long-running CBC radio show, Vinyl Tap which does all sorts of interesting themed shows. I think you can stream it or get on sat radio.
 

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Posted by Horseman Bree (# 5290) on :
 
Having been through the whole works since pre-Elvis, I'll stick with the Beatles, but add Bob Dylan as the individual who had the largest effect.
 

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Posted by Fr Weber (# 13472) on :
 
The Velvet Underground. Not many people bought their records, but apparently everyone who did started a band.

Also, they were a post-punk group before punk itself existed.
 

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Posted by Piglet (# 11803) on :
 
How could they be "post-punk" if punk hadn't happened yet?

I can't say I've really studied the subject - there are lots of bands whose influence was important to popular culture - but I understand that if you ask many rock musicians (especially guitarists) who was their greatest influence most of them will say Jimi Hendrix.

[ 23. January 2015, 01:58: Message edited by: Piglet ]
 

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Posted by Golden Key (# 1468) on :
 
1. Beatles.

2. ABBA--simply because their music always makes me happy.

3. The Monkees. Per something I saw on TV, there was a time when they were up there with both the Beatles and the Stones. And there was Davy (RIP).
 

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Posted by Timothy the Obscure (# 292) on :
 
Actually, I would say the Monkees are an example of a good, popular, but unimportant band (and I'm a fan). Setting aside the "Pre-fab Four" bullshit (so they didn't play on their first two records--that was nothing out of the ordinary, just how records were made in LA in those days--it was an assembly line and the special skill set of session players was needed), they didn't set any musical trends (except that they were the first pop group to use a Moog synthesizer).

BTO is another--lots of hits, but they never influenced anybody of consequence, and if they had never existed the history of rock would be about the same.

Velvet Underground does make the "important" list in spite of being a commercial failure. I suppose the Ramones as well, though I never liked them much. Kiss is on the "big but unimportant" list. Aerosmith likewise (just a Stones tribute band at heart). REM was important, the B-52s just a quirky cult favorite. Dire Straits a brilliant outlier, the Yardbirds mostly unimportant as a band in spite of the importance of their ex-guitarists. One could go on...
 

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Posted by Rosa Winkel (# 11424) on :
 
A lot of good music is influenced by Black Sabbath.

My belief that rock and metal has blues roots is supported by something that Tony Iommi said, when he said that he was influenced by blues records, 78's, where the names were not always written on the records. There are a ton of Black bluesmen who are lost in the deep mists of time, like some kind of pre-earth mix of bacteria in water; we tend to forget that that was the start. Of course, people like Public Enemy would call Elvis Presley racist for copying bluesmen's music and styles but not acknowledging them.

Within blues there were people like Big Joe Turner and Lead Belly, but there are plenty of lesser known bluesmen who are part of something more influential than any 1970s pop band.

With no blues, metal, rock and jazz would either not exist or by massively different.

I wonder though, what, other than slavery was influential upon blues.
 

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Posted by la vie en rouge (# 10688) on :
 
Are we talking about pop or rock? Because if it’s the former, I’m going to put in a vote here for the Beegees. I don’t know how many people really admit to being their fans, but I think they did have a massive influence on much of the commercial pop that followed them.
 

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Posted by Mr Clingford (# 7961) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Lord Jestocost:
Thotch.

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I'm annoyed with myself that I only caught the last episode of the latest series.
 

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Posted by The Phantom Flan Flinger (# 8891) on :
 
There's so many contenders.

Black Sabbath & Led Zeppelin both influenced many rock musicians.

The Beatles' influence is undoubted, but many people forget that without Pet Sounds, there would be no Sgt Pepper.

Several punk groups, including but not limited to the Sex Pistols showed that you don't have to be musically talented to be successful

Clearly however, the two most influential people in rock music are Les Paul & Jim Marshall.
 

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Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by The Phantom Flan Flinger:
Several punk groups, including but not limited to the Sex Pistols showed that you don't have to be musically talented to be successful

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The point of the Sex Pistols is a) that they were highly original b) they completely disrupted the music industry by imposing their style rather than what record company execs wanted, thus opening the way for a lot more artistic creativity.

Plus the studio my band recorded in had previously been used by the Sex Pistols

Time to put Never Mind the Bollocks... on I think.
 

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Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by The Phantom Flan Flinger:

The Beatles' influence is undoubted, but many people forget that without Pet Sounds, there would be no Sgt Pepper.

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quote:

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Originally posted by la vie en rouge:
Are we talking about pop or rock? Because if it’s the former, I’m going to put in a vote here for the Beegees. I don’t know how many people really admit to being their fans, but I think they did have a massive influence on much of the commercial pop that followed them.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Rosa Winkel:
My belief that rock and metal has blues roots is supported by something that Tony Iommi said, when he said that he was influenced by blues records,.

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quote:

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Originally posted by QLib:

quote:

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Originally posted by Rosa Winkel:
My belief that rock and metal has blues roots is supported by something that Tony Iommi said, when he said that he was influenced by blues records,.

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Is there any argument about this? I thought it was widely acknowledged by both academics and musicians.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Timothy the Obscure:
I suppose it must be difficult for anyone who wasn't born then (or old enough to be aware)

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quote:

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Originally posted by QLib:

quote:

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Originally posted by Rosa Winkel:
My belief that rock and metal has blues roots is supported by something that Tony Iommi said, when he said that he was influenced by blues records,.

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Is there any argument about this? I thought it was widely acknowledged by both academics and musicians.

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quote:

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Originally posted by mousethief:
There are no pretenders to the Beatles' crown. Give it up, y'all.

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Originally posted by Eutychus:

quote:

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Originally posted by mousethief:
There are no pretenders to the Beatles' crown. Give it up, y'all.

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Brian Epstein? Not sure they would have influenced anyone without him.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Eutychus:

quote:

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Originally posted by mousethief:
There are no pretenders to the Beatles' crown. Give it up, y'all.

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Brian Epstein? Not sure they would have influenced anyone without him.

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quote:

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Originally posted by The Phantom Flan Flinger:

quote:

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Originally posted by Eutychus:

quote:

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Originally posted by mousethief:
There are no pretenders to the Beatles' crown. Give it up, y'all.

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Brian Epstein? Not sure they would have influenced anyone without him.

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Same can be said of George Martin.

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quote:

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Originally posted by mousethief:
Your point is completely opaque. What's your point?

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Originally posted by Eutychus:

quote:

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Originally posted by mousethief:
Your point is completely opaque. What's your point?

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I can't speak for TPFF, but my point was that the casual assumption is often that the importance of a band is directly related to the sheer musical talent of its immediate members; people fail to realise the crucial role played by managers, producers, and other industry professionals.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Gramps49:
Even the Beatles would admit they were influenced by the Rockabilly Music of the early 50's; but even before that there was the Doo Oop Music of the 30's and 40's. Also Country Western and Jazz Music going back to the early 1900's.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Eutychus:
That's why my vote goes to the Sex Pistols.

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Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:

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Originally posted by The Phantom Flan Flinger:

quote:

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Originally posted by Eutychus:

quote:

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Originally posted by mousethief:
There are no pretenders to the Beatles' crown. Give it up, y'all.

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Brian Epstein? Not sure they would have influenced anyone without him.

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Same can be said of George Martin.

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Neither Brian Epstein nor George Martin were a band. The question is which was the most important band, not, were they completely unaided in their careers by anybody else. Your point is completely opaque. What's your point?

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quote:

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Originally posted by Gramps49:

Thing of it is, my 13 year old granddaughters love the music of the 60's just as much as they love the Hip Hop of today.

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Gramps49: The deal of it is Rock and Roll (to borrow a riff) is here to stay. It is constantly adapting, appealing to new generations of listeners, spinning off new expressions. Myself I have gone from Rockabilly, through the British Invasion, Hard Rock, Acid Rock, Heavy Metal, Punk, New Wave, Disco, Rap, Hip Hop--who knows where it will go next.

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quote:

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Originally posted by The Phantom Flan Flinger:
Some people on this thread have pointed to the Beatles as the most important band, what's wrong with discussing what made them so?

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quote:

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Originally posted by The Phantom Flan Flinger:

Some people on this thread have pointed to the Beatles as the most important band, what's wrong with discussing what made them so?

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quote:

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Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:

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Originally posted by The Phantom Flan Flinger:
Some people on this thread have pointed to the Beatles as the most important band, what's wrong with discussing what made them so?

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Depends on how it's done. When the argument is, "The Beatles had a bunch of support; therefore some other band is more important," then it's no longer just "discussing what made them important".

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Fair comment, but that wasn't my intention.
 

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Posted by Pasta (# 5635) on :
 
Camel. Definitively the most important and influential band in my personal history of music, which is only reference point I can relate to.

[ 28. January 2015, 21:58: Message edited by: Pasta ]
 

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Posted by balaam (# 4543) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by Gramps49:
But if you really want to know who was the most influential person behind Rock and Roll, it would be Adolf Rickenbacker who developed the electric guitar in 1932. The rest is history.

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The collecting of various percussion instruments together to form a drum kit did more to change modern music, be it jazz, blues etc. did more to revolutionise music than electrification and amplification of other insrtuments.

I see your Rickenbacker 1932 and raise a William Ludwig Sr 1908.
 

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Posted by Timothy the Obscure (# 292) on :
 
You could also say that Louis Armstrong's switch from cornet to the louder trumpet, and his invention of the improvised solo break (the two things being one, in effect), in contrast to the group improvisation of very early jazz, led to the core of rock: Satch--> Blind Lemon Jefferson--> T-Bone Walker--> Chuck Berry--> every rock lead guitar player ever.

You could also note that if the King of Swing (Benny Goodman, for the undereducated) had not blown the roof off the Palomar Ballroom on a hot summer night in 1934, White America's popular music might be based on the polka or the waltz. With repercussions for the rest of the world.

The interesting thing is how people project their personal tastes into their judgments of "importance." Kraftwerk was important in a particular musical style, but electronica is an exotic niche genre. Most people will dance to it if they're high enough, but beyond that don't care. You could say the same about a lot of the bands that have been mentioned. Being good doesn't make you important.

There certainly are artists (performers and composers) without whom the history of popular music would not be what it is. I once sketched an outline for an article on the subject, which I never wrote--but now that I think about it, it would take a book. They are:

1. Stephen Foster (really the inventor of American popular song)
2. Ma Rainey (first blues superstar, brought the blues into American music in a big way)
3. Louis Armstrong (see above, and more)
4. The Carter Family (Maybelle, especially)
5. Paul Whiteman (kind of lame, but made people take jazz seriously)
6. Benny Goodman (see above)
7. Duke Ellington (if you gotta ask...)
8. Bing Crosby (the original hipster, and the guy who radically changed pop singing style by understanding what you could do with a microphone)
9. Sinatra
10. Elvis
11. Chuck Berry
12. The Beatles
13. Dylan
14. Joni Mitchell (who radically changed the emotional vocabulary of pop music)

And by then end of the '60s, things had begun to fragment so much that by 1980 no one artist could affect the overall course of music very much--all they could do was create new subgenres, which were very important to fans but not to anyone else. As much as Hendrix influenced guitar players, you can't point to an overall stylistic trend that came from him any more than from Cream, Zep, and for that matter Iron Butterfly (blues-based power trio rock --> heavy metal --> Van Halen, Rush, AC/DC, Metallica etc.) Disco was huge, but there's no one dominant disco band (Earth, Wind, and Fire were the best, but they're not the disco Beatles). Springsteen was huge, but there was no movement that followed from him (except Tom Petty, who would probably deny the influence).

Punk changed things, but it's too easy to overestimate the importance of any one band (the Pistols or the Ramones? Elvis Costello says that he and Graham Parker and Nick Lowe were the real punks, and the Pistols were a corporate creation...) L.L. Cool J and Run DMC were probably more important than any White artists of the '80s, but they didn't change the musical world. Not because they weren't good enough, but because the scene had changed to the point that no one could exert the kind of influence the Beatles did anymore--and probably never will again.
 

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Posted by Rosa Winkel (# 11424) on :
 
You're getting a for that, TTO. You put names to my previous assertion about blues.
 

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Posted by Marvin the Martian (# 4360) on :
 
In relatively recent times, I'd say the Spice Girls had a massive impact on the popular music scene. Not only did they single-handedly change the prevailing musical ethos from being dominated by male guitar bands (Blur, Oasis, Pulp, Ash, etc.) and go on to dominate the airwaves for years and pave the way for a host of imitators, but it could be argued that they represent the beginning of the "packaged pop" era that has culminated in shows like X Factor, Pop Idol and [Country]'s Got Talent. How many of the popular songs, bands and singers of the last decade or two can trace their genesis to that phenomenon?

Their music itself may not have been anything particularly new or innovative, but literally everything else about them has fundamentally changed the music industry across the Western world. And if that doesn't qualify them as an important band in the history of popular music then I don't know what does.
 

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Posted by Alan Cresswell (# 31) on :
 
Though, packaged pop goes back a bit further than Spice Girls. Think Stock, Aitken and Waterman turning Aussie soap actresses into pop stars.
 

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Posted by Marvin the Martian (# 4360) on :
 
Well, sure. And groups of lads playing guitars predate the Beatles. The point is that they were the band that suddenly made it huge.
 

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Posted by mark_in_manchester (# 15978) on :
 

quote:

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packaged pop goes back a bit further than Spice Girls

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quote:

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Originally posted by Piglet:
I take it to mean the "manufactured" bands which, as AC said, probably started* with the Stock, Aitken & Waterman protégés in the late 1980s - Kylie Minogue, Rick Astley and the like, and went on to produce groups like the Spice Girls in the 90s and the televised talent contest winners promoted by the likes of Simon Cowell these days.

* although I've heard it said that the first manufactured band was the Monkees in the 1960s, who I believe were created specifically for the television show.

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Indeed. The Monkees were the first prefab band. But you must also include the Partridge Family and to a lesser extent the Archies (although they were a one-hit wonder, they were certainly an artificial creation; interestingly of Don Kirshner, same guy who made the Monkees). Putting the advent of artificial bands in the 1980s is a little near-sighted. Frankly it looks like people didn't bother to do their homework.
 

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Posted by Palimpsest (# 16772) on :
 
I just went this evening to a lecture called "Yeah Yeah Yeah" from a series called Deconstructing the Beatles. This lecture ended with 1963. In addition to 4 number one singles and 2 number 1 albums they wrote so many songs that they gave them to other groups who then got top ten hits. Groups like Gerry and The Pacemakers and The Rolling Stones got their first hits with songs written by the Beatles.

It certainly did show a year of spectacular dominance and huge influence on other performers from Bob Dylan to the Bee Gees. It also firmly pushed the concept of the rock group writing their own songs.
 

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Posted by Roselyn (# 17859) on :
 
I remember someone once saying that the reason Bing and Elvis were top in the particular years they were was attributable to developments in microphones etc. How much was the history determined by technological invention?
 

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Posted by mark_in_manchester (# 15978) on :
 
Well, here's an example - the Beatles gave up touring because they couldn't be heard above the screams of their fans - and concert PA system design caught up maybe 5-10 years later. Gangs of large amplifiers were possible using valve (US - vacuum tube) technology (WEM - UK and Crown - USA had a go), but the result was expensive, power hungry, heavy and bulky (an issue for touring rigs) and somewhat fragile. So the technological innovation which makes stadium gigs and the Large RocknRoll Tour possible is probably the invention, or perhaps rather the adoption, of the power transistor.

Regarding 'packaged pop' - the idea seems to have deep literary roots which go back a good deal further than the Monkees
 

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Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on :
 
Sometimes, Roselyn, it is the reverse. The European musical scales that dominate this discussion are limitations. African music* operates in different structure, containing notes that do not quite exist in the European systems. "Bending" notes to approximate gave a distinctive sound to the blues and through that to rock 'n roll.
Little Walter and Jimmy Hendrix used the limitations of their instruments and equipment to create styles and sounds which greatly influenced later musicians and drove technical innovation.

People tend to think in terms of a motorway, going from origin to destination. But music is the streets of an old city. Intertwined, connected, traveling in many directions with direct connections and obscure routes.


*not monolithic, no, but grouped for ease of discussion
 

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Posted by mousethief (# 953) on :
 

quote:

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Originally posted by lilBuddha:
People tend to think in terms of a motorway, going from origin to destination. But music is the streets of an old city. Intertwined, connected, traveling in many directions with direct connections and obscure routes.

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quote:

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Originally posted by Roselyn:
I remember someone once saying that the reason Bing and Elvis were top in the particular years they were was attributable to developments in microphones etc. How much was the history determined by technological invention?

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It's not just the technology, but people figuring out how to use it in creative ways. Rudy Vallee sang through a megaphone--he still had to project like an opera singer. The microphone was just supposed to be a way of making voices louder, so they could be heard over a band, but Crosby figured out that they made it possible to sing in a more intimate, "crooning" style. Similarly, the electric guitar was just supposed to make the instrument louder, but it also introduced distortion (and increased sustain, and feedback), and guitar players began to find ways to use that musically (Hendrix especially--and now there are devices to help guitarists get Hendrix-like sounds without Jimi's technique). The recording studio was supposed to capture the live performance, and the Beatles used it to create effects that could not (at that time) be produced in live performance (one of the reasons they stopped touring). But then technology was invented to make it possible to do all that on stage, and there are Beatles tribute bands playing "Tomorrow Never Knows" live...
 

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Posted by Golden Key (# 1468) on :
 
OTOH, I think Peter, Paul, and Mary were put together by a manager. I think *maybe* the guys knew each other before.

They turned out pretty well.
 

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Posted by churchgeek (# 5557) on :
 
How on earth can you narrow it down so much?

But if you had to, I'd say Velvet Underground. But I would - I'm a Gen-Xer, and all the music I grew up with was influenced by them. That's still a pretty limited sphere of influence.

But seriously, how can you narrow it down to one most important band?
 

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