Seven Ages of Rock

Jimi Hendrix grew up in Seattle in the 1950s, learning the Twelve bar blues as a teenager. Whilst in the army he came under the influence of the electric blues of artists such as Howlin' Wolf, B. B. King and Muddy Waters. After he was discharged in 1962 he became involved in the chitlin' circuit, playing with figures such as Little Richard.

Former Animals member, Eric Burdon, says Hendrix could not get off the ground in the US because black blues was not popular there. Meanwhile, the was learning to play the blues from the US records they bought, with bands forming like The Rolling Stones, who began by copying American blues numbers. When they started to write their own songs they gave them a sexual swagger and a new direction. Whites playing the blues made it more acceptable to the white US audience reintroducing the style to America. When Hendrix moved to New York he came under the influence of British blues music, especially that of Jeff Beck of the Yardbirds and Eric Clapton, who had become famous with John Mayall's Bluesbreakers. While Living in Harlem he also came under the influence of Bob Dylan, whose Like A Rolling Stone revolutionised rock. For Hendrix this inspired him to begin singing, havingpreviously been self-conscious about his voice. Another English band, The Who, inspired him most. With a roughness and a high octane sound, they created the modern stage presence with the theatrics of destroying their equipment, such as playing the guitar by ramming it against the floor and speakers.

Jimi Hendrix came to London in late 1966 after having been discovered and invited by his future manager Chas Chandler of The Animals, on the sole condition that he would be introduced to his guitar heroes. He arrived at the height of swinging London with Cream being the most important band around. At one of their concerts, Hendrix asked if he could join in a jam. That was already audacious, playing with 'God', but then he blew Clapton away, who went back stage and had a hard time lighting a cigarette because his hands were shaking too much. Stealing Cream's thunder, Chandler put together The Jimi Hendrix Experience, who beame famous faster than almost any other rock band.

However, despite his UK success, Hendrix was still largely ignored in his home country. This was to change when he played the Monterey Pop Festival at the height of The Summer of Love. The Who played first, with an aggression never before seen in the U.S.A. Hendrix stunned the crowds further with his explosive sound and showmanship culminating in setting fire to his guitar.

In 1966, The Beatles had taken refuge in the studio, transforming themselves from a pop band to psychadelic pioneers. When Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Heart's Club Band was released in 1967, Hendrix covered it on one of the experience's next shows. Having seen the power of the studio album he went on to create Electric Ladyland. However, it led to Hendrix becoming more deeply involved in drugs and Chas Chandler leaving as manager.

By 1968, America and Europe were being torn apart by conflict at home and abroad. The Rolling Stones tapped into these feelings with a new creative zeal. However, their performance at Altamont became one of the most violent days in rock history. The Altamont festival was meant to mirror the Woodstock Festival, where Hendrix delivered a seering version of the Star-Spangled Banner, which many saw as a political statement against the Vietnam War. However, Hendrix began to tire of stage performance and at the Isle of Wight festival in 1970 he gave a lack lustre performance. In September he died of an accidental overdose. Along with the deaths of Jim Morrison and Janis Joplin and the breaking up of The Beatles, this brought this age of rock to a close.

=Alternative Programme 1: "My Generation"=

The broadcast of the VH1 episode is very differently structured and features several different songs, interviews, and artists, as well as the main focus, Jimi Hendrix, being completely removed and the new focus being the Rolling Stones. This is not an issue with other episodes which are only mildly different.

In 1967, Pink Floyd published "Arnold Layne", a song about a clothes-stealing transvestite, introducing a new concept in pop music, psychadelia. Like Andy Warhol did with Velvet Underground in the US, they turned their shows into multimedia spectacles. Warhol came up with the idea of projecting films on the background of the stage. With Peter Jenner seeing Pink Floyd as the English version of the Velvet Underground, they decided to use this medium to illustrate the songs they were singing, projecting what effectively were the first music clips on a large screen behind the band. The shows grew ever more weird, and others followed. David Bowie was inspired by the weirdness of Velvet Underground and the madness of Pink Floyd's Syd Barrett (as exemplified by his Jugband Blues). Bowie created an alter-ego named Ziggy Stardust, which gave him an excuse to dress up on stage. Genesis' Peter Gabriel took Bowie's stage act even further dressing in evenmore elaborate and bizarre costumes; "Compared to what Gabriel wore on stage, Bowie was dressed for a night at the pub".

Another new thing in rock music was experimenting with sounds. Roxy Music introduced an oboe to rock. And when Pink Floyd wondered what a piano would sound like through a Leslie speaker, they came up with the intro to Echoes, a piece that lasted the entire second side of the album "Meddle". The stage performances of songs could also last much longer than the album versions. The performances grew so large that Pink Floyd felt ever more alienated from the audience and decided to 'protest' against that by putting up such a large performance with huge puppets for the stage show of The Wall that the band became almost invisible. During the show they built up a wall on stage between themselves and the audience making them literally invisible. This performance lasted only four shows and marked the end of this age of rock.

It should be noted that the VH1 version is slightly different. David Bowie's early influences are discussed in less detail, there is no discussion of Bowie and Roxy Music playing the Rainbow theatre and Hang On To Yourself- David Bowie, Ladytron and Re-make Remodel are not featured with the section on Roxy Music being much smaller and Supper's Ready- Genesis is played but not discussed except in relation to costumes.

In this episode some of the featured songs on the BBC website were not the same as featured in the episode as The Velvet Underground - Venus In Furs is replaced by The Velvet Underground - All Tomorrow's Parties.

Programme 3: Blank Generation

One of the first big bands of stadium rock was Led Zeppelin, who played to audiences of 50,000. They were so successful that they could take 90% of the revenue, leaving only 10% for the promoters, who were used to taking the largest slice of the pie. But in the case of Led Zeppelin even 10% was worth their while. Queen took this even further and played for audiences of 130.000, filling big stadiums. This was in part due to the act they put on. In the US, Kiss took "that" even further, ignoring the music and focusing purely on the act. They made their money largely from merchandise, which was bought by children who knew nothing of Rock and Roll and the merchandise alone gave them a revenue of 50 million dollars per year. In the US, Bruce Springsteen also became one of the icons of stadium rock, almost against his own will. He kept playing clubs when he could have been playing theatres and he kept playing theatres when he could have been playingstadiums. But ironically, it was exactly this 'regular guy' attitude that made him big.

When The Police had made it in England, they first financed their own tour of the US (where for a while they became the biggest band) and then started going to countries where few other western bands had gone before. Queen did something similar by touring South America and filling huge football stadiums. And in Japan they were received like The Beatles. This was all topped by Live Aid, which was heard by a third of the world population. Bob Geldoff: "It turned out the lingua franca of the world was not English, but Rock and Roll."

U2 was the last great band to emerge from stadium rock. Zoo TV brought the TV on stage. And they introduced another new phenomenon, the B stage, in the middle of the audience, where they were totally surrounded by them, thus reversing the ongoing development of the bands getting ever further separated from their audiences.

Programme 6: Left of the Dial

Featured artists who are listed only on the BBC website

Footnotes

External links

* [http://www.bbc.co.uk/music/sevenages/ Official Seven Ages of Rock website]