Psychedelic,,

Psychedelic rock emerged in the mid-'60s, as British Invasion and folk-rock bands began expanding the sonic possibilities of their music. Instead of confining themselves to the brief, concise verse-chorus-verse patterns of rock & roll, they moved toward more free-form, fluid song structures. Just as important — if not more so — the groups began incorporating elements of Indian and Eastern music and free-form jazz to their sound, as well as experimenting with electronically altering instruments and voices within the recording studio. Initially, around 1965 and 1966, bands like the Yardbirds and the Byrds broke down the boundaries for psychedelia, creating swirling layers of fuzz-toned guitars, sitars, and chanted vocals. Soon, numerous groups followed their pattern, including the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, both of whom recorded psychedelia in 1966. In no time, groups on both sides of the Atlantic embraced the possibilities of the new genre, and the differences were notable. In Britain, psychedelia tended to be whimsical and surrealistic. Nevertheless, bands — most notably Pink Floyd and Traffic — played extended instrumentals that relied on improvisation as much as their American contemporaries the Grateful Dead, the Doors, Love, and Jefferson Airplane.

In other corners of America, garage bands began playing psychedelic rock without abandoning their raw, amateurish foundation of three-chord rock — they just layered in layers of distortion, feedback, and effects. Eventually, psychedelic evolved into acid rock, heavy metal, and art rock, but there continued to be revivals of psychedelia in the decades that followed, most notably in the American underground of the mid-'80s.

American Underground,,

At the dawn of the 1980s, as the first wave of punk bands began to play themselves out and the burgeoning alternative rock scene became increasingly dominated by British post-punk groups and polished new wave acts, a number of American bands began making new music that was a deliberate reaction to these developments. While weaned on punk, the American underground bands tended to favor a broader musical palate (hard rock, psychedelia, roots rock, folk-rock, and country-rock influences were the most common), though they continued to be dominated by electric guitars and a lyrical perspective that reached for intelligence without outward pretension. These bands also tended to favor independent labels and low-budget touring, as much out of necessity as any dominant philosophical tenant, since nearly all of them were ignored by major labels, forcing them to find other avenues to present their music. While they were progenitors of the hardcore punk scene, Black Flag were also the primary trailblazers of the American underground scene, in effect creating an indie touring network through several years of relentless roadwork; the band’s label, SST, was also a crucial influence, releasing records by the Minutemen, the Meat Puppets, Husker Du, Dinosaur Jr., and other key bands who pushed the outsider’s aggression of punk into new and provocative directions.

The Midwest proved to be a potent breeding ground for the American underground, with Minneapolis’s boozy but heartfelt the Replacements and Chicago’s brutally loud Big Black and Naked Raygun winning sizable cult followings, while Sonic Youth and the Swans were the rulers of a dissonant East Coast enclave, Texas’s nomadic psych-noise merchants the Butthole Surfers were leaving a trail of terror across the country, and Boston’s Mission of Burma proved both powerfully influential and prescient during their short lifespan. In the mid-'80s, the initial commercial breakthrough of R.E.M. (who were tangential members of the scene despite their presence on the semi-major label I.R.S.) at once gave the American underground new visibility and put the first chinks into the armor of the close-knit community. By the early '90s, the hard work and relative success of several important American underground bands ultimately proved to be the movement’s undoing; many of the movement’s major acts were wooed away by major labels (where most failed to find sizable audiences in the United States, though some fared better in Europe), and with the breakthrough of Nirvana at the end of 1991, the underground began to splinter, for the most part dividing into alternative rock (for the more commercially accessible bands) and indie rock (for their less compromising counterparts).

industrial

The most abrasive and aggressive fusion of rock and electronic music, industrial was initially a blend of avant-garde electronics experiments (tape music, musique concrète, white noise, synthesizers, sequencers, etc.) and punk provocation. As industrial evolved, its avant-garde influences became far less important than its pounding, relentless, jackhammer beats, which helped transform it into a darker alternative to the hedonism of mainstream dance music. Industrial's trademark sound was harsh and menacing, but its rage was subordinate to the intentionally mechanical, numbingly repetitive qualities of the music, which fit the lyrics' themes of alienation and dehumanization quite well.

In the early '90s, Ministry and Nine Inch Nails took their variations on industrial to wider alt-rock and metal audiences, but a substantial number of industrial artists chose to remain underground. The first group of industrial bands — England's Throbbing Gristle and Cabaret Voltaire, and Germany's Einsturzende Neubauten — were initially as much about beyond-edgy performance art as they were music. The second generation of industrial artists — including Skinny Puppy, Front 242, and Nitzer Ebb — added pummeling dance beats to their predecessors' confrontational sounds, for a substyle often referred to as electronic body music (centered around labels like Wax Trax). Meanwhile, bands like Ministry and KMFDM added metal-guitar riffs, which helped Ministry break through to a wider audience in the late '80s and early '90s; similarly, Nine Inch Nails' Trent Reznor added more traditional song structures, and made his own persona the focal point, giving the music a rare human presence and becoming a star in the process. This more widely appealing strain of industrial continued to influence alternative metal throughout the '90s. Still, after industrial metal began to fade, a near-exclusively electronic form of industrial dance continued to thrive as an uncompromisingly underground style, with many artists coming from the U.S. and Germany.

Rap Rock..

Rap-Rock was a continuation of rap-metal, a hybrid of hip-hop and heavy metal pioneered by such bands as Anthrax. Rap-metal had big, lurching beats and heavy, heavy riffs -- occasionally, it sounded as if the riffs were merely overdubbed over scratching and beat box beats. Rap-rock was a little more organic, often because it was a rock song where the vocalist rapped instead of sang. Nevertheless, there was certainly elements of hip-hop in the rhythms, too, since there was more funk to rap-rock than normal hard rock. At times, the difference between rap-metal and rap-rock may be minute, since they both favor loud guitars and beats, but the main difference is that organic, integrated sound, best heard on Kid Rock's 1998 rap-rock masterpiece, Devil Without a Cause.

Heavy Metal,,

Of all rock & roll's myriad forms, heavy metal is the most extreme in terms of volume, machismo, and theatricality. There are numerous stylistic variations on heavy metal's core sound, but they're all tied together by a reliance on loud, distorted guitars (usually playing repeated riffs) and simple, pounding rhythms. Heavy metal has been controversial nearly throughout its existence -- critics traditionally dismissed the music as riddled with over-the-top adolescent theatrics, and conservative groups have often protested what they perceive as evil lyrical content. Still, despite -- or perhaps because of -- those difficulties, heavy metal has become one of the most consistently popular forms of rock music ever created, able to adapt to the times yet keep its core appeal intact. For all its status as America's rebellion soundtrack of choice, heavy metal was largely a British creation. The first seeds of heavy metal were sown in the British blues movement of the '60s, specifically among bands who found it hard to adjust to the natural swing of American blues. The rhythms became more squared-off, and the amplified electric instruments became more important, especially with the innovations of artists like the Kinks, the Who, Jimi Hendrix, Cream, and the Jeff Beck Group. Arguably the first true metal band, however, was Led Zeppelin. Initially, Zep played blues tunes heavier and louder than anyone ever had, and soon created an epic, textured brand of heavy rock that drew from many musical sources. Less subtle but perhaps even more influential was Black Sabbath, whose murky, leaden guitar riffs created a doomy fantasy world obsessed with drugs, death, and the occult. Following the blueprint laid down by Zep and Sabbath, several American bands modified heavy metal into more accessible forms during the '70s: the catchy tunes and outrageous stage shows of Alice Cooper and Kiss; the sleazy boogie of Aerosmith; and the flashy guitar leads and wild party rock of Van Halen (not to mention the distinctively minimalist grooves of Australia's AC/DC). In the late '70s, a cache of British bands dubbed the New Wave of British Heavy Metal (including Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, and Motorhead) started playing metal faster, leaner, and with more menace than ever before. They helped influence a new American metal scene known as thrash in the '80s, which took shape as a reaction to metal's new mainstream pop breakthrough, which came courtesy of Def Leppard's Pyromania. Metal enjoyed its greatest presence on the charts during the '80s, thanks to a raft of glammed-up pop-metal bands, but thrash bands played complex riffs at breakneck speed, sometimes dispensing with vocal melody altogether. Thrashers like Metallica and Megadeth built rabid cult followings that pushed them into the mainstream around the same time that grunge wiped pop-metal off the charts. Mainstream metal in the '90s centered around a new hybrid called alternative metal, which (in its most commercially potent form) combined grinding thrash and grunge influences with hip-hop and industrial flourishes, though it broke with metal's past in downplaying the importance of memorable riffs. Meanwhile, the underground grew harsher and bleaker, producing two similar, thrash-derived styles known as death metal and black metal, which produced some of the most abrasive, intense, hyperspeed music and graphic shock tactics the metal world had yet witnessed.

Speed Metal,,

In the early '80s, speed metal became the most popular form of heavy metal in the American underground. Crossing the New Wave of British Heavy Metal with hardcore punk, speed metal was extremely fast, abrasive, and technically demanding — the bands played fast, but their attack was precise and clean. In that sense, speed metal always remained true to its metal roots. But what it borrowed from hardcore — namely, insanely fast tempos and a defiant, do-it-yourself attitude — was equally important, since it gave the bands not only a unique musical approach but also an attractive image for legions of alienated suburban youths. Because it was so intense and technically demanding, speed metal quickly evolved into thrash, which allowed greater leeway in terms of tempo, groove, and instrumental dexterity. Led by Metallica, Megadeth, Anthrax, and Slayer this new wave of metal bands stood in direct contrast with the pop-oriented metal that dominated the charts during the '80s, but they managed to cultivate dedicated cult followings that would eventually allow them to go platinum with no support from mainstream media, radio, or MTV.

Thrash,,

Thrash was essentially the sound of underground heavy metal during the '80s, dominated by a driving, percussive approach to rhythm guitar (thanks to a pick-hand technique called palm muting) and furious levels of aggression. Thrash was often technically accomplished, taken at fast tempos, and emphasized heavy, sometimes atonal guitar riffs over melody; however, these generalizations are far from absolute rules. In its early days, thrash was essentially the same thing as speed metal, the product of American bands who in the early '80s fused the lean, vicious attack of the New Wave of British Heavy Metal with the tempos of hardcore punk and Motorhead. However, the dexterity and constant intensity required to play speed metal proved limiting to some, and a variety of different approaches quickly took shape: some thrash bands concentrated more on midtempo grooves, occasionally accelerating into speed-metal realms; some, like Metallica and Megadeth, used their instrumental technique to craft more intricate and progressive music; others emphasized the music's aggression to project theatrically menacing images. Thrash provided a harder, heavier, more authentically metallic alternative to the accessible pop-metal bands who dominated the charts in the late '80s, and despite a dearth of airplay, it became quite popular, so much so that when Metallica and Megadeth streamlined their sound to make it more accessible in the early '90s, they became instant superstars. Diehard underground metalheads took refuge in the thrash-inspired death and black metal styles, which took thrash's dark subject matter and visceral force to intentionally disturbing extremes.

Hard Rock,,,

Hard rock is a term that's frequently applied to any sort of loud, aggressive guitar rock, but for these purposes, the definition is more specific. To be sure, hard rock is loud, aggressive guitar rock, but it isn't as heavy as heavy metal, and it's only very rarely influenced by punk (though it helped inspire punk). Hard rock generally prizes big, stadium-ready guitar riffs, anthemic choruses, and stomping, swaggering backbeats; its goals are usually (though not universally) commercial, and it's nearly always saturated with machismo. With some bands, it can be difficult to tell where the dividing line between hard rock and heavy metal falls, but the basic distinction is that ever since Black Sabbath, metal tends to be darker and more menacing, while hard rock (for the most part) has remained exuberant, chest-thumping party music. Additionally, while metal riffs often function as stand-alone melodies, hard rock riffs tend to outline chord progressions in their hooks, making for looser, more elastic jams should the band decide to stretch out instrumentally. Like heavy metal, hard rock sprang from the mid-'60s intersection of blues-rock and psychedelia pioneered by artists like Cream, Jimi Hendrix, and the Jeff Beck Group. Blues-rock and psychedelia were both exploring the limits of electric amplification, and blues-rock was pushing the repeated guitar riff center stage, while taking some of the swing out of the blues beat and replacing it with a thumping power. Hard rock really came into its own at the dawn of the '70s, with the tough, boozy rock of the Rolling Stones (post-Brian Jones) and Faces, the blues-drenched power and textured arrangements of Led Zeppelin, the post-psychedelic rave-ups of Deep Purple, and the loud, ringing power chords of the Who (circa Who's Next) setting the template for much of what followed. Later in the decade, the lean, stripped-down riffs of AC/DC and Aerosmith, the catchy tunes and stage theatrics of Alice Cooper and Kiss, and the instrumental flash of Van Halen set new trends, though the essential musical blueprint for hard rock remained similar. Arena rock also became a dominant force, stripping out nearly all blues influence and concentrating solely on big, bombastic hooks. During the '80s, hard rock was dominated by glossy pop-metal, although Guns N' Roses, the Black Crowes, and several others did present a grittier, more traditionalist alternative. Old-fashioned hard rock became a scarce commodity in the post-alternative rock era; after grunge, many guitar bands not only adopted a self-consciously serious attitude, but also resisted the urge to write fist-pumping, arena-ready choruses. Still, the '90s did produce a few exceptions, such as Oasis, Urge Overkill, and the serious but anthemic Pearl Jam.

Freestyle,,

Often growing in tandem with contemporary styles like electro and house, Freestyle emerged in the twin Latin capitals of New York City and Miami during the early '80s. Freestyle classics like "I Wonder If I Take You Home" by Lisa Lisa & Cult Jam, "Let the Music Play" by Shannon, and "Party Your Body" by Stevie B relied on angular, synthesized beats similar to electro and early house, but also emphasized the romantic themes of classic R&B and disco. The fusion of mechanical and sensual proved ready for crossover during the period, and both Shannon and Lisa Lisa hit the Top 40 during 1984-85. Freestyle also dovetailed nicely with the rise of dance pop during the mid-'80s — Madonna's early producer and remixer, John Benitez (aka Jellybean), was also active in the freestyle community. By the end of the decade, a number of artists — Exposé, Brenda K. Starr, Trinere, the Cover Girls, India, and Stevie B — followed them into the pop or R&B charts. Even after popular success waned in the late '80s, though, freestyle moved to the underground as a vital stream of modern dance music alongside house, techno, and bass music. Similar to mainstream house, freestyle artists are usually (though by no means exclusively) either female vocalists or male producers. Newer figures like Lil Suzy, George Lamond, Angelique, Johnny O, and others became big stars in the freestyle community.

grunge

Using the sludgy, murky sound of the Stooges and Black Sabbath as a foundation, Grunge was a hybrid of heavy metal and punk. Though the guitars were straight from early '70s metal, the aesthetic of grunge was far from metal. Both the lyrical approach and musical attack of grunge were adopted from punk, particularly the independent ideals of early '80s American hardcore. The first wave of grunge bands -- Green River, Mudhoney, Soundgarden -- were heavier than the second, which began with Nirvana. Nirvana was more melodic than their predecessors and they also had signature stop-start dynamics, which became a genre convention nearly as recognizable as fuzzy, distorted guitars. After Nirvana crossed over into the mainstream, grunge lost many of its independent and punk connections and became the most popular style of hard rock in the '90s.

Alternative Rock

Alternative Pop/Rock is essentially a catch-all term for post-punk bands from the mid-'80s to the mid-'90s. Though there is a variety of musical styles within Alternative Rock, they are all tied together since they existed outside of the mainstream. In some ways, there are two waves of alternative bands, with Nirvana's success in 1991 acting as a dividing point. In the '80s, most alternative bands were on independent labels; if they were on majors, they didn't receive as much support as most of the label's mainstream acts. During the '80s, alternative included everything from jangle pop, post-hardcore punk, funk metal, punk pop, and experimental rock. After Nirvana's popularity in the '90s, alternative included all of these subgenres, but many of the edges were sanded off because the music was now being marketed as part of the mainstream. Hard rock and punk-derived music were more commercially successful than the left-of-center pop that dominated late-'80s alternative pop/rock, so alternative lost some of its quirkier tendencies in the '90s. Most experimental bands were relegated to indie rock.

goth rock

Frequently misunderstood in its aesthetics and misapplied as a term, goth rock is an offshoot of post-punk that existed primarily during the early to mid-'80s. Its reputation as the darkest and gloomiest form of underground rock is largely deserved, though today that reputation stems more from the visual theatricality of its bands and black-clad followers. Sonically, goth rock took the cold synthesizers and processed guitars of post-punk and used them to construct foreboding, sorrowful, often epic soundscapes. Early on, its lyrics were usually introspective and intensely personal, but its poetic sensibilities soon led to a taste for literary romanticism, morbidity, religious symbolism, and/or supernatural mysticism. Goth rock was generally not a critically acclaimed style, given its penchant for florid poetry, relentlessly mournful dirges, and melodramatic excess. However, it spawned a devoted, still-thriving subculture that kept its aesthetics alive long after the music's initial heyday had passed. The godfathers of goth-rock were British post-punkers Joy Division, whose bleak, remote, obsessively introspective music and lyrics laid the initial foundation for goth. But for all intents and purposes, the true birth of goth rock was "Bela Lugosi's Dead," the 1979 debut single by Bauhaus. Already chilly post-punk outfits like the Cure and Siouxsie & the Banshees became full-on goth bands around the same time, and their heavy, menacing makeup and dark clothes became an important part of their fans' expression. As goth rock's popularity spread among a certain segment of sensitive, alienated youth (first in the U.K., where most of its bands came from, then in the U.S.), its fashion sense grew more and more outlandish, and the original sound evolved somewhat. The Cure, Siouxsie & the Banshees, and the Mission UK incorporated more pop and alternative elements in their music, while the Sisters of Mercy, Fields of the Nephilim, and the American band Christian Death took a heavier, sometimes metal-influenced approach. By the end of the '80s, the original goth-rock movement had ceased to exist, but the music mutated into new forms and continued to influence many of rock's darker subgenres. During the '90s, the goth sound began to cross-pollinate with industrial music, producing hybrids that appealed to both sides, as well as the darkwave subgenre (which also incorporated '80s synth-pop and dream-pop). The latter half of the '90s also saw goth rock's influence cropping up all over heavy metal; a new breed of progressive black metal bands drew heavily from goth's sound and style, while some alternative metal bands also borrowed from goth rock's visual imagery (including Marilyn Manson, who -- despite countless news reports to the contrary -- is not a goth-rock artist).

screamo,,

Screamo is a genre that is derived from hardcore, specifically the emo nature that some hardcore bands began to exhibit in the 1990s. Though initial bands began appearing around this time, it wasn’t until the late ‘90s/ early 2000s that many had entered mainstream consciousness. Some of these early bands included Saetia and City of Caterpillar, but screamo was made drastically more popular by later bands like Thursday, the Used, Glassjaw, Thrice, Poison the Well, and MTV favorites, Story of the Year and Hawthorne Heights. Many of these bands took influence from the likes of Refused and At the Drive-In, and subsequent upstarts found their voice listening to albums like Thursday’s Full Collapse, Poison the Well’s The Opposite of December, and Thrice’s The Illusion of Safety.

By the turn of the millennium, the music was generally based in the aggressive side of the overarching punk-revival scene (including pop-punk and punk metal), though some alternative metal groups could also be included. Even bands that weren’t necessarily screamo (since the tag can sometimes be vague) would often delve into the genre’s characteristic guttural vocal style not so dissimilar from the abrasive nature of hardcore. It came to be that the soft/loud dynamic of having either one or two singers who alternate between passionate singing and distraught shrieking that characterizes most screamo. These vocals are often layered or appear side-by-side amid aggressive, hard-hitting guitar licks used to trigger an exhaustive, emotional catharsis. Though the music is outwardly tough and powerful, the lyrics are usually of the introspective kind found in softer emo bands. For many groups, like Senses Fail and Vendetta Red, lyrics often boasted violent or bloody imagery alongside subject matter dealing with overwhelming angst and relationships. By the mid-2000s, the over-saturation of the screamo scene had caused many bands to begin purposefully expanding past the genre’s trademark sing/scream dynamics to remain relevant.

Emo,,

Originally an arty outgrowth of hardcore punk, emo became an important force in underground rock by the late '90s, appealing to modern-day punks and indie-rockers alike. Some emo leans toward the progressive side, full of complex guitar work, unorthodox song structures, arty noise, and extreme dynamic shifts; some emo is much closer to punk-pop, though it's a bit more intricate. Emo lyrics are deeply personal, usually either free-associative poetry or intimate confessionals. Though it's far less macho, emo is a direct descendant of hardcore's preoccupations with authenticity and anti-commercialism; it grew out of the conviction that commercially oriented music was too artificial and calculated to express any genuine emotion. Because the emo ideal is authentic, deeply felt emotion that defies rational analysis, the style can be prone to excess in its quest for ever-bigger peaks and releases. But at its best, emo has a sweeping power that manages to be visceral, challenging, and intimate all at once. The groundwork for emo was laid by Hüsker Dü's 1984 landmark Zen Arcade, which made it possible for hardcore bands to tackle more personal subject matter and write more tuneful and technically demanding songs. Emo emerged in Washington, D.C. not long after, amidst the remnants of the hardcore scene that had produced Minor Threat and Bad Brains. The term "emo" (sometimes lengthened to "emocore") was initially used to describe hardcore bands who favored expressive vocals over the typical barking rants; the first true emo band was Rites of Spring, followed by ex-Minor Threat singer Ian MacKaye's short-lived Embrace. MacKaye's Dischord label became the center for D.C.'s growing emo scene, releasing work by Rites of Spring, Dag Nasty, Nation of Ulysses, and MacKaye's collaboration with members of Rites of Spring, Fugazi. Fugazi became the definitive early emo band, crossing over to alternative rock listeners and getting press for their uncompromisingly anti-commercial attitudes. Aside from the Dischord stable, most early emo was deeply underground, recorded by extremely short-lived bands and released on vinyl in small quantities by small labels; some vocalists literally wept onstage during song climaxes, earning derision from hardcore purists. Fugazi notwithstanding, emo didn't really break out of obscurity until the mid-'90s emergence of Sunny Day Real Estate, whose early work defined the style in the minds of many. Tempering Fugazi's gnarled guitar webs with Seattle grunge, straight-up prog-rock, and crooned vocals, SDRE launched a thousand imitators who connected with their dramatic melodies and introspective mysticism. Some of this new generation connected equally with the wry, geeky introspection and catchy punk-pop of Weezer's Pinkerton album. While several artists continued to build on Fugazi's innovations (including Quicksand and Drive Like Jehu), most '90s emo bands borrowed from some combination of Fugazi, Sunny Day Real Estate, and Weezer. Groups like the Promise Ring, the Get Up Kids, Braid, Texas Is the Reason, Jimmy Eat World, Joan of Arc, and Jets to Brazil earned substantial followings in the indie-rock world, making emo one of the more popular underground rock styles at the turn of the millennium.

japanese rock,,

If Japanese pop is mainstream, Japanese Rock is a little underground. Japan has a healthy rock & roll scene, ranging from garage rockers to noise merchants. Consequently, there is quite a bit of sonic diversity within Japanese rock.Psychedelic-rock had been imported into Japan by countless cover bands and by original bands such as the Jacks, whose Vacant World (1968) was an early classic. Japanese space-rock was born with Hadaka no Rallizes

(also known as Les Rallizes Denudes), who drew inspiration from the Velvet Underground's Exploding Plastic Inevitable light and sound shows and from Blue Cheer's heavily amplified sound. Despite the fact that no one would hear it for two decades, Japan remained an invaluable source of space-rock bands.

The Taj Mahal Travellers (11), led by avantgarde composer and violinist Takehisa Kosugi, played lengthy improvised jams for small ensemble (violin, harmonica, bass, tuba, trumpet, synthesizer, mandolin, percussions) that can be summarized in three principles: a Far-Eastern approach to music as a living organism, an intense electronic processing of instruments and voices, a semi-mathematical overlapping of frequencies. Basically: LaMonte Young on acid. Collected on July 15 1972 and August 1974, their music ranged from cosmic hisses to nightmarish distortions, from pow-wow bacchanals to Tibetan-style chanting and droning.

Lost Aaraaff's Lost Aaraaff (1971) was devoted to three improvised jams. Their young guitarist, Keiji Haino (3) penned the eastern mass Ama No Gawa - Milky Way (1973). Then, inspired by free-jazz master Takayanagi Masayuki, Haino formed Fushitsusha (2) to play improvised psychedelic jams. Starting with Live I (1989), 100 minutes of noise that ranked among the masterpieces of the psychedelic jam of all times, a bacchanal that vomited debris of Blue Cheer, MC5, Iron Butterfly, free-jazz, Grateful Dead and Jimi Hendrix, this prolific trio (originally a quartet) released monumental and dissolute works that seemed to know no limits. Fushitsusha (1991) and Hisou - Pathetique (1994) were among the follow-ups, but later releases such as The Wisdom Prepared (1998) and I Saw It (2000) were equally torrential. In the meantime, Haino was also busy with Nijiumu and Vajra. His solo albums included the galactic suites Affection (1992) and Execration (1993), and his boldest experiment, I Said This Is The Son Of Nihilism (1995). As the influences of LaMonte Young and Brian Eno increased, Haino arrived at Abandon All Words At A Stroke So That Prayer Can Come Spilling Out (2001), which contains a hypnotic piece for hurdy-gurdy and treated voice, and an industrial collage of metallic noises, distortions and ghostly vocals.

The music of Maru Sankaku Shikaku, active between 1970 and 1973, was an ethnic, mystical experience, that embraced the hippy spirit of Taj Mahal Travelers and Third Ear Band.

The eclectic style of the Flower Traveling Band (1) peaked with the five-part suite Satori (1971), a confluence of acid-rock, blues-rock, space-rock and hard-rock.

british pop,,

The Beatles established a long-running British tradition of tuneful, guitar-driven pop bands, a tradition that was refreshed and updated every so often by new musical movements. Britpop, however, refers to the legion of '90s bands who drew more consciously from that tradition than ever before. Although the movement originated in the U.K. indie scene, Britpop was unabashedly commercial - its bands prized big, shiny, catchy hooks, as well as the glamour of mainstream pop stardom and the sense that they were creating the soundtrack to the lives of a new generation of British youth. And it was very definitely British youth they were aiming at; Britpop celebrated and commented on their lives, their culture, and their musical heritage, with little regard for whether that specificity would make them less accessible to American audiences. Britpop's youthful exuberance and desire for recognition were reactions not only against the shy, anti-star personas of the early-'90s shoegazer bands, but also the dourness of American grunge and the faceless producers behind the growing electronic-dance underground. Musically, Britpop drew from the Beatles, of course, but also from the pastoral sound of late-'60s Kinks, the mod movement (the Who, the Small Faces), '70s glam (David Bowie, T. Rex, Roxy Music), punk and new wave (the Jam, the Buzzcocks, Wire, Madness, XTC, Squeeze, Elvis Costello), and the alternative guitar-pop of the Smiths. All those artists were quintessentially British — they crafted their images, lyrics, and sounds from a distinctly British frame of reference, which was why few of them became anything more than cult artists in the U.S. (and why Britpop functioned much the same way). Apart from those influences, Britpop had its most immediate roots in the Madchester scene, whose emphasis on good times and catchy tunes pointed the way around the shoegazer aesthetic. The Stone Roses' effortless pop hooks and rock-star attitude were the most important part of the foundation, but the true founding fathers of Britpop were Suede. Released in 1993, their self-titled debut became an unexpected smash with its fusion of glam-rock majesty and Smiths introspection. Suede opened the doors for even bigger breakthroughs in 1994 by Blur (Parklife) and Oasis (Definitely Maybe), who quickly became Britpop's two most popular superstars. With their success came a giddy explosion of similarly inspired bands; Elastica, Pulp, Supergrass, and the Boo Radleys were among the biggest. In 1996, Oasis became the only Britpop band to become genuine mainstream stars in the U.S. 1997 brought the first signals that the Britpop boom was beginning to run out of steam, namely Oasis' poorly reviewed third album and Blur's move toward American indie rock. Yet even after the movement's star began to fade, several individual bands kept going strong, and the less youth-oriented British trad rock movement kept its classicism alive.

british rock,,

Early British pop/rock is essentially any British popular music that was influenced by rock & roll and that appeared prior to the Beatles (i.e. the late '50s to about 1963). Most early British rock was far more mannered than its inspirations, and its best performers not quite up to the level of American rockers -- simply because rock & roll was full of indigenous American musical ingredients that British performers weren't familiar with. Aside from the skiffle fad (which inspired many future rockers to pick up their first instruments), most early British pop/rock consisted of rockabilly imitations (some of the best of which came from Cliff Richard & the Shadows, Johnny Kidd & the Pirates, and Billy Fury) or string-dominated ballads sung by teen idols. Some of the most intriguing exceptions came from producer Joe Meek, whose space-age aesthetic and adventurous experiments with sound effects produced some of the most distinctive instrumental rock of the pre-Beatles era (it also produced the first British single to hit number one in the States, the Tornados' "Telstar"). But by and large, early British pop/rock's greatest importance was as an inspiration to the next generation of British rockers who would spearhead the British Invasion.

Rock & Roll,,

In its purest form, Rock & Roll has three chords, a strong, insistent back beat, and a catchy melody. Early rock & roll drew from a variety of sources, primarily blues, R&B, and country, but also gospel, traditional pop, jazz, and folk. All of these influences combined in a simple, blues-based song structure that was fast, danceable, and catchy. The first wave of rock & rollers -- Chuck Berry, Elvis Presley, Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis, Buddy Holly, Bo Diddley, Bill Haley, Gene Vincent, the Everly Brothers, and Carl Perkins, among many others -- set the template for rock & roll that was followed over the next four decades. During each decade, a number of artists replicated the sound of the first rockers, while some expanded that definition and others completely exploded the constrictions of the genre. From the British Invasion, folk-rock, psychedelia, and through hard rock, heavy metal, glam rock, and punk, most subgenres of rock & roll initially demonstrated an allegiance to the basic structure of rock & roll. Once these permutations emerged, traditional rock & roll faded away from the pop charts, yet there were always artists that kept the flame alive. Some, like the Rolling Stones and the Faces, adhered to the basic rules of traditional rock & roll but played the music fast and loose. Others, like proto-punk rockers the Velvet Underground, the New York Dolls, and the Stooges, kept the basic song structure, but played it with more menace. Still others, like Dave Edmunds and Graham Parker, became rock & roll traditionalists, writing and recording music that never wavered from the sound of the late '50s and early '60s. Although the term "rock & roll" came to refer to a number of different music styles in the decades following its inception, the essential form of the music never changed.

Rock,,

Rock & Roll is often used as a generic term, but its sound is rarely predictable. From the outset, when the early rockers merged country and blues, rock has been defined by its energy, rebellion and catchy hooks, but as the genre aged, it began to shed those very characteristics, placing equal emphasis on craftmanship and pushing the boundaries of the music. As a result, everything from Chuck Berry's pounding, three-chord rockers and the sweet harmonies of the Beatles to the jarring, atonal white noise of Sonic Youth has been categorized as "rock." That's accurate — rock & roll had a specific sound and image for only a handful of years. For most of its life, rock has been fragmented, spinning off new styles and variations every few years, from Brill Building Pop and heavy metal to dance-pop and grunge. And that's only natural for a genre that began its life as a fusion of styles.

Pop,,

In a broad sense, pop is any music based on memorable melodies, repeated sections (usually, but not always, verses and choruses), and a tight, concise structure that keeps the listener's focus on those elements. Pop as a musical style, however, began in the late '90s and early 2000s, when a pair of major forces began narrowing and focusing commercial tastes. First, the heavy influence of rap and R&B made the pop singles charts more homogeneous than ever. Then, the advent of the television contest American Idol further centralized what people agreed on as pop music. As such, Pop is primarily influenced by the time's two most broadly popular styles: R&B and adult contemporary. The sound of Backstreet Boys and Britney Spears in the mid-to-late '90s was of prime importance to the genesis of Pop, as were R&B superstars Aaliyah and R. Kelly, both of whom had a heavy adult contemporary angle to their material. By the 2000s, a parade of varying artists were catering to the mainstream with a similar type of pop music -- artists as diverse as Destiny's Child, Black Eyed Peas, Faith Hill, Maroon 5, Keith Urban, and AmIdol alums like Kelly Clarkson and Clay Aiken. Not everything they recorded was Pop, but in varying degrees they included several bids to the mainstream each year and on each album. Although the essentials of songcraft were still much in abundance, their songs were as much about production as performance.