Welcome to the Jungle by Daniel Morgan

Welcome to the Jungle by Daniel Morgan

The musical genre of Rock n' Roll, as it has been dubbed, has become one of the strongest driving forces in our country not just as far as pop culture, but in government and society in general. But how did it get that way? Over the years there have been so many different characters and influences in this convoluted story that it can seem a daunting one to tell. From the early influence of the radio disc jockey who broke Rock into the mainstream, to the 70's punk movement that had such an impact on politics and how people viewed the government. Be all that as it may this was a topic with great personal meaning to me so I dove right in, eager to get started and see what I could find.

The first source I checked out was a website written in the form of a book. The name of the actual article was From the Guitar to the Laptop by Piero Scaruffi. He starts out by saying that Rock n' Roll is usually defined as a combination of R n' B n Country. He goes on to say that this might not be the bet description because of other factors which enabled Rock n' Roll to become what it was, and I agree with this especially now that we see how much Rock has moved away from whatever roots it had in those genres.

This was all very interesting, but I needed to know more, like what was the first real rock band. Of course it's going to be hard to classify an actual first rock band, I continued reading in my first source and found that the years of 1952 and 1953 were years full of firsts for the rock genre. In 1952 the band Bill Haley and the Comets formed, and b many are considered to be the first real Rock n' Roll band. This was also the year that Bob Horn's Bandstand program began airing in Philadelphia, and the year that heavily influential aid DJ Alan Freed would organize the first rock concert which would be known as "Moondog Coronation Ball." The very next year Bill Haley's Crazy Man Crazy would be the first rock song to enter the Billboard charts, while at the same time the first Elvis record was being produced.

I now looked to find exactly how rock got into the mainstream. I knew that there had to be someone putting it out there for the masses and since the name Alan Freed had come up in my research as a powerful figure in early Rock n' Roll formation I decided to look up some more on him. It was not long before I found what I was looking for. A website called "The History of Rock.com" had an entire page devoted to the popular disc jockey. In reading I found out that Alan Freed was not only one of the biggest popularizers of rock, but is widely credited with king the term Rock n' Roll. I also read in so many words that he helped blur the lines of so called race music, opening the door to white acceptance of black music. Unfortunately his success only last a few years. In the late fifties he was caught in a scandal called 'Payola.' Basically he was accepting gifts from record companies in exchange for playing their client's music on his show. He had switched radio stations may times before, but in 1959 he was fired from his last station and it wasn't long before the federal government started probing and eventual charged eight men, Freed included, with accepting $116,580 in illegal gratuities. This probe eventually led to the IRS charging Freed with income tax evasion. The IRS claimed Freed owed them $37,920. On Jan 20, 1965 Freed lost his battle with Uremia and died at the age of 43. Although Freed was dead the impact he had had on radio and music would live on forever.

A few years prior to Freed's death the Rock n' Roll scene had taken another staggering blow with the tragic deaths of Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and the Big Bopper in a plane crash which took place on February 3rd while on tour in Clearlake Iowa. The day was fittingly named "The Day the Music Died" and was later memorialized in Don McLean's hit song "American Pie" in 1972.

Despite the hits that the music industry had taken recently it continued to grow, but for a little while seemed to take a step back from Rock n' Roll as if to say "Hold on, I need to take a breather." For the first few years of the sixties a folk revival took place which was comprised of artists such as Joan Baez, Phil Ochs, and the ever popular Bob Dylan. The folk revival was filled with protest songs fighting the left and young people who wanted a voice and used music to attain one.

While this was going on the Beach Boys had become a big name by combining the rhythm of Rock n' Roll with melodies of pop music. This was eventually taken to its logical conclusion in Britain by bands of what was referred to as "Mersey Sound." The most popular of these bands formed a term that stand as a land mark next to the road of time. That term was "Beatlemania." The Beatles, like an airborne pathogen of love and good vibes, spread from Britain to America and before anybody knew what hit them "Beatlemania" had swept the country becoming even more famous then Elvis and selling record in unheard-of quantities. While the Beatles were the clear front runners in the British music