The Evolution of Rock - Creation of Progressive, Hard and Glam Rock

Following the end of the free-loving, psychedelic 1960's the broad genre of "rock" seemed to branch into several different sub-genres. Proponents of this split took their creative differences and founded three new genres of rock and roll: "hard" rock, progressive rock and glam rock. Each young genre came with a unique sound, drastically differing images on stage and varying compositional techniques, with some of these differences made in lieu of the characteristics of one of or both the other genres.

Despite all three of the genres becoming popular at a similar time, hard rock seems to have come before glam and progressive. Hard rock was still blues based and still followed a "Verse-Chorus" structure similar to the mainstream rock hits which came before it, but use distortion and different strumming techniques (down-strumming) to create a much heavier sound. Hard rock also put more emphasis on bass guitar and drums, making them equally important compared to the guitar in creating a certain sound. This increase of importance in bass-instruments can be seen in Led Zeppelin's "Rock & Roll," where a powerful opening drum fill leads into a steady and loud cymbal crash for the rest of the song. Every other instrument is still equally represented, instead of emphasis being placed solely on guitar or vocals like many popular songs which have come before it. Hard rock paved the way for many other styles of rock music including metal and progressive rock.

Progressive took hard rock to the next level by increasing complexity and placed much more emphasis on instrumentals and the technical aspects of creating music. Instead of being based on blues, progressive rock takes its roots from the intricacy of classical and jazz music. Basic song form was radically changed and become less structured, with vocal verses randomly spliced between rich guitar, keyboard, drum and bass solos. Lyrics began to tell a story, deeply soaked in science fiction and fantasy elements. Technology became a huge importance with the use of keyboards and synthesizers. Any time or length constraints previously seen in music (usually pop/rock music on the radio was meant to be short and catchy) were disregarded, allowing for long and finely orchestrated rock. Progressive rock eventually branched off into many other kinds of music, but accidentally created glam rock which was made in direct retaliation to progressive rock.

While some people valued progressive rock for its artistic achievement, some saw it as being too complicated for its own good and wanted something much simpler and fun. This motive created glam rock, which went back to a less complex song structure in favor of fun and catchy songs and a wild new image. As a throwback to the old science fiction films of the 1950's, people performing glam rock wore unorthodox wigs, jumpsuits, spandex and makeup, all of which were rarely seen in music. The image presented by glam rock was also greatly affected by 1970's gay rights movements and activists, creating a sense of sexual ambiguity and androgyny within the genre. Androgyny can best be seen in David Bowie's alternate stage persona "Ziggy Stardust," an assumingly genderless space alien. Between glam rock, progressive rock and hard rock, glam rock definitely had the most to do with image and actually succeeded in making social statements.

These three genres are not mutually exclusive of each other, since some bands exhibit characteristics of all of them (such as Frank Zappa and Queen). The creation of the genres did however flow from each other, with glam coming in response to progressive and progressive stemming from hard rock. All three amassed wide and diverse audiences, and ultimately resulted in the creation of many new kinds of music.