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Michael Jackson, possibly more than any other pop artist
of the 20th Century, managed to bridge the gap in musical tastes between African American audiences and European American
audiences. During his time at Motown, he internalized the goal, taught to all Motown artists by
Berry Gordy, of crossing over and appealing to European American audiences. Motown artists helped popularize R&B
music among white listeners. However, none achieved the same level of crossover success as Jackson. This paper looks at the
popular music conventions that Jackson drew from to appeal to diverse groups expressing a variety of musical tastes. In so
doing, he was able to communicate something essential and authentic that resonated among the many different people who came
to appreciate and love his music.
Michael Jackson certainly had a great influence on MTV
videos. Before Thriller, videos were for promotion of an album or single, or were video tapings of live performances; Thriller
turned videos into an entertainment medium like movies with the soundtrack provided by the song. However, the music became
an accompaniment to the images, not unlike in opera and film. MTV provides a post-modern function in the way it reinforces
or imposes narrative on the music. Although, the lyrics may suggest a narrative structure, the images in the video provide
concrete
images thereby interpreting the lyrics for the viewer;
for example, the video for “Beat It” reinforces images of conflict and resolution even though the lyrics are about
defeat and courage. In this case the images impose an interpretation on the song.
Disco is a style of pop music that was popular in the
mid-1970s. Disco music has a strong beat that people can dance to. People usually dance to disco music at bars called disco
clubs. The word "disco" is also used to refer to the style of dancing that people do to disco music, or to the style
of clothes that people wear to go disco dancing.
Disco was at
its most popular in the United States and Europe in the 1970s and early 1980s. Disco was brought into the mainstream by the
hit movie Saturday Night Fever, which was released in 1977. This movie, which starred John Travolta, showed people doing disco
dancing. Many radio stations played disco in the late 1970s.
Funk music was the soundtrack of the mid 1970s, embraced
by combos such as: Ronald Bell's Kool And The Gang, the most faithful to Sly Stone's model, from Funky Stuff (1973)
to Celebration (1980); the vocal trio Labelle, featuring Patti LaBelle (Holt) and Nona Hendryx, who blended rhythm'n'blues
and rock'n'roll and adopted a glam image for Bob Crewe's and Kenny Nolan's Lady Marmalade
(1974); the Commodores, led by tenor saxophonist Lionel Ritchie, with the electronic
instrumental Machine Gun (1974); drummer Maurice White's jazzsoul- rock fusion concept Earth Wind And Fire, with Shining
Star (1975) and Serpentine Fire (1977), Philip Bailey's effeminate falsetto, Larry Dunn's sleek keyboards, and a Stax-like
horn section; the percussive Ohio Players, with Fire
(1974) and
Love Rollercoaster (1975); Harry Wayne Casey's and Richard Finch's exuberant K.C. And The Sunshine Band, from That's
The Way I Like It (1975) to Baby Give It Up (1983), that coined the quintessential "Miami sound"; Larry Graham's
Graham Central Station, with The Jam (1976), the sound of funk music to come; Larry Blackmon's Cameo, the only veterans
to dominate in two
decades, from Funk Funk (1977) to Word Up
(1986); and, in Britain, the Average White Band, with the instrumental Pick Up The Pieces (1974). Ex- Labelle vocalist Nona
Hendryx fused funk, soul and hard-rock on her Nona Hendryx (? 1977 - ? 1977). Tina Turner, Ike's wife, who had been the
sexy pillar of their revue, capitalized on a tiger-like vocal style with the solid funkboogie groove of Nutbush City Limits
(1973). Betty Davis (Miles' wife), was sexually aggressive and vocally gruff on Betty Davis (? 1973 - summer 1973), featuring
Sly Stone's rhythm section and the Pointer Sisters, and pioneered a look that bridged the psychedelic era and the disco
era.
Rock music in Detroit in the 1960s was a different commodity
than the established Motown sound. Although both musical styles shared a relation with African-American inspired rhythms and
a great association with the youth culture, Motown was polished and professional,
and the new rock music was rough and raw. Detroit rock artists, although different from Motown, were still able to
maintain the success streak to both the radio audiences and the music industry due to Motown’s success. The years 1965
to 1972 represented the era when Detroit rock music became a widespread success. These years have also been called the “season
of rebellion,” which refers to
one of the most pivotal
shifts of American consumer musical tastes.3 This shift of tastes, from Motown’s polished demeanor to the untamed cries
of the young rock bands, directly influenced the music that was heard on radio and throughout the venues in Detroit. It was
in this time
period that the diversification toward rock and
roll music occurred and, within Detroit, it was this time period that brought rock and roll, and its related political messages,
into a national spotlight. These years provided more than just the proliferation of a new style of music, rock and roll; these
years were also the proving ground for the music industry to stay current and, ultimately, ahead of the quickly changing consumer
music trends. These new rock musicians represented a new evolving form of music that the record labels had not dealt with
in the past. Many of the Detroit rock bands did not have the social graces that were expected of the Motown acts. These new
Detroit artists with long hair and rowdy behavior were not as easy to direct and influence. Rock music of the 1960s represented
a product that the record labels were not versed in, but the success of these early rock artists proved a lucrative musical
commodity.
Elvis’s professional life was spent touring the
United States and performing in Las Vegas. After 1972 his performances became increasingly erratic, perhaps because he was
divorced by his wife, Priscilla Beaulieu Presley, after five years of marriage. Elvis’s health deteriorated, in part
because he gained a great deal of
weight. It was his abuse of
prescription drugs, however, that led to his death in Memphis on 16 August 1977. Oddly enough, Elvis’s death revived
his fame. Today he remains a hero to millions of people around the world. As a performer Elvis was most innovative at the
beginning (between 1954-1958) and toward the end (1967-1972) of his career. He made his reputation mostly as a recording artist,
but he was even more exciting in live performance; on stage, his famous smile, snarl, and gyrations, together with the unusual
clothes he wore and his teasing personality, transformed demure young women as well as their middle-aged mothers into
screaming hysterics. Elvis’s career as a movie star mostly damaged his reputation as a musician. Although a few of his
earliest films, including Jailhouse Rock, featured him as a successful actor or actor-singer, his later films were less
successful and some were musical and financial disasters. Ironically, Elvis
actually improved as a singer throughout the 1960s and early 1970s. “Burning Love”, one of his few post-1960s
hits, demonstrates his ever-increasing vocal skill as well as his lifelong dramatic ability to ‘put a song across’.
After establishing himself in Las Vegas, Elvis employed larger and larger groups of instrumentalists and vocalists as accompanists.
His successes during the early 1970s—based in part on his live performances with these ensembles, in part on his increasingly
outrageous costumes— contributed to the rise of glam rock as a musical movement.
Glam rock emerged out of the English psychedelic and
art rock scenes of the late 1960s and can be seen as both an extension of, and reaction against, those trends. Musically it
was very diverse, varying between the simple rock and roll revivalism of figures like Alvin Stardust to the complex art rock
of Roxy Music, and can be seen as much as a fashion as a musical sub-genre. Visually it was a mesh of various styles, ranging
from 1930s Hollywood glamor, through 1950s pin-up sex appeal, pre-war Cabaret theatrics, Victorian literary and symbolist
styles, science fiction, to ancient and occult mysticism and mythology; manifesting itself in outrageous clothes, makeup,
hairstyles, and platform-soled boots. Glam is most noted for its sexual and gender ambiguity and representations of androgyny,
beside extensive use of theatrics. It was prefigured by the showmanship and gender identity manipulation of American acts
such as The Cockettes and Alice Cooper.
The origins of glam rock are associated with Marc Bolan,
who had renamed his folk duo to T. Rex and taken up electric instruments by the end of the 1960s. Often cited as the moment
of inception is his appearance on the UK TV programme Top of the Pops in March 1971 wearing glitter and satins, to perform
what would be his second Top 10 hit and first #1 single "Hot Love". From late 1971, already a minor star, David
Bowie developed his Ziggy Stardust persona, incorporating elements of professional make up, mime and performance into his
act. These performers were soon followed in the style by acts including Roxy Music, Sweet, Slade, Mott the Hoople, Mud and
Alvin Stardust. While highly successful in the single charts in the UK, very few of these musicians were able to make a serious
impact in the United States; Bowie was the major exception becoming an international superstar and prompting the adoption
of glam styles among acts like Lou Reed, Iggy Pop, New York Dolls and Jobriath, often known as "glitter rock" and
with a darker lyrical content than their British counterparts.
In the UK the term glitter rock was most often used
to refer to the extreme version of glam pursued by Gary Glitter and his support musicians the Glitter Band, who between them
achieved eighteen top ten singles in the UK between 1972 and 1976. A second wave of glam rock acts, including Suzi Quatro,
Roy Wood's Wizzard and Sparks, dominated the British single charts from about 1974 to 1976. Quatro directly inspired the
pioneering Los Angeles based all-girl group The Runaways. Existing acts, some not usually considered central to the genre,
also adopted glam styles, including Rod Stewart, Elton John, Queen and, for a time, even the Rolling Stones. Punk rock, often
seen as a reaction to the artifice of glam rock, but using some elements of the genre including makeup and involving covers
versions of glam rock records, helped end the fashion for glam from about 1976.
Slade are from the Black Country area of the West Midlands:
Drummer Don Powell and bass guitarist Jim Lea were both born and raised around Wolverhampton, whilst lead guitarist Dave Hill
was born in Devon but moved to Wolverhampton as a child. Lead singer Noddy Holder was born and raised in the nearby town of
Walsall. In writings by and about Slade, the Trumpet public house in Bilston is mentioned frequently as a band meeting place,
especially in their early days.
The group dominated the
UK charts during the early 1970s. During the height of their success, Slade out-performed their chart rivals, such as Wizzard,
Sweet, T. Rex, Suzi Quatro, Mud, Smokie, Gary Glitter, Roxy Music and David Bowie. In the UK, they achieved twelve Top 5 hit
singles from 1971 to 1974, six of which topped the chart. In total, Slade had seventeen Top 20 hits between 1971 and 1976
including six #1s, three #2s and two #3s. No other UK act of the period enjoyed such consistency in the UK Top 40 and Slade
actually came the closest to matching The Beatles' twenty two Top 10 records in a single decade (1960s). Three of their
singles entered the charts at #1 and they sold more singles in the UK than any other group of the 1970s. By 1973 alone, "Merry
Xmas Everybody" had sold over one million copies globally, and gained gold disc status. They toured Europe in 1973 and
the US in 1974. Slade have released over thirty albums, three of which reached #1 on the UK Albums Chart.
While Slade's attempts at cracking the United States
market were largely unsuccessful, they left their mark on several US bands who cite Slade as an influence.[5] Kiss bassist
Gene Simmons admitted that his band's early songwriting ethos and stage performance style was influenced by Slade. In
his book, Kiss and Make-Up, Simmons wrote on page 85, "the one we kept returning to was Slade," and "we liked
the way they connected with the crowd, and the way they wrote anthems... we wanted that same energy, that same irresistible
simplicity. but we wanted it American-style". Tom Petersson of Cheap Trick said on their From Tokyo to you DVD that his
band went to see Slade perform, and that they used "every cheap trick in the book", thus inadvertently coining his
group's name. Cheap Trick covered the song "When the Lights are Out" (the original appeared on Old New Borrowed
and Blue) on their 2009 release, The Latest. Quiet Riot had US hits with their covers of "Cum On Feel the Noize"
and "Mama Weer All Crazee Now". The origins of Slade's influence on Quiet Riot dated back to the early 1970s,
when Kevin DuBrow photographed Slade during their first Los Angeles appearances at the Whisky a Go Go.
The 1970s saw the advent of two subgenres of rock -
glam rock and punk rock. Both had their roots firmly in rock music but they were very different form each other. Punk rock
was about rebellion and anarchy with bands like the Sex Pistols at the fore front of the movement. Glam rock was more experimental
and saw the like of David Bowie lead the way. Make up, glitter and platforms were the style of choice. By the 1980s rock had
evolved even further. One of the main forms of rock in the 1980s was soft rock. Power ballads were en vogue and big hair was
the order of the day. Bands like Chicago and Mr Mister were setting the tone. There was also a darker, more aggressive rock
on the scene with bands like Black Sabbath gaining coverage. Towards the end of the decade we saw more American rock bands
- particularly shoe-gaze rock bands - come into the scene. The term shoe-gaze was coined from the way the lead singer of such
bands would perform on stage, usually staring at his feet!
ABBA was a Swedish pop music group formed in Stockholm
in 1972, consisting of Anni-Frid "Frida" Lyngstad, Björn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson and Agnetha Fältskog.
They became one of the most commercially successful acts in the history of popular music, topping the charts worldwide from
1972 to 1983.
ABBA sold over 375 million records worldwide,
making them the fourth best-selling popular music artists in the history of recorded music. They still sell two to three million
records a year.[3] ABBA was the first pop group from a non-English-speaking country to enjoy consistent success in the charts
of English-speaking countries, including the UK, the US, Canada, Ireland, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand. As well
as reaching the top of the charts in different countries like Mexico, Argentina, Brazil, Colombia and Peru among others, the
band also released a compilation of their hit songs translated into Spanish.
During the band's existence, Fältskog and Ulvaeus were a married couple, as were Lyngstad and Andersson
- although both couples later divorced. At the height of their popularity, both relationships began suffering strain that
led ultimately to the collapse of first the Ulvaeus-Fältskog marriage (in 1979) and then of the Andersson-Lyngstad marriage
in 1981. In the late 1970s and early 1980s these relationship changes began manifesting in the group's music, as they
produced more introspective lyrics with different compositions.
During the 1960s, popular music underwent a qualitative
change, through the work of The Beatles, Bob Dylan and their successors. This new and ambitious music was closely associated
with the various youth and "counter-cultural" movements of the decade which with varying degrees of clarity opposed
aspects of advanced capitalist
society.1 But, by 1970, very little
remained of this "rock revolution". According to the former Beatle John Lennon, the dream was over. For all the
advocacy of alternative life-styles and Utopian idealism, the power structure remained intact. One of the few marxist accounts
of this decline suggested that it was the success of the music and the "cultural revolt of proletarian youth" which
explained the impasse in which it found itself. On the sexual and cultural front, in opposition to the authoritarianism of
the family and school, the battle had largely been won. But the "latent general rejection of a complete life-situation"
(which the writer considered to be concealed within
the cultural
revolt) could "only be released into consciousness by the passage to politics proper. Nothing guarantees that British
pop music will make this transition. Its eclipse will perhaps already be visible tomorrow." The first half of the 1970s
seemed to justify this pessimism. Most of the dominant trends in pop music showed a regression from the achievements of the
1960s. At one pole was the exploitative "teenybopper" music, purveyed by well-drilled "idols" for pubescent
children. At the other, the experimental musicians of the 1960s adopted a pretentious and apolitical stance of 'artistic
quality" which usually meant the use of electronic instruments and poetic verses about elves or spaceships. In between
were the empty bombast of "heavy rock" and what came to be called "glamrock". This genre was a curious
mixture of
apocalyptic imagery and a kind of "Orwellian"
social criticism, epitomised in the erratic career of David Bowie and his fascination with the paradoxes of stardom.
Punk groups, however, have produced songs about unemployment
(Career Opportunities, Right To Work), the Notting Hill carnival (White Riot), the monarchy (God Save The Queen) and general
expressions of an apocalyptic rebellion (Anarchy In The UK, London's Burning). Since many of these songs have not been
broadcast as a result of
formal or covert censorship, it is worth
dealing in some detail with the most prominent of them. God Save The Queen was released as a recording by the Sex Pistols
at the height of last year's Jubilee euphoria. In a harsh, staccato style, the song expressed a cynical and critical view
of the monarchy. The words veered from overstatement
calculated
to outrage ("God save the Queen/And her fascist regime/Made you a moron/A potential H-bomb") to succinct irony ("God
save the Queen/ Cos tourists are money . . ."). The song ends on the repeated line "No future in England's dreaming",
an accurate diagnosis of the surfeit of regressive nostalgia involved in the whole Jubilee
process. The phrase "N.F.—No Future" was later taken up in anti-fascist propaganda, while a National
Front publication described Sex Pistols' singer Johnny Rotten as a "gormless ethno-masochist". Rotten, whose
real name is John Lydon, was born in London of Irish parents. Despite radio censorship, and the refusal of multiple retailers
such as Boots and W. H. Smith to stock it, the record sold over 200,000 copies and featured in the hit parade. The abnormal,
"underground" conditions which surrounded it must have added to the attention with which the record was heard by
those who managed to acquire a copy. The whole episode was probably the most effective political intervention by a song since
the "protest" era. It's worth noting also that the choice of the same title as the national anthem was an especially
effective blow against ruling class propaganda.
The Bee Gees, the veteran
Australian brothers led by songwriter Barry Gibb,
who
had been stars of the Sixties (A Message To You, 1968), converted to keyboards-oriented funk music with Jive Talking (1975)
and You Should Be Dancing (1976), and then scored the soundtrack for the film Saturday Night Fever (? 1975/? 1977 - nov 1977),
that, thanks to Staying Alive and Night Fever, launched a world-wide fad for disco-music. The Trammps were among the first
soul groups to benefit from the new fad, thanks to Disco Inferno (1977), written by veteran Philadelphia keyboardist Ron Kersey.
Chic (a quintet led by black virtuoso bassist Bernard Edwards and guitarist Nile Rodgers) promoted the most abused stereotype:
minimalist funk rhythm
propelled by
machine-like drumming (Tony Thompson) and embellished with strings and female singers. Their classic formulation of the dogma
can be found in Dance Dance Dance (1977), Le Freak (1978) and Good Times (1979), three anthems of the sociopolitical decadence
of the era. Rodgers went on to become one of the most distinctive producers of dance music. The female aspect was much more
relevant in disco-music than it had ever been in rock music. Several of the early disco singles were sung by women, establishing
a primacy that would endure through the years. The female gay iconography owed a lot to Jamaican model Grace Jones, whose
glacial, androgynous, futuristic, panther-like looks and monotonous vocals redefined the concept of elegance for the disco
masses. I Need A Man (1977) was the hit that created the cult. She represented the terminal point of a disease that had spread
from the Lulu of the expressionists to Marlene Dietrich to decadence-rock. The prototypical "disco divas" were Gloria
Gaynor, who pioneered the extended mix with the Isaac Hayes cover Never Can Say Goodbye
House music, techno, electro and hip hop musicians owe
their existence to the pioneers of analogue and sample based keyboards like the Moog and Mellotron that enabled a wizardry
of sounds to exist, available at the touch of a button or key. Since the new millenium however,"house music" is
known to most people as Hardcore.
Although most people
perceive house music to have originated from Donna Summer's "I Feel Love", fully formed electronic music tracks
actually came before house. Early American Sci-Fi films and the BBC Soundtrack to popular television series Doctor Who stirred
a whole generation of techno music lovers like the space rock generation during the 1970s, influenced by the psychedelic music
sound of the late 1960s and bands such as Pink Floyd, Soft Machine, Amon Duul, Crazy World of Arthur Brown, and the so-called
Krautrock early electronic scene (Tangerine Dream and Klause Schulze). Shunned by many as a "gimmick" or "children's
music", it was a genre similar and parallel to the Kosmische Rock scene in Germany. Space rock is characterized by the
use of spatial and floating backgrounds, mantra loops, electronic sequences, and futuristic effects over Rock structures.
Some of the most representative artists were Steve Hillage's Gong and Hawkwind.
Kraftwerk's 1970 classic "Ruckzuck" mixed live instruments with electric that culminated in a monotonous
epic of bass, wild drums and strange sound effects. Pink Floyd's 1971 album, Dark Side of the Moon, was highly influential
on acid house with steady beats and Moog flurries.
The
mid-1970s saw a spattering of techno- inspired music usually through ambitious producers wishing to experiment with Moog and
Mellotron type keys on more conventional rock bands such as the Steve Miller Band's 1975 track "Fly like an Eagle"
which was later heavily sampled by Nightmares on Wax in 1990.
The
late-1970s saw disco utilise the (by then) much developed electronic sound and a limited genre emerged, appealing mainly to
a gay and/or black audience, it crossed-over into mainstream American culture following the hit 1977 film Saturday Night Fever.
As disco clubs filled there was a move to larger venues. "Paradise
Garage" opened in New York in January 1978, featuring the DJ talents of Larry Levan (1954 - 1992). Studio 54, another
New York disco club, was extremely popular. The clubs played the tunes of groups like The Supremes, Anita Ward, Donna Summer
and Larry Levan's own hit "I Got My Mind Made Up". Drugs including LSD, poppers and quaaludes boosted the stamina
of the clubbers. The disco boom was short-lived. There was a backlash from Middle America, epitomised in Chicago radio DJ
Steve Dahl's "Disco Demolition Night" in 1979. Disco returned to the smaller clubs like the Warehouse in Chicago.
Opened in 1977 the Warehouse in Chicago was a key venue in the development
of House music. The main DJ was Frankie Knuckles. The club staples were still the old disco tunes but the limited number of
records meant that the DJ had to be a creative force, introducing more deck work to revitalise old tunes. The new mixing skills
also had local airplay with the Hot Mix 5 at WBMX. The chief source of this kind of records in Chicago was the record-store
"Imports Etc." where the term House was introduced as a shortening of Warehouse (as in these records are played
at the Warehouse).
Despite the new skills the music was
still essentially disco until the early 1980s when the first drum machines were introduced. Disco tracks could now be given
an edge with the use of a mixer and drum machine. This was an added boost to the prestige of the individual DJs.
The Rocky Horror Picture Show is the 1975 film adaptation
of the British musical stageplay, The Rocky Horror Show. The film is a parody of science fiction and B-movie horror films.
Director Jim Sharman collaborated on the screenplay with Richard O'Brien, who wrote both the book and lyrics for the stage.
The film introduces Tim Curry and features Susan Sarandon and Barry Bostwick along with cast members from the original Kings
Road production presented at the Royal Court Theatre, London, in 1973. In its day it was a highly provocative, though comedic,
portrayal of gay, transgender culture, a symbol of LGBT themes, as well as for underground sexual quirks.
Still in limited release 35 years after its premiere, it has the longest-running
theatrical release in film history. It gained notoriety as a midnight movie in 1977 when audiences began participating with
the film in theatres. Rocky Horror is the first film from a major Hollywood studio to be in the midnight movie market. The
motion picture has a large international following and is one of the most well known and financially successful midnight movies
of all time. In 2005, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of
Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".
Gary Glitter (born Paul Francis Gadd on 8 May 1944)
was an English former glam rock singer-songwriter and musician.
Glitter
first came to prominence in the glam rock era of the early 1970s. He had a long solo UK chart run during the 1970s, with several
hits including "Rock and Roll parts 1 & 2", "I Love You Love Me Love", "I'm the Leader of
the Gang (I Am)" and "Hello, Hello, I'm Back Again". Between 1972 and 1995 Glitter charted twenty-six hit
singles which spent a total of 180 weeks in the UK Top 100. He continued to record in the 1980s and 1990s, with his
1984 song "Another Rock N' Roll Christmas" being one of the Top 30 Christmas hits of all time. He released
seven studio albums, and at least 15 greatest hits collections or live albums. In 1998, his recording of "Rock and Roll"
was listed as one of the "Top 1001 songs in music history." The mostly instrumental "Rock and Roll, Part
2" has been played as a popular cheering song at American sporting events for several decades.
In the late 1990s Glitter returned to public attention due to his conviction for possession of child pornography
in the United Kingdom, and subsequent conviction in Vietnam for committing obscene acts with minors.
In 1976, Glitter faced drug addiction and declining record sales. He took a two year long exile, living in France
and Australia, before returning to the UK, and beginning his comeback.
Glitter's career took a downturn towards the end
of the 1970s, leading to his first bankruptcy (he went bankrupt a second time over unpaid tax bills in the 1990s). He was
said to have begun drinking heavily, even admitting later that he pondered suicide. Under financial pressure, not even a pair
of Top 40 hit singles ("It Takes All Night" and "A Little Boogie Woogie in the Back of My Mind") could
lift him all the way back. It took the post-punk audience, and some of its artists who still respected Glitter's work,
to do that; he had been an influence on post-punk, new wave, britpop and hair metal, as well as early punk rock itself. Around
this time, Glitter settled into being a performer with a cult following that continued until his child pornography conviction
in the late 1990s. This helped provide the opportunity for Glitter to cut a dance medley of his greatest hits, All That Glitters,
which charted in 1981. Within three years, he was playing eighty shows a year at colleges and clubs, and had chart hits "Dance
Me Up" (UK No.25) and "Another Rock N' Roll Christmas" (#7).
Glitter's comeback was boosted in the 1980s by various guest spots and collaborations, leading to his becoming
a cult figure with students. In 1982 he appeared on the British Electric Foundation album Music of Quality and Distinction
Volume One (UK #25) along with fellow pop/rock luminaries Sandie Shaw and Tina Turner. In 1988, the Timelords' "Doctoring
the Tardis," a Doctor Who tribute that sampled "Rock and Roll (Part Two)", reached the number one spot. In
due course, Glitter re-cut "Rock and Roll" with producer Trevor Horn and also "I'm the Leader of the Gang
(I Am)" with Girlschool. In the late 1980s his hit singles were used to compile the Telstar-released C'mon, C'mon
... It's the Gary Glitter Party Album. In 1989, Jive Bunny and the Mastermixers put a large sample of "Another Rock
and Roll Christmas" on their Number 1 UK hit "Let's Party".
In 1991 Glitter opened a restaurant in the West End of London. Glitter's Snack Bar was promoted under the slogan
"Leader of the Snack". It was successful at first, but business eventually slowed and the restaurant closed in the
late 1990s.
Brian Eno (b. 1948) is a contemporary British musician
and artist whose public creative career began in 1972 with his synthesizer playing for the rock group Roxy Music. Through
securing a niche in the music industry and by building up an audience for his progressive rock music, Eno has been able to
diversify his creative efforts considerably. He is a prime example of a new type of composer who has drawn freely on the resources
of many types of music and
ideas about music. These include a
variety of popular genres such as rhythm and blues and rock’n’roll, progressive rock, punk, and new wave, as well
as African, Middle Eastern, and oriental styles. Also notable among his influences are minimalism, experimental new music,
post-Cage avant-garde ideas, and electronic music. Eno has combined music with visual art in the form of video and sculptural
installations, has lectured on musical subjects extensively,
and
is the author or co-author of a number of written materials. Although he has performed live, his primary arena of operation
is the recording studio, which he has called his “real instrument.” In addition to the knobs and switches of the
mixing board and multi-track tape recorder, Eno plays keyboards (primarily synthesizer), guitar (primarily electric), electric
bass, and a variety of percussion instruments, he is also a singer.
The scope of Eno’s musical activity is impressive.
Between 1972 and 1988 he released eleven solo albums that range stylistically from progressive rock to what he has called
“ambient” music – a gentle music of low dynamics, blurred edges, and washes of sound color, produced primarily
through electonic means. As a songwriter he developed a technique of lyric writing based in part on the procedures of phonetic
poetry. It is on his solo albums that we
may observe the unfolding
of Eno’s musical personality in its purest form, in the role of composer he has been keenly interested in working with
the traditionally neglected or at least downplayed realms of timbre (tone colour) and texture, and in the process of pursuing
that interest has been of seminal importance in the development of the “new age” or “space music”
genre. Timbre is a term that refers to the color of sound itself: it is what makes the same note played on a violin, a trumpet,
or a xylophone sound different. This aspect of musical sound can be thought of as “vertical,” since it depends
to a large extent on the harmonics, or barely audible frequencies, that are stacked up “vertically” on top of
the primary heard note itself. The vertical harmonic spectrum determines the color of the sound, and the way our ears and
mind interpret the harmonic spectrum determines whether we hear the characteristic sound of
a guitar or a flute, or whether we hear the vocal syllable “ooh” or “aah,” for example.
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