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Rock & Roll: An Unruly History Hardcover – September 19, 1995

by Robert Palmer (Author)

9 customer reviews

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Rock and roll is a profoundly American art form, the musical expression of revolutionary changes in popular culture and values, a Dionysian eruption that hit the white-bread fifties like a hurricane.  It was a force destined to shake up subsequent decades and transform American culture.  Throughout its nearly four-decade history, rock and roll has continued to reinvent itself, to challenge, to upset as well as delight, to break rules and make new ones.

Rock & Roll: An Unruly History is the companion guide to PBS's ten-part series on rock that aired in September.  When PBS first conceived the Rock & Roll series, they sought out Robert Palmer, an acclaimed rock historian, writer, and the New York Times's first full-time pop music critic, to help assemble the names, events, and landmarks that are the terrain of rock history.  Palmer acted as the chief advisor to the series and it was this association that inspired him to write ROCK & ROLL:  An Unruly History.

ROCK & ROLL traces the course of rock's rich history through Palmer's own perceptions and experiences. Incorporating countless interviews with rock personalities that he has conducted over the last three decades, ROCK & ROLL follows rock's road of creative flashpoints, but diverges, too, to explore the fundamental traditions that have helped define both the music and its culture.  With a corresponding chapter to each part in the series, ROCK & ROLL shows how people, places, and events from rock "gods" to little known session musicians, from Muscle Shoals, Alabama, to the far reaches of West Africa shaped and defined the music's most important epochs.  Yet, to give rock the more in-depth analysis that it deserves, Palmer has written three additional essays "I Put a Spell on You," "Delinquents of Heaven, Hoodlums from Hell," and "The Church of the Sonic Guitar" which  respectively explore the rudiments of rhythm, the ritual of rebellion, and the story of the "six-string" in rock.

In ROCK & ROLL, Robert Palmer traces rock's ongoing evolution, showing how its many styles and early influences from blues and gospel to reggae, punk, and rap overlap and distinguish themselves from one another.  With more than one hundred and fifty illustrations,  ROCK & ROLL is the best of the two primary approaches to rock and roll history the history of innovative flashpoints, and the history of an ongoing tradition.  As told through the senses and lifelong  experiences of one of rock's preeminent critics, ROCK & ROLL is the most insightful and intelligent history of rock ever written.

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Product Details

Hardcover: 325 pages
Publisher: Harmony; 1 edition (September 19, 1995)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0517700506
ISBN-13: 978-0517700501
Product Dimensions: 1 x 8 x 9.5 inches
Shipping Weight: 2.5 pounds
Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #244,260 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #685 in Books > Arts & Photography > Music > History & Criticism
- #927 in Books > Arts & Photography > Music > Musical Genres > Rock
- #2808 in Books > Arts & Photography > Music > Theory, Composition & Performance

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Customer Reviews

4.6 out of 5 stars

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Robert Palmer & the Journey of Rock 'n' Roll

By K. French on April 4, 2002

Format: Hardcover Verified Purchase

I had to write this to offer a different opinion to the one-star review below. Robert Palmer was one of this country's best music writers and a man who died way too young. This book is not his best (that'd be DEEP BLUES), but he does an excellent job of capturing the broad history of rock 'n' roll. He discusses what led up to that crucial moment at Sun Studios in 1954 (I don't think he's trying to say that the music sprang full-grown from Elvis) and where the music traveled from there.
Bear in mind, however, that this book also served as a companion to a PBS special. That it's able to stand alone without the visuals attests to its worth. It badly deserves to be back in print.

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I thought this book was brilliant

By Chuck Bobuck on March 21, 2007

Format: Hardcover

I read this book almost ten years ago, and I still remember it as a remarkable work that put everything into perspective -- a kind of enlightenment experience. I especially loved Palmer's background on the beginnings of rock & roll in the call-and-response tent revivals.

With regard to the Elvis controversy below, I don't think Palmer ever suggests that Elvis invented rock & roll -- he painstakingly documents the contributions of dozens of black artists like Pinetop Smith, T-Bone Walker, Roy Brown, Goree Carter (to whom he credits the first rock & roll record), Ike Turner etc, well before the Elvis "invasion" of the mid-1950s.

I loved it.

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Snapshots into rock 'n' roll's true roots

By Rick Coleman on November 17, 2002

Format: Hardcover

An intriguing archaeological dig down to the murky muddy roots of rock 'n' roll -- sifting through race politics and dogma back to pre-war gospel, blues and jazz, to the Caribbean, to Africa.
Robert Palmer was one of the best rock 'n' roll writers and historians. This is the basis for the PBS TV series ROCK 'N' ROLL, which,unfortunately, did not have nearly the depth of this (it quickly dispensed with rock's roots and showed only Elvis and other latecomers in its first episode). Sadly, Palmer died before he could flesh out this work, which remains a blueprint for future writers to follow on researching rock 'n' roll's roots. Go for it!

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This book needs to be updated, and also the VHS tapes

By dougrs on January 14, 2014

Format: Hardcover Verified Purchase

This is a great and fantastic book - it is a shame that it is out of print. This book is timeless for all that appreciate Rock and Roll music History. This is the best book that I have ever read on the subject. Robert Palmer is one of my favorite music history writers - his writing is truly excellent.
I would like to see this book updated and re-issued - it is a very valuable book for music fans and especially those interested in Rock and Roll history.

Also, I would like to see the set of related VHS tapes updated to DVDs.

The VHS tapes are very hard to find, and not many have VHS players.

These tapes are much too valuable to simply let disappear.
I look forward to the book being updated and re-released, and having the VHS tapes converted to DVD.

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Robert Palmer is one of the greatest Rock writers.

By Amazon Customer on January 26, 2014

Format: Hardcover Verified Purchase

I teach a contemporary music program and studio performance class. This book is a great resource because the author focuses on the most influential artists (not just the most popular/commercial). I highly recommend you ebay the WGBH Rock & Roll documentary 5 Set DVD Collection for this "companion" book (avoid the Time/Life set of the same name- it's not the same, and very weak). The book extends the depth of the video very well.