Introduction
As hard as it may be for some to even give a listen to rock music without cringing, this popular genre has billions of fans around the globe. Rock music has its stylistic origins in rock and roll, electric blues, folk music, country, blues, rhythm and blues, and soul music. Rock music songs have in their centre vocals, electric guitar, bass guitar, acoustic guitar, drums, synthesizer, and keyboards. The lyrics that make up a rock music song are seen to revolve around romantic love and often emphasize on social and political themes. White, male musicians dominate the world of rock music and live performances along with musicianship and originality is what they focus on way more than musicians of many other genres
History
1960s is said to give birth to rock music songs. Many talented singers and musicians brought about the rock revolutions, the most popular and famous of all being The Beatles and The Rolling Stone, both British. As it transpired, art and conceptual expression oozed from rock music songs and theatrical performances soon became a sensation. Sub-genres of rock music emerged of which punk rock is worth mentioning. The Sex Pistols, Patti Smith, The Clash are the names that will roll off the tongue of any true rock music songs lover. It is worth mentioning that punk rock is a child of two cities, New York and London, that are so different from each other that it is hard to believe they could give birth together to this love child.
Features
The most dominant and loudest sub-genre is no doubt heavy metal. Heavy metal rock music songs permeate a certain feeling of anger and rebellion which is the hallmark of the youth that rose up and raised their voices against many causes through this form of music. Like the misunderstood musicians that keep this genre alive, heavy metal is controversial and has come a long way. It it safe to say that heavy metal has the most ardent and devoted fan base that follows and loves band like the Iron Maiden and Metallica with their lives. Alternative rock is a sub-genre that includes rock music songs that do not neatly fit into the other sub-genres of rock. It has no unified style and stands apart from mainstream music. However, in the 1990s, alternative rock went mainstream. Grunge with its unkempt musicians, dirty sound and dark humor declined as rapidly as its rise to fame and was soon over-shadowed by Britpop and the commercial sounding post-grunge. Pop punk, indie rock are two rock scenes worth mentioning.
Tips and comments
With the advancement of music software and the accessibility of computer technology, rock music songs saw themselves digitalized in 2000s. Digital rock music was expanded so rapidly through internet and many of the rock music songs were home-made. This massive increase brought new talent to the forefront and many rock music songs composed in this periods reached the top of the Billboard chart. Rock music songs had a huge social impact and changed, shaped and influenced social attitudes, culture and fashion. Rock music songs have also been associated with stimulants and drug use. Rock music eulogises cocaine, heroine and cannabis and has somehow brought forth greater sexual freedom. All of this has somehow diverted the youth from things that really matter as the world becomes more chaotic and rock music songs about this chaos are composed, sung and loved by the fans daily.
