[POP] Guitar: Fender Telecaster Autumn 1950 The world's first commercially successful solid-body electric guitar. Its simple yet effective design and revolutionary sound broke ground and set trends in electric guitar manufacturing and popular music. Introduced for national distribution as the Broadcaster in the autumn of 1950, it was the first guitar of its kind manufactured on a substantial scale and has been in continuous production in one form or another since its first incarnation.
"Shake, Rattle and Roll" is a twelve bar blues-form song, written in 1954 by Jesse Stone under his songwriting pseudonym of Charles E. Calhoun. It was originally recorded by Big Joe Turner and most successfully by Bill Haley & His Comets. The song as sung by Big Joe Turner is ranked #127 on the Rolling Stone magazine's list of The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.
Both recordings are considered classics.[7] Haley's version is peppier and brighter.[citation needed] It fits the definition of rock and roll as a merger of country music and rhythm and blues. Haley had started his career in country music while Turner was a blues shouter.
[POP] Fender Stratocaster 1954 The Fender Stratocaster was the first guitar to feature three pickups and a spring tension vibrato system, as well as being the first Fender with a contoured body. The Stratocaster's sleek, contoured body shape (officially referred to by Fender as the "Comfort Contour Body") differed from the flat, slab-like design of the Telecaster. The Stratocaster's double cutaways allowed players easier access to higher positions on the neck.
[POP] First commercially produced transistor radio The Regency TR-1 was announced on October 18, 1954 by the Regency Division of I.D.E.A., was put on sale in November 1954, and was the first practical transistor radio made in any significant numbers.
Chrysler and Philco announced that they had developed and produced the world's first all-transistor car radio in the April 28th 1955 edition of the Wall Street Journal. Chrysler made the all-transistor car radio, Mopar model 914HR, available as an "option" in fall 1955 for its new line of 1956 Chrysler and Imperial cars, which hit the showroom floor on October 21, 1955. The all-transistor car radio was a $150 option.
The film marked the rock and roll revolution by featuring Bill Haley & His Comets' "Rock Around the Clock", initially a B-side, over the film's opening credits (with a lengthy drum solo introduction, unlike the originally released single), as well as in the first scene, in an instrumental version in the middle of the film, and at the close of the movie, establishing that song as an instant hit. The record had been released the previous year, gaining only limited sales. But, popularized by its use in the film, "Rock Around the Clock" reached number one on the Billboard charts, and remained there for eight weeks. In some theaters, when the film was in first release, the song was not heard at all at the beginning of the film because rock and roll was considered a bad influence. Despite this, other instances of the song were not cut. This film is also the source of the slang term "Daddy-O". When the teacher, Mr Dadier (Glenn Ford), writes his name on the blackboard early in the film, one of the students throws a baseball and knocks a hole in the blackboard at the end of his name, Dadier becomes Dadi-O and the class erupts in laughter and calls him "Daddy-O".
The music led to a large teenage audience for the film, and their exuberant response to it sometimes overflowed into violence and vandalism at screenings. In this sense, the film has been seen as marking the start of a period of visible teenage rebellion in the latter half of the 20th century. The film was banned in Memphis, Tennessee and Atlanta, Georgia, with the Atlanta Review Board claiming that it was "immoral, obscene, licentious and will adversely affect the peace, health, morals and good order of the city."
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[POP] Shock Theater - 10/57 Shock Theater (marketed as Shock!) was a package of 52 pre-1948 classic horror films from Universal Studios released for television syndicationin October 1957 by Screen Gems, the television subsidiary of Columbia Pictures. The Shock Theater package included Dracula, Frankenstein, The Mummy, The Invisible Man and The Wolf Man as well as a few non-horror spy and mystery films. A second package, Son of Shock, was released for television by Screen Gems in 1958, with 20 horror films from both Universal and Columbia.]
Duane Eddy (born April 26, 1938) is an American guitarist. In the late 1950s and early 1960s, he had a string of hit records produced by Lee Hazlewood which were noted for their characteristically "twangy" sound, including "Rebel Rouser", "Peter Gunn", and "Because They're Young". He had sold 12 million records by 1963.
Eddy devised a technique of playing lead on his guitar's bass strings to produce a low, reverberant "twangy" sound. In November 1957, Eddy recorded an instrumental, "Movin' n' Groovin'", co-written by Eddy and Hazlewood. As the Phoenix studio had no echo chamber, Hazlewood bought a 2,000-gallon (7570-litre) water storage tank which he used as an echo chamber to accentuate the "twangy" guitar sound.
Dick Clark's American Bandstand show, January 4, 1960, featured them performing "Bulldog". Little did the Fireballs know by now that their guitar instrumental music was one of the foundational influences of the Surf music culture that was starting to make big waves. Later, coupled with a new vocalist, the Fireballs savored success in a new dimension. "Sugar Shack", a vocal released in 1963 on DOT records, was a #1 hit and the largest selling single of that year. More vocal singles and albums followed. It was a very unique transition in the music business for an 'instrumental guitar band' to become 'vocal' and retain prestige in both fields.
[POP] Guitar: Fender Jazzmaster 1959
First introduced at the 1959 NAMM Show, it was initially marketed to jazz guitarists, but found favor among surf rock guitarists in the early 1960s.
In a June 1992 interview with author Stephen McParland, Jack Andrews, the writer of the song, said that The Frogmen were a four-piece band from Culver City (called The Corsairs, J. Blair) that he met at a party. He took them into American Recording and cut "Underwater." (The tune was originally called "The Happy Frog, J. Blair) Andrews told McParland, "I shopped it to every record company in town and got booted out...by every [one]. Then my friend Joe Saraceno told me I should overdub something on it to make it more interesting, so I went back in the studio. H.B. Barnum had just done a session and he had a bunch of percussion stuff around. [Engineer Frank DeLuna] happened to pick up a guiro [pronounced "wee-ro," this is a Spanish percussion instrument typically consisting of a long-necked gourd that is sounded by scraping a stick over ridges cut into its surface] and he began making this croaking sound [with it] as we were playing the tape. I said, 'Hey, can you do that on mike?' and he said, 'Yeah, but who's gonna engineer it?' and I said, 'I will.' So, he went out and played and I engineered. Then I took it out and shopped it again."
Saraceno worked for Candix Records and helped get the record released on that label, but was not involved in the recording, itself. According to Andrews, Saraceno also came up with the name Frogmen. Little is known about the band because the members were all under 18 years old at the time "Underwater" was recorded. They were basically a high school band that recorded a few singles and then broke up.
It is often regarded as the first surf rock instrumental and is credited for launching the surf music craze. First played in public in 1960 at the Rendezvous ballroom in Balboa, CA, it quickly reached #4 on influential Los Angeles station KFWB, and later reached #60 on the national charts.
Dale's performances at the Rendezvous Ballroom in Balboa in mid to late 1961 are credited with the creation of the surf music phenomenon. Dale successfully asked for permission to use the 3,000 person capacity ballroom for surfer dances after overcrowding at a local ice cream parlor where he performed made him seek other venues. The Rendezvous ownership and the city of Newport Beach agreed to Dale's request on the condition that he prohibit alcohol sales and implement a dress code. Dale's events at the ballrooms, called "stomps," quickly became legendary, and the events routinely sold out.
The Bel-Airs were still in high school at the time. They were best known for their 1961 hit "Mr. Moto", an instrumental surf rock song, written by guitarist Paul Johnson, that featured a flamenco-inspired intro and contained a melodic piano interlude. Their potential was cited by many, but it was an argument about use of the then new Fender reverb unit that led to their breakup. The Bel-Airs were originally formed by two guitarists, Eddie Bertrand and Paul Johnson, both 16 years old at the time they recorded "Mr. Moto". In early 1963, Eddie Bertrand heard Dick Dale using the Fender reverb unit and wanted to start incorporating heavy reverb into The Bel-Airs songs. He felt reverb was the sound that would come to define surf music. Even at 17, Johnson was something of an independent thinker and told Bertrand that The Bel-Airs had done quite well without reverb and he didn't see any reason at all to begin using it. The argument escalated until Bertrand finally left the band which then broke up for good shortly after. Johnson confirmed this story in the liner notes he contributed to The Bel-Airs reunion album released in 1986.
Upon splitting up, guitarist Eddie Bertrand formed Eddie & the Showmen in 1964. Original Bel-Airs drummer Dick Dodd joined Bertrand in Eddie & the Showmen, and later joined the Standells, playing drums and singing lead on their major 1966 hit, "Dirty Water". Richard Delvy replaced Dick Dodd on drums and went on to found the surf group the Challengers. From _Bel-Airs
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