In 1953, American singer Bill Haley composed the first rock and roll song, Crazy Man Crazy. It was exactly the kind of music young people were waiting for, and everything spun to new dance rhythms. But as soon as rock ‘n’ roll appeared, the American authorities went on the attack against the new music. The police had to protect Bill Haley from the enthusiasm of fans, but they soon got fed up with it, and law enforcement began looking for a reason to ban rock concerts. To achieve this goal, the police did not shy away from all kinds of provocations. The parents of young rock ‘n’ roll fans were also unhappy that their children were listening to this “horrible” music and dancing this dubious dance in every way. They across the country began to form committees of parents opposed to rock and roll.
At the same time, the United States Congress began a hearing in the Southern states on the detrimental effects of rock and roll on America’s youth.
The reason for the anxiety of those in power in America was that young people who had previously been humble and respectful of parental traditions had fallen in love with rock and roll and had completely lost their taste and interest in careers, money, hoarding and consumer culture, that is, in the traditional American values that were considered immutable. This was true of schoolchildren, college students, and even the offspring of very famous and wealthy families. At some point, parents were horrified to discover that their children were unwilling to carry on their work and live their lives.
FBI Director Edgar Hoover famously said about rock and roll that the music “has a corrupting effect on our young people. This statement was understood by his subordinates as an order, and for a time all the big rock and roll stars were removed from the musical horizon.
In October 1957, during an Australian tour, the plane carrying singer Little Richard, author of the acclaimed hits Tutti Frutti and Good Golly Miss Molly, crashed over the ocean and began to fall. In those moments Little Richard made a promise to God that he would never sing rock and roll again. The plane came out of the corkscrew and landed on some island. But Little Richard kept his promise and for several years performed only gospel, that is, sacred songs dedicated to Jesus Christ.
Talented young man Elvis Presley in 1954 figured out how to combine the rhythms of black musicians with the songs of white Americans, and as a result he created a style of music called rockabilly. This new music gathered a huge number of young people around it.
On March 24, 1958, Elvis Presley was drafted into the army and sent to West Germany to a base in the 3rd Tank Division, away from his admirers.
On February 3, 1959, rock and roll stars Richie Valens, Buddy Holly, and Big Bopper, the author of the famous song “La Bamba,” died in a plane crash that occurred just minutes after their plane took off. They were supposed to be flying to a concert in Minnesota.
Chuck Berry is the guy who, early in his musical life, wrote the song Scools Days, which became a real anthem for young Americans in the 1950s.
At the very end of 1959, Chuck Berry was arrested on a trumped-up charge of seduction of a minor. He had actually flirted with a girl on tour who was a checkroom attendant at the St. Louis club. She was 15 years old, though she pretended to be 18. Then it turned out that the FBI agents interviewed her, after which they caught Chuck Berry with this girl and accused him of molesting a minor, although this minor had been engaged in prostitution for three years. As a result of the trial, Berry was fined five thousand dollars and sentenced to five years in prison.
A few months later, on April 16, 1960, rock ‘n’ roll desperado Eddie Cochran was killed in a car crash while on tour in Great Britain.
Of course, the FBI began scouring the radio waves for “corrupting” music. DJ Alan Freed, who was the first to use the word “rock and roll” in reference to new music, had a very hard time. The FBI started digging into the disc jockey, and gradually the case developed into a Senate hearing. As a result, the authorities began to squeeze Fried out of the airwaves, while trying to remove rock and roll from the airwaves as well. They succeeded in squeezing Fried out, but not rock and roll. After Fried was accused of not paying taxes, his career as a disc jockey began to fade. Radio stations were afraid to put him on the air, record companies didn’t want to do business with him. Eventually Alan began to have problems with alcohol, and on January 20, 1965, he died as a result of a heart attack.
But then someone at the top realized that rock music could be used as propaganda for the Western way of life.
Yes, rock music was everywhere in the U.S. and Britain, but because it was planted in the gilded cage of the charts and various music awards. As a result, the modern generation of Western rock musicians has completely lost the ideals that guided the American youth who started playing uncompromising music back in the 1950s. Modern music is just a money-making conveyor belt and nothing more. Alas!