Breif history of rock/pop music - Part Two

To read part one first, go straight to post below this one:
By the end of the 60"s and the break up of the Beatles, music took a different direction. Acts such as Jimi Hendrix and Led Zeppelin were among the first to play heavily distorted guitars in their songs. This was later developed into what we now know as "heavy metal" by bands like Deep purple and Black Sabbath in the early 70"s. Ex Cream guitarist, Eric Clapton as Derik & The Dominoes had one of the first no 1 hits in this genre. By this time, psychedelic gave way to progressive or art rock with acts such as Genesis, Yes and Pink Floyd.
These bands were better known for their albums as their songs were too long for radio airplay. Meanwhile, mainstream pop tried but largely failed to keep up the high standard which The Beatles had set and had to adopt bizarre fashions to attract the attention of music fans. This became known as "glam Rock" Garry Glitter was probably the most over the top in this respect, maybe done to disguise a lack of talent. More talented acts such as T Rex, Roxy Music and David Bowie also adopted this style but were much more adventurous in both their music and fashion yet still managed to have huge hit singles. Other big artists of the time included Rod Stewart, formally in The Faces, and Slade who brought out "Merry Xmas Everybody" A huge guitar stomping hit which continues to sell every Christmas to this very day.
Blues also progressed during this time with bands such as Free, Wishbone Ash and fusing elements of funk, art rock & metal. Money by Pink Floyd (from the album "Dark Side of the Moon") was maybe the most famous example of this. Even quirkier acts like Jethro Tull with their folksy flute overtones fell into this genre.
Previously, synthesisers were huge knob laden devices that required lifting equipment to move them but became much more popular after the introduction of the first portable synthesiser: the ARP Odessy in 1970. However, Bob Moog brought out the Mini Moog the same year which had a built in keyboard and after a slow start, became a legendary success. Manufacturers Yamaha, Roland and Korg followed suit with machines which could easily be carried under a musician"s arm and were much easier to use. Emerson Lake & Palmer and Roxy music were among the first to have big hits using this instrument. With these new advances, electronic rock music started to develop with acts such as Tangerine dream and Kraftwerk. T.G. were more prog. rock with albums like Rubicon. Kraftwerk though invented an entirely new type of music with robotic rhythms & synth sounds and made them rather ahead of their time. Even so, their album Autobahn spurned a big hit single across Europe & America in 1974.
There were drawbacks with these new instruments though. All of them were monosynths meaning they could only play one note at a time and could easily drift out of tune - a major problem on stage. To try to rectify this, players of the time like Rick Wakemen of Yes would use several synths at a time on stage. Keyboardists though were crying out for similar machines but which could play chords (polyphonic) Makers tried to fill this gap in the market by introducing the string machine. This was basically an organ with produced thin buzzy waves instead of the smooth sine wave of an organ. It was far simpler (and cheaper) in design than a synth, resulting in a much smaller range of sounds. Despite this, the better ones could produce the best string sounds ever heard (with built-in analogue chorus added) and were adopted by many players including Jon Michelle Jarre in his mega selling album Oxygen.
Yamaha finally brought out the GX1. a huge three manual synthesiser that could play chords (polysynth) in 1974. It had two huge speakers but cost well over 30.000 and fewer than fifty were ever made. Even so it"s fans included Keith Emerson, Led Zeppelin and Stevie Wonder who used it in the "songs in the key of life" album, so it was However the GX1 formed the blueprint for Yamaha"s smaller, far more affordable instruments such as their superb CS80 in 1977. Moog also brought out the first "cheap" polysynth in the same year as the GX1 but due to a cost cutting flaw never realy cut the mustard and was also notoriously unreliable. However, it was still used by many well known acts including The Buggles, Gary Numan and New Musik in the late 70"s.
Meanwhile, mainstream music was about to undergo a huge change in direction which would seriously challenge the existence of many of the artists mentioned above. - cont later