Episode 1: The Precursors

Rock N Roll Archaeology

Welcome to Rock N Roll Archaeology! This is a reboot of Episode One: The Precursors, originally released October 15, 2015. We updated and improved it some, and re-released it on November 4, 2020.

We begin in Times Square, late summer of 1945. The war is over.

First up, the Baby Boom and a newly-discovered demographic, the white American teenager.

This new cohort is huge, with unprecedented economic clout. Young, restless and affluent, and they want to get beyond the timid, conformist popular culture of 1950s America.

“Race Records” (an outdated term for rhythm and blues records by African American musicians) become hugely popular with white teenagers. Drawn from the well of sorrow that is the Black American experience, this music has the edge and urgency--the authenticity--these kids are seeking.

We meet our first hero - the musical genius Ray Charles - and our first anti-hero, the frenetic, fatally flawed DJ Alan Freed.

We shine a light on two grassroots cultural movements that became important later: the Skiffle Craze in the United Kingdom and the Beat Poets of Urban America.

1954 is an inflection point. On the musical front, Bill Haley released the first million-selling Rock N Roll record: “Rock Around The Clock.”

That same year, big changes in the political landscape. The Brown v Board of Education decision; and Senator Joseph McCarthy was publically humiliated and discredited.

Freedom of Association and Freedom of Expression take a step forward. Paranoid politics and systemic racism are still very much with us in America, but in 1954 it got a little easier, became a little less risky, to be yourself and express yourself.

We head to the delivery room: Memphis Recording Service, where we meet the first Rock N Roll superstar, Elvis Presley, and tease Chapter Two.

Hosted and Produced by Christian Swain

Written By Richard Evans and Christian Swain

Sound Design by Jerry Danielsen

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