Rock & Roll
The 1950s collision that made everything after it. Rhythm and blues meeting country, Sun Studio, Little Richard and Chuck Berry, Elvis, the payola hearings, the moral panic, and the moment pop became a teenage market.
Part of Pop
23 moments in this segment.
- - Elvis Presley - Heartbreak Hotel. Elvis's first RCA single and first US number one, cut at RCA's Nashville studio with Scotty Moore and Bill Black.
- - Elvis Presley on the Milton Berle Show, June 1956. The 5 June 1956 broadcast whose hip movements triggered national press condemnation and led networks to shoot Presley from the waist up.
- - Elvis Presley - Hound Dog. Elvis's rewrite of the Big Mama Thornton blues, recorded July 1956 and issued as a double-A side with Don't Be Cruel.
- - Elvis Presley performs Don't Be Cruel on The Ed Sullivan Show. Elvis's first Sullivan appearance, watched by roughly 60 million Americans.
- - Chuck Berry performs Sweet Little Sixteen on the Saturday Night Beech-Nut Show. Berry performs his newly released Chess single on ABC's Saturday Night Beech-Nut Show hosted by Dick Clark.
- - Chuck Berry - Johnny B. Goode. The guitar figure and the story of a country boy who could play, the template for rock songwriting.
- - Little Richard - Good Golly Miss Molly. One of the defining rock and roll records, cut at J&M Studio in New Orleans and released on Specialty.
- - Johnny Hallyday sings Retiens la nuit on French television. France's rock and roll import performs the Charles Aznavour-penned ballad on ORTF at the start of the yé-yé years.
- - The Beatles - I Want To Hold Your Hand, live on The Ed Sullivan Show. The 9 February 1964 broadcast watched by an estimated 73 million Americans, the moment the British Invasion began.
- - The Beatles return home to England from their first US tour. British Pathe newsreel of the Beatles facing reporters and fans at London Airport after conquering America.
- - The Beatles receive the Variety Club show business award. Newsreel of the Variety Club Showbiz Dinner at the Dorchester Hotel, where Harold Wilson presented the Beatles their award.
- - The Beatles arrive in Holland. British Pathe newsreel of the Beatles landing at Schiphol to play I Saw Her Standing There in Amsterdam.
- - The Beatles - Eight Days A Week. A Beatles For Sale track issued as an American single and the group's seventh US number one.
- - The Beach Boys perform I Get Around on The Ed Sullivan Show. Brian Wilson's group play their first US number one on Sullivan's stage.
- - The Beatles - Ticket To Ride. The Help! single McCartney later called one of the first heavy-metal records.
- - The Beatles - We Can Work It Out. A Lennon-McCartney double-A side with Day Tripper, promoted with one of the earliest pop promo films.
- - The Beatles - Paperback Writer. The single whose bass sound the group pushed the EMI engineers to make far louder than usual.
- - The Beach Boys - God Only Knows. Brian Wilson and Tony Asher's Pet Sounds ballad, sung by Carl Wilson.
- - The Beach Boys - God Only Knows, live in 1966. Official live audio of the Pet Sounds centrepiece from the year of its release.
- - The Beatles - Lady Madonna. McCartney's Fats Domino-styled piano single, the group's last for Parlophone before Apple.
- - Nico performs on The Old Grey Whistle Test. The former Velvet Underground singer performs solo with harmonium for the BBC.
- - Robert Plant interviewed about Led Zeppelin on The Old Grey Whistle Test. Bob Harris interviews Plant at the Vorst Nationaal in Brussels during Led Zeppelin's 1975 European tour.
- - All My Loving A. The Beatles, A-Seite: All my Loving, Ask me why; B-Seite: Money, PS I Love You Photograph/scan dated 2025.
