Victorian Rock Music
Status: TrueMost people think rock music got its start as an identifiable genre in the 1950s with artists such as Chuck Berry, Buddy Holly, and Elvis Presley. Not so. As Paul Collins points out in the current issue of The Believer, there was a thriving tradition of rock music during the nineteenth century. In fact, rock music was invented in 1785 by a retired sailor named Peter Crosthwaite in the Lake District village of Keswick. Of course, the nineteenth-century version of rock music was a bit more low-key than its twentieth-century successor, since it involved music played with rocks, as opposed to guitars and drums.
When I first saw Collins's article, I thought he had to be joking. But no, a little research confirmed that Victorian rock music was quite real. I found an article in the Galphin Society Journal (Aug, 1989) about the "Till Family Rock Band," a group that toured quite widely during the 1880s, written by a modern-day member of the family, A.M. Till. He writes: Below is a picture of the Till Family Rock Band, posing with their rocks. They look like rockers to me.
Also known as "Music with Rocks In" on Discworld.Posted by JoeDaJuggler in St. Louis, MO on Tue Jun 06, 2006 at 12:31 AM
I'm glad I'm not the only one who thought that.Posted by Smerk in to mischief on Tue Jun 06, 2006 at 01:10 AM
I hope they didn't take their fans for granite.Posted by cvirtue on Tue Jun 06, 2006 at 08:14 AM
For that, cvirtue, you should be wheeled out and shot.Posted by outeast on Wed Jun 07, 2006 at 03:52 AM
Oh, come on outeast...don't you marble at their ingenuity?Posted by Nymph on Fri Jun 09, 2006 at 08:01 AM
It was rather igneous of them to use rocks that way, I thought it was coal. (ok - I'm done hehehe)Posted by Nymph on Fri Jun 09, 2006 at 08:05 AM
Stop making these awful puns or I Shale be forced to Breccia necks, ok? IPosted by outeast on Fri Jun 09, 2006 at 09:59 AM
This is the coolest thing I've seen for a long time. I want to start one of these rock bands.Posted by Big Gary in Muleshoe, Texas, USA on Fri Jun 09, 2006 at 06:45 PM
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