Southern rock
Southern rock is a style of
rock music that was very popular in the
1970s, and still retains a large fan base to the present.
Rock music's origins lie mostly in the music of
Southerners, and many stars from the first wave of
1950s rock and roll such as
Elvis Presley,
Little Richard,
Bo Diddley and
Jerry Lee Lewis hailed from the
Deep South. But the
British Invasion, and the rise of
folk rock and
psychedelic rock in the middle
1960s, shifted the focus of new rock music away from the rural south and to large cities like
Liverpool,
London,
New York,
San Francisco, and
Los Angeles.
In the late
1960s, traditionalists such as
Creedence Clearwater Revival (from Northern
California), and
The Band (
Canadian, though drummer
Levon Helm is a native
Arkansan) revived interest in the roots of rock music.
Eventually the spotlight once again turned to bands from the American South.
The Allman Brothers Band out of
Macon, Georgia made their national debut in
1969 and soon gained a loyal following. Their
blues-rock sound on one hand incorporated long jams informed by
jazz and
classical music, and on the other hand incorporated softer elements of
country and
folk with a Southern feel. The death of guitarist and leader
Duane Allman in
1971 did not prevent them from gaining widespread popular appeal for the next several years, until internal tensions broke them apart after 1976.
The Allmans were signed to
Capricorn Records, a small Macon outfit headed by
Phil Walden (former manager of
Otis Redding). A number of somewhat similar acts also recorded on Capricorn, including the
Marshall Tucker Band from
South Carolina,
Wet Willie from
Alabama,
Grinderswitch from Georgia (and comprised of Allmans
roadies), and the
Elvin Bishop Band from
Oklahoma.
Not on Capricorn, but loosely associated with this first wave of Southern rock, were
Barefoot Jerry from
Tennessee and the
Charlie Daniels Band from Tennessee. Indeed it was Charlie Daniels, a big-bearded
fiddler with a knack for
novelty songs, who gave Southern rock its self-identifying anthem with his 1975 hit, "The South's Gonna Do It", whose lyrics mentioned all of the above bands and then asserted: "Be proud you're a rebel / Cause the South's gonna do it again."A year earlier, Daniels had started the
Volunteer Jam, an annual concert held in Tennessee that would bring together many Southern rock artists in a loose setting.
In the early
1970s, a different wave of
hard rock Southern groups emerged that emphasized stripped down boogie rhythms, fast guitar leads derived from
heavy metal, and lyrical themes borrowed from the concurrent
outlaw country movement. Also mentioned in "The South's Gonna Do It",
Lynyrd Skynyrd out of
Jacksonville, Florida dominated this genre until the deaths of lead singer
Ronnie Van Zant and other members of the group in a
1977 airplane crash. Groups such as
.38 Special,
The Outlaws,
Molly Hatchet,
Blackfoot, and
Black Oak Arkansas also thrived in this genre for a time.
This branch of Southern rock's use of Southern imagery, in particular the
Confederate Rebel Flag, and lyrics seemingly extolling
redneck values drew considerable criticism and derision. Some groups such as Black Oak Arkansas played up these images to the point of obvious parody. More attention was focused on Lynyrd Skynyrd's "
Sweet Home Alabama" (
1974), widely perceived as a redneck anthem and containing lines pointed at
Neil Young's song "Southern Man" (which indicted Alabama as a state full of
George Wallace-style segregationists).How Van Zant really meant "Sweet Home Alabama" is much debated, with many taking it as ironic or satiric and pointing out that Young and Van Zant respected each other as musicians.
In any case, this redneck strain was not universal in Southern rock; the Allman Brothers had multiple
African American members (percussionist
Jai Johanny Johanson and bassist
Lamar Williams) at a time when mainstream rock was actively resegregating. Moreover, the Allmans' Southern feel came more from the temperament of its music ("Hot 'Lanta", "
Little Martha", interpolations of "Will the Circle Be Unbroken") than any explicit cultural identification. Phil Walden, the Allmans, and other Capricorn artists had also played a part in
Jimmy Carter's successful, unity-based run for the
presidency; Carter himself was an avowed Allmans fan. Even within the Skynyrd branch of Southern rock, the appearance of Molly Hatchet on the dance-oriented show
Solid Gold showed that the redneck rock/metal combination had some universal appeal.
Not all Southern rock artists fit into the above molds. The
Atlanta Rhythm Section and the
Amazing Rhythm Aces were more focused on tight vocal harmonies, while the
Dixie Dregs and Allmans offshoot
Sea Level explored
jazz fusion.
Southern rock gained popularity far beyond the American south, and influenced groups as far flung as
Australia's
AC/DC and the
UK's
Def Leppard. Hard rock fans appreciated the blazing guitar solos, and working class listeners responded to the lack of glamour and rock star pretension in this music.
However, by the beginning of the
1980s, with the Allmans and Skynyrd both broken, with Capricorn Records in bankruptcy, and with Jimmy Carter out of office, much of Southern rock had become thoroughly enmeshed into corporate
arena rock. With the rise of
MTV,
New Wave, and
hair metal, most surviving Southern rock groups were relegated to secondary or regional venues.
One notable exception was
Texas'
ZZ Top, who had started in 1970 and were the one other band mentioned in "The South's Gonna Do It". In the 1980s they added slick
synthesizer production to their boogie blues sound, and skillfully used
music videos to achieve great popularity.There were occasional hits by groups such as the
Georgia Satellites as well.
During the
1990s the Allman Brothers reunified and became a strong touring and recording presence again, and the
jam band scene revived interest in extended improvisory music (although the scene also owed much to the
Grateful Dead, a group that relied heavily on southern music traditions). Incarnations of Lynyrd Skynyrd also made themselves heard. Hard rock groups with southern rock touches such as
Jackyl renewed some interest in Southern rock, while groups such as
Kings of Leon combined Southern rock with rawer genres, such as
garage rock.
Classic rock radio stations played some of the more familiar 1970s works, and Daniels' Volunteer Jam concerts were still going.
But most rock groups from the South, such as
Georgia's
R.E.M.,
B-52's,
Widespread Panic, and
Black Crowes, and
Mississippi's
Blind Melon, incorporated Southern musical and lyrical themes without explicitly allying with any Southern rock movement.
In the early 2000s, Detroit rap/rock star
Kid Rock included several southern rock tracks on his 2001
Cocky album as well as his 2003 self-titled album. Additionally, Kid Rock has listed southern rock (particularly Lynyrd Skynyrd) as being a major influence on his music. In
2005 Southern rock received new exposure from an unlikely source: singer
Bo Bice took an explicitly Southern rock sensibility and appearance to a runner-up finish on the massively watched but normally pop-oriented
American Idol television program. Fueled by a key early performance of the Allmans' "Whipping Post" and later performing Skynyrd's "
Free Bird" and, with Skynyrd on stage with him, "Sweet Home Alabama", Bice demonstrated that Southern rock still had a place in the American music pantheon.More recently, metal acts like
Black Label Society,
Every Time I Die,
The Showdown and
Maylene and the Sons of Disaster have blended strong Southern Rock influences with
heavy metal music. A number of crossover acts from
country music also are reviving the genre. Among these are
Drive-By Truckers,
Ryan Adams,
Cross Canadian Ragweed, The Great Divide, and Reckless Kelly. These bands often come from Oklahoma's
Red Dirt music scene or the Texas music scene as opposed to mainstream country meccas like Nashville. Probably one of the more unlikely blends is that of punk and Southern Rock, most notably
Slobberbone and
Jason and the Scorchers (both now disbanded).
Beginning in the 1980s and continuing into the 1990s and the new millennium, bands formed that combined heavy metal with southern rock and blues, often including southern references and imagery. Some important bands include
Corrosion of Conformity (from North Carolina),
Crowbar (from Louisiana),
Down (from Louisiana),
Pantera (from Texas), and
Superjoint Ritual.
Zakk Wylde and his
Black Label Society, though hailing from New Jersey, have strong Southern Rock influences and vibes, perhaps advanced by Wylde's close friendship with the late
Dimebag Darrell of Pantera.
Bands like
Maylene and the Sons of Disaster,
Every Time I Die, and
Cancer Bats have a southern influence that helps bring southern metal and punk together.
List of southern rock bands*
The Rolling Stone Illustrated History of Rock & Roll. Random House, 1980. "Southern Rock" entry by Joe Nick Patoski. ISBN 394739388.
