Rock and Roll as the Poetry of Our Time--a work in progress

This is the beginning of a study. If it takes wing, it might be the beginning of a volume of entries that better trace the line of thought and the history of the focus. I welcome any suggestions you may have to better fill in the thought and the years. Send me your submissions with a paragraph detailing how and/or why the song fits. If I feel as if it helps to draw this line, I'll include it and give you credit and create a link to your page.

After World War II, Contemporary American Poetry moved away from the use of rhyme scheme, and free verse became the acceptable form. Rhyming verse was said to be too "sing-songy." What is more, it was believed--rightly so, in some cases--that applying rhyme forced words, ultimately changing meaning.

Still, there were poets who wanted to right in rhyme, and many of them found their place in the world of rock and roll and popular music. Someone, I think it may have been Jim Morrison, was even moved to say that rock and roll is the poetry of our time, a statement I won't argue with.

Not only do I see rock and roll as the poetry of our time, but I also see how popular music has been shaped by the desire to write in rhyme. The seventies brought us punk and rap, the latter of which gave birth to hip hop and merged with rock to form rap-rock. We may have come close to full circle now, as a lot of rock music, while not rap-rock as we know it, is released as a type of rock and roll that raps. (This last type of music is one that is currently missing here, largely because I don't care for most of it, and I can never think of the bands who do the songs I do like.)

This may a bit confusing, but hopefully I'll be able to convey some of what I'm thinking.

The only thing I know for certain is that it will be vastly incomplete. If I take these seven pieces I'm beginning with, dating from 1965 to present day, and try to weave the flow of the application of rhymed-verse to the world of rock and roll music--and its offshoots--then that means that I'll just miss hundreds of other good examples. To put together something like this is to open myself to all of the "I don't know how you can make such a list without including..." and "I can't believe you didn't mention..." that can be dished out. That's where you can come in; rather than be a detractor, you can make a submission.

Suffice it to say that these are just some totems at which the music world veered, some points in the flow of the evolution of how we talk to one another. We are still troubadours; we just have better means to get our voices to the next camp more quickly and efficiently.

I mentioned 1965, because that's when our study begins.

If we're gonna talk about where poetry and rock and roll meet, we can do pretty well by beginning with Dylan.

• "Subterranean Homesick Blues" by Bob Dylan; released January '65; from the album Bringing it all Back Home

I worked for a guy named Rich Gerba, and Rich believed that "SHB" was the first rap song. Rich was older than I, and he knew a lot more about the music of the 50s and 60s than I did, so I had no basis to argue with him. Still, it made sense to me. While not being a student of the music of those days, I had been exposed to a good bit of it, and I couldn't think of any other song from the era that could be considered a rap song. The more I thought about "SHB" in context to the musical lexicon of its day, I could definitely see his point.

Not only is the song rhyme-scheme poetry, but the flashcards he holds up are poetically juxtaposed as well. It could be that Mr. Dylan was speaking to the very fact about which I now write, that popular music is the place for contemporary poets to write in rhyme without being ostracized.

Mayhap. Anywho, here it is, a song which might or might not be the beginnings of rap music.

• "Blinded by the Light" by Bruce Springsteen; released January '73; from the album Greetings from Asbury Park, NJ

I can't stand to hear Manfred Mann's version of this song. I have nothing against that version other than that it creates the song as something totally unlike what the song was. It would be one thing if the Springsteen track had been a big hit and then Manfred came along a did what he did, but that wasn't the case. The case is that, in the history of American music, the Springsteen version just doesn't exist. Even when folks learn that it does actually exist, they have no idea how much different a song it is; they just imagine it the same way they would imagine Bruce covering it. In their defense, that is the only way they can imagine it, as they don't have this original version to draw upon.

And the difference between the two? Well, Manfred's version wouldn't fit here; Bruce's does. People who have problems imagining Bruce as the next Bob Dylan have never heard this song...his song. I give you the lyric video, as it shows just what a feat the poetry of this song is; that's what is lost in Manfred's song.

• "Rapper's Delight" by The Sugarhill Gang; released February of '80; from the album Rapper's Delight

Everything changed musically with the release of "Rapper's Delight." You can say that everything changed with Ramones or Nirvana, but not like it did with "Rapper's Delight." The airwaves had never played anything like it, and it's safe to say that no song has so shaped popular music in the last 40 years. I'm posting the six minute single version, but if you want to get the true effect, the 14 minute album version is available on Youtube also.

• "No Sleep till Brooklyn" by The Beastie Boys; released November of '86; from the album Licensed to Ill

You could pretty much take any song off this album. This is the album necessary for rap-rock to happen. Another important point to make about the Beasties is that they forced words to fit, and it didn't take away from the verse. As I mentioned earlier, that's the other big argument against writing in rhyme, that sometimes the writer forces words to make them fit and that doing so changes the potential meaning. This assumes that the writer/artist places more emphasis on meaning than he/she/they do on flow. Springsteen's "Blinded" fits here too. The meaning is secondary to the flow, the rhyme, and if forcing words, changing meaning, is necessary to maintain the flow, artists such as these don't mind. They are slaves to the vibe, and that's simply a wonderful thing to be.

• "In the End" by Linkin Park; released October of '00; from the album Hybrid Theory

I have never purchased a piece of Linkin Park's music, and I never had the opportunity to see them in concert before Chester died; still, I can't say enough about what they did to mold how we communicate with each other musically and break down cultural lines. Possibly the true founders of rap-rock, they changed so much of the musical landscape when they released Hybrid Theory. This is a merging of two different types of music and styles of verse, and they fit together as if they had been together forever. This song might be the best example that I know of, and it really means a lot to what you hear when you listen to popular music radio these days.

• "Jesus Walks" by Kanye West; released February of '04; from the album The College Dropout

I could use a lot of other hip hop artists here, but I choose Kanye for two reasons. Kanye is a master at singing raps, plus he has a rhyme couplet that speaks to forcing words to keep the rhyme. I've always loved that he said "The way that Kathie Lee needed Regis, that's the way that I need Jesus." Where the Beasties and Bruce didn't lose anything by forcing words to maintain the rhyme, I can't say the same thing about this couplet. I just hope the way Kanye needs Jesus is more than that. My apologies for including a song with such objectionable lyrics, but it fits the theme. If we're going to be true to the study, we can't let it be pigeonholed by concerns like that. It also shows another way we've developed in how we write rhyme, as Bob Dylan wouldn't have gotten away with lyrics like these in 1965.

• "Car Radio" By Twenty One Pilots; released January of '13; from the album Vessel

I'm a big fan of these guys. This is not my favorite song--that's "Fairly Local"--but it just shows what a master wordsmith Tyler is. I don't mean to take anything away from Josh, but if this dude can't do what he can do with words, this band is nowhere. I listen to this guy--and read him--and I see just how little I pushed myself when it came to spoken word. I'm pleased with the work I've done, but this cat just shows us what can really be done, when you spend enough time in the corner with a pen and a notebook. Big kudos to him for showing us one of the ways we're gonna talk next.

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So, now we have the beginning of a thought. I hope you find that it adds something to the discourse over how we communicate with one another, because I think that conversation matters. I so look forward to your thoughts, and any thoughts you have to continue the study are more than welcome.

I close with warm thoughts and prayers for you and yours.

Until soon...