Classic Rock and The Top Ten Bands

I myself absolutely love classic rock music! It's really the only genre I listen to, with the exception of a little bit of '90s country, like Tioby Keith or Brooks and Dunn, and '90s rock, like Weezer, Pearl Jam, or Foo Fighters. Anyway, are there any classic rock fans out there? If so, what are your top ten favorite bands of the classic rock era? My list looks like this:

1. Foreigner
2. The Rolling Stones
3. Van Halen
4. Rush
5. Styx
6. Aerosmith
7. Boston
8. Chicago
9. Steve Miller Band
10. The Who

00Beast wrote:

I myself absolutely love classic rock music! It's really the only genre I listen to, with the exception of a little bit of '90s country, like Tioby Keith or Brooks and Dunn, and '90s rock, like Weezer, Pearl Jam, or Foo Fighters. Anyway, are there any classic rock fans out there? If so, what are your top ten favorite bands of the classic rock era? My list looks like this:

1. Foreigner
2. The Rolling Stones
3. Van Halen
4. Rush
5. Styx
6. Aerosmith
7. Boston
8. Chicago
9. Steve Miller Band
10. The Who

1. Boston
2. Steve Miller Band
3. Pat Benatar
4. Electric Light Orchestra
5. Journey
6. Queen
7. Van Halen
8. Motley Crue
9. Bon Jovi
10. Kansas

Honorable mentions: Richard Marx, REO Speedwagon, Cheap Trick, Joan Jett and The Blackhearts,

Gravy tells me Rock didn't exist before 1980.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

00Beast wrote:

I myself absolutely love classic rock music! It's really the only genre I listen to, with the exception of a little bit of '90s country, like Tioby Keith or Brooks and Dunn, and '90s rock, like Weezer, Pearl Jam, or Foo Fighters. Anyway, are there any classic rock fans out there? If so, what are your top ten favorite bands of the classic rock era? My list looks like this:

1. Foreigner
2. The Rolling Stones
3. Van Halen
4. Rush
5. Styx
6. Aerosmith
7. Boston
8. Chicago
9. Steve Miller Band
10. The Who

1. Boston
2. Steve Miller Band
3. Pat Benatar
4. Electric Light Orchestra
5. Journey
6. Queen
7. Van Halen
8. Motley Crue
9. Bon Jovi
10. Kansas

Honorable mentions: Richard Marx, REO Speedwagon, Cheap Trick, Joan Jett and The Blackhearts,

Nice list you've got there! I like numbers 1, 2, 4, 7, and 10, as well as your honorable mentions of REO Speedwagon and Cheap Trick.

Largo's Shark wrote:

Gravy tells me Rock didn't exist before 1980.

No, I'm pretty sure my list is telling you that Rock didn't exist before 1973.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

Largo's Shark wrote:

Gravy tells me Rock didn't exist before 1980.

No, I'm pretty sure my list is telling you that Rock didn't exist before 1973.

Point still stands. ;)

1, Queen
2. Thin Lizzy
3. Rainbow
4. Motley Crue (up to Dr. Feelgood anyway)
5. Iron Maiden
6. Deep Purple
7. Black Sabbath (specifically Dio and Martin era)
8. Meatloaf

9 and 10 can go to Queen as well. I love Queen.

Gravity's Silhouette wrote:

Largo's Shark wrote:

Gravy tells me Rock didn't exist before 1980.

No, I'm pretty sure my list is telling you that Rock didn't exist before 1973.

Regardless of when it was born, it died in 1992.

What consitutes rock in the context of this thread? Soft rock? Big hair rock? 70s rock? Prog rock? Just old rock? There are quite a few bands who out-rock some of the ones mentioned, not to mention a few bands with astonishingly long and successful careers not on these lists. Criteria clarification anyone?

Think we're talking about big, pompous, overproduced, stadium rock here. If Señor Khan's right and it died in the early 90s, I'm glad.

BTW, I love Queen w/ Freddie, so I'm not throwing that in here. Just some of the others (i.e. ELO, Styx, Bon Jovi, Rainbow etc.).

No Ziggy and the Spiders? :*d*:

In no particular order....

The Doors
Led Zeppelin
Genesis
AC/DC
Aerosmith (1970s; hated their descent into power ballads)
Van Halen (with Roth in vocals, only liked a few Hagar songs, again I hate power ballads)
Metallica (1980s; that's right, I did not care for the black album)
The Smashing Pumpkins
Nirvana

Largo's Shark wrote:

Think we're talking about big, pompous, overproduced, stadium rock here. If Señor Khan's right and it died in the early 90s, I'm glad.

BTW, I love Queen w/ Freddie, so I'm not throwing that in here. Just some of the others (i.e. ELO, Styx, Bon Jovi, Rainbow etc.).

"Classic" basically means: whatever you have nostalgia for. The 80's and the 70's are "classic" rock and roll for me because I started to listen to music on the radio around '79 and '80, so for a lot of those songs are tied into memories of being young, having fun in the summer time, going to water slides, etc....

Other points: I concede some people's classic list will include music from the 50's and 60's (i.e. The Beatles, The Beach Boys, The Rolling Stones, Elvis) and that's fine; it's just not my music. Additionally, not all music that I love today was something I had even grew up on. I didn't actually discover BOSTON until 1989, by which point they had creatively peaked (after having produced only 3 albums in roughly 15 years). Also didn't really discover ELO until the summer of 1990, by which point I was 19 and by which time ELO was essentially done. So it's not as if the music I think is great is great simply because I grew up with it as a kid; some music simply means more to me now as a 29 year old man than it did back in high school in the 80's.

There are a couple of songs here and there that I liked (or thought I liked) back in the 80's, but now in the 10's I really can't stand them and don't understand how I ever liked that song.

Nonetheless, some songs are simply classic because they stand the test of time. For all of you looking for *CLASSIC ROCK AND ROLL***, a sound that never seems to date, or lyrics that betray the time the song was written, listen to Boston's 1976 debut: BOSTON. There's not a spare song on that album that can be cut. It's all pure gold. How often can you say that about any album you once bought?

Check out these tunes from Boston for the young posters here who have never heard of this phrase called "rock and roll", and only know hip-hop and "rap" :x :
#1 More Than A Feeling (the best of the best.......never gets old; still on regular airplay rotation everyday 36 years later)
#2 Don't Look Back
#3 Foreplay/Long Time
#4 Feelin' Satisfied
#5 A Man I'll Never Be
#6 Amanda
#7 The Launch:Cool The Engines
#8 Can't You Say (You Believe In Me)
#9 To Be A Man
10: Something About You
#11 Rock and Roll Band
#12 Peace of Mind

And I"ll throw in a couple of good songs from their lesser known albums:
1994's Magdalene (from the WALK ON album)
1997's My Higher Power (from their Greatest Hits album)
and
2002's I Had A Good Time (from their disastrous Corporate America album).

Here are my 10 favorite rock bands/musicians in no particular order:

Talking Heads
Steely Dan
ZZ Top
Rolling Stones
Beatles
Billy Joel
CCR
Tears for Fears
John Mellencamp
Doobie Brothers

Pink Floyd
Boston
The Police
Rolling Stones
Led Zeppelin
REM
Creedence Clearwater Revival
Cream
Pearl Jam
The Who

Grav wrote:

#1 More Than A Feeling (the best of the best.......never gets old; still on regular airplay rotation everyday 36 years later)

As a kid, I think I listened to that song just about every day on my cassette player. A decade+ later, I could still listen to it every day.

If we're talking about our all time favourite rock (in its broadest sense) bands, I'd have to go with:

Pink Floyd
Killing Joke
The Beatles
Creedence Clearwater Revival
Cream
The Fall
Queen
The Stranglers
The Smiths
Steely Dan

Man that was tough.

I'll define classic rock as acts that managed to get their first release out by the end of the '70's.

My favourites of the first wave of '60s rooted bands, in this order

1. Stones

2. Who

3. Zep

4. Bowie

5. Faces/Rod Stewart

6. Alice Cooper

7. Purple

8. Floyd

9. Tull

10. Yes

Best 70's rooted bands

1. Pat Benatar

2. AC/DC

3. Queen

4. Sweet

5. Rush

6. Blondie

7. Police

8. Runaways

9. Styx

10. Supertramp

I'm leaving out the punks but I would include them in a rock n roll round-up.

Sweet is underrated.

Perilagu Khan wrote:

Sweet is underrated.

Damn right.



One of my favourites.

Control wrote:

Pink Floyd
Boston
The Police
Rolling Stones
---------
REM
Creedence Clearwater Revival
Cream
Pearl Jam [!]
The Who

Some very good ones here. Maybe I'll post my favourites some other time.

I used to love REM, and I still like several of their tunes. But perhaps I've changed because I now find Michael Stipe's whiny voice and lyrics to be a bit irritating.

Control wrote:

Grav wrote:

#1 More Than A Feeling (the best of the best.......never gets old; still on regular airplay rotation everyday 36 years later)

As a kid, I think I listened to that song just about every day on my cassette player. A decade+ later, I could still listen to it every day.

I have flashbacks to 1976 every time I listen to More Than A Feeling, even though I wasn't really old enough to remember anything about that year. If I had only 10 songs to choose from to listen to for the rest of my life on a deserted island, MTAF would definitely be on the list. I feel sorry for anyone who has never heard the song; they don't know what they're missing.

Perilagu Khan wrote:

I used to love REM, and I still like several of their tunes. But perhaps I've changed because I now find Michael Stipe's whiny voice and lyrics to be a bit irritating.

I used to think that but then I'd get a remix of one of their classics...like Losing My Religion Brooklyn Avenue Mix and it would breathe new life into their catalogue. I still play LMR and Drive fairly often, they're both on my WINAMP playlist right now...

Perilagu Khan wrote:

Sweet is underrated.

Desolation Blvd is one of my favourite schlock-rock '70s glam-rock albums. How do you beat Fox On The Run, Ballroom Blitz, ACDC, No You Don't? This music was plain fun stuff.

The Mike Chapman production and tailored songwriting gave his acts a distinct commercial appeal. He did nice work with Pat Benatar, Blondie and the Joan Jett/Lita Ford Runaways as well.

Mrs Aural Sects wrote:

Perilagu Khan wrote:

I used to love REM, and I still like several of their tunes. But perhaps I've changed because I now find Michael Stipe's whiny voice and lyrics to be a bit irritating.

I used to think that but then I'd get a remix of one of their classics...like Losing My Religion Brooklyn Avenue Mix and it would breathe new life into their catalogue. I still play LMR and Drive fairly often, they're both on my WINAMP playlist right now...

I love Driver 8, Can't Get There from Here, The Finest Work Song and Radio Free Europe.