What band(s) had the biggest influence on music?

Which band(s) have had the biggest influences on bands that followed them?

I would think bands like The Beatles and Black Sabbath have made huge marks in the music industry (for good and bad probably).

I think you can hear the "Stones" in most popular music that has a blues influence; even metal and punk.

Sure the Beatles and Stones were very influencial but even they give credit to Elvis and Buddy Holly, Jerry lee Lewis, Roy Orbison and Little Richard and Bill Haley and the Comets. It's a big list!!

Its difficult to attribute the quality of being 'the most influencial' to any one band or artist; there are just so many key artists, events, characters, and movements in rock music history. Credit must obviously go to Elvis (blues-pop x over), The Beatles (songwriting sensibilities), Robert Johnson (blues guitar), Black Sabbath (metal), Hendrix (who has a guitar and DOESNT want to play like that?), among probably many others!


I think the Kinks are very often unjustly overlooked when it comes to influential bands, but they were playing blues tinged rock 2 years before the Stones, Ray Davies had a pioneering (in pop music) - and highly influencial - style of observational writing and dry humour....

Not to mention they invented the power chord riff!


As far as I know (and I could be wrong), The Who were the first band to use Synths, on Baba O Reiley and Wont Get Fooled Again (1971?), so credit is due there.


Also worth a mention I think are the Sex Pistols, who changed the musical landscape forever in 1976: the year zero in many people's musical world (particularly if you write for the NME!).




[edit on 16-2-2006 by Paul]

Not one of my favorites but I'd have to go with the Beatles. They took music from hit's to albums.

I would have to Nirvana would be a huge one (maybe just because im a fan) but they did accomplish a lot.. I would also say the kingsmen with louie louie.

I used to be fan of Nirvana (I still am, though not as much) and Nirvana are not an amazingly original band as some claim. Cobain's main strength was writing good songs (especially good melodies). If you listen to bands that he sites as influences, it's fairly obvious that Nirvana isn't all that original.

The most influential bands are (especially of bands in my musical tastes): Velvet Underground & Sex Pistols.
Both these bands were incredibly influential for the underground an if it wasn't for these two bands, underground music would be undoubtably different.

They were also more important than many other more popular bands who many people just accept as "the best". I'm talking about bands such as The Beatles, Rolling Stones, Elvis, Led Zeppelin etc. I'll admit the beatles had many great songs, but they sure didn't have the musical mida's touch in my view.

A lot of bands also ripped off old blues artists, either in musical style (rolling stones, Elvis) or direct plagarism of actual music/riffs (Led Zeppelin).

A couple bands come to mind.

Kraftwerk (the godfathers of techno and synths)
The Ramones
The Beatles
Black Sabbath
Nirvana
The Who
Jimi Hendrix
The Byrds
The Kinks
The Beach Boys (For those who laugh, Pet Sounds is still considered by many the greatest album ever recorded)
David Bowie
The Clash
R.E.M.
The Pixies
Radiohead
Elvis Presley
Pink Floyd
The Stooges

It's really hard to try and norrow it down to just one, since there are so many bands that have made such a huge impact.

Overall you can't say that an artist influenced music since that is a very broad term encompassing many genres. But overall I'd say these groups and artists dealt out a lot of influence

Bob Dylan
The Beatles
Black Sabbath
Beach Boys
Little Richard
Elvis
Chuck Berry
Alice Cooper (Very influential on the sub-genre of "shock rock")
Queen
Led Zepplin
Nick Drake
The Pixies ( You wouldn't have Nirvana without them)
The Velvet Underground
The Stooges
Kraftwerk
The Ramones
The Sex Pistols
James Brown
Bob Maryley and The Wailers
Husker Du
Sly & The Family Stone
Miles Davis
Roxy Music

Those are just some that I can think of right now. All of them influenced some sort of music in one way or another. Either by creating new music or being the ground base for later acts.