Queen

Queen are a British rock band formed in London in 1971, and one of the most commercially successful musical acts of all time. The group originally consisted of Freddie Mercury, (lead vocals), Brian May (lead guitar, vocals), John Deacon (bass guitar), and Roger Taylor (drums, vocals). Queen's initial works were chiefly glam rock,[3] heavy metal and progressive rock orientated; however, with time, the band has incorporated diverse and innovative styles in their music, exploring the likes of vaudeville, electronic music and funk. The band digressed from using progressive themes in their music in the mid-1970s, with more conventional and radio-friendly works bringing them greater success. Throughout the 1970s, Queen disclosed the absence of synthesisers on their albums, yet their style continued to evolve. They eventually started using synthesisers in the 1980s, reflecting their experimental approach to music.

Brian May and Roger Taylor had been playing together in a band named Smile. Freddie Mercury (then known by his birth name of Farrokh, or Freddie, Bulsara) was a fan of Smile, and encouraged them to experiment with more elaborate stage and recording techniques. Mercury himself joined the band shortly thereafter, changed the name of the band to 'Queen' and adopted his familiar stage name. John Deacon was recruited prior to recording their first album. Queen enjoyed success in the UK during the early 1970s, but it was the release of Sheer Heart Attack (1974) and A Night at the Opera (1975) that gained the band international success. The latter featured "Bohemian Rhapsody", which stayed at number one in the UK charts for nine weeks. In 1991 Mercury died of bronchopneumonia, a complication of AIDS, and Deacon retired in 1997. Since then May and Taylor have infrequently performed together, including a collaboration with Paul Rodgers under the name Queen + Paul Rodgers.

The band has released a total of 18 number one albums, 18 number one singles and 10 number one DVDs, and have sold over 300 million albums worldwide, making them one of the world's best-selling music artists. They have been honoured with seven Ivor Novello awards and were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2001.

Kiss

Kiss, often written as KISS, is an American hard rock band formed in New York City in January 1973. Easily identified by its members' face paint and flamboyant stage outfits, the group rose to prominence in the mid to late 1970s on the basis of their elaborate live performances, which featured fire breathing, blood spitting, smoking guitars, and pyrotechnics. Kiss has been awarded 24 gold albums to date in the USA. The band has sold over 19 million albums in the United States, and their worldwide sales exceeded 100 million albums.

The lineup of Paul Stanley (vocals and rhythm guitar), Gene Simmons (vocals and bass guitar), Ace Frehley (lead guitar and vocals), and Peter Criss (drums, percussion and vocals) is the most successful and identifiable. With their makeup and costumes, they took on the personae of comic book-style characters: The Demon (Simmons), Starchild (Stanley), Spaceman (Frehley), and Catman (Criss). The band explains that the fans were the ones who ultimately chose their makeup designs. The "Demon" makeup reflected Simmons's cynicism and dark sense of humor, as well as his affection for comic books. Paul Stanley became the "Starchild" because of his tendency to be referred to as the "starry-eyed lover" and "hopeless romantic." Ace Frehley's "Spaceman" makeup was a reflection of his fondness for science fiction and supposedly being from another planet. Peter Criss's "Catman" makeup was in accordance with the belief that Criss had nine lives because of his rough childhood in Brooklyn. Because of creative differences, both Criss and Frehley were out of the group by 1982. The band's commercial fortunes had also waned considerably by that point.

In 1983, Kiss abandoned its makeup and profited from a commercial resurgence throughout the rest of the decade. Buoyed by a wave of Kiss nostalgia in the 1990s, the band announced a reunion of the original lineup (with makeup) in 1996. The resulting Kiss Alive/Worldwide/Lost Cities/Reunion Tour was the top-grossing act of 1996 and 1997. Criss and Frehley have since left Kiss again and have been replaced by Eric Singer and Tommy Thayer, respectively. The band continues to perform with makeup, while Stanley and Simmons have remained the only two constant members.

Kiss was named by VH1 as 10th on their list of the '100 Greatest Artists of Hard Rock.' and 9th on 'The Greatest Metal Bands' list by MTV. On September 23, 2009, Kiss was nominated for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, ten years after becoming eligible but on December 15, 2009 it was announced that Kiss did not make it into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Metallica

When you're able to brandish the kind of musical firepower that Metallica has unleashed for more than two decades - 10 uncompromising albums, marking an unprecedented reign as the Greatest hard rock band in history - you learn a thing or two about where to aim. But curiously enough, the making of their first studio album since 1997's Re-Load, the primal, raptorial, St. Anger, found Metallica not behind the turrets this time, but in the firing line itself.

The trials and tribulations leading up to St. Anger are well documented. The fissures in what the band members themselves describe as the well-oiled "Metallica machine" were beginning to show; Bassist Jason Newsted's nebulous exit from the group. James Hetfield's voluntary sojourn into rehab and much-longed-for sobriety. Public squabbles over the illegal downloading quagmire. All of these issues revealed the kind of seismic fault-lines that even the Metallica jauggernaut could not navigate - could not negotiate away.

At stake? Nothing less than the very existence of the band itself. Metallica's three principals, James Hetfield, Lars Ulrich, and Kirk Hammett, along with their frequent producer/collaborator Bob Rock, found themselves at the kind of crossroads worthy of the themes in many a Metallica song. The kind of foreboding scenario Ulrich and Hetfield could write in their sleep.

The irony was, if this was Metallica's oft-predicted meltdown, each member would have to face it in his own way. And from the inside out this time, without the Metallica
heat-shield to fend off all the bullshit that tends to calcify when you're a member of the most exclusive rock club in the world for twenty-odd years. With James on an indefinite hiatus, the group admitted to becoming 'professional speculators' themselves as to whether Metallica was headed for a rebirth, or withering away on life-support.

"It has been a very interesting three years," Lars Ulrich begins with atypical understatement. "A very different three years for us. Difficult. Awkward. It's been a ride that's taken us to places inside ourselves, inside the band, inside the potential of human beings and the music and everything else that we could not imagine existed. But if you asked me then, I would say for the first time in my life with Metallica, I was starting to prepare myself that maybe the ride was over."

Aerosmith

Aerosmith is an American hard rock band, sometimes referred to as "The Bad Boys from Boston" and "America's Greatest Rock and Roll Band". Their style, which is rooted in blues-based hard rock, has come to also incorporate elements of pop, heavy metal, and rhythm and blues, and has inspired many subsequent rock artists. The band was formed in Boston, Massachusetts in 1970. Guitarist Joe Perry and bassist Tom Hamilton, originally in a band together called the Jam Band, met up with singer Steven Tyler, drummer Joey Kramer, and guitarist Ray Tabano, and formed Aerosmith. In 1971, Tabano was replaced by Brad Whitford, and the band began developing a following in Boston.

They were signed to Columbia Records in 1972, and released a string of multi-platinum albums, beginning with their 1973 eponymous debut album, followed by their 1974 album Get Your Wings. In 1975, the band broke into the mainstream with the album Toys in the Attic, and their 1976 follow-up Rocks cemented their status as hard rock superstars. By the end of the 1970s, they were among the most popular hard rock bands in the world and developed a loyal following of fans, often referred to as the "Blue Army". However, drug addiction and internal conflict took their toll on the band, which resulted in the departures of Perry and Whitford, in 1979 and 1981 respectively. They were replaced by Jimmy Crespo and Rick Dufay. The band did not fare well between 1980 and 1984, releasing a lone album, Rock in a Hard Place, which went gold but failed to match their previous successes.

Although Perry and Whitford returned in 1984 and the band signed a new deal with Geffen Records, it was not until the band sobered up and released 1987's Permanent Vacation that they regained the level of popularity they had experienced in the 1970s. Throughout the late 1980s and 1990s, the band scored several hits and won numerous awards for music from the multi-platinum albums Pump (1989), Get a Grip (1993), and Nine Lives (1997). Their comeback has been described as one of the most remarkable and spectacular in rock 'n' roll history. After 40 years of performing, the band continues to tour and record music.

Aerosmith is the best-selling American rock band of all time, having sold more than 150 million albums worldwide, including 66.5 million albums in the United States alone. They also hold the record for the most gold and multi-platinum albums by an American group. The band has scored 21 Top 40 hits on the Billboard Hot 100, nine #1 Mainstream Rock hits, four Grammy Awards, and ten MTV Video Music Awards. They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2001, and in 2005 they were ranked #57 in Rolling Stone magazine's 100 Greatest Artists of All Time.

Jet

Rock and roll: some would argue that it's become all smoke and mirrors, plug-ins and effects. True in certain cases, but not at all for Jet. At the heart of every great rock and roll band lie four essential elements: bass, drums, guitars and vocals. That, in its purest essence, is Jet. And Jet, in their purest essence, have again captured those elements with their third album, Shaka Rock. With their previous releases - 2003's Get Born and 2006's Shine On - Jet broke out of their native Australia and established themselves as a multi-platinum, international success story, merging the charisma and energy of classic rock and roll with just enough punk swagger and contemporary flair to create something uniquely theirs. Here at last is a band that's returning the cool to rock and roll.

2009's Shaka Rock reveals new dimensions of Jet while never losing the raw roots of Get Born or the grace and melody of Shine On, which together went on to make Jet an international band of style and substance. In the writing and recording of Shaka Rock, which took place in Miami, Brooklyn, Austin, Sydney and Melbourne, the band worked hard to create 12 finely crafted tracks that owe as much to Jet's past as to their future. The band also stepped up to the plate in the studio, working side by side as co-producers with Chris "Frenchie" Smith to ensure that Shaka Rock would live up to their own expectations. Says Mark Wilson, "This time, the album wasn't dictated by a producer or a record company. It was dictated by us. Going in this time, we were a lot more comfortable about taking the reins and being in control."

The album is highlighted by tracks like "Black Hearts (On Fire)" about which songwriter Chris Cester observes, "Greed and power are fascinating things...in some ways, "Black Hearts" is just putting them under the microscope. Power is a slippery slope. It's a song about sliding out of control, losing yourself to something, whether it's real or not...we all know what that feels like, it's frightening, but it makes you feel alive."

Chris continues, "I think Shaka Rock is like when TV went colour. It's our musical equivalent. There are moments on this record that are just pure...and moments that just rock harder than we ever have before. "Start the Show" is easily the heaviest song we've ever committed to tape. "K.I.A" has the drama of film, in a three minute song. "Beat On Repeat," well, that's about as Australian as it gets for us --- it's cheeky, conversational almost, its having a laugh at how ridiculously repetitive our society is, how it keeps on going down the same roads to end up at the same conclusions. We never would have had the balls years ago. There's also some story-telling that's come back again, like "Goodbye Hollywood." I like to think of it as our kiss-off to our past and it really sums up the forward thinking...go-go, don't think twice attitude that we had making this album."

Jet first gained notoriety in 2002 with their self-released EP, Dirty Sweet. An initial run of 1000 copies in Australia soon led to another 1000 based on U.K. demand. Following the U.S. release of the record in 2003, Jet landed the coveted opening slot on the Rolling Stones' Australian tour. Just months later came the critically acclaimed Get Born. That album produced the runaway hit single "Are You Gonna Be My Girl," spurred by its inclusion in the second ever iTunes ad and was the catalyst for record sales that hit 4 million. All Music Guide compared Jet to "a mix between the White Stripes' bluesy insouciance and AC/DC's cockeyed swagger," and Entertainment Weekly noted, "The overall aesthetic is young, loud . . . ." With this recording, Jet swept the Australian Record Industry Association awards with seven nominations and six wins including Album and Single of the Year.

As Jet began working on Shine On, Nic and Chris Cester were felled by the tragic loss of their father, who inspired the album's title track. While the band pushed forward to create their album, bereavement enveloped them, making Shine On in some cases a misunderstood project. "For me Shine On was a deeply personal and intense album in which the writing and recording process became an outlet of expression for changing understanding of what was happening around us," says Nic, "In that regard it was incredibly important and cathartic and allowed our collective song writing to advance, but was not what most fans were expecting." Shine On debuted at No. 16 on the U.S. charts and at No. 3 on the Australian charts. While garnering mixed critical reviews, Shine On was praised by numerous publications. Q Magazine called it as "new old rock at its finest" and New Musical Express best summed it up by noting, "If you get a kick out of glorious, ragged old rock 'n' roll, then you'll consider it essential."

Nirvana

Nirvana Timeline:

May 10, 1965 Krist Novoselic is born.

February 20, 1967 Kurt Cobain is born.

January 14, 1969 Dave Grohl is born.

Fall 1985 Kurt meets Krist. They play in several bands together, including Stiff Woodies.

December 1987 Kurt, Krist and drummer Aaron Burckhard form the original lineup of Nirvana in Aberdeen, Washington.

January 23, 1988 Nirvana records a 10-song demo with the "Godfather of Grunge," legendary Seattle producer Jack Endino. Sub Pop co-honcho Jonathan Poneman hears the tape and offers to put out a Nirvana single. The band accepts.

October 30, 1988 Kurt smashes his first guitar.

June 1989 Bleach is released on Sub Pop. Nirvana embarks on a month-long U.S. tour.

September 25, 1990 Dave Grohl, former drummer for Washinton, D.C.'s Scream, joins Nirvana.

October 1990 Nirvana briefly tours England with L7.

Winter 1991 Nirvana signs with DGC Records.

August 1991 Nirvana opens for Sonic Youth on a European festival tour, which includes a landmark performance at the Reading Festival. The tour is documented in the film 1991: The Year Punk Broke.

September 24, 1991 Nevermind is released.

October 12, 1991 Nevermind is certified a gold album.

November 1991 The band starts a six-week European tour as Nirvanamania sweeps the United States. MTV airs "Smells Like Teen Spirit" video constantly; the song is hailed as an anthem for a generation.

January 11, 1992 Nevermind hits No. 1 on the Billboard 200 album chart.

January/February 1992 Nirvana tours Australia, Japan and Hawaii.

April 1992 Nirvana appears on the cover of Rolling Stone.

June/July 1992 Nirvana tours Europe.

December 15, 1992 Incesticide, a collection of B-sides and rarities, is released. It goes gold the following spring.

April 9, 1993 Nirvana plays a concert at San Francisco's Cow Palace to raise awareness of and generate aid for rape survivors in Bosnia-Herzegovina. L7, the Breeders and Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy are also on the bill.

September 21, 1993 In Utero is released.

October 18, 1993 Nirvana starts a three-month tour of North America.

November 19, 1993 Nirvana tapes an all-acoustic show for "MTV Unplugged" at Sony Studios in New York. Cris and Curt Kirkwood of the Meat Puppets sit in on three Meat Puppets songs.

December 16, 1993 MTV airs Nirvana's "Unplugged" show.

January 7, 1994 Nirvana plays the Seattle Arena. It will be the band's last U.S. show.

February 6, 1994 Nirvana embarks on a tour of Europe.

April 8, 1994 Kurt Cobain is found dead of a self-inflicted shotgun wound.

November 1, 1994 Nirvana's "MTV Unplugged" performance is released as MTV Unplugged in New York. Two tracks not aired on the MTV broadcast appear on the album.

October 1, 1996 The Nirvana live album, From the Muddy Banks of the Wishkah, is released, featuring performances from 1989 to 1994.

Oasis

Eleven years after their first gig, eight years after their first album, five years after the mid-nineties madness started to subside, there's no mystery why millions still love Oasis: honesty. The men are honest, the music is honest. We trust Oasis. That's why one Saturday morning this winter, when 120,000 tickets went on sale for the band's two summer shows at Finsbury Park, Noel Gallagher was able to take a call from his manager by lunchtime to say that all the tickets had gone. "That's without them hearing any of the new stuff," says Noel, shaking his head in admiration. "For all the fans knew, we could have made a reggae album."

They haven't made a reggae album. What they've made is Heathen Chemistry: explosive, yes; experimental, no. It's another, great, Oasis album; their fifth. "We've moved on a wee bit," says Noel. "But to re-invent ourselves completely we'd have to be contrived and we're not capable of that. I couldn't take on an alter ego and I know Liam couldn't because I'd be stood behind him going 'you look like a twat'. I don't think I'd look good in leather trousers anyway. We do Oasis music and that's it." Honesty again. Similarly, there's nothing too deep and meaningful about the album's title.
It came from a T-shirt Noel bought in Ibiza.

"I love this record," says Noel. "But I would say that wouldn't I?" With any other pop idol, of course you'd share his cynicism. Coming from a man so ruthlessly self-critical as to virtually disown the band's third album, a man who is scathingly dismissive of the marketing hype that threatens to take over his industry, you pay attention when he says: "It's a better collection of songs than the last two or three. It boils down to that: the songs are better. It does get more difficult. You can't just write Raspberry Fields Forever."

"I don't know if I'm a better songwriter," he says. "But there is something in the air around the band that breeds better songs." He is reluctant to analyse it further, but admits that Liam contributing three songs and Gem Archer and Andy Bell one each might well have forced him to raise his game. "Maybe it's a competitive thing, I don't know. Keith Richards said "you don't go after the songs, the songs find you."

"The best songs," he says, "pour out of you. You sit there with a guitar and a piece of paper and a pen, get the first line right, the rest of it comes immediately." That happened to him several times last summer. "I was living in a hotel near Buckingham Palace. Warm day, fuck all on the telly, in love with my girlfriend. I wrote She is Love in ten minutes. Live Forever was like that. Slide Away was like that. They're the songs that mean something to other people. You write it, put the kettle on, come back, sing it into a tape recorder, play it back and go: 'yeah, that's finished.' Fast forward six months and there's 60,000 people in a field singing it to you. What the fuck's that about? That's magic, as Paul Daniels once said."

Noel conjured up Stop Crying Your Heart Out in similar fashion. Buskers be advised: learn it quickly; this track will be the Wonderwall of its time. If She is Love is about Noel's new girlfriend, many will assume that Force of Nature is about his ex-wife (I certainly did). But they'd be wrong. "I'll have to answer this a million times," he says wearily. "I wrote it for a film with Jude Law and Jonny Lee Miller a year before I got divorced and I've got the video to prove it. There you go. I'm going to bring that video to all my interviews for this album." In any event, it's a cracking song.

The Beatles

　The Beatles were an English rock band, formed in Liverpool in 1960, and one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed acts in the history of popular music. From 1962 the group consisted of John Lennon (rhythm guitar, vocals), Paul McCartney (bass guitar, vocals), George Harrison (lead guitar, vocals) and Ringo Starr (drums, vocals). Rooted in skiffle and 1950s rock and roll, the group later worked in many genres ranging from pop ballads to psychedelic rock, often incorporating classical and other elements in innovative ways. The nature of their enormous popularity, which first emerged as the "Beatlemania" fad, transformed as their songwriting grew in sophistication. The group came to be perceived as the embodiment of progressive ideals, seeing their influence extend into the social and cultural revolutions of the 1960s.

With an early five-piece line-up of Lennon, McCartney, Harrison, Stuart Sutcliffe (bass) and Pete Best (drums), the Beatles built their reputation in Liverpool and Hamburg clubs over a three-year period from 1960. Sutcliffe left the group in 1961, and Best was replaced by Starr the following year. Moulded into a professional outfit by music store owner Brian Epstein after he offered to act as the group's manager, and with their musical potential enhanced by the hands-on creativity of producer George Martin, the Beatles achieved mainstream success in the United Kingdom in late 1962 with their first single, "Love Me Do". Gaining international popularity over the course of the next year, they toured extensively until 1966, then retreated to the recording studio until their breakup in 1970. Each then found success in an independent musical career. McCartney and Starr remain active; Lennon was shot and killed in 1980, and Harrison died of cancer in 2001.

During their studio years, the Beatles produced what critics consider some of their finest material including the album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967), widely regarded as a masterpiece. Four decades after their breakup, the Beatles' music continues to be popular. The Beatles have had more number one albums on the UK charts, and held down the top spot longer, than any other musical act. According to RIAA certifications, they have sold more albums in the United States than any other artist. In 2008, Billboard magazine released a list of the all-time top-selling Hot 100 artists to celebrate the US singles chart's fiftieth anniversary, with the Beatles at number one. They have been honoured with 7 Grammy Awards, and they have received 15 Ivor Novello Awards from the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors. The Beatles were collectively included in Time magazine's compilation of the 20th century's 100 most influential people.

The Rolling Stones

The Rolling Stones are an English rock band formed in April 1962 by guitarist and harmonica player Brian Jones, pianist Ian Stewart, vocalist Mick Jagger and guitarist Keith Richards. Bassist Bill Wyman and drummer Charlie Watts completed the early lineup.

Jones initially led the band, but Jagger and Richards assumed band leadership after becoming prolific hit songwriters and after Jones became increasingly erratic. In 1969 Mick Taylor joined the band on guitar shortly before Jones' untimely death. Since Taylor quit in 1974, guitarist Ronnie Wood has been with the band. Stewart was taken from the official lineup in 1963 to continue as the band's road manager and occasional keyboardist until his death in 1985. Wyman left in 1990 and was replaced by Darryl Jones as the primary bassist.

The Rolling Stones were first popular in Europe and became popular in North America during the British Invasion of the early sixties. The Rolling Stones have released 22 studio albums in the United Kingdom (24 in the United States), eight concert albums (nine in the US) and numerous compilations; and have album sales estimated at more than 200 million worldwide. Sticky Fingers (1971) began a string of eight consecutive studio albums reaching number one in the United States. Their latest album, A Bigger Bang, was released in 2005. In 1989 the Rolling Stones were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and in 2004 they ranked number 4 in Rolling Stone magazine's 100 Greatest Artists of All Time. In 2008, Billboard magazine ranked the Rolling Stones at number ten on "The Billboard Hot 100 Top All-Time Artists", and as the second most successful group in the Billboard Hot 100 chart.

After signing to Decca Records in 1963, the band changed their name from "The Rollin' Stones" to "The Rolling Stones". Band members and others often refer to the band as "The Stones".

Elvis Presley

Elvis Aaron Presleya (January 8, 1935 – August 16, 1977) was one of the most popular American singers of the 20th century. A cultural icon, he is widely known by the single name Elvis. He is often referred to as the "King of Rock and Roll" or simply "the King".

Born in Tupelo, Mississippi, Presley moved to Memphis, Tennessee, with his family at the age of 13. He began his career there in 1954 when Sun Records owner Sam Phillips, eager to bring the sound of African American music to a wider audience, saw in Presley the means to realize his ambition. Accompanied by guitarist Scotty Moore and bassist Bill Black, Presley was one of the originators of rockabilly, an uptempo, backbeat-driven fusion of country and rhythm and blues. RCA Victor acquired his contract in a deal arranged by Colonel Tom Parker, who would manage the singer for over two decades. Presley's first RCA single, "Heartbreak Hotel", released in January 1956, was a number one hit. He became the leading figure of the newly popular sound of rock and roll with a series of network television appearances and chart-topping records. His energized interpretations of songs, many from African American sources, and his uninhibited performance style made him enormously popular—and controversial. In November 1956, he made his film debut in Love Me Tender.

Conscripted into military service in 1958, Presley relaunched his recording career two years later with some of his most commercially successful work. He staged few concerts, however, and, guided by Parker, proceeded to devote much of the 1960s to making Hollywood movies and soundtrack albums, most of them critically derided. In 1968, after seven years away from the stage, he returned to live performance in a celebrated comeback television special that led to an extended Las Vegas concert residency and a string of profitable tours. In 1973, Presley staged the first concert broadcast globally via satellite, Aloha from Hawaii, seen by approximately 1.5 billion viewers. Prescription drug abuse severely compromised his health, and he died suddenly in 1977 at the age of 42.

Presley is regarded as one of the most important figures of 20th-century popular culture. He had a versatile voice and unusually wide success encompassing many genres, including country, pop ballads, gospel, and blues. He is the best-selling solo artist in the history of popular music. Nominated for 14 competitive Grammys, he won three, and received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award at age 36. He has been inducted into four music halls of fame.