70s Hard Rock
tagStarted 1970Peak 1972-1979Last big hit 1980
Located in 1 route
Raw, analog, blues-soaked heaviness: warm overdriven Marshalls, swinging Bonham-style drums, Hammond organ swells, and bluesy vocal wails. Riffs rooted in pentatonic blues, extended improvisational solos, and a loose, human feel captured on tape. The foundational era — heavy but groovy, before the genre got slick.
History
The genre's founding decade, when Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple, and Aerosmith turned blues-rock into a louder, riff-centric art form. AC/DC and Thin Lizzy added lean economy, while bands toured arenas and sold albums by the million. This era set the riffs, solos, and swagger every later hard-rock variant would inherit and rework.
Defining artists
Essential listening
Sources
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_rock
- https://www.allmusic.com/style/hard-rock-ma0000002633
- https://www.britannica.com/art/hard-rock