Chuck Berry
The architect of rock and roll. Chuck Berry welded country storytelling to a jump-blues beat and drew the guitar blueprint every rocker has followed since.
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Bo Diddley
The Chicago originator whose hypnotic, clave-driven groove became the Bo Diddley beat and seeded rock and roll. Start with the square guitar, the maracas, and a rhythm you will never shake.
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Led Zeppelin
The band that took the blues, cranked it to a mythic scale, and more or less invented hard rock, four musicians whose every album still sounds enormous.
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The Rolling Stones
American R&B cranked into swagger and danger, the band that took the blues, made it their own, and never once stopped.
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Fleetwood Mac
Two bands in one, a British blues outfit reborn as the biggest soft-rock act on Earth, with Rumours at the center of it all.
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The Beatles
Four young men from Liverpool who compressed a whole era into seven years, turning the pop song into an art form.
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The Who
Four combustible Londoners who turned mod fury, feedback, and smashed guitars into the loudest band of their era, then built whole operas out of it. Start with Who's Next and keep going.
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Jimi Hendrix
The self-taught left-hander who reinvented the electric guitar in barely four years, turning feedback and fuzz into a new language. Start with the four albums that still set the standard for every player since.
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Creedence Clearwater Revival
John Fogerty's California quartet distilled blues, rockabilly, and R&B into a lean bayou-flavored sound. In a prolific 1968 to 1972 run they became one of the most successful American bands of their era.
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Queen
Queen formed in London in 1970 with Freddie Mercury, Brian May, Roger Taylor, and John Deacon. One of the biggest rock bands in history, known for multi-layered vocal harmonies and stadium anthems.
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U2
The Dublin band formed in 1976 around Bono, The Edge, Adam Clayton, and Larry Mullen Jr. Built on The Edge's chiming, delay-driven guitar, they grew from post-punk beginnings into one of the biggest arena-rock bands in the world.
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The Kinks
The London band led by brothers Ray and Dave Davies, who helped invent the hard rock riff with You Really Got Me and went on to make some of English pop's most detailed character songs and concept albums.
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Cream
Cream were the short-lived British power trio of Eric Clapton, Jack Bruce, and Ginger Baker. Across four albums from 1966 to 1968 they fused blues, psychedelia, and extended improvisation into a template for hard rock.
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The Beach Boys
Formed in Hawthorne, California, in 1961, the Beach Boys built their sound on layered vocal harmony and Brian Wilson's studio production. Their catalog runs from early surf pop hits to the orchestral pop of Pet Sounds.
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Lynyrd Skynyrd
The Jacksonville, Florida band that defined Southern rock in the 1970s, built on a three-guitar attack and the plainspoken vocals of Ronnie Van Zant. Their five classic albums from 1973 to 1977 remain the genre's cornerstone.
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The Band
Five musicians who backed Bob Dylan when he went electric, then made rustic, communal albums that helped invent Americana, trading instruments and lead vocals over a deep well of American roots styles.
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Little Richard
The Georgia-born singer and pianist whose explosive Specialty Records hits of the mid-1950s helped invent rock and roll. His shouting, gospel-fired voice and pounding piano shaped generations that followed.
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