1970s · 1970–1979

Hard Rock, Prog & Early Metal

Side-long suites and crushed riffs share the same decade of bigger rooms.

Chapter

The seventies split into parallel markets. Prog uses odd meters, Mellotron, and multi-part suites. Hard rock bets on riff, volume, and chorus hooks. Led Zeppelin mixes acoustic/electric dynamics and long improvisation. Black Sabbath detunes and writes tritone-heavy songs that seed metal. Pink Floyd builds album-length studio concepts. King Crimson keeps dissonant structure tight. Arena touring scales with PA systems and lighting rigs. Bigger songs need bigger rooms; the economics follow.

Sound: Concept side-longs, downtuned power chords, double-kick and tom fills

Anchor bands

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