The History of Rock Told in a Whirlwind 15-Minute Video

Based in Eng­land, Itha­ca Audio spe­cial­izes in cre­at­ing music for film, TV, ani­ma­tions and games. And they also have a knack for remix­ing audio visu­als and pro­duc­ing mashups. Care to sam­ple their work? Watch the video above.

The His­to­ry of Rock takes you from Elvis to The White Stripes, trav­el­ing from 1957 to 2003, in the space of 15 min­utes. 348 rock­stars, 84 gui­tarists, 64 songs, 44 drum­mers — they’re all knit­ted into a nar­ra­tive using a device–the Face­book timeline–that came into exis­tence in 2004. It’s anachro­nis­tic but clever, and I’m will­ing to sus­pend dis­be­lief and take the ride. A big­ger com­plaint might be the one made by For­rest Wick­man over at Slate. “No Lit­tle Richard. No Ike Turn­er and Jack­ie Bren­ston. No Sis­ter Roset­ta Tharpe. No Bo Did­dley or Big Joe Turn­er,” he observes. The His­to­ry of Rock would have you believe that “rock was [orig­i­nal­ly] pio­neered exclu­sive­ly by white artists.” Give Kei­th Richards and Mick Jag­ger the chance–two icons who orig­i­nal­ly saw them­selves as just play­ing the Amer­i­can blues–and they might tell the ori­gin sto­ry of rock n roll a lit­tle dif­fer­ent­ly.

Below you can see a list of tracks used in the mashup. And if you head over to the Itha­ca Audio web­site, you can down­load the sound­track in full.

Elvis Pres­ley — Jail­house Rock
The Yard­birds — For your Love
The Rolling Stones — Honky Tonk Women
The Rolling Stones — (I Can’t Get No) Sat­is­fac­tion
Cream — Sun­shine of your Love
Led Zep­pelin — Whole Lot­ta Love
Led Zep­pelin — Good Times, Bad Times
Led Zep­pelin — Immi­grant Song
Jimi Hen­drix — Hey Joe
Jimi Hen­drix — Pur­ple Haze
Fleet­wood Mac — Oh Well (Part 1)
The Kinks — You Real­ly Got Me
The Doors — Rid­ers on the Storm
Queen — Don’t Stop Me
Queen — Radio Ga Ga
Queen — Anoth­er One Bites the Dust
Queen — A Kind of Mag­ic
The Bea­t­les — Sgt. Pep­per’s Lone­ly Hearts Club Band
The Who — Baba O’Ri­ley
The Who — Emi­nence Front
Black Sab­bath — Iron Man
Black Sab­bath — War Pigs
Deep Pur­ple — Woman From Tokyo
Deep Pur­ple — Smoke on the Water
Deep Pur­ple — Liv­ing Wreck
The Eagles — Life in the Fast Lane
Aero­smith — Walk this Way
Aero­smith — Dude Looks Like a Lady
Alice Coop­er — I’m Eigh­teen
The Clash — Train in Vain (Stand by Me)
The Police — Rox­anne
Jour­ney — Don’t Stop Believin’
Dire Straits — Sul­tans of Swing
Duran Duran — Girls on Film
Duran Duran — Wild Boys
Pink Floyd — Anoth­er Brick in the Wall
David Bowie — Let’s Dance
David Bowie & Queen — Under Pres­sure
Iron Maid­en — Run to the Hills
Def Lep­pard — Pour Some Sug­ar on Me
Guns N’ Ros­es — Mr Brown­stone
Guns N’ Ros­es — Sweet Child O’ Mine
AC/DC — Back in Black
Rage Against the Machine — Bomb­track
Rage Against the Machine — Guer­ril­la Radio
Rage Against the Machine — Killing in the Name
Metal­li­ca — Enter Sand­man
Nir­vana — Smells Like Teen Spir­it
Nir­vana — Heart Shaped Box
Oasis — Super­son­ic
Oasis — Live For­ev­er
Blur — Song 2
The Verve — Bit­ter­sweet Sym­pho­ny
Radio­head — High and Dry
Radio­head — Idioteque
Red Hot Chili Pep­pers — Can’t Stop
The Killers — All These Things That I’ve Done
Foo Fight­ers — All My Life
U2 — Hold Me, Thrill Me, Kiss Me, Kill Me
Linkin Park — One Step Clos­er
The White Stripes — Sev­en Nation Army
The Strokes — 12 51
Goril­laz — Clint East­wood
Kings of Leon — Sex on Fire

If you would like to sign up for Open Culture’s free email newslet­ter, please find it here. Or fol­low our posts on Threads, Face­book, BlueSky or Mastodon.

If you would like to sup­port the mis­sion of Open Cul­ture, con­sid­er mak­ing a dona­tion to our site. It’s hard to rely 100% on ads, and your con­tri­bu­tions will help us con­tin­ue pro­vid­ing the best free cul­tur­al and edu­ca­tion­al mate­ri­als to learn­ers every­where. You can con­tribute through Pay­Pal, Patre­on, and Ven­mo (@openculture). Thanks!

Relat­ed Con­tent:

A His­to­ry of Rock ‘n’ Roll in 100 Riffs

Rock Crit­ic Greil Mar­cus Picks 10 Unex­pect­ed Songs That Tell the Sto­ry of Rock ‘n’ Roll

The Evo­lu­tion of the Rock Gui­tar Solo: 28 Solos, Span­ning 50 Years, Played in 6 Fun Min­utes