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Introduction
The Beatles’ Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band changed everything. Suddenly pop groups began to realise that an album could be more than just a handful of singles fleshed out with cover versions and obvious filler. As other bands followed their lead, a strand of album-oriented music began to emerge. Unlike pop, rock wasn’t reliant on hit singles and had a veneer of seriousness - justified or not - rarely afforded to chart music. Pop was built for disposable pleasure; rock was supposed to last. It was the music of hip older brothers. Thus, Led Zeppelin became a world power while never releasing an official single, and by the mid-’70s America’s album-oriented radio format has helped turn Bruce Springsteen and The Eagles into superstars. While punk rock was completely at odds with the likes of Peter Frampton, bands such as The Clash still embraced the album format. A move repeated in the ’80s and ’90s as left-field US rockers R.E.M. and Nirvana and, later, British acts Oasis and Manic Street Preachers broke into the mainstream to reap huge commercial rewards. Nevertheless, from Hendrix to Oasis, rock's foundations have remained largely unchanged: electric guitars, electric guitars and a mandolin where necessary.
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