Shock rock

{{Short description|Music genre}}{{for|the rock band|Shlock Rock}} {{Infobox music genre | name = Shock rock | other_names = Horror rock<ref>{{Cite web |title=HERE COME THE GHOULS - Record Collector Magazine |url=https://recordcollectormag.com/articles/here-come-the-ghouls |access-date=2026-01-20 |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |date=1992-03-08 |title='Shock Rock'--Short Stories Mix Elements of Horror, Rock 'n' Roll |url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1992-03-08-ca-6234-story.html |access-date=2026-01-20 |website=Los Angeles Times |language=en-US}}</ref><ref name=":1" /> | stylistic_origins = {{flatlist| * Rock * cabaret * hard rock * heavy metal * punk rock * horror fiction * glam rock * science fiction * shock value }} | cultural_origins = 1950s–1970s, United Kingdom and United States | derivatives = | subgenres = | fusiongenres = | local_scenes = United Kingdom, United States | other_topics = {{hlist|Glam punk|glam metal|gothic rock}} }}

'''Shock rock''' (also known as '''horror rock''') is a subgenre of rock music which primarily focuses on highly theatrical live performances emphasizing shock value. The term was originally coined in December 1966 by journalist Robert Shelton to describe Frank Zappa and his group the Mothers of Invention. However, the phrase was later popularized during the late 1960s and early 1970s to refer to acts such as Arthur Brown, Alice Cooper and Iggy Pop. Artists such as Screamin' Jay Hawkins and Screaming Lord Sutch were later regarded as precursors and influences to the genre. By the 1990s and 2000s, "shock rock" was used as a term to describe Marilyn Manson.

Performances may include violent or provocative behavior from the artists, the use of attention-grabbing imagery such as costumes, masks, or face paint, or special effects such as pyrotechnics or fake blood. Shock rock also often includes elements of horror.

== Etymology == On December 25, 1966, ''The New York Times'' published an article entitled ''Shock Rock: Take Musical Satire One Step Further'' by journalist Robert Shelton. In the article, Shelton would coin the term "shock rock" to describe musician Frank Zappa and his group the Mothers of Invention, he stated:<ref name=":2">{{cite news |last=Shelton |first=Robert |date=25 December 1966 |title=Shock Rock: Take Musical Satire One Step Further |url=https://www.afka.net/Articles/1966-12_NYT.htm |access-date=20 January 2026 |newspaper=The New York Times}}</ref> {{Blockquote|text=The Mothers of Invention are primarily musical satirists. Beyond that, they are perhaps the first pop group to successfully amalgamate rock 'n' roll with the serious music of Stravinsky and others. Both in their material and in their looks, they are also furthering some of the more outrageous elements of anti-convention, thus contributing to a new style that might be called "shock-rock."}}

==History==

=== Influences and precursors === Screamin' Jay Hawkins has been seen as a pioneer for shock rock. After the success of his 1956 hit "I Put a Spell on You", Hawkins began to perform a recurring stunt at many of his live shows: he would emerge from a coffin, sing into a skull-shaped microphone and set off smoke bombs.<ref name="Komara 2006">{{cite book |author=Komara, Edward M. |year=2006 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-w-uGwm_LhcC&q=Screamin%27+Jay+Hawkins&pg=PA415 |title=Encyclopedia of the Blues: A-J |publisher=Routledge |pages=415 |isbn=978-0-415-92700-0}}</ref> Another artist who performed similar stunts was the British singer-songwriter Screaming Lord Sutch.

[[File:Arthur Brown.jpg|thumb|right|Arthur Brown in 2005. During live performances and in the promotional television video, Brown performed the 1968 song "Fire" wearing black and white makeup (corpse paint) and a burning headpiece.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Miles|first1=Barry|title=The British Invasion: Arthur Brown|date=2009|publisher=Sterling Publishing Company, Inc.|page=274|isbn=9781402769764|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=r8xbaIlrUREC&q=arthur+brown+black+and+white+face+paint&pg=PA274}}</ref><ref name="RS">[https://www.rollingstone.com/music/features/arthur-brown-on-shock-rock-hendrix-close-calls-with-fire-w463039 "Arthur Brown on Shock Rock, Hendrix, Close Calls With Fire"]. ''Rolling Stone''. Retrieved 29 December 2017</ref>]]

=== 1960s–1970s: Origins === The 1960s brought several proto-shock rock artists.{{Citation needed|date=January 2026}} The term was originally coined to describe the music of Frank Zappa and his group the Mothers of Invention.<ref name=":2" /> In England, the Who often destroyed their instruments, the Move did the same to television sets, and Arthur Brown wore vivid makeup and a flaming headpiece.<ref name="RS"/> In the US, Jimi Hendrix set his guitar alight at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967. Detroit musician Iggy Pop of the Stooges adopted a violent, erratic onstage persona which drew influence from Jim Morrison of the Doors. Pop would often throw his body around the stage and was known to wear a dog collar during some performances, along with arm length silver lamé gloves, exemplifying both shock and glam rock sensibilities.<ref name="surivalofiggy">{{cite magazine |url=https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/09/02/the-survival-of-iggy-pop |title=The Survival of Iggy Pop |last=Petrusich |first=Amanda |date=August 26, 2019 |magazine=The New Yorker |access-date=April 10, 2020}}</ref> At one show in 1970, Pop smeared peanut butter on his body and threw it into the crowd.<ref name="surivalofiggy" /> In 1973, Pop committed self-mutilation on stage with a knife and at a later show exposed himself.<ref>{{Cite magazine |last=Stone |first=Rolling |date=2021-04-21 |title=20 Wildest Iggy Pop Moments |url=https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/20-wildest-iggy-pop-moments-72545/ |access-date=2025-10-13 |magazine=Rolling Stone |language=en-US}}</ref>

On seeing Arthur Brown, Alice Cooper, often described as 'The Godfather of Shock rock',<ref>{{Cite web|last=Loud|first=All Things|date=October 3, 2019|title=Alice Cooper is Still the Godfather of Shock Rock|url=https://www.allthingsloud.com/alice-cooper-still-godfather-shock-rock/|access-date=April 25, 2021|website=All Things Loud|language=en-US}}</ref> stated, "Can you imagine the young Alice Cooper watching that with all his make-up and hellish performance? It was like all my Halloweens came at once!"<ref>{{cite news|title=Alice Cooper recruits Arthur Brown for fire-themed Halloween show|url=http://ultimateclassicrock.com/alice-cooper-arthur-brown-halloween-show/|agency=Ultimate Classic Rock|date=December 29, 2017}}</ref>

=== 1980s–2000s: Popularity === Subsequently, Roky Erickson coined the term "horror rock"<ref name=":1">{{Cite web |last=Burns |first=William |title=The Pioneers of Horror Rock |url=https://sccompassnews.com/3003/showcase/the-pioneers-of-horror-rock/ |access-date=2025-07-28 |website=Compass News}}</ref> in 1980, when describing the music of his band Roky Erickson and the Aliens, whose music influenced by horror movies was retroactively noted by ''Compass News'',''<ref name=":1" />'' as influential to the development of shock rock.<ref name=":0">{{Cite book |last1=Belsito |first1=Peter |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FnO-anKbEzoC |title=Hardcore California: A History of Punk and New Wave |last2=Davis |first2=Bob |date=1983 |publisher=Last Gasp |isbn=978-0-86719-314-5 |language=en}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Stegall |first=Tim |title=A history of horror punk, from the Damned and Misfits to Alkaline Trio |url=https://www.altpress.com/best-horror-punk-bands-misfits-alkaline-trio/ |access-date=2025-07-24 |website=Alternative Press Magazine |language=en-US}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Quietus |first=The |date=2009-08-19 |title=Getting To Grips With Roky Erickson: A Dr Rock Interview |url=https://thequietus.com/interviews/getting-to-grips-with-roky-erickson-a-dr-rock-interview/ |access-date=2025-07-24 |website=The Quietus |language=en-GB}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Kogon |first=Bennett |date=2018-10-30 |title=I Walk with Demons: Roky Erickson depicts selling his soul to the devil on public TV, Halloween '84 |url=https://dangerousminds.net/comments/i_walk_with_demons_roky_erickson_depicts_selling_his_soul_to_the_devil_on_p/ |access-date=2025-07-24 |website=dangerousminds.net |language=en-US}}</ref>

The Plasmatics were an American punk rock band formed by Yale University art school graduate Rod Swenson with Wendy O. Williams. The band was a controversial group known for wild live shows. In addition to chainsawing guitars, blowing up speaker cabinets and sledgehammering television sets, Williams and the Plasmatics blew up automobiles live on stage. Williams was arrested in Milwaukee by the Milwaukee police before being charged with public indecency.<ref name="Skanse">Skanse</ref>{{Citation not found|date=May 2023}} Jim Farber of ''Sounds'' described the show: "Lead singer/ex-porn star/current weight lifter Wendy Orleans Williams (W.O.W. for short) spends most of the Plasmatics' show fondling her family size breasts, scratching her sweaty snatch and eating the drum kit, among other playful events".<ref name="Gimarc235">Gimarc, p.235</ref>{{Citation not found|date=May 2023}}

In the 1980s in Richmond, Virginia, Gwar formed as a collaboration of artists and musicians, and since 2024, has been touring consistently for over forty years.<ref name="GWAR & Static-X Unleash 'Machines Vs. Monsters' Tour As GWAR Celebrates 40 Years of Groundbreaking Shock Rock">GWAR. [https://gwar.net/blogs/news/machines-vs-monsters]. Gwar. Retrieved March 25, 2025.</ref> The band members make their own lavish monster costumes, which they claim are inspired by many of the creatures from H. P. Lovecraft's literary multiverse, the Cthulhu Mythos. Gwar frequently incorporates extravagant theatrics into their shows, such as mock jousts and pretending to murder each other.

The Mentors cultivated a shock-rock image by wearing executioners' hoods in concert and making deliberately outlandish statements to the press. In the 1990s, vocalist Eldon Hoke also began incorporating onstage sex acts into the band's repertoire.<ref name="Mentors">Torreano, Bradley. [http://www.allmusic.com/artist/the-mentors-p4898/biography The Mentors bio]. AllMusic. Retrieved March 11, 2012.</ref>

[[File:Marilyn Manson Rotr 2015 (109543887).jpeg|thumb|Marilyn Manson has widely been described as a shock rocker.]] In the 1990s and 2000s, Marilyn Manson became perhaps the most notable and well known act in shock rock.{{According to whom|date=January 2026}} His band was once dubbed by former US Senator Joseph Lieberman (D-Conn) as "perhaps the sickest group ever promoted by a mainstream record company." Manson's stage antics, such as burning the American flag and ripping pages out of the Bible, have been the focus of protests throughout his career.<ref>{{cite news| url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/325957.stm | work=BBC News | title=The mystery of Marilyn Manson | date=April 22, 1999}}</ref> Manson argued that every artist has their means of presentation and that his visual and vocal styles are merely a way for him to control the angle that his audience and the general public view and interpret what he is trying to convey artistically.<ref name="youtube">{{cite web|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PkxomNoPN-Q|title=Fox News Marilyn Manson Interview|access-date=January 12, 2008|work=YouTube}}</ref>

==See also== *List of shock rock musicians

==References== {{reflist|30em}}

==Further reading== *Haenfler, Ross (2006). ''Straight Edge: Hardcore Punk, Clean-Living Youth, and Social Change'' (New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press). {{ISBN|0-8135-3852-1}} *Leblanc, Lauraine (1999). ''Pretty in Punk: Girls' Gender Resistance in a Boys' Subculture'' (New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press). {{ISBN|0-8135-2651-5}} *Lydon, John (1995). ''Rotten: No Irish, No Blacks, No Dogs'' (New York: Picador). {{ISBN|0-312-11883-X}} *McNeil, Legs, and Gillian McCain (1997). ''Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History of Punk'' (New York: Penguin Books). {{ISBN|0-14-026690-9}} *Raha, Maria (2005). ''Cinderella's Big Score: Women of the Punk and Indie Underground'' (Emeryville, Calif.: Seal). {{ISBN|1-58005-116-2}} *Reynolds, Simon (2005). ''Rip It Up and Start Again: Post Punk 1978–1984'' (London and New York: Faber and Faber). {{ISBN|0-571-21569-6}} *Robb, John (2006). ''Punk Rock: An Oral History'' (London: Elbury Press). {{ISBN|0-09-190511-7}} *Sabin, Roger (1999). ''Punk Rock, So What? The Cultural Legacy of Punk'' (London: Routledge). {{ISBN|0-415-17030-3}} *Savage, Jon (1991). ''England's Dreaming: The Sex Pistols and Punk Rock'' (London: Faber and Faber). {{ISBN|0-312-28822-0}} *Simpson, Paul (2003). ''The Rough Guide to Cult Pop: The Songs, the Artists, the Genres, the Dubious Fashions'' (London: Rough Guides). {{ISBN|1-84353-229-8}} *Taylor, Steven (2003). ''False Prophet: Field Notes from the Punk Underground'' (Middletown, Conn.: Wesleyan University Press). {{ISBN|0-8195-6668-3}}

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Shock Rock}} Category:Rock music genres