Top 5 Most Influential Artists

[stevGNR666]

miles davis - Musically, virtually created an entire structure of song unchartered prior - blocked chord changing - also experimented from soulful jazz to creating bop with charley parker in the mid 50s

robert johnson - the king of the blues...everyone borrowed from this guy from clapton to the stones to zeppelin...who in turn influenced everyone else

bob dylan - the king of all lyrical experimentation and creating personal stylized metaphors to allow for the meaning of the words to be the forefront or holding hands with the music as a partner in statement

the beatles - taking the three above well...maybe two of them and making them available to a wide audience

james brown - took miles davis and expanded and expanded until an entire genre was created in the name of funk and then hip hop and eventually rap

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Pretty similar to mine but I disagree in some places. Miles led Charlie Parker's band in the mid-40's (yes he led because bird was too fucked up himself) not the mid-50's. And if you read up on Miles he has said that James Brown and Sly Stone influenced his shift to electric music, not the other way around, so if you wanted to you could say James Brown had an even bigger influence. James Brown was doing Funk-type shit in the late 60's, but Miles didn't really go that route until '72 when he made "On the Corner" to attempt to appeal to young black people.

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yeah but without miles i doubt brown would ever have moved soul into the derection it did...he started out as a jazz/soul singer...influenced more by miles than anything and then he moved into the funk zone...which symbiotically brought miles into the electronic On the Corner

without sketches of spain i doubt brown would have made it where he was in the beginning...so they kinda fed off each other

Another sax to be mentioned to bring jazz up to the forefront should be john coltrane...him and miles and parker....GODS.

[stevGNR666]

I never really thought dylan was particularly influential. I mean, how many acoustic singer songwriters have their been that were around before him?

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---____---

you've got to be kidding me.

woodie gutherie came before him of course him and robert johnson were his two main influential artists but he took both of their lyrical powers and sent them into the stratosphere of lyrical imagery and universal meaning that showed social commentary while keeping the songs personal instead of just about LOOVE or bullshit that only means things to the person singing and his/her partner. of course dylan had his love songs but that's not what he's famous for is it?

Edited December 21, 2005 by stevGNR666

[Anagram Of Oral Sex]

Everyone forgot Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young

Another good one is Parliament.

OH! and Zappa.

Edited December 21, 2005 by Anagram Of Oral Sex

[Rumin]

I never really thought dylan was particularly influential. I mean, how many acoustic singer songwriters have their been that were around before him?

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Dylan made the folk scene very popular. Joan Baez and Woodie Guthrie really weren't big names before Dylan revolutionized music. And stuff like Green Day's American Idiot album? Dylan did protest songs and albums before just about anyone and popularized them as well. And his songwriting has been more influential than anybody elses, too.

[stevGNR666]

I never really thought dylan was particularly influential. I mean, how many acoustic singer songwriters have their been that were around before him?

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Dylan made the folk scene very popular. Joan Baez and Woodie Guthrie really weren't big names before Dylan revolutionized music. And stuff like Green Day's American Idiot album? Dylan did protest songs and albums before just about anyone and popularized them as well. And his songwriting has been more influential than anybody elses, too.

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you're my hero rumin.

[Rumin]

I never really thought dylan was particularly influential. I mean, how many acoustic singer songwriters have their been that were around before him?

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Dylan made the folk scene very popular. Joan Baez and Woodie Guthrie really weren't big names before Dylan revolutionized music. And stuff like Green Day's American Idiot album? Dylan did protest songs and albums before just about anyone and popularized them as well. And his songwriting has been more influential than anybody elses, too.

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you're my hero rumin.

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Thanks! You can be my sidekick.

[Nightrain_Kid]

I never really thought dylan was particularly influential. I mean, how many acoustic singer songwriters have their been that were around before him?

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Dylan made the folk scene very popular. Joan Baez and Woodie Guthrie really weren't big names before Dylan revolutionized music. And stuff like Green Day's American Idiot album? Dylan did protest songs and albums before just about anyone and popularized them as well. And his songwriting has been more influential than anybody elses, too.

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you're my hero rumin.

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Thanks! You can be my sidekick.

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I will be the villian then *kidnaps stev*

[Yamisonic]

I never really thought dylan was particularly influential. I mean, how many acoustic singer songwriters have their been that were around before him?

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Dylan made the folk scene very popular. Joan Baez and Woodie Guthrie really weren't big names before Dylan revolutionized music. And stuff like Green Day's American Idiot album? Dylan did protest songs and albums before just about anyone and popularized them as well. And his songwriting has been more influential than anybody elses, too.

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you're my hero rumin.

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Thanks! You can be my sidekick.

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Can I be the other sidekick?

[johnezz]

I still say Leo Fender is the most influentaul person ever on the music industry.

[sabre]

I still say Leo Fender is the most influentaul person ever on the music industry.

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Yeah we all heard you the first time. What about the inventor of the microphone, or the speaker?

Fender just created something that would have been invented two years later by someone else.

[johnezz]

I still say Leo Fender is the most influentaul person ever on the music industry.

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Fender just created something that would have been invented two years later by someone else.

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Same thing could be said for the Beatles, or Elvis...

[sabre]

I still say Leo Fender is the most influentaul person ever on the music industry.

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Fender just created something that would have been invented two years later by someone else.

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Same thing could be said for the Beatles, or Elvis...

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I doubt there would have been another beatles, Elvis yeah.

[Yamisonic]

No two people think the same, do the same things, want the same things. So there couldn't have been another anybody.

[artfromtex]

Hank Williams (at least in the U.S.)

Elvis Presley

The Beatles

Bob Dylan (changed how the music industry worked. songwriter's not selling their material, but instead recording it themselves.)

Led Zeppelin