50 Fun Facts About Classic Rock

Who played the riff that opens the Rolling Stones' "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction"?

The 1965 single was the Stones' first US number one and is widely called one of the greatest hooks in rock.

Which founding Pink Floyd frontman left the band in 1968?

His mental health was a theme of The Dark Side of the Moon and Wish You Were Here years after he had gone.

Which 1969 concept album by the Who included "Pinball Wizard"?

The double album made the term "rock opera" stick and remains the band's best-known concept record.

Who replaced Bon Scott as AC/DC's lead singer in 1980?

Axl Rose did eventually front the band, filling in on tour in 2016.

The Doors took their name from a book by which writer?

The Doors of Perception in turn quotes William Blake, so the name is a literary reference to a literary reference.

What is Bruce Springsteen's nickname?

The E Street Band has backed him since 1972 across most of his 21 studio albums.

Which song did Jimi Hendrix drench in feedback and distortion at Woodstock?

Guitar World's editors named it the greatest performance of all time in 2011.

Tom Petty was a member of which late-1980s supergroup?

His bandmates were George Harrison, Bob Dylan, Roy Orbison and Jeff Lynne.

"Smoke on the Water" recounts a 1971 casino fire in which country?

Deep Purple had come to Montreux to record Machine Head and ended up cutting it in a nearby hotel.

"American Pie" mourns "the day the music died" — the 1959 crash that killed which star?

Don McLean, then 13, learned of it while folding papers for his delivery round.

Jethro Tull's Ian Anderson is best known for playing which instrument?

He has led the band continuously since it formed in Blackpool in 1967.

What was Elton John's birth name?

The others became Sting, David Bowie and Cliff Richard.

Which 1964 single was the Kinks' international breakthrough?

Problems on their 1965 US tour got the band banned from touring America for several years.

Billy Joel's nickname comes from which 1973 song?

He went on to release 12 entirely self-written studio albums between 1971 and 1993.

What are devoted Grateful Dead fans called?

The band is considered "the pioneering godfathers of the jam band world".

What were Led Zeppelin originally called?

Jimmy Page built the band from the ashes of the Yardbirds; the Honeydrippers was a later Robert Plant side project.

On which Led Zeppelin album does "Kashmir" appear?

Page and Plant wrote it over three years; John Paul Jones missed a credit by arriving late to the sessions.

Which Dark Side of the Moon track became Pink Floyd's first US hit single?

Written by Roger Waters, it opened side two and reached number 13 on the Billboard Hot 100.

Before Queen, Brian May and Roger Taylor played together in which band?

Freddie Mercury was a fan of the group before he joined in 1970 and suggested the new name.

Freddie Mercury described "Bohemian Rhapsody" as what kind of piece?

It stitched together three songs he had written and needed nearly 200 overdub tracks bounced across eight tape generations.

Which song opens the Who's 1971 album Who's Next?

Its title fuses Meher Baba and minimalist composer Terry Riley; in Europe it was a single backed with "My Wife".

Which Grammy did "Hotel California" win in 1978?

Don Henley later summed the song up as "a journey from innocence to experience ... that's all."

The four founding Eagles had all been recruited as a backing band for which singer?

They all played on her self-titled 1972 album before signing to David Geffen's Asylum Records.

"Sweet Home Alabama" was written as a riposte to which musician's songs?

"Southern Man" and "Alabama" had struck the band as blaming the whole South; the song name-checks him directly.

Why is the cover of AC/DC's Back in Black entirely black?

The band briefly considered splitting after Scott's death before recording the album in the Bahamas.

Steven Tyler and Joe Perry of Aerosmith are nicknamed what?

The Glimmer Twins are Jagger and Richards; Aerosmith's fans are known as the Blue Army.

Journey was formed in 1973 by former members of which band?

Guitarist Neal Schon and keyboardist Gregg Rolie both came over; Steve Miller Band alumni joined too.

Who is Springsteen leaning on in the famous Born to Run cover photo?

The E Street saxophonist's shoulder has been imitated on countless covers since.

On whose dairy farm was the 1969 Woodstock festival held?

The farm was in Bethel, New York, about 60 miles from the town of Woodstock itself.

Eric Clapton's "Layla" was inspired by his secret love for whom?

She was married to George Harrison at the time; after their divorce she married Clapton.

Which Led Zeppelin member missed a writing credit on "Kashmir" for arriving late?

Bonham did get a credit; the lyrics date back to 1973.

Which session singer wails on Pink Floyd's "The Great Gig in the Sky"?

A regular at Abbey Road, she improvised the wordless melody in a few takes on a Sunday night over Richard Wright's piano.

Who's Next grew out of which abandoned Pete Townshend project?

Eight of the album's nine songs came from it; only John Entwistle's "My Wife" did not.

Which 1968 instrumental gave Fleetwood Mac a UK number one?

That was the Peter Green blues-band era, years before Buckingham and Nicks joined.

Who produced both Highway to Hell and Back in Black for AC/DC?

Back in Black was cut in seven weeks in the Bahamas and mixed at Electric Lady Studios in New York.

How long did Springsteen spend working on the title track of Born to Run?

He was chasing Phil Spector's Wall of Sound; the whole album took from January 1974 to July 1975.

Whose concert was on at the Montreux casino when the "Smoke on the Water" fire began?

He was playing with the Mothers of Invention; decades later his son Dweezil remixed the song for an animated video.

What superlative did the 1975 Guinness Book of World Records give Deep Purple?

It was for a 1972 concert at London's Rainbow Theatre.

Bob Seger co-wrote which number-one Eagles hit?

Seger also wrote "Shakedown" for Beverly Hills Cop II, his own Hot 100 number one.

Which earlier radio format, known by a three-letter abbreviation, spawned classic rock?

Album-oriented rock; consultant Lee Abrams' 1982 "Timeless Rock" format mixed current AOR with 1960s and 1970s hits.

Foreigner's Ian McDonald had been a founding member of which prog band?

Foreigner formed in New York in 1976 and has sold more than 80 million records.

Who wrote Kansas's "Carry On Wayward Son"?

It was the band's first top-40 hit and was the most-played song on US classic rock radio in 1997.

Who refused Atlantic's requests to release "Stairway to Heaven" as a US single?

Fans bought the fourth album as if it were the single; the manager said no in both 1972 and 1973.

How many nonconsecutive weeks did Dark Side of the Moon log on the Billboard 200 (1973–88)?

It held number one for only a single week, and its longest unbroken run was 593 weeks.

Near which town did Lynyrd Skynyrd's chartered plane crash in October 1977?

The Convair had run out of fuel flying from Greenville to Baton Rouge; Ronnie Van Zant and Steve Gaines died.

Which guitarist co-wrote "Free Bird" with Ronnie Van Zant?

Released as a single in November 1974, it peaked at number 19 in early 1975.

Which band did AC/DC's second long-term singer front before joining in 1980?

He was recruited after the band decided against disbanding following Bon Scott's death.

"Don't Stop Believin'" was recorded in one take at Fantasy Studios in which city?

Its chorus does not arrive until the song is nearly over; the title came from advice Jonathan Cain's father gave him.

Which city's station M105 billed itself as "Classic Rock" in 1980, an early use of the term?

Chicago's WMET followed in 1981, and Houston's KRBE ran an early all-vintage format in 1983.

Where did Aerosmith's "Dream On" peak on the Billboard Hot 100 on its 1973 release?

It was a number one for the year on Boston's WBZ-FM, and a 1976 reissue finally took it into the top 10.