Evolution of the Electric Guitar - From Doo-Wop to Glam Rock and Everything in Between

Like any 80s baby worth their salt, I grew up with the Back to the Future trilogy. For the uninitiated, in the franchise’s first installment, Marty McFly accidentally travels back in time from 1985 to 1955, where he alters the course of his parents’ lives, and therefore his own, in the process. 

Over a week, Marty races against the clock to re-establish order in his parents’ timeline so they can fall in love and eventually create a family that includes him and his siblings. The fate of his existence rests on his parents falling in love at the Enchantment Under the Sea dance, where he is also in attendance. 

In 1985, Marty is a guitar player in a rock band. They’ve just auditioned to play their own school dance (parallels!) and have been declined for being “too darn loud”. So of course, 1955 Marty ends up on stage at his parents’ dance, playing the very romantic “Earth Angel” by The Penguins (American, 1954).

Despite being The Penguins only hit, “Earth Angel” is a doo-wop song that debuted in 1954 and remained a hit single through most of the 1950s. The song is composed in the key of A-flat major and is set in common time with a tempo of 76 beats per minute.

The song features an electric guitar but its role in the song is measured and steady, creating the perfect pace for slow dancing. The lyrics are about a man in love with a woman “sent from heaven above”. A perfect selection for the scene and wouldn’t you know, his parents kiss and cement their future together. Yay!

Once the performance ends, Marty is set to meet up with Doc Brown so he can jump in his DeLorean and catch a lightning bolt back to 1985. But the guys he’s been playing with ask him to stay for one more song… to play something that ‘“really cooks”. Marty thinks for a second before giving instructions to the band and then telling them to watch him for the changes.

He then launches into the opening notes of “Johnny B. Goode” by Chuck Berry (American). Released in 1958, “Johnny B. Goode” was written in the key of B-flat Major and is set in common time with a tempo of 168 beats per minute. It is widely regarded as the first rock song that celebrated making a living as a rock star. 

In the song, Johnny was a poor country boy (originally “colored boy” but Berry changed the lyrics so the song would get airplay on the radio) who couldn’t read or write well but when he played the guitar, no one was better. Johnny rode that talent to celebrity and stardom, something that had never been the subject of a song before. Berry later confirmed that the song was autobiographical, influenced by his own life and that of his pianist Johnny Jenkins.

The joke is that one of the band members is the cousin of Chuck Berry. He calls Chuck during the performance and tells him that he’s found the new sound he’s looking for, then holds up the phone so he can hear Marty play. Michael J. Fox is obviously not singing but he definitely captures the feeling of being overcome by singing such a powerfully charged song.

It’s not long before things start to go off the rails and Marty slips into a 1980s style though, playing the notes with more force than the audience has ever heard. He starts jumping across the stage, kicking over the amp, sliding on his knees before ending with a final note played in the style of Eddie Van Halen. 

When he finally opens his eyes, he sees that the audience is stunned at what they’ve just witnessed. He tells them that he guesses they’re not ready for that kind of music yet… “But your kids are gonna love it”. This is, of course, a nod to how artists like Chuck Berry and Little Richard revolutionized the electric guitar and paved the way for The Beatles to change rock in the 1960s, for Led Zepplin to become legends in the 1970s and for Metallica to inspire legions of headbanging teens in the 1980s.

You can hear the influence that 1950s pioneer guitarists had on those who came after in Motley Crue’s “Kickstart My Heart”. I chose to highlight this song because I’ve played it before every job interview I’ve ever had (even before Dwight Schrute did it to psych himself up for a sales call on The Office!) and it has worked every time. I highly recommend that you give it a try next time you have an interview or another situation that you need to rock!

“Kickstart My Heart” is written in the key of G Minor and is set in common time with a tempo of 178 beats per minute. The song was written by the band’s bassist Nikki Sixx (American, 1987), in the aftermath of a drug overdose that he says he was saved from via a shot of adrenaline straight to his chest from responding paramedics, therefore, kickstarting his heart. 

However, the band’s drummer Steven Adler disputes that Sixx was revived in this way, saying instead that he came to after paramedics performed standard chest compressions. Nonetheless, Adler told the press in 2018 that Sixx got a “hell of a good song out of it”. Indeed, “Kickstart My Heart” takes listeners on a manic ride through what I can only assume it was like to be a rock star during the wild days of the 1980s LA music scene.

Early rock pioneers made it possible for my 11-year-old son to plug into an amp and immediately feel like a star based on sound alone. The technique is still coming along. But when you consider that his grandmother had to wait until she was out of the house to play The Eagles and Nazareth in her friend’s car, lest she incurred the wrath of her straight-laced parents (my grandparents), you can see how far society has come in accepting rock music as the norm. Just as my husband blasted the walls of his parent’s home with Danzig every morning, I wait to see what the future holds for me as my son’s musical tastes develop.

Sources:

Wikimedia Foundation. (2023, November 21). Earth angel. Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth_Angel 

Wikimedia Foundation. (2024b, February 27). Johnny B. Goode. Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johnny_B._Goode 

Cartwright, G. (2022, December 12). Johnny B. Goode — Chuck Berry’s 1958 hit celebrated his own rise to fame. https://rb.gy/04xh4o 

BPM for Johnny B. Goode (Chuck Berry), Berry is on Top / St. Louis to Liverpool. GetSongBPM.com. (n.d.-a). https://getsongbpm.com/song/johnny-bpoint-goode/0RlQkL 

Wikimedia Foundation. (2024, January 5). Kickstart my heart. Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kickstart_My_Heart 

BPM for Kickstart My Heart (Mötley Crüe). GetSongBPM.com. (n.d.). https://getsongbpm.com/song/kickstart-my-heart/5ypzY 

Childers, C. (2018, May 15). Steven Adler on Motley Crue’s “Kickstart My Heart” actual origins. Loudwire. https://loudwire.com/steven-adler-true-story-motley-crue-kickstart-my-heart/

Kickstart My Heart by Motley Crue Chords and melody. Hooktheory. (n.d.). https://rb.gy/l12lvh