In the Future There will be...no rock and roll, no rock and roll...

An interesting what if....what if Alan Freed had keeled over from alcoholism in the late 40's rather than the mid-60's? There would be no DJ listening to this new kind of music that sings blues to a jazz beat, no one to spin its records and no one to advocate for it. No payola either, but whatev. What if Glenn Ford's son hadn't played an obscure 45 to him leading to its use in the opening credits to Black Board Jungle?

To put it another way, could there have been a counter-culture without rock? Frankly its hard to believe the kids would have rebelled to the songs of Frank, Dino and Sammy, the Lennon Sisters, Rosemary Clooney and Jim Neighbors. One supposed that folk music would have come on, but you don't change the world to soft guitar strums.

My generation rebelled against the counterculture. Imagine a bunch of College Republicans coming to meetings in shorts and sandals but also wearing coats and ties. Of course we were fueled by Metal and Grunge, as this was 1994, mostly Grunge and by the end of the decade my friends and I were in Northern Virginia trying to re-create Ozzie and Harriet. As PJ O'Rourke once said, we took one look at the '60s and said 'give me a haircut and a job'.

I just don't know if you can need a haircut if the Beatles never came along: