10 Perfect Songs That Started Hard Rock

From the minute that Pete Townshend became part of the Who, he wasn't looking to just make traditional rock and roll music. There were a million bands in the Mod scene looking to just play traditional covers of R&B songs, and there was a lot more on the horizon past the three minute single. Whatever Townshend played had to last longer than just his adolescence, and My Generation is the kind of song seemed to tear down everyone's expectations of what rock and roll could be.

While the original version of this song was meant to be slower and almost folksy in its delivery, its classic form as a hard rock song almost came about by accident, with Roger Daltrey suggesting on a whim about saying the opening verses with a stutter, almost like the singer is filled with too much emotion to even articulate what he's trying to say. Throwing out the traditional love song format that was happening around this time, this song was calling almost for a revolution of the younger generation, wanting to lead more self destructive lifestyles and hoping to die before they got old.

Although The Who had much bigger plans beyond just this song, My Generation has become the catchphrase of every up and coming rock band, looking to make the kind of music that would piss off their parents and blasting their amps all night long. Johnny B Goode may have been the holy ground for rock and rollers across the world, but My Generation is one of the cornerstones for what the punk movement was all about a few years later.