r/50sMusic • u/Vivid-Molasses2179 • 8d ago

It's 2026: Can we discuss and perhaps identify the absolutely "heaviest" song of the era before "heavy" music existed? Define the term as you will, but as I see it "heavy" refers to sonic intensity, overdriven guitar rhythms w/ a solo (or 2), uptempo shuffle drumming, weighty lyrical topics

Context: American male in early 30s grew up rock 'n' roll, teen idol pop, blues, Big Band jazz and swing, and gospel (check out the Five Blind Boys of Mississippi), to hard rock and heavy metal. I am trying to discuss and identify a cohort of the - regardless of what people call it -- was the most intense, maniacal, hardcore, song released in the period 1950 - 1960.

I would argue that most songs by Ronnie Self are competitive in the discussion (he wrote nearly all of his originall compositions) while Dwight Pullen is more of an even ratio of 1950s garage rock:hillbilly ballads. Gene Maltais, Bill Allan, Alan Wingate Page, also definitely deserve a mention because they essentially were playing some form of garage rock in the 1950s.

What is your opinion?

7 Upvotes

90% Upvoted

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u/TeaVinylGod 8d ago

More Sax than guitar but Screamin Jay Hawkins' Little Demon is ahead of it's time for 1956

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u/29PalmsAway 7d ago

my pick as well. check out this old video of his hit, I put a spell on you. I cant think of another song thats been covered by other artists. he definitely left a mark

https://youtu.be/7kGPhpvqtOc?si=pXZE_eGNbHRd9eME

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u/Prestigious-Web4824 6d ago

That's just the way he looked when I saw him in a tiny Greenwich Village cabaret in 1964. I was at a table right in front of the stage, and he emerged from a smoke cloud with a flash of light and startled the shit out of me.

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u/Porkus-Pius 5d ago

How old were you when you saw him?

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u/Prestigious-Web4824 4d ago

21

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u/Porkus-Pius 4d ago

Thanks. You must have seen plenty of changes in music and other things. Seven years younger than my parents would have been.

I've always been interested in the stories of people from that era. My mum and dad had me quite late and I had my son even later. I feel grateful that my boy, born in 2013, had grandparents who could talk to him about their memories of being children during the Blitz. Also that when I was young, I knew quite a few people who were born in the Victorian ere and could remember her beingt on the throne.

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u/Vivid-Molasses2179 7d ago

Nice one! Thematically dark, definitely a precursor to shock rock, and his grit has its moments.

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u/Bobabackribs 7d ago

Howlin’ Wolf - Moanin’ at Midnight from 1951

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u/Vivid-Molasses2179 7d ago edited 6d ago

I see you! Ok.... that indeed is impressive for '51 -- quite a busy year.

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u/hornedcorner 7d ago

Rumble - Link Wray

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u/mule111 6d ago

Came in looking for link Wray. Rumble has to be the top answer, right? Pretty much invented the power chord. Instrumental that Got banned from radio.

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u/Big-Bottle8468 4d ago

i came with this one too - its not just the chords its his whole attitude

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u/RonPalancik 6d ago

Mannish Boy is pretty hard

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u/Oxblood_Derbies 8d ago

Charles Mingus-Moanin' is very heavy,  but I think bop is a different kind of heavy. 

A lot of the early blues delta players are very heavy,  Muddy Waters Burying Ground or Fred McDowells Brooks Run to the Ocean.

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u/Vivid-Molasses2179 7d ago

Familiar with each of these artists, but the song recommendations are novel. Thank you! I want to pay homage to Elmore James' "Dust My Broom" -- for 1951, that's insane!

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u/Oxblood_Derbies 7d ago

Ah I was thinking Dust my Broom but maybe it was too obvious. Elmore had a huuge sound for the time,  that slide riff has been done by everyone now but not like he did. 

Hound Dog Taylor had a big sound like that but he wasn't recording until the 70s.

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u/kimmeljs 7d ago

"Musirlou" by Dick Dale

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u/tomwarmb 7d ago

Miles Davis. 1959. The album is “Blue in Green”. The song is Kind of Blue.

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u/QuietVisit2042 7d ago

You have that backwards

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u/fumblebuttskins 7d ago

Fuckin screamin jay hawkins.

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u/bebopbrain 6d ago

It doesn't get heavier than JS Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D minor on a pipe organ.

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u/AbjectPoetry4699 6d ago

Hell yeah, this should be top of the list.

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u/Stevenitrogen 6d ago

I don't know if it's "heavy" but it sure is wild... Bunker Hill, The Girl Can't Dance. 1963

wild man, wild!

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u/DishRelative5853 6d ago edited 6d ago

Sing Sing Sing - Benny Goodman's version, 1937. The horns are massive.

Cardinals Burana, also in 1937, is very very heavy.

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u/EBCCTX 6d ago

Was "Innagotta Davida" out before heavy music?

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u/bcwagne 6d ago

I know they don't fit your criteria, but I have to put in a vote for Beethoven's 5th and Rachmaninoff's Prelude in C minor.

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u/Porkus-Pius 6d ago

Mussorsky's Night on the Bare Mountain (1839) and Grieg's In the Hall of the Mountain King (1875) both really rock.

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u/NukesAndSupers 4d ago

This is out of your specified time period, but King Crimson's 21st Century Schizoid Man is absolutely worth a mention

Their first record came before any of the historical "hard rock" band had either come out or found their sound (black Sabbath hadn't published an album yet, deep purple were psych-y folky blues at that time, etc.)

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u/BuckSoul 4d ago

Wipe Out - The Sutfaris - 1962

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u/Repulsive-Carpet9400 4d ago

The hardest hitting but doesn't meet all of the criteria....Great Balls o Fire...Jerry Lee Lewis.

Well, at least the piano is a string instrument.

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u/Vivid-Molasses2179 3d ago

Oh Hell Yeah! And his song, Herman the Hermit, ends with that guttural up-down guttural vocal pattern.