Andrew Hickey
‘A History of Rock Music in 500 Songs’
Available on Podcast Platforms and at 500songs.com

An English journalist, historian, and critic responsible for dozens of books, Andrew Hickey launched this podcast series in 2018 and in the intervening years has progressed to about 1968 from what he deems to be the dawn of rock-and-roll prehistory, a span of roughly 30 years. It takes more than 100 episodes even to get us beyond the 1950s.

I’m up to episode no. 28, focusing on “Sincerely” by the Moonglows, and have a long way to go: The latest episode, on “Sympathy for the Devil” by the Rolling Stones, is no. 176. Yes, Mr. Hickey said 500 songs, but who knows how many actual episodes there will be.

Like its country-and-western counterpart, Tyler Mahan Coe’s “Cocaine and Rhinestones,” what makes “500 Songs” great is the author’s eagerness to embrace every aspect of his subject: world history, musicology, social justice issues, relevant moments in the culture at large — and, of no small importance, changes in technology and the business aspects of pop music.  The difference is that Mr. Coe, especially in his second season — an extended treatise on the life and music of the great George Jones — likes to give us lengthy, even epic episodes covering a wide range of topics related to the central figure. Mr. Hickey prefers to be more specific: Each show covers an individual song, and all are not more than roughly 40 minutes.

Mr. Hickey is his own man from the start of the series. When I first began reading about this music, every history began with the early blues singers — whether the male “country” variety, like Charlie Patton and Blind Lemon Jefferson, the more urban classic blues of Bessie Smith and Ma Rainey, or the Mississippi-to-Chicago electrified blues connection of Muddy Waters and Howlin’ Wolf. Mr. Hickey, though, begins with “Flying Home” by Charlie Christian and Benny Goodman, the first record where he hears the prototype of a rock-style electric guitar solo.

From there, Mr. Hickey adheres to what has become contemporary thinking about the evolution of the Black swing bands into rhythm-and-blues and from there into rock-and-roll, with considerable inroads from country music, particularly western swing (episode no. 3 is on “Ida Red” by Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys) and gospel (episode no. 5 is on “This Train” by Sister Rosetta Tharpe). Larry Birnbaum mapped out this trajectory in his groundbreaking 2012 book, “Before Elvis: The Prehistory of Rock ’n’ Roll,” and Mr. Hickey now expands upon it with much in the way of fresh insights and material.

Mr. Hickey is particularly strong on the concept of “cover records.” This is no small accomplishment: Virtually every early history of rock was eager to dismiss any artist who had ever deigned to record a song that had been written or previously recorded by anyone else. Obviously, this makes for a sticky situation, relegating virtually all of traditional pop and theater music, not to mention a great deal of jazz, to the ash heap of history.  

If we say that Sinatra is “covering” Cole Porter when he sings “I’ve Got You Under My Skin,” does it follow that Leonard Bernstein is “covering” Beethoven when he conducts the Ninth Symphony? Or even that Laurence Olivier is “covering” Shakespeare when he recites Hamlet’s soliloquy?

Mr. Hickey, though, wisely distinguishes between interpretation and imitation. He gives a solid example: Elvis Presley, in his first record, “That’s All Right, Mama,” reinterpreting Arthur Crudup in his own way, creatively recasting it as an Elvis song rather than a mere impersonation of the original  

This is opposed to straight knockoff records, which, often as not, are racially charged, when white artists have huge hits doing carbon copies of Black originals — not just note-for-note but inflection-for-inflection, like the Crew Cuts with “Sh-Boom” by the Chords or Georgia Gibbs with “Tweedle-Dee-Dee” by LaVern Baker. The latter is especially unfortunate: Gibbs enjoyed a long, vital career as a big band vocalist and pop star well before the rock era, but today she’s remembered only as a key perpetrator of cultural appropriation. 

Mr. Hickey is so opinionated that I’m continually surprised by how much I agree with him. Still, like nearly everyone who writes about early rock music — with the big exception of Elijah Wald — he views most of the mainstream pre-rock music as vapid and boring; tunes that only existed to give the early rockers something to rebel against. Clearly, this would be news to Sinatra, Nat King Cole, Tony Bennett, Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan, and many others. 

I was surprised to see that so far there’s virtually nothing about the Four Seasons: a relatively brief “bonus” episode on “Sherry.” This may be a matter of geographic perspective: Perhaps Frankie Valli and company seem more important to me as a lifelong resident of New York City. Conversely, he has episodes on several pre-Invasion British acts that are uniformly ignored by American scribes, such as Lonnie Donegan, the Shadows, and even Anthony Newley — no fool he — and I was very happy indeed to learn more about them.

Still, this is at most a minor quibble, as each episode is loaded with factoids as well as snippets of the song he’s discussing and others that relate to it. On his website he provides transcripts, source notes, and, most rewardingly, mixtapes with full-length versions of those same songs. 

There’s new information and context even on Elvis and the Beatles — and, yes, even for those like myself who have already read all of the lengthy biographies of them. Mr. Hickey’s coverage of artists largely overlooked by history is even more valuable: I had never quite grasped the full significance of Johnny Ace, the Moonglows, Jackie Brenston, Wanda Jackson, and dozens of others.  

One final suggestion: The Boswell Sisters, the most popular female vocal group of the 1930s, were hardly a rock band, but since they sing the opening theme (the 1935 Richard Whiting song “Rock and Roll”), they surely deserve at least a bonus episode. Indeed, more people have probably discovered the Boswell Sisters via Mr. Hickey than from any other source in many decades.

Considering all the supplemental material for each show — and that there will ultimately be 500 songs covered — this is certainly a major dive into the deepest possible rock and roll rabbit hole. By the time Mr. Hickey’s finished, he will have given us nothing less than a complete pop music Hickeypedia.