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Oliver Messiaen was one of the major composers of the 20th century. Johnny Greenwood, one of the guitarists in Radiohead who also composes the bands strings sections named Messiaen as ‘the greatest of all time’ and stated that he is “one of the few composers when you can hear just a few chords in isolation and know it’s him” (Faroutmagazine, 2021). Messiaen had a huge influence on the way that Greenwood composes, in turn influencing Radiohead as a whole.

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Jeff Buckley was a singer and songwriter who was very influential to Radiohead’s early work. Colin Greenwood, The bassist in Radiohead tells a story about how the band was pressed for time and needed to complete their song ‘Fake Plastic Trees’, but were at a creative standstill. “ We went to see Jeff Buckley play at The Garage. He just had a Telecaster and a pint of Guinness. And it was just fucking amazing, really inspirational… Then we went back to the studio and tried an acoustic version of ‘Fake Plastic Trees’. Thom sat down and played it in three takes”. Jeff Buckley’s acoustic guitar playing and singing was the main inspiration for Radiohead’s ‘Fake Plastic Trees’, which became one of the band's most popular songs.

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R.E.M. were a rock band formed in 1980. Their music incorporates characteristics from many genres of music such as airy guitar hooks, mumbled lyrics and a punk-band attitude. Thom Yorke has stated that Michael Stipe, the frontman for R.E.M., was a massive influence on him and his music and his lyric writing in particular. “I discovered R.E.M. and it turned my life upside down. Michael Stipe was singing about his flaws and weaknesses, and that it is okay to be weird. I was weird. And through his songs Stipe spoke to me, “It’s okay, you don’t have to justify yourself to anyone.” Shortly after that, I signed up for art school and started to take making music seriously.” Yorke states that he could relate to Stipe's lyrics and His songwriting was one of the reasons he took his music writing seriously.

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Elmore James was a blues guitarist and singer from Mississippi and was known as the ‘King of slide guitar’. James’s many popular songs utilised a bottleneck slide to play the guitar, which is a very common characteristic of blues music. “I saw him play bottleneck guitar. So I was struggling with the Elmore James stuff. Suddenly, it clicked. It was in the tuning. He was doing it.” (Grow. K, 2022). Page was influenced by James’s use of alternate tunings and use of slide guitar, many of the songs that Page would write during ‘Led Zeppelin’ would incorporate slide guitar, like on the song ‘In My Time Of Dying’, as well as alternate tunings, like on the song ‘Kashmir’, where DADGAD guitar tuning is used

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Gene Vincent was another American musician who was known as a pioneer in rockabilly and rock and roll music. Vincent’s 1951 release ‘Be-bop-a-Lula’ is known as a notable rockabilly song which influenced many artists after Vincent, including Jimmy Page. “As each release came, with the Gene Vincent stuff, it was really challenging to even attempt to play it. But once you had a solid-body guitar, as opposed to a cello body, it became more doable. Nevertheless, you were fueled to do the best you could, and it’s quite right.” (Grow. K, 2022) Page states that the releases from Vincent were difficult for him to play when he was a young guitarist, but it fueled him to learn more and more, heightening Page’s skill and technique in guitar playing.

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Johnny Burnette and the Rock and Roll Trio

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Johnny Burnette and the Rock and Roll Trio

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Johnny Burnette was a musician from Memphis, Tennessee and was known as one of the main pioneers of ‘Rockabilly’ music, which is a genre of music which is a precursor to rock and roll. This style of music incorporates styles of country music as well as rhythm and blues music. “The musical glue of that record is just absolutely phenomenal. Also the guitar playing was so abstract to anything else that I’d ever heard.” (Grow. K, 2020). Jimmy states that the guitar playing from Burnette was a strong influence for him and his own playing and Page incorporates a lot of the rhythm and blues style in his playing from Johnny Burnette.

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The Melvins were a rock band who were formed in 1983 in the town of Aberdeen. The Melvins had a strong influence on Kurt Cobain as The Mevlins originated from Kurt’s home town of Aberdeen and many of the same sort of sounds and tone of The Melvins music can be heard in Nirvana’s music. “The Melvins really influenced me because they were from Aberdeen and I watched a lot of their practices.” (Daniel. S, 2022). Nirvana’s use of heavily distorted guitars as well as loud screamed vocals can be seen in The Melvins music as well as they had an influence on Kurt Cobain and his music

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The Beatles were an English rock band who were formed in 1960. The Beatles were known for the very catchy and pop-influenced songs that were very popular in the 60’s. The early sound of The Beatles utilised very simple chords and chord changes which were very memorable as well as melodies that were very easy to remember. Kurt Cobain was influenced by The Beatles in the way that he wrote melodies for Nirvana and was able to craft very catchy and memorable songs because of this. “I’ve always loved the Beatles and stuff like that too… I like that old 60’s pop kind of sound” (The Grunge Scene, 2021)

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The Pixies were an American alternative-rock band and was formed in 1986. Throughout their career the band released a series of critically acclaimed albums from 1987 - 1991 and were known for their use of distinct and sudden change in dynamics, with many of their songs going from soft and quiet, to loud and abrasive. The band was also known for their songs being very catchy, incorporating a lot of pop music tropes and techniques in their pieces. “I was trying to write the ultimate pop song. I was basically trying to rip off the Pixies… We used their sense of dynamics, being soft and quiet and then loud and hard.” (Rolling Stone, 1994). Kurt Cobain spoke on many occasions on how The Pixies influenced the sound of Nirvana, specifically referring to the use of dynamics changes.

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Radiohead is a band that has gone through many stylistic changes throughout their career, originally starting as an alternative rock band throughout the 90’s. Their style and sound changed during the early 2000’s with the release of their albums ‘Kid A’ and ‘Amnesiac’. These two albums were recorded in the same sessions and mark a change to a more minimalistic style of song-writing, ditching the heavy focus on guitar which plagued their early 90’s records and replacing it with glitchy electronic sounds and a focus on rhythm. Radiohead’s later works incorporated the use of polytempo’s and syncopated rhythms which I find influencing my music today.

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Jimmy Page was the guitar player for the band ‘Led Zeppelin’ who were popular during the late 1960’s and 1970’s. Jimmy Page has influenced me through his incredibly unique guitar playing style which is notoriously difficult to replicate. Page’s guitar playing incorporates many of the fundamentals from the blues genre of music and many of his guitar licks are inspired from this genre. Page’s guitar playing style is often referred to as ‘sloppy’, but I believe that it is his willingness to incorporate little mistakes and inconsistencies in his guitar parts that make his style unique and inspiring.

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Kurt Cobain wrote every commercially released Nirvana song except for one song (Scentless Apprentice) which was a collaborative effort between the three members of the band. Cobain’s knack for writing songs that are memorable and catchy whilst also being incredibly simple was one of the main factors that contributed to Nirvana’s popularity during the early 90’s. Cobain made use of abrupt and sudden changes in dynamics to create interest in his songs, often going from soft and quietly strummed guitar parts with whispered vocals to loud, distorted guitar power chords and screamed vocals. These characteristics of Cobain’s songwriting as well as the punk-rock inspired attitude that he gave towards his guitar playing has been a massive influence to my music.