3 Rock Songs From 1964 That Made You Want To Play Guitar

If you are a guitarist, you probably have a handful of rock songs that first led you to the instrument. It could have been a riff by a band of your generation or perhaps something you discovered in your parents’ record collection. And there are plenty of rock music references in video games and anime to send kids hunting for the origins of their favorite characters—Dio Brando, Zeppeli, and Axl Rose, to name a few.

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So here are three classics from 1964 that similarly created generations of new guitarists. Many of whom became rock stars themselves.

“Promised Land” by Chuck Berry

With iconic hits like “Maybellene” and “Johnny B. Goode”, Chuck Berry helped pioneer rock and roll. Moreover, The Beach Boys, The Beatles, and The Rolling Stones wrote their own groundbreaking anthems using the jumped-up DNA of Berry’s tunes. On the 1964 LP, St. Louis To Liverpool, Berry answered his musical descendants while adding even more standards to the rock and roll canon: “No Particular Place To Go” and “You Never Can Tell”. But “Promised Land”, written during the guitarist’s stint in prison for violating the Mann Act, features the kind of showmanship and swagger that shaped both the beginning and future of rock music.

“You Really Got Me” by The Kinks

One of the most recognizable guitar riffs in rock history, The Kinks’ breakthrough hit helped lead the British Invasion of the 1960s. But it also provided a blueprint for punk, hard rock, and heavy metal. It immediately transformed the rhythm and blues that defined garage rock into the blown-out power chords of the Ramones, Van Halen, and many others. Not the first figure to do so, the riff moves in parallel fifths by omitting the third from each triad (a three-note chord). The third establishes whether a chord is major or minor, and this type of progression of fifths has since become one of the most indelible sounds in rock guitar playing.

“House Of The Rising Sun” by The Animals

If you’ve ever spent any amount of time in a guitar shop, you’ll quickly gather a list of riffs inspiring most to pick up the guitar. Often, you’ll hear them all played simultaneously in a kind of animated cacophony as guitarists of all levels try out equipment at full volume. Frequently heard during these noisy excursions is The Animals’ 1964 version of “House Of The Rising Sun”. This may be the equivalent of The Kinks’ fuzzy R&B, as The Animals helped forever place this folk standard into the rock and roll tradition.

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