Roots rock

Earlier in the year Parsons had already recorded Safe at Home with the International Submarine Band, which made extensive use of pedal steel guitar and is seen by some as the first true country-rock album.

[2] The Byrds continued for a brief period in the same vein, but Parsons left soon after the album was released to be joined by another ex-Byrds member Chris Hillman in forming the Flying Burrito Brothers.

Over the next two years they recorded the albums The Gilded Palace of Sin (1969) and Burrito Deluxe (1970), which helped establish the respectability and parameters of the genre, before Parsons departed to pursue a solo career.

[14] (This was despite some successful bands from the region, a major contribution to the evolution of soul music in the Stax-Volt records company and the existence of the Muscle Shoals and FAME Studios).

[14] Of the acts that followed the Allmans into the emerging genre, the most successful was Lynyrd Skynyrd, who with songs like "Free Bird" (1973) and "Sweet Home Alabama" (1974) helped establish the "Good ol' boy" image of the subgenre and the general shape of 1970s guitar rock.

[20][21] Part of the early swamp rock scene were John Fogerty & C.C.R., Leon Russell, Dale Hawkins, Tony Joe White, and Delaney & Bonnie.

[24] Led by figures who had initially been identified with punk and new wave, it was most strongly influenced by acts such as Bob Dylan, the Byrds, Creedence Clearwater Revival, and Van Morrison, 1960s garage rock, and the Rolling Stones.

[25] Exemplified by the commercial success of singer songwriters Bruce Springsteen, Bob Seger, and Tom Petty, along with less widely known acts such as Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes and Joe Grushecky and the Houserockers, it was partly a reaction to post-industrial urban decline in the East and Mid-West, often dwelling on issues of social disintegration and isolation, beside a form of good-time rock and roll revivalism.

[25] Subsequently, however, American bands the Killers[29] and the War on Drugs[30] and English act Sam Fender firmly integrated the heartland rock genre into their respective musical styles.

[31] In addition the alternative country movement, producing such figures as Steve Earle, Lucinda Williams, and Uncle Tupelo, can be seen as part of the roots rock tendency.