The Satanic Panic | 5

Uncharted: Crime and Mayhem in the Music Industry

When rock music appeared in the 1950s, a lot of people were frightened…all this dancing and gyrating and hootin’ and hollerin’ was labeled “the devil’s music”…it beckoned youth down a dangerous path towards immorality and destruction…

It encouraged disrespect of parents and elders…it spat in the face of strong traditional values…and this music could only lead to a rise in godlessness, which, of course, meant that everyone was going to hell…

This kind of opposition was seen across the western world but was particularly strong in the united states…preachers railed from pulpits…politicians wailed about juvenile delinquents and their music…rallies were held, records were burned, and this new music was roundly condemned as the worst thing to ever happen to civilization…

For the most part, though, young people ignored this histrionic caterwauling and keeping making and listening to rock…the anti-rock crowd grew even more apoplectic with the rise of the counter-culturalism of the 1960s and early 70s, blaming music for everything from long hair to the sexual revolution to drug use to opposition against foreign wars…

Rock fans took it all in stride… “yeah, whatever…you’re over-reacting…our souls are perfectly safe…tell you what: you do you and we’ll do us, okay?”…and for about a decade, there was this uneasy divide separating rockers from the religious anti-rockers…

Then in the 1980s and 90s, a portion of society lost its collective mind…to these people Satan was everywhere in music…his work and influence needed to be exposed and exorcised from culture…

This wasn’t artistic expression…this was Lucifer’s sneaky way to seize the souls of the vulnerable, impressionable young…the antichrist was at work…evil demonic forces were everywhere…and nothing became more important that casting out Beelzebub’s rock music once and for all…it was nuts…

…I’m Alan Cross and have I got some stories for… this is uncharted: crime and mayhem in the music industry…episode 5…the era of satanic panic

Show contact info:

X (formerly Twitter): @AlanCross

Website: curiouscast.ca

Email: [e-mail]

Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices