Rockabilly

With a thunkin' bass line, a syncopated beat, and stripped-down instrumentation, rockabilly made for excellent rebel music. Carl Perkins sounded like he really would kick your behind if you messed with his "Blue Suede Shoes." And young Ricky Nelson proved his rock mettle with "Hello Mary Lou (Goodbye Heart)," which features a terrific (and influential) James Burton guitar solo.

Pictured: Gene Vincent, Johnny Cash

Sun Studios resident hellion Jerry Lee Lewis showboats to the limits of his incomparable ability in "Breathless." And when Jimmie Lloyd boasts "I Got a Rocket In My Pocket," he ain't just straining similes. Hidden gem: the Maddox Brothers' paean to plain-Jane girlfriends, "Ugly and Slouchy."

Pictured: Gene Vincent, Johnny Cash

Here's where we separate the hep cats from the squares. Texan Sid King (né Erwin) made the leap from Western swing to rockabilly in the mid-'50s, exemplified in "Purr, Kitty Purr." With its Duane Eddy-esque guitar and massive reverb, Johnny Horton's "Honky Tonk Man" predates the singer's more famous, historically themed epics, and Conway Twitty rocks harder than his rhinestone-cowboy future ever indicated.

Pictured: Gene Vincent, Johnny Cash

Sometime in the early '50s, east of the Pecos and south of the Mason-Dixon Line, the sound of a slapping bass string combined with hillbilly music, a boogie-woogie rhythm, and a confrontational attitude to produce rockabilly. The stuff of sock hops and state fairs, rockabilly had a relatively short reign at the forefront of rock consciousness, but its adherents persist to the present day, and from Queen's "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" to the "Stray Cat Strut," the occasional rockabilly-derived tune still rears its head at radio from time to time.

Pictured: Gene Vincent, Johnny Cash