Crossroads; Blues in Technicolor

Series: Rock & Roll Series

Duration: 60

Year Published: 1995

Creator: Alan Lewens

Format: 16mm

Color: Color

Description: Crossroads traces the blues--another African American tradition that changed the sound of rock and roll--from the Mississippi Delta to Chicago to the UK, where this earthy, rich sound inspired a host of young British musicians bored with the pop music of the day. Van Morrison, Eric Burdon of the Animals, Eric Clapton, John Mayall, Keith Richards and Bill Wyman of the Rolling Stones and Jeff Beck tell how their hits introduced American rock fans to their own indigenous blues masters, like Howlin' Wolf and John Lee Hooker. Also, Led Zeppelin's Robert Plant and Jimmy Page on Jimi Hendrix, the dawning of the guitar hero and the birth of heavy metal. Blues in Technicolor takes viewers on a trip into the psychedelic rock world of the late 60's and early 70's. Using interviews with the Byrds, Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane and Pink Floyd, shows how a bohemian folk culture based in San Francisco set off an international explosion of musical experimentation and eclecticism, much of it drug-inspired.