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Podcast: Today In History with The Retrospectors
Episode: Bill Haley's Teenage Anthem
Description: Rock Around The Clock was a moderately successful B-side - until its inclusion in the teen rebellion movie Blackboard Jungle - following which, on 9th July, 1955, Bill Haley and the Comets’ earworm became the first rock n’roll song to hit US No.1.
But Haley was no teenage rebel. He was already in his late 30s, balding, and rocking a curl on his forehead that screamed “respectable uncle”. But he was smart. He had rebranded his country-western band, The Saddlemen, as a rock outfit; raided high school dances for slang, watched what kids moved to, and marketed according...