The Rolling Stones: Roll Them Bones

(7 of 7)

What's happened already, and a fair, far time ago, is still happening too. There was never any cardinal rule about rock -- that was its only cardinal rule -- and it can't be written off or knocked off because, from its sheer quality and audacity, it has persisted. No rules, no predictable half-life. Rock may have become Big Business, but it still has no set agenda and no fixed address. Lots of names, lots of labels, lots of styles, and by now lots of history, some of it even proud.

But despite everything, it still can't be tightly classified or tied down. It's still a cultural orphan, hiding out on the far end of respectability: it has age, but it has no home. Or, as the greatest rock writer of all put it, splitting the distinction like an atom, no direction home. Like a complete unknown. Like a rolling stone.

Caps on those last two words at any fan's discretion.