The universe will punish you in ways I cannot.
Yep.
Probably. The Beatles were the vanguards of the British invasion. Then again, there was a growing talent pool in Britain, so perhaps another group can rise to prominence to lead an ATL invasion.
This I'm not supportive of. Although Brit rock will take a hit, I wouldn't go so far as to say something could never come out of there.
My knowledge of fashion history is superficial at best, so IDK on this one.
This contention is problematic. On one hand, it's true the Beatles really did popularize long hair, and it cannot be understated that they were the ones that made it fashionable; the fact that they were countercultural but clean cut made a lot of things they did ok in the mainstream's eyes and thus broke down barriers. On the other, long hair also grew in popularity due to factors like the counterculture, a feeling of getting back to nature and naturalism in the counterculture, a feeling of distinguishing one's self from the mainstream fashion-wise (and the mainstream had been, for the earlier decades, short hair if not buzz cuts), etc. So, given the latter, maybe it could still popularize.
Maybe.
Acid-Rock not evolving, maybe; again, depends on the counter culture. Certainly the Beatles were great pioneers in music, and the barrier they broke down helped foster Acid Rock, but that doesn't mean others can't go there.
I think Folk-Rock could still evolve given that, before the Beatles, Rock seemed to be dying -it's heroes were all gone or had left; Elvis had retired to doing films, Little Richard had gone gospel, Jerry Lee Lewis was on the outs for the scandal of marrying his cousin, Buddy Holly was dead, etc. And in the wake of this Rock was being replaced with corporate rock; bands put together by recording companies, with music written by in-studio writers, and everything pretty much put on an assembly line more or less- and in its wake Folk seemed pretty solid. So, absent the "Rock Messiah's" the Beatles and British invasion were, perhaps Folk sees fit to meld with rock into the 60's leading to Folk-Rock.
Heavy Metal has a storied development, and it depends on if you mean the early, bluesy, downer metal (ala Black Sabbath) or the hard heavy metal which evolved later which removed that Black musical element (I mean Black as in African American, not as in dark). Rock began as a sort of mongrel music which was rugged and broke barriers across race and sex, but with the Beatles and others it became more artsy and you'd see things like progressive rock and acid rock and so forth; this would also lead to the rock and roll audience "whitening" as a result; there's a good number of stories about Jimi Hendrix playing to all white crowds because African Americans didn't like his music largely. Metal was a kind of reaction against that artsy development, similar to Punk later on in that respect, which sought to get back to a mongrel sound (it didn't recoup a black audience, however, because it kept out the black musical cultural elements that had gone into rock to begin with, at least where it concerned later Metal). But Metal wasn't fully where it would be early on. Metal evolved out of a harder sound, but likewise bluesy sound, which came with bands like Led Zepplin and the like (which in themselves have been called early Heavy Metal, but I consider them as Hard Rock). With early Metal bands like Black Sabbath, the sound and lyrics and music were very bluesy -and, in Sabbath's case, down and dark- (In fact, during Sabbath's early days, their brand of music was called "Downer Rock" and not Heavy Metal; the latter term hadn't been invented yet). However, later metal bands (I think either Judas Priest of Motorhead started it) stripped that Black, blues sound out completely giving us the Metal we have today.
Disco was a reaction against both the more artsy rock of the 1960's-1970's, and the harsh sound of Punk and Metal. The latter I've already covered I think, but concerning the former: because of the Beatles influence and bands like them, music became more artsy and the kind you'd sit down to listen to, and not get up to dance to. So there was a great void of dance music. Disco addressed this.
Reggae seems like it'd be inoculated from butterflies.
Rap and Hip Hop depend on other musical genres, especially musical genres popular with the black communities, and how they evolve.
Country is an entire mess here. It could go in sooo many different directions. People like Eddie Rabbit could still come along and lead to the fusion of rock and country which created the country we have today, or Rockabilly could remain distinct from country rather than being absorbed, etc.
Bob Dylan took Presley's crown in the OTL because Presley sat on his butt collecting royalties and making b-movies.
I don't know enough on this one
Same as the above.
Subject to butterflies
The Beatles influenced the counter culture, but it's important to note the counterculture kinda outran them at a certain point before they caught up with it with "Sgt. Pepper's" (which would then go on to influence the counterculture and help broaden it). It's likewise important to note that "Sgt. Pepper's" was created out of the Psychedelic scene growing in California at the time and not the other way around (albeit the album and the bands direction thereafter would then go on to influence the Psychedelic scene likewise). So, while the Beatles influenced the counter culture, broadened it, made the psychedelia far more marketable and mainstream, etc., I think it would still be in existence. It'd suffer for lack of the Beatles, though. I think it'd be smaller, maybe isolated.
I don't wanna sound like I'm giving the Beatles too little credit because they were major beyond description in influencing and changing the world. But there were things they didn't create. A counter culture of some form is probable to happen. The New Left was already in motion by 1960, and it brought with it a generational belief in action for social progress.
Perhaps not as wide spread, perhaps psychedelics remain isolated in popular use to intellectual circles and the west coast, but weed will be puffed...a lot.
...why?
The baby boomers did grow up with the anti-Commie Cold war bravado of their parents.....and they grew disillusioned with it because of Vietnam and the social revolutions being put down by "the man", leading to those protests, and that cultural backlash against the man. It wasn't "I just listened to 'Hey Jude'...f**k Nixon!", it was that the public was dealing with a stalemated war, whose investment was far outweighing what would be gained, and which was costing the lives of thousands of Americans.
You also can't paint the generation with such a broad brush. There was the mainstream belief that communism was bad, that America was good, that if we set our mind to it we could do anything, etc. But to paint everyone as a Conservative McCarthyite with jingoistic attitudes is as heinous as the people who think "Leave it to Beaver" is a historical documentary. This was the age of the Liberal Consensus where there was the ideas I just mentioned (not the Conservative, jingo ones; the Commies bad, America good, we can do anything ones), but also pragmatism and the fact that these were thinking humans. It was that pragmatism that made most people think that it was not in America's interests to nuke the Soviets if it could be avoided (where as 1950's stereotypes would kill us all in atomic hellfire), to use common sense policy at home and abroad, to avoid conflict if necessary, etc. We beefed up US involvement into Vietnam in 1964 out of a belief it'd be a relatively easy war for the South Vietnamese to win, we Americanized the war in 1965 because we thought that we'd be helping the South Vietnamese to win and that they'd win soon. But that didn't happen, and it was that pragmatism that lead the public to question the war, the reasons for the war, the Cold war bravado of 'America can do anything', and the very social order.
The statement in that quote just hurts my brain with its wrongness.
Butterflies.
Too far from the initial POD to gauge this in any way legitimately...and subject to butterflies.
What?
.....what?
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