John Lennon once described glam rock simply as rock and roll with lipstick on. A succinct summation, to be sure, but Lennon was onto something. While glam has often been maligned for emphasizing ...

3. New York Dolls. The birth of glam rock didn’t just occur in the U.K.; it was happening across the pond as well. Take New York Dolls, for example.The band didn’t achieve much commercial ...

Simon Reynolds' new book, Shock and Awe, details the history of glam rock, a musical genre and style stemming from the early '70s and marked by an outlandish, eye-catching aesthetic.