Glam rock (also known as glitter rock) is a style of rock and pop music that developed in the United Kingdom in the early 1970s, which was performed by singers and musicians who wore outrageous clothes, makeup and hairstyles, particularly platform-soled boots and glitter. The flamboyant costumes and visual styles of glam performers were often camp or androgynous, and have been connected with new views of gender roles. Glam rock visuals peaked during the mid 1970s with artists including T. Rex, David Bowie, Roxy Music and Gary Glitter in the UK and New York Dolls, Lou Reed and Jobriath in the US.

Musically glam rock was very diverse, varying between the simple rock and roll revivalism of figures like Alvin Stardust to the complex art rock of Roxy Music, and can be seen as much as a fashion as a musical sub-genre. Visually it was a mesh of various styles, ranging from 1930s Hollywood glamour, through 1950s pin-up sex appeal, pre-war Cabaret theatrics, Victorian literary and symbolist styles, science fiction, to ancient and occult mysticism and mythology; manifesting itself in outrageous clothes, makeup, hairstyles, and platform-soled boots. Glam is most noted for its sexual and gender ambiguity and representations of androgyny, beside extensive use of theatrics. It was prefigured by the showmanship and gender identity manipulation of American acts such as The Cockettes and Alice Cooper, the latter of which combined glam with shock rock.

Glam is a shortened form of the word glamour. Glam or GLAM may also refer to:

Rock usually refers to:

It can also refer to:

Marc Bolan (born Mark Feld; 30 September 1947 – 16 September 1977) was an English singer-songwriter, guitarist and poet. He is best known as the frontman of glam rock group T. Rex.

Bolan grew up in post-war Hackney, northeast London, the son of Phyllis Winifred (née Atkins) and Simeon Feld, a lorry driver. His father was Jewish (of Russian and Polish origin) and his mother was from a Christian background. Later moving to Wimbledon, southwest London, he fell in love with the rock and roll of Gene Vincent, Eddie Cochran, Arthur Crudup and Chuck Berry^{[citation needed]} and was considered a mod because of dress, hanging around coffee bars such as the 2 I's in Soho.^{[citation needed]} He appeared as an extra in an episode of the television show Orlando, dressed as a mod. At the age of nine, Bolan was given his first guitar and began a skiffle band. While at school, he played guitar in "Susie and the Hoops," a trio whose vocalist was a 12-year old Helen Shapiro. At 15, he left school "by mutual consent".^{[citation needed]}

David Bowie ( /ˈboʊ.i/ BOH-ee; born David Robert Jones on 8 January 1947) is an English musician, actor, record producer and arranger. A major figure for over four decades in the world of popular music, Bowie is widely regarded as an innovator, particularly for his work in the 1970s. He is known for his distinctive voice and the intellectual depth and eclecticism of his work.

Bowie first caught the eye and ear of the public in July 1969, when his song "Space Oddity" reached the top five of the UK Singles Chart. After a three-year period of experimentation he re-emerged in 1972 during the glam rock era with the flamboyant, androgynous alter ego Ziggy Stardust, spearheaded by the hit single "Starman" and the album The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars. Bowie's impact at that time, as described by biographer David Buckley, "challenged the core belief of the rock music of its day" and "created perhaps the biggest cult in popular culture." The relatively short-lived Ziggy persona proved merely one facet of a career marked by continual reinvention, musical innovation and striking visual presentation.