Fact #191994

Russ Ballard (Argent) : I wrote God Gave Rock And Roll To You with this feeling of well-being after coming out of a year of total depression. Previously I'd just wanted to die, because every day was grey, every day was black. There was always this cloud over me - what Winston Churchill called 'the black fog'. I thought I was going mad but then I found somebody who had compassion. Coming out of my depression was like moving into the light and suddenly I was consumed by anger, aggression, resentment, envy - the whole gamut of blocked emotions - and you can hear that in the words.

Sometimes you write lyrics and wonder where they came from, you just write them because they rhyme. But later you look and you realise that that was exactly the way you were feeling at the time. I guess that's expression.

Writing this song was a cathartic experience to just get it out of myself, so it's hard for me to say what the appeal for other people is because, basically, it was written for me. The words 'God' and 'love' are probably over-used but I suppose they make us feel secure, and because humans are so fearful, they'll jump onto anything that sounds like it's going to take away their responsibility.

Kiss recorded the song in 1992 for the film Bill And Ted's Bogus Journey, but the record company decided that the lyrics about Cliff Richard probably wouldn't be understood in America so they changed a few lines. Effectively all they changed was four lines and they needed three other writers to do it. I liked the Kiss version from the word go, and again was disappointed that it only got to number 4 because it was played a lot on MTV.
(Source : Inspirations by Michael Randolfi, Mike Read and David Stark, Sanctuary 2002)

Russ Ballard : I felt blissful when I started writing God Gave Rock And Roll To You, and that was the opposite of how I’d felt the year before. My parents had both been really ill; my dad had prostate cancer, my mum had bowel cancer, at the same time. I’d felt so low. During that period, I remember writing I Don’t Believe In Miracles, and at the end of the song I just put my head down on the piano keys and cried.

It was wonderful to feel myself come out of that depression. I felt so ‘up’. It probably only took twenty minutes to write it. I’d always liked gospel. With the lyric, I was saying that we live on this incredible planet, and when you find a passion, this world makes sense. Whereas, if you settle for a job to pay the bills, it’s very sad.

The song was written on this heavy Eavestaff upright piano I’d been given for my twenty-first birthday. That might seem strange for a rock song – but I wrote Since You’ve Been Gone on a piano as well. As a kid I’d learnt classical piano. As soon as my mum and dad left the room, I was playing Jerry Lee Lewis.

The song didn’t do a lot for my career, because I decided to leave Argent around then – I was gone by 1974. We were getting very jazzy, when I was more about rock’n’roll

I think the song will resonate for the next hundred years, whether people want to believe there’s a god or not. For me, music has been my saviour. God gave rock’n’roll to me, basically. That’s what I was trying to say. And that line: ‘If you’re young and you’ll never be old, music can make your dreams unfold’, I still believe that.
(Source : https://www.loudersound.com/features/argent-god-gave-rock-and-roll-to-you-the-story-behind-the-song)