| Rock and Other Four Letter Words | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Studio album by Marks and Lebzelter | |
| Released | December 1968 |
| Studio | 30th Street Studio, New York |
| Genre | |
| Length | 49:39 |
| Label | Columbia Masterworks |
| Producer | John McClure |
Rock and Other Four Letter Words is a collaborative album by American writer J Marks and composer Shipen Lebzelter (credited together as Marks and Lebzelter), released in December 1968 by Columbia Masterworks. Produced by John McClure, it is the companion to Marks' paperback book of the same name, which profiled the writer's interviews with many major rock musicians and personalities. He and Lebzelter created the album using the Moog III synthesizer and cut-up excerpts of the interview tapes, which featured 27 hours of conversation with 53 musicians.
The record has been described as a work of electronic, psychedelic and avant-garde music, using a sound collage approach that mixes snippets of interviews and musical contributions from a large personnel, including the Gregg Smith Singers and a baptist choir directed by Alex Bradford. It was one of three albums used to launch Columbia's "Bach to Rock" campaign, which drew links between rock and the music of Johann Sebastian Bach; although it was expected to be the biggest commercial success of the three releases, it underperformed and reportedly only sold several thousand copies. Music critics discussed the album's unusual concept and experimentation. In 2012, the album was re-released by Paradigm Discs.