ENTRY NO. 0228 EXAMINED 2026-08-29 3 CONFIGURATIONS ON FILE

ROCK

01 MUSIC GENRE AND PERFORMANCE STYLE 02 SOMETHING EXCELLENT 03 A STONE OR HARD OBJECT (AND BY EXTENSION, A SYMBOL OF STABILITY)
SENSE 01 noun PREVALENCE 44%

Music genre and performance style

The genre that keeps declaring itself dead and keeps showing up anyway.
1

Variations

  • rock and roll
  • rock music
  • rock 'n' roll
2

Origin

Emerged in the early-to-mid 1950s from a blend of blues, R&B, country, and gospel, with figures like Chuck Berry and Elvis Presley pushing it into mainstream white audiences. The exact 'first rock song' is a bar-fight topic among music historians that nobody wins.

3

Examples

"The band's been playing rock since before grunge made flannel a personality."
"She grew up on classic rock but got into punk in her twenties."
"Nothing beats live rock — the amps, the sweat, the guy inevitably crowd-surfing badly."
4

Cultural context

Rock has splintered into dozens of subgenres (punk, metal, indie, prog, grunge) each with their own gatekeeping rituals and playlist wars; safe to use broadly in casual conversation but specify a subgenre if you want to survive a conversation with an actual rock nerd.

SENSE 02 verb PREVALENCE 37%

Something excellent

When something rocks, it's not moving — it's slaying, decades before slaying was a word.
1

Variations

  • rocks
  • rocked
  • totally rocks
  • rock on
2

Origin

Emerged alongside rock and roll culture in the mid-20th century, where the music's energy got shorthanded into a general verb for anything impressive; by the 1970s-80s it had detached fully from music and could describe a burrito.

3

Examples

"This new album rocks from start to finish."
"You rocked that job interview."
"Her Halloween costume totally rocks."
4

Cultural context

Broadly generational-neutral slang that skews toward being used earnestly by people over 35 and semi-ironically by everyone younger; safe in nearly any setting including grandparents and group chats.

SENSE 03 noun PREVALENCE 19%

A stone or hard object (and by extension, a symbol of stability)

A stone by any other name is still the thing you stub your toe on.
1

Variations

  • rocky
  • rock-solid
  • the rock
2

Origin

From Old English 'stan' was actually replaced by Anglo-Norman 'roque', itself from Vulgar Latin 'rocca' of uncertain pre-Latin origin — etymologists shrug and call it 'probably Celtic,' which is scholarly code for 'we genuinely don't know.'

3

Examples

"The trail was covered in loose rock, so we watched our footing."
"Geologists classify rock into igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic types."
"After the divorce, her sister was the rock she leaned on."
4

Cultural context

Beyond geology, 'rock' does heavy metaphorical lifting for anything unshakeable — a person, a marriage, a decision — which is why 'rock solid' outperforms actual solid rock in everyday conversation. Safe to use literally or figuratively in any register, from toddler vocabulary to eulogies.

STILL NOT IT?

If none of these configurations is the one you meant, the machine can run a fresh search and document the missing meaning.

Or is the entry itself wrong? File a correction — a human reads every one.