Who have been the most influential bands (popular or not)?
 

There have been so many bands that have come and gone. So many were influential in their own right, either positive or negative.

What bands would you say were the most influential on the rock music groups that followed after they got started (or broke up, if not still going)?

King Crimson influenced just about every prog band out there. The Beatles and Zeppelin laid the ground work for a lot of rock. Metal is all Ozzy and Metallica. Some bands that aren't as well known have been influential too. Kyuss is an amazing band and they've influenced bands like Mastodon and a lot of people in the music buisness.

Spooky Tooth influenced Deep Purple, Black Sabbath and possibly Led Zeppelin and Blue Oyster Cult.

As for King Crimson, they were clearly influenced by The Moody Blues, who influenced many Mellotron driven Prog bands.

Metallica have influenced a vast number of bands, as did Motorhead before them - but the metal sound was created by Michael Schenker, who is the unsung major influence on the genre.

Pink Floyd too are massively influential - the entire Krautrock scene (or, at least, the rockier side of it) seems to stem from their first 2 albums. They even influenced The Beatles.

But no-one can be as influential as Bob Dylan, surely?

I totally forgot about Pink Floyd. Whoops.

I think Yes and Pink floydwere pretty influential for prog rock.

David Bowie pretty much set the template for a huge amount of the post-punk and New Wave groups.

Ozric Tentacles

Living proof that you can sell a million records without the backing of a major record label.

Radiohead

Living proof that you can completely change your musical direction to something a lot more experimental, rather than churning out the same old stuff, give away your album for free, influence some of the biggest bands (Coldplay, Muse and Keane for starters), and still retain your own spot as one of the biggest bands, continuing to sell millions :D

Sex Pistols/Johnny Rotten, then PiL/John Lydon.

I would say Zeppelin, Hendrix, Iron Butterfly, Jeff Beck w/Cream, The Yardbirds, and The Beatles from the 60s had the most impact and influence on musicians and the bands that followed in their footsteps. A lot of neat riffs and song structures came from the aforementioned bands and influenced not only the 70s musicians, but every musician who has stepped up to the amplifier since then.