Look at almost any rock song from the 50s and 60s. "Johnny B. Goode," "Hound Dog," "Roll Over Beethoven" — they're all built on that same 12-bar frame. That's not a coincidence. The 12-bar blues is the DNA of modern Western music. It gave us rock and roll, R&B, soul, and even early funk. Without it, you basically don't get Elvis, the Beatles, or the Rolling Stones. They all started by playing blues covers. Now, I get that other structures matter — the I-IV-V progression shows up everywhere too. But the 12-bar blues isn't just a chord pattern. It's a complete storytelling format. That turnaround, that tension and release, that call-and-response feel — it shaped how we write songs. It's the bridge between folk traditions and everything that came after. So yeah, I'd argue it's the most influential. Not because it's fancy, but because it's the foundation so many genres stand on.