1965: The Most Revolutionary Year in Music: The Most Revolutionary Year in Music - Hardcover

Jackson, Andrew Grant

3.83

453 ratings by Goodreads

9781250059628: 1965: The Most Revolutionary Year in Music: The Most Revolutionary Year in Music

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1250059623 ISBN 13: 9781250059628

Publisher: Thomas Dunne Books, 2015

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A lively chronicle of the year that shaped popular music forever!

Fifty years ago, friendly rivalry between musicians turned 1965 into the year rock evolved into the premier art form of its time and accelerated the drive for personal freedom throughout the Western world.

The Beatles made their first artistic statement with Rubber Soul. Bob Dylan released "Like a Rolling Stone, arguably the greatest song of all time, and went electric at the Newport Folk Festival. The Rolling Stones's "Satisfaction" catapulted the band to world-wide success. New genres such as funk, psychedelia, folk rock, proto-punk, and baroque pop were born. Soul music became a prime force of desegregation as Motown crossed over from the R&B charts to the top of the Billboard Hot 100. Country music reached new heights with Nashville and the Bakersfield sound. Musicians raced to innovate sonically and lyrically against the backdrop of seismic cultural shifts wrought by the Civil Rights Movement, Vietnam, psychedelics, the Pill, long hair for men, and designer Mary Quant’s introduction of the miniskirt.

In 1965, Andrew Grant Jackson combines fascinating and often surprising personal stories with a panoramic historical narrative.

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About the Author:

ANDREW GRANT JACKSON is the author of Still the Greatest: The Essential Songs of the Beatles' Solo Careers and Where's Ringo? He has written for Rolling Stone, Yahoo!, Slate's "Blogging the Beatles," Baseline Studio System, music magazines Burn Lounge, Mean Street, and Dispatch, and copyedited the Hollywood monthly magazine Ingenue. He directed and cowrote the feature film The Discontents starring Perry King and Amy Madigan and served as actor Jeff Bridges's development associate at AsIs Productions. He lives in Los Angeles.

Review:

“Jackson has a better ear than a lot of music writers, and one of the best parts of this book is his many casual citings of songs that echo others: Marvin Gaye’s first million-selling single, “I’ll Be Doggone,” builds on a riff used in the Searchers’ “Needles and Pins,” one also pinched by the Byrds for “I’ll Feel a Whole Lot Better” ... A lot of the best insights come from writers who show us the familiar through fresh eyes, as Jackson does when he returns us to a year when a lot of us were young and poor and not as happy as we thought we were, yet there was always a great song on the radio.”
-- Washington Post

“This mid-decade moment of enchantment is finally given the scrutiny it deserves in Andrew Grant Jackson's 1965: The Most Revolutionary Year in Music ... This book deftly supports the claim embedded in its title ... Written for music lovers who were there and for those who wish they were, the book is a well-researched cultural history that leaves no rolling stone unturned ... [Jackson] goes beyond pop, rock, and the new "folk rock," showing how R&B, jazz, and country were also undergoing dramatic change in '65, and he foreshadows glam, funk, disco, and hip hop ... The most revolutionary year in music is under the radar no more.”
-- Huffington Post

“The author covered a lot more than many of the other books on music history I have read.”
-- The VVA Veteran, A Publication Of Vietnam Veterans Of America, Inc.

“This is a powerful book because a lot of powerful things happened in 1965. A look at any current newspaper reveals how much we’ve progressed beyond that seemingly remote era and how little has really changed. My only wish is that Jackson’s doesn’t let it be with ’65. He may prove that ’66, ’67, ’68, and beyond weren’t as revolutionary, but I would still love to see him peer into those years too. It would make one revolutionary series.”
-- Psychobabble

“Andrew Grant Jackson makes a powerful case...This book is a welcome reminder of some truly great music. Recommended.”—National Review Online

“Jackson’s rapid-fire jaunt through the musical highlights of 1965—the rise of Motown and Stax Records, the early music of David Bowie, the arrival of the Bakersfield sound—is a helpful survey for readers unfamiliar with the history of popular music.”—Publishers Weekly

"Jackson presents a thoroughly entertaining romp through one mighty year in pop-music history."—Booklist

"Lively... ackson does a solid job covering the hit-makers."—Kirkus Reviews

“From the Beatles to the Byrds, from Dylan to the Stones, from the Beach Boys to Motown, author Andrew G. Jackson brilliantly details how the year 1965 was essentially rock and roll’s coming-out party. 1965: The Most Revolutionary Year in Music is filled with interesting insight and analysis into how a unique confluence of cultural events helped spur many of popular music’s all-time greats to reach their artistic apex, all within one, short, action-packed twelve-month period. If you weren’t there the first time around — or even if you were — sit back and prepare yourself for one heck of a ‘ticket to ride.’”—Kent Hartman, author of the Los Angeles Times bestseller The Wrecking Crew: The Inside Story of Rock and Roll’s Best-Kept Secret, winner of the Oregon Book Award and the Audie Award

“1965 is a year that pop fans... revere [for] the sheer volume of innovative music and cultural transformation. A half-century on, it all remains astonishing but Jackson takes us through these 365 earth-changing days with steady hands and an addictive style. I started making a playlist almost immediately.”—Marc Spitz, author of We Got the Neutron Bomb and Twee

“The Beatles, Stones, Dylan, Coltrane, The Dead, Velvet Underground, Motown ... what wasn’t happening in 1965? Andrew Grant Jackson painstakingly chronicles this pivotal year in music with an eye for detail and the big picture – an exciting ride with a timeless soundtrack.”—Joel Selvin, author of Summer of Love

Praise for Andrew Jackson's Still the Greatest:

“This creative, enlightening, and informative work by a welcomed entrant to Beatles scholarship is highly recommended to anyone interested in learning more about the Fab Four’s sporadically great post-breakup recordings.”—Library Journal

“Loads of fun for Beatles fans.”—Booklist

“The fellow is pretty smart and the book is wonderfully well researched ... With the Beatles having been covered to death, this is really new territory ... both quite fun and impressive.”— Eric Alterman, The Nation

“An excellent volume and definitely a worthwhile read for music scholars, music enthusiasts, or fans of The Beatles.”—American Reference Books Annual