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1965: The Most Revolutionary Year in Music by Andrew Grant
Jackson
c.2015, Thomas Dunne Books
$27.99 / $32.50 Canada
352 pages
Terri Schlichenmeyer
The Truth Contributor
You turned up the volume – again.
Surely, the guy in the car next to yours must think you’re
weird. There you are, groovin’ to your tunes, seat-dancing,
singing along like you were in-concert. Really, is there
such a thing as having the music too loud?
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No. There’s not, so turn up the volume one more time and
read 1965: The Most Revolutionary Year in Music by
Andrew Grant Jackson.
As the year 1965 began, more than 40 percent of Americans
were under 20 years old. Teens emulated their parents then:
boys wore short hair, girls wore long skirts. Segregation
was common, color TV was new, 80 percent of America was
white, and the country’s youth had tasted The Beatles and
loved them.
Bob Dylan did, too, though John Lennon had once dismissed
his music. The Rolling Stones were singing “puppy love”
songs, while Barry Gordy hoped his Supremes might follow in
Dean Martin’s footsteps since the “big money” was in
nightclubs. Marvin Gaye, meanwhile, wanted to be “singing
Cole Porter,” Malcolm X (who would soon be assassinated) met
Martin Luther King, Jr. and thousands marched to Montgomery.
As winter turned to spring, Roger Miller captured six
Grammys; Charlie Pride struggled with recording deals in a
segregated music industry; and Johnny Cash accidentally,
drunkenly, set fire to five hundred acres of California
forest. The Byrds’ music “gave birth to the West Coast
hippie dance style…” Girls wore shorter skirts and boys wore
longer hair, which “angered” future presidential candidate
Mitt Romney and he gave a classmate an impromptu haircut.
By the summer of 1965, President Johnson launched Medicaid,
Medicare, and escalated America’s presence in Vietnam. Sonny
and Cher got you, Babe; everybody was dancing at
discotheques; Barry Gordy hired “a charm school teacher” to
prepare the Supremes for stardom… and Watts burned.
With 1965 winding down, Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass’s
album whipped up interest. Frank Sinatra insisted that Sammy
Davis, Jr. be allowed to stay at Rat Pack hotels, and Paul
McCartney allowed a string quartet on “Yesterday.” Cass
Elliot became a Mama, John Lennon insulted Carol King, and
drug songs were hip. And so, at years’ end, was the premiere
of A Charlie Brown Christmas.
I looked it up: time travel remains merely theoretical.
Still, you can have the next best thing by reading “1965.”
This book will have you humming along with songs you
remember (or recognize, if you weren’t around then). Author
Andrew Grant Jackson melds history, music, and little-known
anecdotes as seamlessly as butter but what’s most
fascinating about this book is seeing how times changed so
completely in one year: we went from flattops to Beatle
mops, from black segregation to Black is Beautiful, from “I
Feel Fine” to “I Feel Good.” And, indeed, it was.
So is this book, and I think 1965: The Most Revolutionary
Year in Music is what you should reach for next. If
you’re an oldies fan, a follower of culture, or if you
remember the year with fondness (or regret), how could you
turn it down?
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