1960s: Motown & Revolution

Day 20: Introduction & Civil Rights Movement

• Conservative society of the 1950s gave way to open social and political upheaval in the 1960s

• Musically, the decade was marked by the Beatles (British Invasion).

• Movements: civil rights, antiwar, black power, student power, counterculture, & women’s rights

• New President – John F. Kennedy

Civil Rights Movement

• Civil rights activists avoided R&R music at first because its commercial side didn’t fit with their goals.

• Regional struggles for equity (mainly in the South)

“Girl Groups” and the Men Behind ThemThe Shirelles• From Passaic, NJ• Combined gospel with

uptown r&b• Will You Still Love Me

Tomorrow• Dedicated to the One I Love

Phil Spector• Producer at the lead of the

“girl group” phenomenon• Controlled every aspect of

the production process• Righteous Brothers: You’ve

Lost That Lovin’ Feeling• Blue-eyed Soul

George “Shadow” Morton• Songwriter• Wrote Leader of the Pack

Day 21 - Motown: The Integration of Pop• Primary task of African Americans during civil rights mvmt was to

integrate into mainstream American life. This was how Motown developed and defined itself.

• Motown was the largest black-owned corporation in US, until 1988.• Berry Gordy – founder of Motown• All of Motown’s creative personnel were African American’s

groomed for long careers.• Musical formula = upbeat black pop that was irresistibly danceable

and threatening to no one in tone or content• 1961-1971, 100 singles in the pop Top 10• Motown’s understanding of Top 40 radio format permitted it to

produce so many hits.

The Supremes

Signed to Motown in 1964

Turned out five #1 singles in a row

Had a sleek, elegant image

Stop in the Name of Love

Day 22 - Folk Music: The Voice of Civil Rights

• Woodie Guthrie– Wrote some of the country’s most enduring folk

songs, This Land is Your Land• Pete Seeger• College educated, New York radical who saw music as a

means for helping to mobilize a mass movement

• “Authentic” vs. “Commercial” in folk music

Bob DylanOpenly challenged authentic vs. commercial

Born Robert Zimmerman, son of a Jewish middle-class family

Grew up in Hibbing, Michigan listening to a 1950s mixture of r&b, c&w, R&R, and pop

Signed to Columbia Records in 1962

Leader in the civil rights movement

Only a Pawn in Their Game

Performed at ‘March on Washington’

Transformed the lyric content of popular music

The Times They Are A-Changin’

Day 23: The British Invasion Occupies the Pop Charts

• JFK assassinated on Nov. 22, 1963. National mood of defeat and depression.

British Invasion started in 1964.

• The Beatles upbeat sound revitalized the nation’s mood.

The Beatles

• Charted 30 songs and released 6 best-selling albums in 1964 alone.

• From 1963-1968, they sold an estimated $154 million worth of records worldwide!

• Obscured all other talent.• Covered many AA hits, but did

so to pay tribute to those who influenced them.

• Brian Epstein – Manager of the Beatles

• “Fab Four” arrived in NYC on Feb. 7, 1964.

• I Want to Hold Your Hand• A Hard Day’s Night• Can’t Buy Me Love• Beatlemania!

More on the British Invasion (1964)

• 3 Cities• Liverpool– Beatles home town– Created “skiffle”

• Manchester– Herman’s Hermits

• London– Manfred Man to Dusty Springfield– The Kinks

African American Influence on British RockersThe Animals

• House of the Rising Sun

The Rolling Stones

• Satisfaction

Lead to debate over white people singing the blues.Only Motown acts survived the British Invasion.

Images Created for the U.S.

• Beatles were made into middle-class family entertainment by their manager. Even parents liked them – they were “cute.”

• The Rolling Stones had the opposite image as menacing, street-toughened alternatives to the playful mop-tops.

• Both images were based on strategic career choices.

Day 24: Breaking the Sounds of Silence

• Folk Rock– The Byrds• turned folk rock into a genre• Recognized that rock could revitalize folk• Mr. Tambourine Man

– Simon and Garfunkel• Sounds of Silence• Mrs. Robinson• Bridge Over Troubled Water

Folk Rock continued…

• The Lovin’ Spoonful– Do You Believe in Magic– Summer in the City

• The Mamas and the Papas– California Dreamin’– Monday Monday

• Folk rock sounded very lighthearted.

Southern Soul Music

• Challenged Motown’s power over black pop, recorded in Memphis

• Stax-Volt (Memphis, TN)– Motown’s chief competitor founded c. 1960

• Wilson Pickett– Signed to Atlantic in early 1960s– In the Midnight Hour– Land of 1000 Dances– Hits were straight-ahead dance tunes

Southern Soul Music continued…Aretha Franklin• Signed to Atlantic in 1967• Respect• Crowned “Lady Soul”

because she took the fusion of gospel and r&b to new heights

• Confirmed the slogan “Black is Beautiful”

James Brown• Was called “Soul Brother

No. 1”• His music was the ideal first

sound of “funk” and significant for black pride

• (I Got You) I Feel Good

Day 25: Counterculture (aka Hippies)

• The making of the counterculture was based on a rejection of the competitive, achievement-oriented culture surrounding them in favor of free-living, free-loving lifestyles and shared communities of choice.

• These citizens of counterculture were called “hippies”

• San Francisco was the center of the hippie movement

Psychedelic RockJefferson Airplane• First group to get a major

label contract and the first to get national exposure

• Somebody to Love• White Rabbit

The Grateful Dead• Never registered a Top 10

album or single until 1987• Represented the

counterculture to the rest of America

• Jerry Garcia (band leader)• Lived with their fans in the

heart of the hippie scene• Performed more free concerts

than any band in the history of music

Psychedelic Rock continued…

• The sense of community led bands to start naming themselves in the singular, instead of the plural.

• The music that emerged from Psychedelic Rock came to be known as Acid Rock– Swirling concert posters– Art and light shows– Colorful moving images

Cream

British Group

One of the first Supergroups (groups that were comprised of top musicians from previously existing groups)

Eric Clapton – guitar

Sunshine of Your Love

Janis Joplin

Prominent as one of the few white female blues singers in San Francisco

Lived for the moment

A symbol of rebellion for millions of white middle-class teens

Died of a heroine overdose in 1970

Me and Bobby McGee

Mercedes Benz

San Francisco Scene• Peaked during the 1967 “Summer of Love”• Scott McKenzie advised young people heading to San

Francisco to “wear some flowers in your hair”• “Flower Power” became the hippie’s slogan• Showed the gentler, perhaps more female, side of

resistance

Monterey International Pop Festival

• Held June 16-18, 1967 at the Monterey Fairgrounds in CA

• The perfect opening event of the Summer of Love

• The first huge rock festival (30,000 fans in attendance)

• Launched the careers of the Who, Jimi Hendrix, and Otis Redding

• Got Janis Joplin a contract with Clive Davis of CBS Records

Day 26: The Monterey Pop Festival continued…

• A platform for the politics of its supporters– The Byrd’s, He Was A Friend of Mine– The Animals, We Gotta Get Out of This Place

Jimi Hendrix

Left-handed African American virtuoso guitar player from Seattle

Made it big in England first, then came over with his trio (The Jimi Hendrix Experience)

After performing at Monterey Pop Festival, he toured as the opening act for The Monkees

Died unexpectedly in 1970

Songwriter and pioneered adding distortion and feedback into popular music

His version of Bob Dylan’s All Along the Watchtower

Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band

• Took 8 months to make the album

• It epitomized all the creativity and excess of the counterculture

• Was the first concept album– An album designed as a coherent

whole with each song moving seamlessly into the next

The Doors

Avatars of the darker side (exact opposite of the Beatles)

Signed to Elektra in 1967

First hit single was Break on Through (To the Other Side)

Became the #1 teenybopper band in the country with Light My Fire

Performed on the Ed Sullivan Show

Jim Morrison died on July 3, 1971, most probably from a drug-induced heart attack

Riders on the Storm

Riding the Storm• 1968 – Tet Offensive in Vietnam• MLK Assassinated (April 4, 1968) just after the Kerner

Commission on Civil Disorders– Provoked violent reactions in over 100 American cities– James Brown joins gov. as “Ambassador to the Streets”

• Robert Kennedy murdered• Aretha Franklin’s version of Young, Gifted, and Black• NOW (National Organization for Women) was founded in

1966• Counterculture split into two groups

– Revolution by the Beatles in 1968– Imagine by John Lennon

Day 27: Woodstock and Altamont• Woodstock Music and Art Fair– August 1969 on Max Yasgur’s

600-acre farm in Bethel, NY– Expected 50,000 people, but got

7-8 times that number– Road blocked; not enough food,

water, medical facilities, bathrooms…then it began to rain!

– The counterculture’s finest hour• No violence and spirit of

cooperation

Woodstock continued…

• Jimi Hendrix – version of the Star Spangled Banner

• Santana– Guitar

• Sly and the Family Stone– Dance Hits

Crosby, Stills, and Nash

Supergroup who started in 1968

Song Ohio

Members had freedom to work on solo projects

Altamont Festival

• Held at Altamont Speedway just outside San Francisco, CA in 1969

• Many problems…a lot of violence…