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MY SELECTION: The Psychedelic Era of Rock, 1965-1969

• The summer of 1967 will forever be known as the Summer of Love. It was a landmark year, not just in the history of rock and roll, but in the history of our culture.
• Massive cultural, social and political change took place during this era
• Time when creativity flourished, optimism reigned, youth sought spiritual enlightenment
• San Francisco and London, the twin capitals of psychedelia
• Not only music significant, but also the art, literature, lifestyles, fashion and politics.

MOST POPULAR BANDS OF THE ERA

• The Beatles
• Grateful Dead
• Pink Floyd
• Donovan
• Janis Joplin
• Cream
• The Doors
• Jimi Hendrix
• The Who
• The Byrds
• Jefferson Airplane
• Big Brother & the Holding Company

INFLUENCES ON MUSIC

POLITICS/WORLD EVENTS:

• Vietnam War
• Democratic National Convention
• Assassinations: MLK / Robert Kennedy, etc.
• Anti-war protests: Central Park, San Francisco, Campus Protests
• Equal Rights Movement

CULTURAL:

• Anti-Establishment Trend
• Woodstock 1969
• Montery Pop, other festivals
• Hallucinogenic drugs, Timothy Leary, "altered states", LSD
• Musicians starting looking beyond traditional means of expression during the mid 1960s.
• Underground newspapers
• Haight-Ashbury
• Moon Landing
• Entertainment: Hair on Broadway, Jesus Christ Superstar, The Graduate

MUSICAL INFLUENCES/TRENDS:

• British Invasion: Influenced by the Beatles' studio experimentation and interest in Middle Eastern music
• Bands began to explore new sounds and textures using the latest electronic recording technology such as echo, reverb, distortion and phasing.
• Jimi Hendrix Experience and Pink Floyd treated the recording studio like a musical instrument to create a sound that was often difficult to duplicate live, while the Doors, the Grateful Dead and Cream embellished their live performances with extended, improvised jams.
• Jefferson Airplane introduced psychedelic sounds to the masses through popular hit tunes.
• Bob Dylan helped bring about a folk music revival
• Major change in popular music in the mid-1960's, caused in part by the drug scene.
• Acid Rock, highly amplified and improvisational, and the more mellow psychedelic rock gained prominence.
• When the Beatles turned to acid rock, their audience narrowed to the young.
• Jefferson Airplane and the Grateful Dead grew out of the counterculture in 1967.
• The musical phenomena of the decade was Woodstock, a three day music festival that drew 400,000 hippies
• Folk music contributed to the counterculture.
• The modular synthesizer (aka moog synthesizer), developed in 1960 by Robert Moog and Donald Buchla, marked a major change in serious music
• Computers were used in music composition and sound synthesis
• By the end of the decade, popular music was also using synthesizers and other electronic devices.

RESOURCES:

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