’60s songs that defined a generation: Can you name them?
The 1960s produced more music that mattered than any decade before or since. In ten years, popular music absorbed the British Invasion, gave way to psychedelia, bore witness to the civil rights movement and Vietnam, and emerged on the other side barely recognizable.
Hundreds of songs could appear on a list like this. The five below do not represent a ranking. They represent the breadth of what the decade meant. Confrontation, beauty, loss, and the electric thrill of a world changing faster than anyone knew how to process.
Each song comes with a hint. Think fast, though, because as soon as you click to the next slide, the answer is revealed.
Image credit: DWPhotos / iStock
Song 1
A folk singer came back from a grueling European tour and handed a session guitarist a Hammond organ he had never played before. The guitarist improvised a riff on the spot, and the singer kept it. Some stations refused to air the six-minute result, but listeners wanted it anyway.
Image Credit: Amazon.com.
“Like a rolling stone” by Bob Dylan (1965)
Bob Dylan wrote the song in a white heat after a grueling European tour. Al Kooper, a session guitarist who had never touched a Hammond organ, improvised the famous riff on the spot, and Dylan kept the take. At six minutes, it nearly doubled the acceptable length for a pop single. It peaked at number 2 on the Hot 100, held from number 1 by the Beatles’ “Help!” Rolling Stone later named it the greatest song of all time.
Image credit: DWPhotos / iStock
Song 2
A singer from Alabama wrote this about a woman who left him for a modeling career. The original title was something else entirely, and a local disc jockey convinced him to reverse the premise. A year later, a British band borrowed its chord progression and built one of 1967’s biggest hits on top of it.
Image credit: Amazon
“When a man loves a woman” by Percy Sledge (1966)
Percy Sledge wrote the track about Lizz King, a girlfriend who left him for a modeling career. He had no money to follow her. The original title was “Why Did You Leave Me Baby,” and a disc jockey convinced Sledge to reverse the premise. The result reached number 1 on the Hot 100. A year later, Procol Harum borrowed its chord progression for “A Whiter Shade of Pale.”
Image Credit: puhhha/iStock
Song 3
He wrote the first version backstage at a London club on a December evening in 1966, on a napkin. His producer heard the opening riff and told him to stop everything and finish it. He reportedly wrote a thousand words of lyrics and condensed them to barely 130. He gave different explanations for what the song was about for the rest of his life, including a dream, a science fiction novel, and a voodoo spell. None of them quite settled the question.
Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons
“Purple haze” by Jimi Hendrix (1967)
Jimi Hendrix wrote the first version of “Purple Haze” backstage at a London club on December 26, 1966. His producer, Chas Chandler, heard the riff and told him to finish it immediately. Hendrix reportedly wrote a thousand words of lyrics and condensed them to barely 130, offering multiple explanations over the years, including a dream, a science fiction novel, and a voodoo spell. Rolling Stone placed it at number 17 on its list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.
Image Credit: stockfour/iStock
Song 4
The lyricist got the title by overhearing a phrase at a party. The organist drew his melody from Bach and from a soul hit of the year before. One Beatle in the audience reportedly went home and played it on repeat in his car.
Image Credit: Amazon.com.
“A whiter shade of pale” by Procol Harum (1967)
Keith Reid got the title for the single by overhearing someone say it to a woman at a party. The Hammond organ line drew from Bach and from Percy Sledge’s chord progression. John Lennon heard it at a London club in May 1967 and reportedly played it on repeat in his Rolls-Royce. It reached number 1 in the UK and has since sold more than 10 million copies worldwide.
Image Credit: Alessandro Biascioli/iStock
Song 5
The writer had previously composed a novelty song about a cartoon dog. He wrote this one in the days after a presidential candidate was shot, weeks after a civil rights leader had also been killed. The singer who recorded it was a former doo-wop star who had just come out of rehab and needed a comeback. The song names three assassinated Americans in its title and adds a fourth in its final verse. It became an elegy for an entire generation.
Image credit: Amazon UK
“Abraham, Martin and John” by Dion (1968)
Dick Holler wrote the anthem in the days after Robert Kennedy’s assassination, weeks after Martin Luther King Jr. had been shot. It is named Lincoln, King, and John F. Kennedy in its title and added Bobby Kennedy in a final verse. Holler’s previous hit had been “Snoopy vs. the Red Baron.” Dion, recovering from heroin addiction, recorded it as a comeback, and it reached number 4. Covered by Marvin Gaye and Smokey Robinson among dozens of others, the song became the decade’s quiet requiem.
Image Credit: Pressmaster/iStock
Wrap up
Dylan’s language, Sledge’s heartbreak, Hendrix’s electricity, Procol Harum’s mystery, Dion’s grief. Five different frequencies, one impossible decade. Which of these stops you cold when you hear it now?
Ask us! What questions do you have about content, strategy, pop culture, lifestyle, wellness, history or more? We may use your question in an upcoming article!
Related:
- The most controversial songs of the ’50s: Do you agree?
- The most controversial songs of the ’60s: Do you agree?
Like MediaFeed’s content? Be sure to follow us.
This article was syndicated by MediaFeed.org.
AlertMe
