Cultural history....
I liked the 60's. Many people didn't. I did. It was an interesting time of change, but I do see why many "younger" people get tired of hearing about it. Frankly you had to have been there and besides, I think, we all tend to think of our teens as probably the best time of life. In that decade I went from being a kid to almost a man. When I was 10 y.o. at the start of the decade we hadn't even put a man in space....by the time I was 19, at the end, we were on the moon. We got color TV in my house for the first time when I was 16, 8 track tapes in cars were a huge invention as was FM stereo radio although very few people had this.
Today many "younger" people who weren't there tend to think of the pop culture of the whole decade summed up in one word...."Hippies". That's OK, but not necessarily true. Hippies as a undercurrent didn't appear till around 1965 and didn't become mainstream [is that an oxymoron?] until after the Summer of Love in 1967. Truthfully, I doubt there were ever very many real hippies, certainly not in Midland Texas. The "hippies" I knew drove new Ford Mustangs. Wannabes...
And so many of the "younger" people I know think of one thing when they think of the music of the '60s....."psychedelic". Again not until late in the decade. Actually during the first several years of the decade the avante garde music was "folk" which gave way to folk rock. This was an outshoot of the "Beat Generation" of the late 50's and coffehouse music. Some of the beat generation advocates later morphed into hippies as did the their music which went to the folk rock which was more electrified.
The folk rock music scene changed for one reason, in my opinion. The Beatles. The Beatles changed the game in 1964 and soon all those folk rockers needed to adjust to stay viable; many did and became more famous as rock n' rollers than they ever were as folk rockers. Roger McGuinn featured below is a good example.
There was a time that was/is one of my favorites in music. There was short window, probably 1965-1966, when electrified rock n' roll was picking up steam but had not gotten the hard edge it took later. The Beatles were still singing love songs, the Beach Boys were singing about surfin', hot rods and beach babes. But rock was going mainstream, so much so that prime time rock n' roll TV shows started appearing and the Monkees were conjured up so that all us young hipsters could see rock on the tube. This was a big deal as there were only three channels on the TV...total.
Today on Captured Moments I have two offerings designed to feature what was hip, groovy and cool in 1965....please don't laugh this was the happenin' entertainment in my day. Traveling back in time you will notice the ubiquitous "go go boots" [looking somehow not right on Mama Cass!] and what every show had to have....Go Go Dancers. Go Go Dancers were hot to a 15 year old kid....I still think they're hot! It's sad to me that you can't find a girl today who can do a decent "frug" or "swim". And by the way, the first rock concert I ever saw was "Paul Revere and the Raiders", in Odessa. They weren't too bad, but alas no Go Go Dancers.
Today many "younger" people who weren't there tend to think of the pop culture of the whole decade summed up in one word...."Hippies". That's OK, but not necessarily true. Hippies as a undercurrent didn't appear till around 1965 and didn't become mainstream [is that an oxymoron?] until after the Summer of Love in 1967. Truthfully, I doubt there were ever very many real hippies, certainly not in Midland Texas. The "hippies" I knew drove new Ford Mustangs. Wannabes...
And so many of the "younger" people I know think of one thing when they think of the music of the '60s....."psychedelic". Again not until late in the decade. Actually during the first several years of the decade the avante garde music was "folk" which gave way to folk rock. This was an outshoot of the "Beat Generation" of the late 50's and coffehouse music. Some of the beat generation advocates later morphed into hippies as did the their music which went to the folk rock which was more electrified.
The folk rock music scene changed for one reason, in my opinion. The Beatles. The Beatles changed the game in 1964 and soon all those folk rockers needed to adjust to stay viable; many did and became more famous as rock n' rollers than they ever were as folk rockers. Roger McGuinn featured below is a good example.
There was a time that was/is one of my favorites in music. There was short window, probably 1965-1966, when electrified rock n' roll was picking up steam but had not gotten the hard edge it took later. The Beatles were still singing love songs, the Beach Boys were singing about surfin', hot rods and beach babes. But rock was going mainstream, so much so that prime time rock n' roll TV shows started appearing and the Monkees were conjured up so that all us young hipsters could see rock on the tube. This was a big deal as there were only three channels on the TV...total.
Today on Captured Moments I have two offerings designed to feature what was hip, groovy and cool in 1965....please don't laugh this was the happenin' entertainment in my day. Traveling back in time you will notice the ubiquitous "go go boots" [looking somehow not right on Mama Cass!] and what every show had to have....Go Go Dancers. Go Go Dancers were hot to a 15 year old kid....I still think they're hot! It's sad to me that you can't find a girl today who can do a decent "frug" or "swim". And by the way, the first rock concert I ever saw was "Paul Revere and the Raiders", in Odessa. They weren't too bad, but alas no Go Go Dancers.
