This book sneaks up on you. About a quarter of the way through I was thinking that there was no way the author could prove his case that 1965 was the MOST revolutionary year in music. By the tine I was halfway through, I still thought the prenise was never going to be met. At the same time I was thoroughly enjoying the anecdotes and history of the year and was impressed with the amount of information that was being related with out being either boring or based on fan worship. When I finished reading the book, I wanted more. I also realized that the case had been. I can't imagine a year that affected music and the world more (really!).

The book is written in chronological format which made getting into it a little difficult but ultimately made the story flow. The author also goes off on related tangents that really enhance the overall story. Topics like the Watts riots, femenism, hippies, Martin Luther King, Jr. and freedom movement, as well as others are related well and better explained than many history books I've read do. ( )

A fun overview of 1965, its music and its politics.

Jackson does a good job connecting all the disparate dots of the music scene, going roughly from month to month with the Beatles, Stones, Beach Boys and the rest. Don't think this is all about rock, though. Chapters focus on the country music scene, folk, jazz, even ska/reggae.

This isn't an in-depth treatment, though. For example, one chapter deals with Dylan plugging in, and angering folkies, at the Newport Folk Festival. A full treatment of the event can be found in Dylan Goes Electric! by Elijah Wald.

All in all, a good starting point. Maybe it'll encourage you to seek out more about each artist - and seek out the music, too! ( )

Research and fact-checking, plus quality of critical analysis and basic composition would get this a C- in high school English class. Factual errors (Dr Zhivago was not 1965's Best Picture Oscar winner -- It was The Sound of Music; Louise Harrison was George's sister, not his mother!) abound. A really good book on 1965's music scene is still waiting to be written. ( )

In the summer of 1965 I was 13 years old and about to enter high school. The songs discussed in this book were the soundtrack of my life at the time. My family didn't own a record player and I couldn't have afforded to buy records anyway, but I listened to the pop stations on my transistor radio whenever I could. The best part of the book, for me, was the overall story of the year. I remember all the songs and I remember all the other events he mentions, but 50 years later, I don't exactly remember the interrelatedness of the events. Ask me about any song or event mentioned and I would probably have guessed somewhere from 1964 to 1968. The stories about how many of the songs came to be written were also interesting but I don't know how the author knows all this stuff. He sure doesn't look old enough in his jacket photo to have had first-hand experience. There is an extensive bibliographical section so I assume these stories have been told by others. In fact I knew some of the stories. There are a lot of references sprinkled throughout the book but many of the details are un-sourced. The author does a lot of speculation about the details of some songs. He does a lot of "the song writer when he wrote this line, may have had another song writer's line in mind". Often I didn't see the connection. This sort of speculation was the weakest part of the book. ( )