There’s also a reason why the Metal Archives asks its new users, in order to filter out the spam accounts, which was the first metal band. A metalhead can have an incredibly extensive knowledge of every black metal demo released in Finland in the ‘90s but be completely ignorant of power metal. A metalhead can follow every metalcore band under the sun but also have never heard of prog metal. Picking a single common denominator for all metalheads is quite impossible, but Black Sabbath is as close as we can get. You simply cannot tell metal’s history without Black Sabbath. They’re a band whose significance we celebrated time and time and time again.
However this article is not about Black Sabbath. Sure, they were active in the 60s, initially under other names like Earth and The Polka Tulk Blues Band, changing their name to its final version before the turn of the decade, and one can find demos the band made in 1969. By all means, look those up (they are, however, seemingly bootlegs). But the main reason is that Black Sabbath has been talked about to death, and they’re so obvious as metal’s progenitors. They’re also more definitively a metal band compared to every band that will be featured here, whose metalness, if existent, is more historical. It’s not like the other picks that I will feature here are not obvious in any way, since I don’t expect our readers are completely ignorant of some of the most popular bands that this decade had to offer, even if they’re mainly known for their contributions to music as a whole rather than specifically for their contributions to metal, and quite a few of them might be “bigger” than Black Sabbath.
What I want to do instead is talk about the music of the ‘60s, and while I’ll be approaching it through the lens of a metalhead presenting it to other metalheads, it won’t be exclusively about how metal each piece of music is. I’m choosing the ‘60s not only because, as the seeds for metal were just being laid, it is easier to compile and curate an entire decade within a single article, compared to how massive a ‘70s article would have to be; but also because it was a decade when the album format finally gained the status it currently has. Sure, albums, even very celebrated ones, were released before the ‘60s - think Miles Davis’s Kind Of Blue or Charles Mingus’s Mingus Ah Um - but they’re mostly either jazz or live albums or compilations of songs that are not always talked about from the album perspective. That was a slow process, which can be evidenced by the fact that most of the picks are from the tail end of the decade (which is true for both the ‘50s and the ‘60s).
And because I want to both tackle metalness and present the decade as a whole, I am dividing the picks by their significance to the metal world. I am also only featuring one album per artist / band, even though some of them would deserve to have their entire discography within this decade featured.
Of course, such a large undertaking would be a daunting task for one person, especially for one that grew up in a country where I'd be hard pressed to include any album from. ScreamingSteelUS' experience not only as a writer and music listener, but also as someone who grew up in a country that spawned half the albums here (roughly) made him the perfect candidate for a contributor, and you'll easily spot his contributions not only because of the increased level of detail he goes into, but also because I've color coded them to be yellow.
SSUS: I’m here because Radu didn’t have The Kinks on this list initially, and that just wasn’t going to fly. But also because attempting to summarize even the top crumbs of the top slice of the top tier of an entire decade in music is task too large for one person; even if the 1960s probably are the most manageable decade for such a project, it was also the decade where popular music changed apparently forever, or at least for a period of time that has extended to the present and foreseeable future, and so in those archives is more music worthy of appreciation than we could ever cover. You can probably name a few classics that we’re missing without even blinking (and you should see the bones of the draft, littered with suggestions we couldn’t get around to). Like anything else on this site, however, you should consider this just an introduction: it’s a gateway to more that you can explore to your own taste and satisfaction. If you’ve ever wondered what kind of metal-related stuff there was in the old days aside from Black Sabbath, or what else was going on in the musical world entirely separate from that small subscene, let this be a sampler of the most influential artists from the 1960s.
MUST-LISTENS FOR METALHEADS
This is the most important section, as here are the albums I consider absolutely significant for metal’s history, but also whose significance is of a larger scope, being albums that are important to the music world as a whole.
I wouldn’t be surprised to see In The Court Of The Crimson King having the same significance to prog rock that Black Sabbath has for metal, in the sense that while prog-leaning albums were released prior to it (some in this article), they were primarily jazz rock or psychedelic rock or experimental rock albums, whereas In The Court Of The Crimson King is the first one you can call a prog rock one first and foremost. It is also one whose laurels are far from being taken only by its earliness, from its iconic cover art to having more than half of its tracks become prog rock staples. There’s jazzy free-form improvisation in “Moonchild” and “21st Century Schizoid Man”, there’s symphonic prog grandeur in “Epitaph” and “The Court Of The Crimson King”, folky psychedelia in “I Talk To The Wind”. But there’s also an intense side to some of these tracks. “The Court Of The Crimson King” has some of the densest and most grandiose choruses, from the choir vocals to the powerful synths to its drum fills, while the space between is filled with gloomy anticipation. Ian McDonald’s performance on “21st Century Schizoid Man” is personally responsible for every saxophone that appears in a metal song, with it being such a behemoth of a track, scorching and intense, all the while (soon-to-be-Emerson, Lake & Palmer’s) Greg Lake’s processed screams of “Blood rack / Barbed wire / Politician’s funeral pyre / Innocents raped with napalm fire / 21st century schizoid man” feel more metal than anything in the ‘60s should have the right to be. Out of the lineup, only Robert Fripp remained a constant member, most of the rest leaving after one more album. But thankfully for you, this wasn’t the only King Crimson album that bordered on metal, and we have a whole article about them.
Standout tracks: “21st Century Schizoid Man”, “Epitaph”, “The Court Of The Crimson King”.
With this album we run into the same issue that bands like The Beatles or The Rolling Stones or AC/DC ran into with the release of their early albums, namely that you’ll find different versions depending on where the album was released. There’s a US version and an international version, so a lot of tracks would be found on only a single one of these. The US version does have the more well-known songs that were released as singles prior, like “Purple Haze” and “Hey Joe” and “The Wind Cries Mary”, while the international version’s exclusives have stayed as deep cuts. Thankfully, with our five decades of hindsight and re-releases, you can easily find longer versions of Are You Experienced that contain all of these. It’s also hard to pick just one of the three The Jimi Hendrix Experience albums, as Axis: Bold As Love and Electric Ladyland are just as brilliant, but it is Are You Experienced that served as a watershed moment in psychedelic rock. Simply put the trio was on fire: bassist Noel Redding is groovy, the fills from drummer Mitch Mitchell are insane and way too overlooked, and Jimi is often considered the best guitarist of all time. Even though I disagree with that statement, it’s undeniable how innovative and intoxicating his playing is. The bluesy licks alongside the psychedelic production (this album is such a joy to listen to in stereo) and the ear-splitting acid rock volume all coalesce into some of the heaviest riffs of the ‘60s. Jimi isn’t a shabby vocalist either, with a lot of his singing having a more soulful blues leaning. There’s a bit too much psychedelic experimentation that didn’t age so well, but credit where credit is due, it does sound ahead of its time.
Standout tracks: “Purple Haze”, “Hey Joe”, “Fire”.
Having to pick between this and Led Zeppelin II is quite a daunting task, and obviously both are essential (as are all Led Zeppelin albums up to and including Presence). But I’m picking the first one because that’s where this mixture of hard rock, folk, and blues originated, even with the latter two often being inspirations taken from other artists, sometimes credited, sometimes not. Regardless, both the original and the covered/plagiarized songs became part of the rock canon because of how intense they sound, and it really feels like not only does the band have immense chemistry but they’re also utilizing the studio to its full potential for all the sonic depth in this album. The roots it has in folk and blues keep it from leaning too much on a heavy sound, but even those cuts feel loud and heavy, like the riffing in “Babe I’m Gonna Leave You”, the gloomy vibe of “Dazed And Confused”, and the drumming and keys on “Your Time Is Gonna Come”. But the heaviest moments are the ones that come from the more straightforwardly rocking songs, like “Communication Breakdown” and “Good Times Bad Times”, songs that are hard rock but inch towards heavy metal, and I’d credit John Bonham’s intensity as the deciding factor in how heavy they sound. The Hindenburg disaster cover art is iconic and became close to synonymous with the band. Loved by (gran)dads around the world to this day.
Standout tracks: “Good Times Bad Times”, “Dazed And Confused”, “Communication Breakdown”.
Cream - Disraeli Gears (1967)
[Blues Rock | Psychedelic Rock]
Cream’s short-lived existence, barely amounting to 3 years total, led to three really great albums, each of them having tracks I’d consider pretty significant to the development of metal. Cream being a trio drew some parallels to The Jimi Hendrix Experience, with there seemingly being a friendly rivalry between Jimi and Eric Clapton, even if Cream is a trio where all three members shared vocal duties. However only one of the two has a profile here (as of the writing of this article), because even if there is heaviness and clear influence towards metal in Cream’s metal, the blues side is much stronger and not geared towards heaviness in the same way. It’s true that a lot of Cream’s importance towards metal lies in the riffing of their most famous song “Sunshine Of Your Love”, and in the heaviness of Ginger Baker’s drumming, though his influence on metal wasn’t one he was personally fond of. Yes, I did pick Disraeli Gears out of the other Cream albums because of “Sunshine Of Your Love” primarily (and because a lot of the most famous songs on their other albums are covers), but there’s more to the deeper cuts on this album, both the ones that go into a louder psychedelic direction and the mellower blues tracks. A lot of tracks do sound quite different in a live setting, with “We’re Going Wrong” sounding even gloomier during the band’s reunion concerts.
Standout tracks: “Sunshine Of Your Love”, “Strange Brew”, “Tales Of Brave Ulysses”.
The Stooges - The Stooges (1969)
[Garage Rock]
Here’s a bit of cheating, because I don’t consider The Stooges as directly influential to metal in the exact same way that the other four bands in this section are, but the ‘60s and ‘70s also served as an incubation for metal’s cousin and recurring influence, punk rock. In the ‘60s, that was mostly through the “garage rock” sound, one that is almost synonymous with proto-punk, and out of these, The Stooges are arguably the biggest of them. The band is/was fronted by Iggy Pop, arguably as known for his voice as for his wild stage antics, like popularizing stage diving and many others. Their debut album is quite front-loaded, with side A having not only their most famous song, “I Wanna Be Your Dog”, but also the more rock ‘n’ roll cut “1969”, and very surprisingly a gloomy, 10-minute drone-ish dirge in “We Will Fall”. A lot of the album’s character is given by Velvet Underground’s John Cale, who produced the album and performed miscellaneous instruments on a bunch of tracks, like bells on “I Wanna Be Your Dog” and viola on “We Will Fall”. Modern listeners might find this album and the entire Iggy & The Stooges catalog as more rowdy than actually heavy, which is only fair for how much rock ‘n’ roll is in it.
Standout tracks: “I Wanna Be Your Dog”, “1969”, “We Will Fall”.
That’s it?? Where are Blue Cheer and Iron Butterfly and The Beatles and Deep Purple? Well, I preferred to be very conservative with what I consider “mandatory” in this instance. Of course I think a metalhead, or just about anybody with an interest in music, should listen to all the aforementioned, but knowing from my large experience of seeing huge “must-see” or “must-read” or “must-listen” lists full of stuff I haven’t seen or read or listened to, here is where I draw the first line between “must” and “should”. Metalheads who are content with doing the bare minimum dive in the genre’s history can safely stop here, and only resume it when and if further interest in the decade, whether for its metalness or for all of its music, arises again.
GENERAL MANDATORY LISTENS
There’s much more to the ‘60s than how metal’s seeds were sown. This section includes a bunch of albums that I consider mandatory listens (aside from the ones in the previous section) for anyone diving into the decade’s music, regardless of their importance to metal. Of course, quite a lot of them are important in some way to metal, but in this section that’s no longer the deciding factor for their inclusion. Of course there’s still some bias towards that, otherwise there might be more soul or Motown or country or jazz or bossa nova, but I’m trying to be both conservative with what is “mandatory” and to be inclusive of the decade’s variety.
The Beatles - Abbey Road (1969)
[Pop Rock]
An article purporting to compile some of the most essential musical recordings of the 1960s ought by rights to open with the Beatles' complete discography. There is no band in history that has had as gargantuan and lasting an impact on the writing, recording, producing, packaging, marketing, public perception, cultural status, and commercial potential of music all at once. In fact, the choice of Beatles album for this article is effectively arbitrary and immaterial: we could as well have picked Sgt. Pepper, The White Album, Revolver, Rubber Soul, Let It Be, any singles collection, a bootleg from a Hamburg nightclub, or the 2017 limited-edition vinyl box set of their 1963-1969 fan club-exclusive Christmas records. It almost doesn't matter; a five-second loop of John Lennon picking out his teeth would do. But for the sake of argument, it's Abbey Road, a genre-expanding assortment of exactingly produced, elaborately arranged, and beautifully performed pop songs under the banner of arguably the greatest album cover of all time. Covering rock and roll, blues, folk, R&B, some things that have no name, and most things in between, Abbey Road joined its predecessors in advancing pop music through its incorporation of new instrumental technology, sophisticated production, and freely associating musical influences, realized through note-perfect instrumental performances and vocal arrangements of exceptional delicacy and emotion. It's a smorgasbord of stylistic and tonal variety, with breaths of Beethoven in the vocal-heavy psychedelic dirge "Because", a rolling music hall jaunt in the midst of the bright rock of "You Never Give Me Your Money", subtle influences of Indian folk music in the humble acoustic hymn "Here Comes The Sun", and what can be described only as the direct ancestor of doom metal in the aptly entitled "I Want You (She's So Heavy)". Embodying the fractious nature of the band by this point in its history, most of side two is taken up by "the medley", essentially a demo reel of song ideas strung together in a continuous suite; even in the midst of disintegrating, the Beatles were still consummate songsmiths in 90-second bursts. The furtive shuffle and barreling riffs of "Come Together", the relaxed reflections and burning doubts of "Something", the jolly commanding chorus of "Carry That Weight", and about every other moment on this album are written all across the history of popular music, all the wholesome whimsy ("Octopus's Garden") and violent whimsy ("Maxwell's Silver Hammer"), all the fiery blues ("Oh! Darling") and bracing rock ("Polythene Pam"), even the 23-second snippet of "Her Majesty" (not technically the first hidden track ever, but possibly the first to constitute an actual song). Abbey Road is a legend among legends. But at the end of the day, down the road of history, influence and legacy and innovation are only so much bookkeeping - it's always the music itself that governs, and what keeps the Beatles relevant so many decades later is that underneath it all you just can't beat a beautifully written song. This is an album of nonstop fabulous pop music; that's all you really need to know.
Standout tracks: "Octopus's Garden", "Something", "Come Together", "I Want You (She's So Heavy)".
by SSUS
The Rolling Stones - Let It Bleed (1969)
[Blues Rock]
If there is one band whose name comes as an immediate second to the Beatles as embodiments of rock’n’roll royalty, it is the Rolling Stones. The Stones are so inextricably linked with the evolution of rock music that they’re a walking definition of it, and after defying death for 63 years and counting, their street cred is older than most of the streets they’ve strutted; compared to their epochal countrymen of the Fab Four, the Stones were into harder drugs and harder knocks, less interested in psychedelic abstracts than violence and vulgarity, more at home with a gritty vein of blues-rooted rock than with radical experimentation. Tough, tenacious, and apparently immortal, the Stones developed a lively and guitar-heavy style that helped usher in the hard rock sound and often provided an earthy contrast to the bubblegum, psych, and folk leanings of many British Invasion contemporaries. Thus, while there are disagreements as to how much the title Let It Bleed was informed by Let It Be (contradiction or coincidence?), the unavoidable connection is nonetheless appropriate. This album, their eighth by UK count and the last of their ‘60s run, was one of their most focused and personal, certainly one of the best points of entry alongside its immediate predecessor, Beggars Banquet, and its immediate successor, Sticky Fingers. By this time they'd settled into their own school of songwriting, leaving just a single cover amidst a bank of confident originals - Robert Johnson's "Love In Vain", a faithful slow blues piece that establishes the band's old-time American roots in a handshake with the next song, the fiddle-led country blues "Country Honk". From there, short another acoustic detour in "You Got The Silver", things get more modern and voluminous: in the limber "Live With Me", the sleazy title track, the smashing blues rock build of "Midnight Rambler" (inspired by the Boston Strangler), and the dramatic strut of "Monkey Man", it's all shimmering slide guitar, clattering honky-tonk piano, distinctive rhythmic riffing, and Mick Jagger's sultry, mocking, irreverent, and bruising vocals. Let It Bleed does feature one more grandiose composition, the lengthy admonishment of "You Can't Always Get What You Want"; with its children's gospel choir, assortment of extra instruments, and lofty, earnest melodies, it shows that a little spitshine and decorum could sometimes pay off for the Stones. But what elevates the album more than any other piece is the opener, "Gimme Shelter", often cited as the band's greatest song: it is a fearsome and apocalyptic prophecy of wartime destruction, led by ominous guitars and prominently featuring the bloodcurdling belting of singer Merry Clayton. It's an important piece of history, soundtracking the counterculture of the '60s, the evolution of rock itself, and just about every Scorsese film. On the back of its staying power and that of the other classics here featured, Let It Bleed offers a consistently strong blueprint for fusing old blues into modern rock, or simply for celebrating them each in tandem, showing off the band's skill as instrumentalists and songwriters as few other albums would.
Standout tracks: "Gimme Shelter", "Midnight Rambler", "Let It Bleed", "Love In Vain".
by SSUS
In the late ‘60s, the album concept had barely begun to cohere, let alone the concept album – and already by their second album, 1966’s A Quick One, The Who were experimenting with what would later become known as the “rock opera”. Their next album, The Who Sell Out, was presciently lampooning high-art pretensions of pop music with its cheeky running themes and commercial-like interludes, but it was 1969's Tommy that proved how extensively an album’s components could be woven into one discrete story. Tommy is one of the first true rock operas and easily one of the most recognizable examples, perhaps the poster child for the term: it is heralded by a proper overture (later interrupted by an extended "underture"), incorporates leitmotifs, and features a prominent narrative, melding The Who's raucous rock with more elaborate orchestrations and less conventional songwriting. In an ambitious 75 minutes is told the story of Tommy Walker, a boy who is rendered psychosomatically deaf, dumb, and blind as a result of childhood trauma; the album explores the world of his inner mind and the concerns of observers as he endures sexual and physical abuse, misguided attempts to heal his senses, and his own self-absorption, culminating with his becoming a religious icon. The album displays sophistication in its themes and composition that had rarely ever been approached by pop music at that time and represents an important step toward establishing the artistic legitimacy of its genre; in comparison to The Who's other works, however, the legacy of Tommy is somewhat more historical than experiential. With how adventurous and progressive the songs are, they can feel disjointed or incomplete, and there are few good candidates for singles aside from the album's most ubiquitous anthem, "Pinball Wizard". The plaintive refrain in which Tommy begs to be healed and loved can be genuinely stirring and there are fabulous twists of melody on songs like "Christmas", "Go to the Mirror!", and "Cousin Kevin", but the quality varies across the prodigious run time and there is not much to rank against the band's best. For some of rock's greatest musicians at their absolute peak, there is no substitute for Who's Next, and Quadrophenia would later offer a more unified and musically impressive rock opera. Still, Tommy laid the groundwork for many high-concept musical epics that would follow (W.A.S.P.'s The Crimson Idol is a particularly direct descendant of The Who), and enjoyed in full, Tommy is an "Amazing Journey" of its own.
Standout tracks: “Pinball Wizard”, “Christmas”, “Go To The Mirror!”, “Overture”.
by SSUS
The Kinks - The Kinks Are The Village Green Preservation Society (1968)
[Pop Rock]
Just like The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, and The Who, The Kinks achieved strong transatlantic success in the mid-1960s; they cemented themselves as one of the major British Invasion acts with a series of high-charting singles in the US, including their 1964 debut, "You Really Got Me", whose aggressive riffs and distorted guitar tone, famously achieved through amplifier violence, would later become an influence not just on hard rock but on punk and heavy metal. As the decade trudged along, however, lead vocalist and songwriter Ray Davies became increasingly disillusioned with the global pervasiveness of American culture and modernism, turning his attention more and more to traditionally English themes and musical styles. As the Kinks bowed out of the spotlight and became a critical rather than commercial success, Davies investigated quirkier and more personal modes of writing, and his trend toward overt Englishness culminated in the 1968 masterpiece The Kinks Are The Village Green Preservation Society. Though the album does not have a cohesive story, it is nonetheless a concept album, exalting the simplicity of pastoral life, lamenting the encroaching obsolescence of provincial customs, and exploring the functions of memory and nostalgia in view of aging and progress. While there are a few notably blues- or rock-oriented tracks reflecting the band's earlier influences, most of the songs bear the marks of English folk music and music hall performances, incorporating more traditional instrumentation such as harpsichord, oboe, and a string section for a sound that is at once quaint and sophisticated; Davies has the very voice of nostalgia, narrating his idyllic imaginings with a wry, lonely lilt and gentle humor. Village Green Preservation Society stands as a pointed contrast to the rapid internationalization of pop music at the time, preferring a distinct temporal and local grounding guided by a bittersweet and introspective tone; its acoustic-electric ballads of country living are full of a timeless sweetness, and it can be enjoyed both as a corollary to other experiments with folk rock occurring at that time and a forerunner to the sounds of indie rock and Britpop some decades later.
Standout tracks: “The Village Green Preservation Society”, “Do You Remember Walter”, “Village Green”, “Big Sky”.
by SSUS
When I first joined Metal Storm, The Doors were one of the first bands that really boggled my mind by their inclusion. Of course by that time I had listened to their discography, so I was aware of their sound, but some of the dots were still missing. I can’t say for sure why The Doors are in our database, and I’m not sure I’d be in favour if they were to be added today, but now I’ve been able to connect some of the dots, not in a sense that The Doors were ever especially “heavy”, but rather especially “dark”. A lot of it comes down to Jim Morrison, a man whose deep crooning vocals, poetic and often abstract lyricism, and mystical stage presence must’ve been quite revelatory for the goth wave that would come a decade later. Even though all four members deserve their laurels, aside from Morrison’s immense charisma, a lot of the musical character of The Doors comes through the playful keyboard tone of the late Ray Manczarek, even if that specific side of their sound is not especially metal. Strange Days might be my favorite of The Doors’ records, but I can’t deny that the self-titled debut deserves the attention that it gets. Not only because of the “Light My Fire” hit or its hard-rocking “Break On Through (To The Other Side)” opener, but also because of the nonsensical lyricism that makes even a cover like Willie Dixon’s “Back Door Man” fit like a glove, the mellow darkness of “End Of The Night”, and especially the manic Swans-predicting “The End”, a track so grandiose and macabre I’d see it as the only necessary argument for their inclusion.
Standout tracks: “Break On Through (To The Other Side)”, “Light My Fire”, “The End”.
Bob Dylan - Highway 61 Revisited (1965)
[Folk Rock]
1965 was the year Bob Dylan went electric, showing that even the quintessential hippie prophet was capable of a-changin’ along with the times. This album should be considered in tandem with Bringing It All Back Home, released just a few months earlier; home to classics like “Subterranean Homesick Blues” and “Mr. Tambourine Man”, that was the real point of departure, featuring Dylan’s first collaborations with electric instrumentation in a rock context. Also necessary to mention is the Newport Folk Festival that bridged these two albums, where Dylan debuted his electric rock sound live before an audience of folk fans. Highway 61 Revisited made an even louder transition from pure folk and is arguably the stronger record, hence its specific selection, but it is part of a continuum. While Dylan had debuted and gained his first fame as a semi-political figure, best known even today for his canon of protest songs and socially conscious storytelling, he was growing from a pundit into a poet, and this album is one of the clearest reflections of that evolution. Of course his formidable wordsmithing prowess even early on ranks him among the most accomplished lyricists in the English language, and truthfully all of his albums from this decade should be considered more or less essential, but this shift toward modern musicality brought with it a changed philosophy in writing, and here his lyrics can be seen adopting more surreal and metaphorical techniques even while still concerned with the raw political turmoil within the United States. Musically, too, he was diverting to more modern and rock-based structures and melodies, notably on songs like “Like A Rolling Stone” and “From A Buick 6”. In retrospect, it’s somewhat humorous to imagine that there was any controversy over Dylan going electric when the accompaniment is still so lax by even contemporary rock standards; but compared to earlier Dylan, there’s no denying the huge shift in energy and volume. The extra layers, with a more rigid beat and rowdier, more diverse instrumentation, grant extra assertive energy to his words and support a more strident delivery. For the most part, this is still a folk-based album, heavy with blues influences, but all of that mixed-up experimentation makes this album possibly something more: one of the earliest examples of folk rock. And even more than any genre experiment, it’s home to some of the most important songs in the last century of popular music, including the angry and sarcastic “Like A Rolling Stone”, the locomotive lament “Tombstone Blues”, and the epic-length tangle of dreams and headlines that is “Desolation Row”. With his trademark withered rasp and harmonica harness, Bob Dylan was one of the most recognizable figures not just in music, but in popular culture of the 20th century; and while certain aspects of his cultural influence were more present on earlier records, this is one of the best examples of Bob Dylan as an all-around musical force.
Standout tracks: “Like A Rolling Stone”, “Tombstone Blues”, “Desolation Row”.
by SSUS
The Beach Boys - Pet Sounds (1966)
[Baroque Pop]
Even though they were at least rock-adjacent by the period’s standards, The Beach Boys’ pop rock was noticeably brighter and more sunshine-y, especially since their early days pigeon-holed them as a “surf band”. Even if that period stands out for adding vocal harmonies to a genre that was mostly instrumental up to that point, their mid-’60s albums got increasingly complex and layered, especially as Brian Wilson became more and more involved with the songwriting and the production. Pet Sounds might not be the first Beach Boys album to have Wilson at the helm, nor the first to be more complex than their initial surf gimmick, with 1965’s Beach Boys Today! being a career highlight as well, but Pet Sounds’s ambitiousness must have been apparent even without the hindsight we have today. Written and produced pretty much entirely by Wilson, being inspired by what The Beatles were doing with Rubber Soul and what Phil Spector’s wall-of-sound production style yielded, Pet Sounds had intricate orchestral arrangements often featuring unusual instruments like theremins and soda cans; meticulous and quite psychedelic production; sentimental lyricism; and, most importantly, it felt like a complete package rather than something to fill space around a couple of singles. Highlights do remain, obviously, but no song here feels unnecessary. In an alternate universe where Wilson’s ambitions with Smile actually led to that album not being delayed for decades while the band’s career had its ups and downs (mostly downs after the ‘60s), maybe that would’ve been my pick, but Pet Sounds being considered a perfect pop album is really not a controversial opinion. Its influence made it a watershed release for how ambitious the role of its production was in helping usher in the psychedelic experimentation that defined the rest of the decade.
Standout songs: “Wouldn’t It Be Nice”, “God Only Knows”, “I Just Wasn’t Made For These Times”.
The Velvet Underground & Nico - The Velvet Underground & Nico (1967)
[Art Rock | Experimental Rock]
The influence of The Velvet Underground's 1967 debut is no better explained than by the oft-repeated adage that the album sold only a few thousand copies, but everyone who bought one started a band. It's easy to see why: the album is a hard first listen, a mess of audibly deconstructing rock and roll carried by frenzied, toneless instrumentation and cold, aloof vocals, and yet the sheer strangeness of it all elicits a dangerous excitement. Led by the perennially irascible Lou Reed and otherwise consisting of instrumentalists John Cale, Sterling Morrison, and Maureen “Moe” Tucker, The Velvet Underground was produced, managed, and creatively influenced by pop-art paragon Andy Warhol, who also provided this album’s iconic cover and maneuvered model/actress Nico into the band’s midst for this collaboration. Between the drugs, the strong personalities, the nascent revolutionary impulses, and the oddly posed elements that strike against each other in absurd ways, The Velvet Underground & Nico is an incendiary grenade of creativity. Its tense and unpredictable atmospheres are perforated by lyrics about taboo subjects, all across the sex/drugs/rock’n’roll spectrum and more, delivered in a mix of Nico’s husky, hypnotic, and thickly accented pronouncements and Reed’s half-Dylan/half-Cohen talk-singing. The sound of the album is raw, atonal, caustic – not aggressive or violent in the way that so many bands would be in ways influenced by these concepts, for there are dreamy, delicate constructions like opener "Sunday Morning" that feel in every way benign, even childlike, except for the subtle sense of imbalance; the approach is merely unvarnished, shameless about its blemishes. It’s an obscure blend of conceptual pretension and garage rock abandon: you’ve got flower-child ballads like “Femme Fatale” and “I’ll Be Your Mirror”, hazy, plodding, and instrumentally layered psychedelia fascinated by soundscapes, and then you’ve got more conventional rock numbers like the humming rockabilly “Run Run Run” and the chugging proto-punk “I’m Waiting For The Man”, composed more or less conventionally but performed with a novel attitude of disaffection. Juxtaposed with these compositions are the surreal odysseys, the album’s most enduring masterpieces. “Venus In Furs” is a precursor to all the ritual drone, all the creeping neofolk, all the psychedelic doom, all the gothic darkwave that wouldn’t coalesce until years later. “All Tomorrow’s Parties” flips that unnerving atmosphere into a bright, welcoming melody that is nonetheless surrounded by chaotic layers of droning strings. “Heroin” makes use of text painting: the song cycles through successive injections of the eponymous drug, each time quickening its pace to imitate the high until it passes and returns to its initial stasis, and with each new high the instrumentation grows more urgent and disjointed, Lou Reed’s voice more excited, his lyrics more apathetic. Everywhere lies an undercurrent of drone: some ominous echo, a warping confluence of reverb, a persistent twang that makes even the most traditional numbers feel slightly off and slightly mystical, often achieved through John Cale's frenetic viola; the album's final two tracks eventually dissipate into waves of barely structured noise. In the immense variety, bold experimentation, and coarse production of this album arises a challenge to the standard of rock music: The Velvet Underground & Nico is one of the great mysteries for the punk, one of the most significant landmarks for the avant-garde in popular music.
Standout tracks: “Heroin”, “Venus In Furs”, “All Tomorrow’s Parties”, "I'm Waiting For The Man".
by SSUS
Pink Floyd - The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn (1967)
[Psychedelic Rock | Psychedelic Pop]
Your dad’s favorite band had to start somewhere. Just kidding, they’re also your stoner roommate’s favorite band. And they were also mine at some point. Because of my dad. Anyway, I bet Pink Floyd is a lot of people’s favorite band, and that’s because of how full of highlights their long career is. But if I had to guess, most of it is because of anything past 1971’s Meddle, with their early material being either more of a curiosity or actually preferred by some contrarians. The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn is not only pre-Meddle, it’s also before David Gilmour even joined the band. I would’ve picked the follow-up A Saucerful Of Secrets since that one has all five members, but that one has only one track ("Set The Controls For The Heart Of The Sun") with all five members, the rest being either songs with Gilmour or songs with Barrett. So I picked the only full-on Syd Barrett-led one. The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn is a very experimental album even for its time, but it also has a strong pop leaning, which makes for a very weird listen, especially knowing that this is the same band that made The Dark Side Of The Moon. Expect a lot of vocal harmonies, weird production effects, and the kind of trippiness you’d expect to find in Saturday morning cartoons that makes it very clear how much LSD had an effect in the songwriting of the album. There’s something quite whimsical about it as a result, in a very fever dream-ish way. As far as the songs go, on one hand you had the shorter pop-ish songs, usually penned by Syd, like “Lucifer Sam”, “Scarecrow”, “Bike”, and, with the power of further reissues including non-album singles from that time, “See Emily Play” and “Arnold Layne”. But aside from that you also have songs with a stronger improvisational psychedelic angle, like “Astronomy Domine”, “Interstellar Overdrive”, and “Pow R Toc H”. Given how Voivod covered “Astronomy Domine”, Melvins covered “Interstellar Overdrive”, and Death Grips sampled both of them, I think the metal world was more influenced by the latter.
Standout tracks: “Astronomy Domine”, “Interstellar Overdrive”, “Lucifer Sam”.
Jefferson Airplane - Surrealistic Pillow (1967)
[Psychedelic Rock]
There are few albums you can say are more emblematic of the Summer-of-Love psych rock scene of San Francisco than Surrealistic Pillow. The band had just released their mellower Jefferson Airplane Takes Off record a year prior, but it was the lineup changes in between that album and this one that really made the difference: drummer Spencer Dryden, who had a background in jazz, and vocalist Grace Slick, who was previously part of the folkier The Great Society. It was Slick’s time in the aforementioned band where the song “Somebody To Love” was written, and Slick took that song, a folk ballad, to Jefferson Airplane, who turned it into a psych rock rager and a huge hit, quite emblematic of the synergy between the new band members. Grace Slick wrote the album’s other famous song, “White Rabbit”, a dark, hazy song with a slight bolero touch, which still amazes me with how much of a build-up it manages to create in just over two minutes. Those two songs remaining in the popular consciousness gave me the wrong retroactive idea about how much Grace Slick would do as a vocalist on the record, but vocal duties are shared with other members, sometimes solo, sometimes as harmonies, with Marty Balin getting the most leads. The other songs on the record move in more folk rocky directions, maintaining the trippy atmosphere (huge kudos for the echoey production for making it sound so lively and immersive), and containing highlights like the tender love ballads of “Today” and “Comin’ Back to Me” and the country twang of “3/5 of a Mile in 10 Seconds”. But there’s a reason why the two Slick songs are the ones with the biggest shelf life, blending the band’s rocking chemistry and trippy production with just how strong of a vocalist Grace Slick was, and I think most female-fronted psych rock bands owe a lot to her.
Standout tracks: “Somebody To Love”, “Today”, “White Rabbit”.
Big Brother & The Holding Company - Cheap Thrills (1968)
[Blues Rock]
Kinda similar to Jefferson Airplane in that it’s a San Francisco psych rock band whose first album was kinda unassuming compared to how well-received the follow-up was, and especially because both of them make really good use of powerhouse performances of their female vocalists. The biggest difference is that while Grace Slick appeared more sporadically on Surrealistic Pillow and didn’t become a bigger household name, Janis Joplin is the centerpiece of this album (there are backing vocals by other members, and “Oh, Sweet Mary” is the only song to have co-lead vocals), and she became so emblematic that she didn’t just overshadow the band to the point that a lot of people don’t even know that the most famous songs on this record aren’t solo songs, but she became emblematic for the decade as a whole. The rest of the band deserve their laurels as well, with the band’s bluesier sound relying on having that specific touch coming from the guitar (on most of the album) or the piano (on “Turtle Blues”), but I’d be lying if I didn’t say that Joplin’s grave vocals don’t suck all the air out of the room, and her performance makes you forget that half the songs here are covers, and it makes sense why she’s still seen as one of the gold standards of blues vocals more than five decades after her passing. While only one song on the original record (“Ball And Chain”, a cover of Big Mama Thornton) was actually recorded in front of a live audience, crowd noises added to other tracks do give the impression of a live setting to the entire record, and the performance feeling so organic as if in a live setting away does make it easy to be fooled by it.
Standout tracks: “Piece Of My Heart”, “Turtle Blues”, “Ball And Chain”.
Creedence Clearwater Revival - Willy And The Poor Boys (1969)
[Swamp Rock | Blues Rock]
In five years, from 1968 to 1972, Creedence Clearwater Revival released seven albums, rapidly ascending to rock'n'roll stardom after years of run-up under different names. With a succession of earthy rock'n'roll hits that blended blues, rockabilly, funk, folk, and soul into a distinctive “swamp rock” sound, Creedence became not only one of the defining acts of the era but one of the most quintessentially American rock bands; the grooving rhythms, the gunslinging guitar riffs, and John Fogerty's burning howl could equally grace a moody, murky blues jam, a searing rock missile, and a resurrected gospel tune, and this unification of roots styles made Creedence central to the distinct identity of American popular music of the time. While their masterpiece among masterpieces was 1970's Cosmo's Factory, Willy And The Poor Boys features what is arguably the band's most enduring composition, "Fortunate Son". The ultimate theme song of America's Vietnam War era and the concomitant counterculture, "Fortunate Son" is a bilious revolt against classism, mindless patriotism, and the war machine of the establishment contained in a raging knockout that could be taken as a forerunner to punk. The album is more than one song, of course - of the three albums that Creedence released in 1969, Willy And The Poor Boys was likely the best, driven by other such classics as the delightful calypso beat of "Down On The Corner", a beautifully harmonized take on Lead Belly's "Cotton Fields", and a multi-phased chug through the old standard “The Midnight Special”. Every track is in its own way a Creedence classic. Frontman John Fogerty's notorious perfectionism keeps a tight lid on every note, and from the brash rock'n'roll riffing to the smooth and versatile vocal arrangements, you'll be hard-pressed to find anything out of place. CCR mastered many trades, and Willy And The Poor Boys represents much of what made this band legendary: raw, emotive, working-class rock that can swing into slow bayou jams and soothing blues without breaking stride. This is proof that classic rock isn't boring unless it's The Eagles.
Standout tracks: "Fortunate Son", "Down On The Corner", "Cotton Fields", "Effigy".
by SSUS
Johnny Cash - At Folsom Prison (1968)
[Country]
"I just wanted to tell you that this show is being recorded for an album released on Columbia Records, so you can't say 'hell' or [bleep] or anything like that." So Johnny Cash closes the second song of his performance, "Dark As The Dungeon", an appropriate inclusion for a set played to a literally captive audience. In fact, Cash knew how to pick the songs for his setting; almost all of the tunes he played for the inmates at Folsom Prison deal with either being in prison or doing something that could get you sent there (and his closer, "Greystone Chapel", was written by Glen Sherley, who himself was present as one of the incarcerees at Folsom). Though the religious trappings of his gospel origins would remain present all throughout his career, even from his earliest professional days Cash was courting controversy with his tales of murder, drug use, kicking dogs, and other such unsavory pursuits; Cash opened this performance with one of his trademark songs, the tailor-made "Folsom Prison Blues", where he famously reveals "I shot a man in Reno / Just to watch him die". Stone-cold stuff for its 1955 release, and for this 1968 live recording, and for today. Cash's deep, rich voice, dark in tone and somber in expression, makes for versatile narration, capturing the hangdog sorrows of a man reflecting on a life of misdeeds and puffing out with the stone-cold pride of a man who brags about them ("I can't forget the day I shot that bad bitch down", he reminisces in his revised lyrics to T.J. Arnall's "Cocaine Blues"). He talks much the way he sings, amiably interacting with his audience sometimes at the expense of the prison personnel; his manner is humble and humorous, and he delights in the crude turns of the lyrics and the laughs they elicit from the Folsom set. Meanwhile, his backing band, the Tennessee Three, trundles and skitters behind him with its signature freight train sound, practicing the "boom-chicka-boom" rhythm that became one of Cash's most fundamental musical contributions. At Folsom Prison was a milestone in country music, Cash's biggest seller to that point, and this collection of driving western capers, humorous country ballads, and rueful blues laments summarizes well the persona of the Man in Black. He was not exactly exterior to the country music establishment, but he did make himself known as someone who sympathized with the outlaw and sought humanity in the criminal, and this album, among others, solidified his reputation as an important part of the counterculture. This album is, perhaps more than the rest, the key to his legacy; it is an album that says, as he so often would, "Hello. I'm Johnny Cash."
Standout tracks: “Folsom Prison Blues”, “25 Minutes To Go”, “Dark As The Dungeon”, “The Long Black Veil”.
by SSUS
Neil Young / Crazy Horse - Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere (1969)
[Country Rock]
In the late '60s, rock music was scarcely a generation old and already Neil Young had come up with a way to make it about suffering and chaos instead of sock hops and cars. His self-titled debut previewed some of the strident melancholy for which he would become known, but it was this second album - also his first with longtime backing band Crazy Horse - that would define the sound of Neil Young for the world at large and prefigure countercultural corollaries to mainstream rock. Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere blends several styles, arriving always at the most poignant or cutting mix: at some points it resides in calm country, laying down sliding cowboy rhythms at a lackadaisical pace, then weaving in deceptively mellow folk strains, but before long the crunching guitar riffs and searing leads burst forth into a storm of hot rock. It's an album that seems to masquerade as something more conventional, just some dirty blues or electric folk to light up the cold nights, but the overpowering distortion of its rock side can't be contained in simple sing-alongs. It's easy to hear why Young is labeled the "Godfather of Grunge": already alternative rock is born here, in these slow, grim progressions, cynical choruses, and rough, coarse guitar chords that scrape and grunt with contrarian rhythms behind the country/blues leads; the ominous riffs and emotional leads of "Cowgirl In The Sand" are practically full-bore doom. Even when the songs restrain their volume, the wistful dirges summon disarming darkness thanks to their aching melodies and Young's trademark singing style: his high-pitched, nasal, almost whiny voice is his calling card, a conveyer of heartfelt emotion (usually the bad kind) with unvarnished earnestness and a touch of angelic sadness. There's no safe point on this album: it's either raw power or poisonous bitterness, either abrasive volume or withering sorrow. Quite often it's everything negative at the same time. Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere represents the darkest elements of folk and country and the heaviest elements of rock; its forlorn, vulnerable demeanor and uncontrolled guitar spasms make it a foundational text for all the offshoots of rock music that would adapt the style to personal, painful, and rebellious subjects.
Standout tracks: "Cowgirl In The Sand", "Down By The River", "Cinnamon Girl".
by SSUS
John Coltrane - A Love Supreme (1965)
[Spiritual Jazz]
A lot of people have called this the best jazz record of all time, and usually that’s the kind of thing that puts a lot of pressure on people from outside jazz to appreciate it. A Love Supreme isn’t an easy record, even if it’s still on the most accessible side of the spectrum, so I don’t think it should be someone’s first jazz album. But I do think that anyone with an interest in jazz (and music in general) should get to it eventually. Even all the praise aside, there is something magical about the performances on this album. Up to that point Coltrane’s work has mostly been in the more conventional modal jazz subgenre, and just two years prior he had done a collaboration with Duke Ellington. Even though all of the three other performers on this record have worked with Coltrane before, it feels like something changed in the way that A Love Supreme feels more avant-garde in its performance. At this point free jazz and avant-garde jazz were already developing, and Coltrane would pursue that more in the following albums, leaving A Love Supreme as a sweet spot, containing the spiritual-tinged avant-garde jazz to follow in a more accessible and beautifully composed manner, and one in which the saxophone, the piano, the bass, and the drums (oh, especially the drums) all get to have their moments to shine. The avant-garde edge leaves some of the instrumental layers feeling a bit too independent, which is why this might feel jarring to unaccustomed listeners, but the melodies and the performances that create them feel imbued with so much spiritual emotion.
Standout tracks: “Acknowledgement”, “Resolution”, “Pursuance”.
Charles Mingus - The Black Saint And The Sinner Lady (1963)
[Avant-Garde Jazz]
By 1963, Charles Mingus had already been part of the pioneering move towards the avant-garde in jazz that started around 1956, even if not all of his works were avant-garde first and foremost. The Black Saint And The Sinner Lady is the one that had the longest shelf life because of how it specifically pushed the envelope of what a jazz album could be: almost conceptual in its themes, despite being completely instrumental, with an almost narrative feeling to the flow, courtesy of the fact that the album was written akin to a ballet. As a result, a lot of the songs here feel like they have more in common with the way “classical” music operates, with plenty of moments where one might forget that this is a jazz album, especially true during moments of flamenco injections. But a jazz album it is, just one where the scale has been pushed larger, and one where the large ensemble is described by Mingus as an “ethnic folk-dance” group, one that is among the first albums of its kind to benefit from studio overdubs, thus having the studio be an active participant in its creation. And all the contextual stuff aside, it’s the kind of album that gets better for me with every listen. There’s always something going on in a way that doesn’t feel overwhelming, and there’s always something new to appreciate with every listen.
Standout tracks: “Stop! Look! And Listen, Sinner Jim Whitney!”, “(Soul Fusion) Freewoman And Oh, This Freedom's Slave Cries”, “Of Love, Pain, And Passioned Revolt, Then Farewell, My Beloved, 'til It's Freedom Day”.
Miles Davis - In A Silent Way (1969)
[Jazz Fusion]
Miles Davis has two huge albums: Kind Of Blue in 1959 and Bitches Brew in 1970. You’ll notice that both of them inconveniently miss out on the ‘60s by one year, so In A Silent Way is kind of like the compromise of being the third best Miles Davis, yet it is still one of the best records of the decade. The ‘60s themselves ran through a great musical controversy when Bob Dylan went electric, but I don’t think that Miles Davis going electric with this record remained as much in public consciousness. Revisiting this, I am amazed to find less of the fiery energy of its follow-up in Bitches Brew; instead Miles’s first electric record is cool and atmospheric, almost like he took the title way too seriously. Sporting a lineup that featured future jazz legends like Wayne Shorter on sax, John McLaughlin on guitar, and Chick Corea and Herbie Hancock on piano, among others, In A Silent Way takes some cues from the jazz-rock blend happening at the time as well as from “classical” music, then uses tape editing in a way that blends multiple performances of separate movements into a single track in a way that seems almost blasphemous by the time’s standards. I’m convinced that a lot of what made the early ‘70s great for jazz fusion and prog rock is owed to this record.
Standout tracks: “In A Silent Way / It's About That Time”.
Frank Zappa - Hot Rats (1969)
[Jazz-Rock]
Frank Zappa is another case of a musician who is more famous than his own music, recognizable for that moustache (ironically not visible on this album’s cover), for being such an ambassador for experimental music and satirical music, and also for being an anti-censorship advocate. The 1960s side of his career is mostly the work that he did with The Mothers Of Invention group, themselves a landmark in experimental rock, with Hot Rats being Zappa’s second solo album and the first to be released after that group’s temporary breakup. I’m picking it not just because it has Zappa’s name actually on it, but because it’s a much easier entry point into his discography, being a somewhat more conventional work than the overtly experimental rest of the ‘60s catalog, taking the jazz leanings already present in them, keeping the feeling of zaniness but stripping the musique concrete experiments. Being almost fully instrumental, with “Willie The Pimp” the only song to contain vocals, courtesy of Captain Beefheart (more on him later), and having Zappa performing guitars on the record (unlike his first solo album, Lumpy Gravy, where he was just conducting) make Hot Rats a pretty great showing of Zappa’s abilities as a musician and songwriter besides just being a pioneer of experimental rock, with a lot of the album featuring long improvisational solos that are a staple of jazz by itself, though here they also have Zappa’s eccentric touch. It’s worth looking up the ‘80s remixed version of this album solely for those extra four minutes tossed into “The Gumbo Variations”.
Standout tracks: “Peaches En Regalia”, “Willie The Pimp”, “The Gumbo Variations”.
Nina Simone - Pastel Blues (1965)
[Soul | Vocal Jazz]
We’ve reached the point where we get to artists with only very indirect ties to metal at most, and also ones where it’s harder to pinpoint a single album to recommend rather than just recommending the artist themselves. The choice of Pastel Blues for Nina Simone is a pretty uncontroversial entry point into her discography, even if perhaps a live album could’ve covered more ground and showcased how great of a live performer she was. But Pastel Blues does cover ground and showcases Nina’s great performance, too, even if the album is barely 35 minutes long. I tagged it as “soul” and “vocal jazz”, but for a singer/songwriter album of the mid-’60s, there’s even more to mention, with a lot of it having quite a bluesy feel, some more overtly bluesy, some more of a rhythm & blues kind. The album opens with “Be My Husband”, something more in line with the “work songs” that predated the blues, which does feel like a contrasting tone-setter when it’s followed by “Nobody Knows You When You're Down And Out”, which is about as standard of a piano blues song as you can get. That itself contrasts in Nina’s tone of voice with the following track, with how explosive it is on the former and how low in tone and volume it is on “End Of The Line”. There’s a certain darkness on the latter, though that’s only a small taste compared to the final two tracks, ones informed by Nina’s involvement in the civil rights movement. “Strange Fruit” is as gut-wrenching as any doom metal song in how minimal the piano playing is and how expressive and bellowing the pain in Nina’s vocals is, while “Sinnerman” extends the gospel spiritual in a sprawling, epic 10 minutes that also shows more of Nina’s piano playing.
Standout tracks: “End Of The Line”, “Strange Fruit”, “Sinnerman”.
Otis Redding - Otis Blue (1965)
[Soul]
Once again there’s something that feels weird looking back retrospectively about albums from this era being so full of covers. It’s something that kinda comes with exploring the music of the ‘60s, and it’s not relegated just to soul or just to this decade, but Otis Blue is especially an interesting case study. Listening to it I was met with a lot of songs I was familiar with, some of which I wasn’t quite sure whether I was familiar with Otis’s version or the original or some other version. There’re songs penned by B.B. King, The Rolling Stones, Smokey Robbinson, and a lot of Sam Cooke (Otis Blue was recorded a few months after Cooke’s murder), so there’s a bit of diversity in the songs chosen here. What is even weirder though is that Otis Redding did write his own songs too, but the most famous song on this album that was written by him is “Respect”, in its own right one of the most recognizable songs of all time, just one where Aretha Franklin did such an amazing job covering it that it being a cover, let alone an Otis Redding one, feels like deep lore. Songwriting shenanigans aside, Otis Blue is an amazing soul record, and you can tell why it’s seen as one of the best soul records. Not only does it have names like Isaac Hayes and Booker T & The MGs in the backing personnel, but you can also tell how much gospel DNA is in soul from Otis’s performance.
Standout tracks: “Change Gonna Come”, “I’ve Been Loving You Too Long”, “My Girl”.
James Brown - Live At The Apollo (1963)
[Soul | Rhythm & Blues]
James Brown is a name that’s impossible not to encounter in the history of music, being such a massive influence on popular music, not only for how his move from R&B and soul ballads towards more sexually charged material eventually gave birth to funk, but also for how wild of a live performer he was. More of a singles artist than an album artist, it thus makes more sense to pick a live album. I can safely assume that anyone alive with any interest in music has heard “I Feel Good”, “Papa’s Got A Brand New Bag”, “Sex Machine”, or “It’s A Man’s World” (actual titles much longer), so this particular pick finds a James Brown who’s still in the early phases of his career, with the performance recorded in October 1962, before any of those hits were released and made him larger than life. But by this time he was already introduced as “the hardest-working man in show business”, and he already had fans screaming when the titles of the hits to be played were announced. James is still not as wild of a performer as he’d eventually turn out to be, but the seeds for it are there: you can tell that in the shorter songs with their bursts of energy and in the vocal acrobatics on the much longer “Lost Someone”. At this point the material is more R&B- and doo-wop-inspired, with the backing vocal group The Famous Flames providing a more traditional choir contrast to James’s more passionate vocals. At barely over half an hour, Live At The Appolo feels like the spot where the legend started.
Standout tracks: “I’ll Go Crazy”, “I Don’t Mind”, “Lost Someone”.
B.B. King - Live At The Regal (1965)
[Electric Blues]
Since metal comes from all kinds of rock strands, one of the most important being blues rock, it’s only fair to go one step further and check “blues” itself out. Sure, this is “electric blues”, so it’s a version of the sound that had already gone through its own developments and commercialization, but what better place to start with than with B.B. King, the most recognizable name in the genre? Live At The Regal is still somewhat early in the man’s career (recorded in November 1964), so “The Thrill Is Gone” is still a couple of years away (still a ‘60s song, though one I assume everyone is already familiar with). This particular album is praised to hell and back, both by musicians themselves and by retrospectives, chosen for preservation and all that, and while I’m not well versed enough in the blues to tell you why this particular album gets the praise instead of others, I can tell you it’s 35 minutes of some great blues, with playing and singing that is as passionate as it gets, both in the moments that are more jovial and the ones with maybe less of the kind of stuff to appeal to the “I’d rather BB King touch me with one note than have *insert proficient guitarist* play 100 and make me feel nothing” type than expected.
Standout tracks: “Everyday I Have The Blues”, “How Blue Can You Get”, “Worry, Worry”.
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