“That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.” Thus spoke Neil Armstrong. (Cue the Richard Strauss soundtrack.) With the Apollo 11 mission in July of 1969—a little more than a year after the world had its collective mind blown in movie theaters by Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey—the world had its mind expanded more profoundly by a real-life lunar landing, broadcast live on TV. Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first humans on the moon, and 20% of the world was watching. The Space Race was won.
Closer to earth, 1969 saw the first test flights of both the faster-than-the-speed-of-sound Concorde and the Boeing 747 jumbo jet. And on the ground, Pontiac unveiled its iconic Trans Am. Culturally, the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) was created.
Yet not all in America was forward progress. In many ways, the fabric of American culture was starting to fray. The excesses of the 1960s’ counterculture movement were starting to erode its foundation. The positive, change-the-world vibes that had begun the movement were becoming progressively clouded by more and more excessive drug use. After years of substance-abuse problems and fractured relationships, recently fired Rolling Stones guitarist Brian Jones was found dead in his swimming pool. In the world of politics, the reputation of the fabled Kennedy family was stained by the incident at Chappaquiddick, in which Senator Ted Kennedy lost control of his car on a bridge and escaped the sinking vehicle, leaving passenger Mary Jo Kopechne to drown inside.
And counterculture figure Charles Manson attracted a group of disaffected followers that developed into a doomsday cult. In prophesying an upcoming apocalyptic race war, Manson (a white supremacist) wove together a web of textual connections between the Book of Revelations in the Bible and the Beatles’ eponymous (White) album, most famously adopting the term “Helter Skelter” to refer to the coming chaos. The resulting murders committed by the Manson family were a watershed moment in revealing the dangerous directions the counterculture movement could lead.
Retrospectively, two rock concerts from 1969 have come to tell the story of the culmination and collapse of the 1960s: the Woodstock music festival in upstate New York on August 15-18 and the disaster at the free concert at Altamont Speedway in California. Woodstock showed the counterculture at its musical peak—a festival featuring 32 acts (a veritable Who’s Who of prominent musicians) playing across four days to an audience of more than 400,000 people. It became a cultural touchstone for an entire generation, the symbolic fruition of the flower-power, free-love, psychedelic music movement.
But when the Hells Angels motorcycle club was hired to provide security at a free concert at the Altamont Speedway in California on December 6, the results were disastrous. Excessive drug use in the audience and free beer consumption by the bikers—plus the unfortunate placement of the stage at the bottom of a hill, causing the force of the 300,000-stong audience pushing ever downwards—proved a recipe for catastrophe. Chaos brewed throughout the event (prompting The Grateful Dead to cancel their appearance) and finally erupted during the Rolling Stones’ headlining performance. The resulting violence left four dead; most notably, the Hells Angels beat and stabbed Meredith Hunter after he pulled out a gun near the stage.
Unaware of the incident, the Stones played on. But literally and symbolically, the ‘60s were over.
My Top 6 Albums of 1969
Note: Some of this commentary is adapted from that in No Hype No Trends Music’s 200 Best Albums of the 1960s.
As always, you can jump to the playlist at the bottom of each post to listen while you read.
Within each tier (Top 6, Next 6, etc.), all albums are listed roughly chronologically (all release dates from Wikipedia, unless otherwise noted).
The Velvet Underground
The Velvet Underground
The Velvet UndergroundReleased 1969/03
After getting their full noise-rock freak on for their second album, White Light/White Heat, Lou Reed and the Velvets reveal their gentle side for much of this album. It’s hard to believe that the band that delivers such tender moments as “Candy Says,” “Pale Blue Eyes,” and “Jesus” here was the same one that had earlier cranked out such earsplitting noise as “Sister Ray” and “I Heard Her Call My Name.” But the album’s peak for me is the rhythm-guitar-driven “What Goes On”; when the effects-laden droning guitar solo comes in over the rhythmic surge, I am entranced, transported.
Listen to more Velvet Underground.
Read more in my top 20 of the decade.
Notable Critical Mentions:
- Acclaimed Music top albums of the ’60s, No. 044
- 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die (2005)
- SPIN: The Top 100 Alternative Albums of the 1960s, No. 022
- SPIN: The Top 100 Alternative Albums (SPIN Alternative Record Guide, 1995), No. 041
- Rolling Stone: 100 Best Albums of the Past 20 Years (1987), No. 097
- Rolling Stone: 500 Greatest Albums of All Time (2003), No. 314
- NME Writers Top 100 Albums (1993), No. 058
- NME Greatest Albums of the ’60s (1993), No. 031
- Uncut 200 Greatest Albums of All Time (2016), No. 052
- Paste 60 Best Albums of the 1960s, No. 049
The Mothers of Invention
Uncle Meat
The Mothers of InventionReleased 1969/04/21
Uncle Meat was and remains my favorite Mothers/Zappa album, by a wide margin. Other albums may get all the critical and cultural props (most notably We’re Only in it for the Money), but as far as I’m concerned none come close to Uncle Meat’s quality and breadth. It has more amusing songs than Money (with less obvious targets) and a broader, more adventurous, more exhilarating musical scope.
Indeed, Uncle Meat displays the full breadth of Frank Zappa’s ambitions—off-kilter doo-wop absurdity, freak-out jazz jams, odd spoken word segments, satire (ranging from witty and sophisticated to downright sophomoric), modernist classical arrangements, rocking guitar, and more. I’ll take the surreal doo-wop humor of “The Air” and the jazz-rock jam “King Kong” over anything from Money. Check it out.
Listen to more Mothers of Invention and Frank Zappa.
Read more in my top 20 of the decade.
Notable Critical Mentions:
- Acclaimed Music top albums of the ’60s, No. 155
Sly and the Family Stone
Stand!
Sly and the Family StoneReleased 1969/05/03
Not only were Sly and the Family Stone a model of diversity, they put out some of the best, most influential music of their time. Like their personnel (black and white, male and female) their music was a potent blend—of funk, rock, and psychedelic soul.
DJ-turned-musician Sly Stone, siblings Freddie and Rose, and the rest of the band formed a seven-piece act that fused a revolutionary range of musical styles and featured multiple lead singers trading vocal lines back and forth. It feels like a true democratic collaboration, a full-on party for progress. And Stand! captures them at the peak of their early phase, with songs triumphing positivity and compassion, and rallying against prejudice.
Drug problems and conflict within the group would soon shatter their illusions, eventually derailing the group entirely. But Stand! and their subsequent masterpiece of disillusionment There’s a Riot Goin’ On (1971) are among the very finest albums of their time—soulful and funky, innovative and fresh. Essential.
Listen to more Sly and the Family Stone (coming soon).
Read more in my top 50 of the decade.
Notable Critical Mentions:
- Acclaimed Music top albums of the ’60s, No. 042
- 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die (2005)
- Rolling Stone: 100 Best Albums of the Past 20 Years (1987), No . 087
- Rolling Stone: 500 Greatest Albums of All Time (2003), No . 118
- Paste 60 Best Albums of the 1960s, No . 017
Neil Young with Crazy Horse
Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere
Neil Young with Crazy HorseReleased 1969/05/14
To me, Neil Young is one of the ultimate rock guitar gods, not because of any virtuosity or fancy effects, but because he can play a simple melody and phrase it perfectly, giving it the time and space it needs to emerge naturally from the music.
After a false start with his debut album, released after the breakup of Buffalo Springfield, Young recruited the musicians who would become Crazy Horse for his follow-up. It was a match made in country-rock heaven. On Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere, the first of his many great albums, Young learned to stretch his songs out, providing space for his calmly meandering guitar explorations, most notably on the classics “Cowgirl in the Sand” and “Down by the River.” Even mid-length songs like “Round and Round” and “Running Dry” seem imbued with an eternal patience.
But the album’s finest moment comes in one of its shortest songs, the career-highlight “Cinnamon Girl.” Here, his guitar work shines in a smaller format, with a basic, unintrusive melodic line and a guitar solo consisting of the same note repeated over and over in rhythm, managing to be more expressive with a single tone than many an elaborately noodled solo; the song ends with an unexpected guitar fanfare, just to show us he can be fancy, too.
Read more in my top 20 of the decade.
Notable Critical Mentions:
- Acclaimed Music top albums of the ’60s, No. 052
- 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die (2005)
- SPIN: 25 Greatest Albums of All Time (1989), No. 023
- Rolling Stone: 500 Greatest Albums of All Time (2003), No. 208
- NME Writers Top 100 Albums (1993), No. 063
- NME Greatest Albums of the ’60s (1993), No. 029
- Uncut 200 Greatest Albums of All Time (2016), No. 091
- Paste 60 Best Albums of the 1960s, No. 021
The Beatles
Abbey Road
The BeatlesReleased 1969/09/26
Abbey Road saw the Beatles continue their string of excellent albums, even as they were falling apart at the seams. About half the album featured the band actually collaborating as a unit; John Lennon and George Harrison in particular contributed solid numbers that were developed and completed with the band.
The other half of the album showed primarily Paul McCartney alone at the helm. Most notably, McCartney and producer George Martin cobbled together the 16-minute medley that takes up most of side two from a variety of partially finished scraps from the current Abbey Road sessions and leftovers from previous recording sessions, with little actual involvement from other members of the band. But regardless of its disparate sources, the medley is a remarkably coherent musical whole, flowing quite naturally from one fragment to the next. I consider it one of my favorite moments of McCartney’s whimsical inventiveness.
And the album as a whole ranks among their finest and most essential. Sadly, the band announced its breakup not long after its release. The 1970s would see only one more proper studio album release from the band, Let it Be.
Read more in my top 10 of the decade.
Notable Critical Mentions:
- Acclaimed Music top albums of the ’60s, No. 010
- 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die (2005)
- Rolling Stone: 100 Best Albums of the Past 20 Years (1987), No. 017
- Rolling Stone: 500 Greatest Albums of All Time (2003), No. 014
- NME Writers All-Time 100 (1974), No. 008
- NME Greatest Albums of the ’60s (1993), No. 028
- Melody Maker All-Time Top 100 (2000), No. 093
- Uncut 200 Greatest Albums of All Time (2016), No. 024
- Paste 60 Best Albums of the 1960s, No. 014
The Rolling Stones
Let It Bleed
The Rolling StonesReleased 1969/12/05
This the second of the four consecutive Rolling Stones albums that represent their peak (1968-72). It’s perhaps the least great of the four, but that would be quibbling, really. It’s still essential.
The album opens with “Gimme Shelter” surely one of their very best songs, instantly infectious and yet wildly innovative at the same time, most notably for the passionate R&B backing vocals by Merry Clayton as she sings, “Rape! Murder! It’s just a shot away!” Other songs feature more of Jagger’s quite convincing Southern US accent, which began in earnest with Beggars Banquet. And the album closes with another career highlight, “You Can’t Always Get What You Want,” complete with a choral opening and finale courtesy of the London Bach Choir.
Both of the album’s two greatest songs seem to presage the collapse of the ‘60s’ positive vibe, the need for shelter from the troubles of the world and the disenchantment with the unfulfilled promises of love, drugs, and politics. It’s only fitting that it was violence during a Rolling Stones performance the day after this album’s release that was a symbolic tipping point toward disillusionment to signal the end of the ‘60s.
Listen to more Rolling Stones.
Read more in my top 20 of the decade.
Notable Critical Mentions:
- Acclaimed Music top albums of the ’60s, No. 015
- 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die (2005)
- Rolling Stone: 100 Best Albums of the Past 20 Years (1987), No. 018
- Rolling Stone: 500 Greatest Albums of All Time (2003), No. 032
- NME Writers Top 100 Albums (1993), No. 022
- NME Greatest Albums of the ’60s (1993), No. 008
- Uncut 200 Greatest Albums of All Time (2016), No. 028
- Paste 60 Best Albums of the 1960s, No. 004
Here’s the complete 1969: The Year in Review playlist for you—three tracks per album. Enjoy!
Playlist Note:
I normally cap the length of my Year in Review playlists at just about 8.5 hours, the amount of music that in the good ol’ days way back in the early 21st century you could fit on a single burned CD of MP3 tracks (ripped at 192). However, you may notice that for 1969, my playlist is longer. So many albums from 1969 made my Top 200 of the decade that the playlist for the year went over the time limit by the time I’d included them all. So I’ve stretched the limit. If an album was one of the best of the decade, it deserves a place on the Year in Review playlist, obviously.
More 1969, The Year in Review
More Years in Review of the 1960s…
Art Citations:
- Apollo 11: By NASA – http://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/a11/AS11-40-5903HR.jpghttp://www.archive.org/details/AS11-40-5903 (TIFF image)NASA Image and Video Library, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=3847764
- Charles Manson: By California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation – California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=76142698
- Woodstock: By Source, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=15899614
- Altamont: By Unknown author – https://www.flickr.com/photos/paille-fr/6465286069, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=84896752
- Abbey Road: By Source, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=4897516
- The Velvet Underground: By Source, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1253933
- Uncle Meat: By Source, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1143253
- Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere: By Source, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2650819
- Let It Bleed: By Source, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=17196186
- Stand!: Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1407925
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