860 The Association “Along Comes Mary” 1966

“The Association were a successful sixties vocal-harmony group who, despite selling some 15 million copies of their singles, were unable to build a long-term career for themselves. Formed around Terry Kirkman (who had played with Frank Zappa) and Jules Alexander in Los Angeles in 1965, the group from the start ploughed the path of soft, rather than hard, rock. Signed to Valiant in 1966, they had an immediate million-seller with the controversial ‘Along Comes Mary’ (despite its soft harmonies, the song was widely regarded, like the Byrds’ ‘Eight Miles High’, as an ode to marijuana” (Phil Hardy, The Faber Companion to 20th Century Popular Music, 2001).

The Association “Along Comes Mary”

859 The Yardbirds “Heart Full of Soul” 1965

“The three successive lead guitarists of the highly influential Yardbirds personified the changes in (London-based) British rock of the sixties: from blues (Eric Clapton) through the beginnings of psychedelia (Jeff Beck) to heavy rock (Jimmy Page, who formed Led Zeppelin as a direct descendant of the Yardbirds.) As was the case with many British groups of the early sixties, Samwell-Smith (bass), Relf (vocals), Dreja (guitar) and McCarty (drums) met while performing in school and folk-club bands. They formed the Metropolitan Blues Quartet in 1963, which became the Yardbirds with the addition of lead guitarist Topham. With the arrival of Clapton to replace Topham, who chose to remain at art school (Phil Hardy, The Faber Companion to 20th Century Popular Music, 2001).

The Yardbirds “Heart Full of Soul”

858 The Yardbirds “For Your Love” 1965

“‘For Your Love’ was composed in the changing room of a men’s clothing shop where one of British pop’s great enigmas then worked. The originator of smashes, home and abroad, for The Hollies, Herman’s Hermits, Dave Berry, Freddie & the Dreamers and Wayne Fontana as well as The Yardbirds, Manchester’s Graham Gouldman was oddly unable to get far with his own groups, The Whirlwinds and then The Mockingbirds—whose 1964 version ‘For Your Love’ had been urned down by Columbia…At first, Gouldman’s manager Harvey Lisberg pondered sending the number to The Beatles—but as Graham himself would muse with a laugh, ‘They were doing all right in the songwriting department…but he still mentioned the idea to a publisher friend, who suggested that instead it should be offered to The Yardbirds as they were looking to break away from pure R&B and become more commercial” (Alan Clayson, The Yardbirds, 2002). 

The Yardbirds “For Your Love”

857 Stevie Wonder “Uptight (Everything’s Alright)” 1965

“When they finished working and released the record in December 1965, ‘Uptight’ exploded with a funky, exuberant expression of the gospel vision. Paying Stevie’s debt to Ray Charles in full, the song’s celebration of redemptive love rang out in a stirring call and response with the chorus of voices that was transforming the American soundscape…Most white rockers set themselves up in defiant opposition to the stifling worlds where they’d grown up. Wonder never gave a thought to rejecting his elders and ancestors. Backed by James Jamerson’s pulsing bass and Benny Benjamin’s thunderous drums, Wonder joyously declares himself a poor man’s son from the wrong side of the tracks” (Craig Werner, Higher Ground, 2004). 

Stevie Wonder “Uptight (Everything’s Alright)”

856 Junior Wells with Buddy Guy “Hoodoo Man Blues” 1965

“Amos Wells Blakemore Jr. arrived in Chicago as a boy and made his first records in his own name in 1953, aged just eighteen. Elmore James and Muddy Waters served as session men. He learned to play harp at the feet of Sonny Boy Williamson, and he fronted The Aces—Louis and Dave Myers, and Fred Below—one of the finest of all Chicago blues bands. By the mid-1960s Junior Wells was at the forefront of the city’s blues scene, a veteran of the Muddy Waters band and the resident headline at Theresa’s Tavern…He was a genuine star, born to perform: a brooding and almost sinister presence during a slow blues, an eccentrically electrifying dancer, and a mesmerizing singer who would punctuate an impassioned tenor wail with weird, guttural clicks and growls. He sang and played as if totally possessed. When Junior Wells was up on stage, nothing else in the room could hold your attention” (Alan Harper, Waiting for Buddy Guy: Chicago Blues at the Crossroads, 2016). 

Junior Wells with Buddy Guy “Hoodoo Man Blues”

855 The Who “My Generation” 1965

Manager Kit Lambert: “I paid my few shillings and went into the back. On a stage made entirely of beer crates…were The High Numbers, ugly in the extreme. Roger with his teeth crossed at the front, moving from foot to foot like a zombie. John immobile, looking like a stationary blob. Townshend like a lanky beanpole. Behind them Keith Moon sitting on a bicycle saddle, with his ridiculous eyes in his round moon face, bashing away for dear life, sending them all up and ogling the audience. They were all quarrelling among themselves between numbers. Yet there was an evil excitement about it all and instantly I know they could become world superstars” (John Perry, Meaty, Beaty, Big & Bouncy: The Who, 1998). The Who Sings My Generation album is listed on the National Recording Registry of the Library of Congress.

The Who “My Generation”

854 The Who “I Can’t Explain” 1964

Pete Townshend: “I grew up in Acton, and heard Ken Colyer’s band locally near Hounslow where my friend Jimpy lived. His band was called the Crane River Band, and they played all the Louis Armstrong marching songs. Ken had actually gone to New Orleans in the Merchant Navy, and came back with stories about Louis Armstrong. Before The Who, John Entwistle and I had a jazz band called The Confederates, and we played all those songs. Later, when I made the connection that a lot of skiffle (that grew out of Trad Jazz in the UK) was based on country blues, I started looking further, and found Snooks Eaglin and a few others from New Orleans itself. I think rock ‘n’ roll related to, and grew partly out of New Orleans jazz…” (John Swenson, Offbeat, 2 May 2015).  

The Who “I Can’t Explain”

853 The We Five “Let’s Get Together” and “You Were On My Mind” 1965

“A major attraction on the San Francisco scene, We Five found that elusive middle ground between folk and pop and enjoyed a fair amount of success stateside in the latter half of the Sixties…At their best, they harnessed their instinctive folk sensibilities to more commercial songs…We Five were also the first of many bands to feature on a Coca-Cola advertisement…How To Make A Soft Drink Commercial includes some attempts they made and making the perfect jingle before they nailed it” (Music Week, 7 March 2009). 

The We Five “Let’s Get Together” 

The We Five “You Were On My Mind” 

852 Junior Walker and the All Stars “Shotgun” 1965

“Born Autry DeWalt II in 1942 in Blythesville, Arkansas, the saxophonist was nicknamed Junior by his stepfather, whose name was Walker. When he turned professional in 1962, he took up the stage name of Junior Walker while still signing his compositions with the DeWalt monicker. Walker’s honking, hard-driving style was heavily influenced by Earl Bostic, a Lionel Hampton sideman and one of the early exponents of the R&B and jazz crossover genre. In the late Fifties, Walker met up with the guitarist Willie Wood in the South Bend area of Indiana and formed the band Jumping Jacks. In 1961, an over-excited fan jumped on stage in Battle Creek, Michigan, and shouted ‘These guys are all stars.’ The name stuck…Detroit was the place to be for black musicians in the mid-Sixties and Junior Walker was keen to join label-mates like the Temptations, the Four tops and the Supremes in the charts. In 1965, while playing a gig in Benton Harbor, Michigan, he spotted two teenagers doing an unusual dance they called the Shotgun: Walker went back to his motel room, penned an infectious tune he simply called ‘Shotgun’ and recorded it as soon as he was back in Detroit” (Pierre Perrone, The Independent (London), 25 Nov. 19950).   

Junior Walker and the All Stars “Shotgun”

851 The Turtles “It Ain’t Me Babe” 1965

“This is a great example of how, even on a song you love and think you know by heart, Dylan can trick you. Given just a perfunctory listen, ‘It Ain’t Me, Babe’ comes off as a guy’s admission that he’s just no damn good, and, as a result, he is chivalrously stepping away from a girl who holds him in lofty status in her mind…When the Turtles took the song to the U.S. Top 10 in 1965, they seemed practically gleeful in re-telling Dylan’s tale. In their hands, ‘It Aint’t Me, Babe’ came off sounding like a guy who knew he was the weak link in the relationship and was completely unapologetic about it. That same year, Johnny and June Carter Cash put out a duet of the song which messed with the context in fascinating ways, taking Bob’s measured words and shouting them at each other like two former lovers who were each trying to win the blame game” (Jim Beviglia, Counting Down Bob Dylan: His 100 Finest Songs, 2013). 

The Turtles “It Ain’t Me, Babe”

850 Them “Gloria” 1964

“The release of ‘Baby Please Don’t Go/’Gloria’ in November of 1964 is the landmark record that changed, however briefly, how the world saw Belfast and, just as importantly, how Belfast saw itself…The record is ‘one of the greatest achievements of the British R’n’B scene of the time and, by extension, one of the most significant achievements of the beat era in Ireland’. It was selected as the signature theme tune of ‘the most hip programme on British television of the time’—Ready Set Go—and hence conferred on Belfast a ‘cultural cache that wasn’t there previously” (Noel McLaughlin, Joanna Braniff, Popular Music History, 2015).

Them “Gloria”

849 The Supremes “Stop! In the Name of Love” 1965

“This one was inspired by an argument between its composer, Lamont Dozier, and his girlfriend. Just as she was about to take a swing at him after catching him in a lie, Lamont shouted out, ‘Please, baby! Stop! In the name of love!’ Years later, he recalled, ‘It was so corny and silly that we burst out laughing. Then, I said, Ding, ding, ding! And she asked, What’ that? And I said, It’s the cash register, baby. Can’t you hear it? In other words, I knew in that very second that I had a hit, and it would be for the Supremes. Oh, and it also ended the fight’” (J. Randy Taraborrelli, Diana Ross: An Unauthorized Biography, 2007). 

The Supremes “Stop! In the Name of Love”

848 The Statler Brothers “Flowers on the Wall” 1965

“The ride began in the early 1960s when the Statler Brothers, who had formed in 1955 and later took their name from a box of tissues in a hotel room, first opened for Johnny Cash. Agent Marshall Grant had seen them perform in 1963 and remembered them the following year when Cash’s band was searching for background vocalists…The Statler Brothers’ own historic recording career commenced when Cash was late for a session at Owen Bradley’s fabled Quonset Hut studio. Cash producer and Columbia executive Don Law asked the group if it wanted to record something. Grant says, ‘So Don pushed the button and we recorded Flowers on the Wall’” (Jim Bessman, Billboard, 7 Dec. 2002). 

The Statler Brothers “Flowers on the Wall”

847 Sonny and Cher “I Got You Babe” 1965

“The son of Italian immigrants (father Santo was a truck driver, mother Jean a beautician), he tried to break into show business after graduating from high school in Inglewood, Calif., in 1952. Working as a deliveryman for a meat company, he ducked into record-company offices between stops to peddle his songs. By 1962 he was working in promotion for an independent record distributor. Bono was 27 and separated from his first wife when he took a liking to 16-year-old runaway Cherilyn LaPierre on a double date in 1963…Deciding that Cher was star material, Sonny brought her to impresario Phil Spector. Soon she was singing backup on hits like the Crystals’ ‘Da Doo Ron Ron.’ Still too shy to perform alone when given a chance to solo on ‘Baby Don’t Go’ in 1965, she insisted that Sonny sing with her, and a duo was born” (Michelle Cunneff, People, Aug. 1991). 

Sonny and Cher “I Got You Babe”

846 The Sonics “Strychnine” 1965

Jerry Roslie’s “voice—a meaty, lunatic, blast of hoodlum-R&B bravado, punctuated with bloodcurdling howls—would be Roslie’s ticket to legend with his next band, Tacoma garage-rock pioneers the Sonics” (David Frick, Rolling Stone, 7 May 2015).

“One of the earliest exponents of the garage sound cited as an influence on everyone who kicked up a fearsome racket from iggy and the Stooges to Eagles of Death Metal. Jimi Hendrix was a big fan” (Pete Clark, Evening Standard, 26 March 2008). 

The Sonics “Strychnine”

845 The Sonics “Have Love Will Travel” 1965, Richard Berry “Have Love Will Travel” 1959

“Founded in 1961 by guitarist Larry Parypa and his bassist brother, Andy, the Sonics were part of a singular Northwest ferment with the Kingsmen, the Fabulous Wailers, and Paul Revere and the Raiders, packing teen dances with Fifties-R&B fundamentals and proto-punk ferocity. The Sonics—with drummer Bob Bennett—were rougher than the rest. ‘We used to call beer our polish,’ Roslie says. ‘We’d dring beer to become polished’” (David Frick, Rolling Stone, 7 May 2015). 

Richard Berry “became a street-smart L.A. record hustler, the studio rat who seemed born to stay up all night, singing into a mike for pleasure and profit. Berry possessed the studio hustler’s arsenal of skills, including singing, piano playing, arranging, bandleading, and—potentially most profitably—songwriting” (Dave March, Louie Louie, 2004). 

The Sonics “Have Love Will Travel”

Richard Berry “Have Love Will Travel”

844 The Skatalites “Guns of Navarrone” 1965

“The Skatalites’ sound was born in Kingston, Jamaica, where several of the original members graduated from the Alpha Boys School, a prestigious arts and trade academy, in the 1940s.” Drummer Lloyd Knibb converted the African rhythms of hand drums “onto a trap set, playing all three drum parts at the same time. He took the sound into the studio and with boogie-woogie melodies laid on top of the nyabinghi beats, ska was born. Suddenly the city’s top vocalists were clamoring to record over the ska beats. Knibb and company found themselves backing a who’s who of soon-to-be Jamaican legends” (Sengupta Stith, Austin American-Statesman, 16 April 2015). 

The Skatalites “Guns of Navarrone”

843 Sir Douglas Quintet “She’s About a Mover” 1965

“In the brazen spirit of the best garage rock, a music in which gumption and attitude mean more than craft and creativity, it represented a ruse by a band from San Antonio to grow long hair, wear ‘mod’ clothes, and pass itself off as the latest British sensation…The scheme succeeded, at least initially, despite the fact that two of the five were Chicanos (swarthier skinned than was typical of pastier British Invasion bands of the era), the singer’s yelp had a distinctively Texas twang, and the repetitive, telegraph-key insistence of the band’s signature Vox organ shared more with the accordion-laced two-step of the Tex-Mex cantina than with the buoyant guitar jangle of Liverpool’s Cavern Club” (Don McLeese, Popular Music and Society, October 2006).

Sir Douglas Quintet “She’s About a Mover”

842 Simon and Garfunkel “The Sound of Silence” 1965

At the Flamingo Club in London, 1964, “There wasn’t anyone around to entertain the large audience. Then suddenly we noticed a young kid with a guitar sitting on the floor. Curly Goss, the promoter, asked him his name. It was Paul…Paul Simon and he was American. Anyway, this unknown kid from New York was dragged onto the stage and started with ‘Church is Burning’, followed it with ‘Leaves That Are Green’ and then ‘The Sound of Silence’. Just then he waved to a tall fair-haired kid at the back of the club, asking him to join him and together they sang ‘Benedictus’. Everyone was flabbergasted. They’d knocked the audience out. We got into conversation and soon learnt to our disappointment that both were returning to New York the next day” (Robert Matthew-Walker, Simon and Garfunkel, 1984). The Sounds of Silence album is listed on the National Recording Registry of the Library of Congress. 

Simon and Garfunkel “The Sound of Silence”

841 The Shangri-Las “Out in the Streets” 1965

“George Morton was born in 1940 in Richmond, Virginia but grew up in Brooklyn, New York. When he was 14, his family moved to Hicksville, on Long Island, a decision taken by his parents, according to Morton, to keep him out of the trouble. Needless to say, he found a gang to run with on Long Island and at school formed a doo-wop group, the Marquees. By his early twenties, Morton was loafing around and his entry into the music industry came about by accident, through an acquaintance with Ellie Greenwich, who was married to Jeff Barry...A skeptical Barry then challenged him to bring him some of his work. In fact, Morton at that stage did not have a single song.” But he wrote a demo performed by session players, Billy Joel and the Shangri-Las, and became “a key architect of the ‘girl group’ sound.” When he left the music business, he “found a second unlikely career designing golf clubs” (The Times (London), 18 February 2013). 

The Shangri-Las “Out in the Streets”