the electric internet

The music of 1966 hits the sweet spot between two eras. On one side, you have a period dominated by professional songwriters and an unpretentious pursuit of the pleasure principle, which was ending (or at least making itself less obvious). On the other side is a period of self-conscious artistic and intellectual exploration and cultural experimentation that was just starting to bubble up from the underground. It was the beginning of pop music being treated with a measure of seriousness; the first American rock magazine, Paul Williams’ Crawdaddy!, was created in ’66, and the Beatles and Bob Dylan began openly forsaking the star system, opting to cease touring in order to focus instead on creating the blueprint for the next 40 years of rock music.

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