Most important/influential MUSICAL artists of the 60s?

[bbernardini]

Part of my 8th grade curriculum is a history of rock music. Over the years, I've been meaning to type up a list of important and/or influential artists from each decade. Today, I'm finally getting around to it. I figured I'd start with the 60s (not that I won't cover the 50s...I just felt like starting with the 60s). Below is a list of artists I've got so far. I'm sure I'm missing about a zillion, most of which I'll feel really stupid about missing. If you don't see something you think is essential, could you please add it? Thanks.

Up next, the 70s. But now...

The Beatles
The Beach Boys/Brian Wilson
The Kinks
The Rolling Stones
Jimi Hendrix
The Temptations
The Four Tops
Jefferson Airplane
The Grateful Dead
The Monkees
Aretha Franklin
The Supremes
Phil Spector
The Who
The Doors
The Yardbirds
The Byrds
James Brown
Bob Dylan
Otis Redding

[Magrittes Pipe]

1. The Monks, the Sonics, The United States of America, Love, The Fugs....

Most people you talk to won't even have heard of most of these bands. That said, they are VERY influential in the rock & roll ouvre, and the research you do will be a lot more fun (start by reading "Black Monk Time" by Thomas Edward Shaw -- GREAT book).

OH! And don't forget the Velvet Underground.

[The empressof all]

2. Buffalo Springfield (nt)

[mac56]

3. A couple of influences you should touch on

were Brazilian and Indian music.

Joao Gilberto and Antonio Carlos Jobim for the former, Ravi Shankar for the latter.

[Howardx]

4. i theink the influence the yardbirds had

is always underrated, look at the three guitarists they had and the influence on heavy music the band had.

[kcwayne]

5. Cream

Eric Clapton, Jack Bruce, and Ginger Baker were one of the most influential innovators of acid rock/blues

[Wilber_Stool]

6. Almost all of them.......n/t

(800, it's over)

[KurtNYC]

7. Carlos Santana

Who fused rock and latin percussion. Discovered by rock promoter and salsa afficianado Bill Graham.
http://www.delafont.com/music_acts/santana.htm

And I would add Led Zepplin, even though their fame was greatest in the 1970s, the first album was out in 1969 and it spawned the sound of rock in the 1970s which was used by such other artists as Aerosmith. My uncle who was drummer in a band at the time recalls bringig home the album and calling his bandmates after 2 songs to tell them to get over here and listen to this. He says of the event,"We all knew the bar had been raised. The complexity of rythm, the overall sound, the look and the subject matter were like almost nothing that came before it."

[FunBobbyMucha]

8. Why are the Kinks so forgotten these days?

I see nowhere near the hero worship for them as for Beatles/Stones/Zep/Who.

Is it the same reason that the Jam are less known in the states than the Clash? Namely that Mssrs. Davies and Weller wrote in such a British voice that they didn't transcend the way these others did?

[Magrittes Pipe]

11. Not too easy for Americans to get all worked up over "Victoria."

;)

The sounds Dave coaxed out of his Harmony Meteor came to define the mid-to-late '60s guitar sound, though. The Beatles' and Stones' songwriting influenced the early Kinks, but the Kinks influenced the sound of the Beatles and Stones.

And even in the States, you're gonna find PLENTY of people bouncing around to "You Really Got Me," "All Day and All of the Night," "Well Respected Man," and "Dedicated Follower of Fashion." Not to mention "Lola."

But yeah, most of the later Kinks stuff just doesn't translate well to my more parochial countrymen.

[bbernardini]

9. Here's a few I've added, besides your suggestions:

Simon & Garfunkel
Frank Zappa
Ray Charles
John Coltrane

[ChavezSpeakstheTruth]

10. Dali, Pollock, Stella, Close.....

[bbernardini]

12. Some more that I added...

Booker T and the MGs
The Turtles
B.B. King
Albert King
Freddie King
Buddy Guy
The Moody Blues
Van Morrison
Willie Nelson
Herman’s Hermits
Stevie Wonder

[bbernardini]

13. Perhaps some more British Invasion?

I'm thinking along these lines:

The Hollies
Gerry & The Pacemakers
Freddie & The Dreamers
The Animals

[Squeech]

14. Define influential

Because I think your list is too big.

Jefferson Airplane was great-- my favorite band, back in the day-- but I defy you to point out any influence they've had in the subsequent evolution of rock. Precious few other bands even *understood* what they were doing, let alone capable of emulating.

On the flip side, I don't think the Supremes were influential in and of themselves; more like the Motown machine and the Funk Brothers as a rhythm section constituted a sound and a production system that cast a humongous shadow on the future of R&B. (Similarly, the Monkees were an "influence" only on other manufactured boy bands, from New Kids on the Block to N'Sync-- or, rather, on their handlers.)

But I would add the Animals, and Janis Joplin, and Sly and the Family Stone. And, going back a ways, Buddy Holly and the Crickets.

And maybe Country Joe and the Fish, for proving you could fight the power and still have fun doing it.

And Phil Ochs, for proving you could write the harshest critiques with the prettiest melodies.

[Hubert Flottz]

15. The Animals!

Sam Cooke, Smoky Robinson, Otis Redding, Marvin Gaye, Roy Orbison, Big Brother and the Holding Company, Country Joe, The Four Tops, The Drifters, The Coasters, Martha Reeves, The Supremes, Mary Wells, Sam and Dave, Chuck Jackson and Maxine Brown, Percy Sledge, Spider Turner, Cream, The Who, Iron Butterfly, Ike & Tina Turner, The Esquires, The Ventures, you could go on and on and on!

Edit} THE STAX STORY

http://staxrecords.free.fr/staxstory.htm

[lpbk2713]

16. Comprehensive list. I would only add......

Gladys Knight.

[DelawareValleyDem]

17. I'd include

John Mayall's Bluesbreakers, a breeding ground for a number of stars.
A couple other groups who got started in the late 60s and were very influential were the Band, the Allman Brothers and Creedence Clearwater Revical

[ralps]

18. How about Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young

and Joni Mitchell

[Contrary1]

19. Janis Joplin, Simon and Garfunkel, The Mamas and the Papas