If P.E. members would post how they feel about the 60's and 70's in all areas of the lifestyle and the music, I would greatly appreciate that. I would appreciate other people's viewpoints, personal stories, and opinions on the music. I would like to know people's viewpoints ..people from every generation living today. This could start a debate...but no need to get heated over another person's comments. Maybe we could learn something from what we all disagree with in the end.
1964-1969: I listened to the 50's Elvis, American Blues Masters, British Invasion, Folk, Classical, Jazz, Art Rock, Psychedelic Rock, Electronic, Avant-Garde, Motown, R and B, Soul, and Bubblegum music. Between '64 and '65 the British Invasion was so incredibly hyped up and produced chaotic behaviour in the youth. I was a seven year old with a hobby that required collecting every Beatles single along with every album. I was a disappointed kid when I rudely discovered through a record store owner that the British Beatle albums contained more tracks and that the flow of their early albums had little to do with singles. I then realized that what the British kids were hearing was a total different representation of The Beatles music. Those albums contained some British versions of American Rock N' Roll and Lennon, McCartney, and Harrison songs which clearly didn't have to be represented along with singles in order to enjoy the album itself. Anyone else being a child in '65 ....a British Invasion fanatic and feeling a bit cheated by that?
The British Invasion was a very strange and shocking revelation. Girls screaming and trying to use physical force on the band's. Some girls threw themselves off balconies according to Charlie Watts. But my favorite band was The Kinks because they were so rebellious and very real projecting an "I don't give a shit attitude" on national television. Dave Davies had really long hair in '65 and played a "Flying V". Kids in music class were entirely enthusiastic about him. All these fads in the fashion world became overwhelming in the sense that it was vast and relentless for parents. So profound from every aspect but the word "Invasion" applied to how controlling it became over the youth.
In the late 60's began collecting Psychedelic Rock and British Blues albums that I heard from my sister's hippie friends. I loved Mike Bloomfield and Johnny Winter and then I'd be off listening to Wendy Carlos, Mort Garson, and Beaver and Krause. It was a very eclectic time for music and to a larger degree, record companies were giving the musicians the freedom to do whatever they wanted to do. Just being yourself and creating art....and reaching a crowd on a vast level was an awesome experience. Everything was up for grabs and nothing was really compartmentalized.
The Occult
In the 60's and 70's a theory existed which basically explained to observant intelligent people that drugs were the side of the coin face up , but if you flipped it over there was the occult. I don't know if I agree on that totally?? I know that the occult was a fashion statement and a farce subject for Hollywood movies in the 60's and 70's ...but it was quite debating that a Satan worshippers sect would be concerned with any of that. In the town I grew up in there were occultism related atrocities and there are several documented cases. I believe the drugs added to the sensation of being programmed by a cult leader. Several cult leaders that grew up in the 1950's disliked drugs. The only thing consistent with their agenda was smoothly operating against someone's will if they were on drugs. This I gather from personal experience as I was abused by a cult.
This is a huge debate because there isn't proof of a sect or cult abuse existing in real life. Cults do not murder and leave fascinating clues in front of your eyes to solve a mystery. You get what you get.....a body with no marks or signs of struggle. You have to investigate their belief system, ( if you can figure that out), and scope the grounds where the body was discovered. You won't nail the sect by rehearsing with the fringe evidence they purposely leave behind. Unless you're dealing with some idiots from the "Satanic Panic" era who killed someone for fame and fortune. I'm not sure if both sides of the coin can be referred to anything other than a sign of the times. People who belong to sects and have wealth and power in the community do not make drugs a priority.
Drugs
When I experienced witnessing the drug scene of the 70's I took into consideration that much of the experimentation originally derived from Dr. Timothy Leary's ideology on LSD. I gathered that he promoted LSD as being good for everybody. Although evidence of this not being true was scattered everywhere. My emphasis is not on characters like Syd Barrett and Peter Green but more importantly all the people who took it only once and never came back. Several of my friends that took it only once, could not handle it and ended up in a mental hospital acting very delusional . People do in fact make decisions on their own, but the 60's and 70's had persuasion to influence you to try anything at least once. It was a ridiculously vast environment and people in general seemed naturally keen to try something new without hardly questioning anything at all.
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