The 10 most influential rock albums of the 1960s
If the 1950s exposed the music world to rock and roll, the 1960s turned the whole thing into a cultural movement. With each passing year, another record or artist would come with a new take on the genre, brandishing new production techniques that would leave their mark on the world or writing some of the most timeless songs to come out of the counterculture revolution. The times they were a-changing, and acts like The Beatles and Bob Dylan were at the forefront of it all.
From the start of the ‘British Invasion’ to the genesis of the Summer of Love, there were always records that left an indelible impact on the future generations of rock and roll. Though not every record was revered in its time, the songs on them have aged like fine wine, bringing together different pieces of music to create a cornucopia of different sounds that no one had ever heard.
It wasn’t until the next generations that most fans would hear these albums leave their mark. Although not every record flew off the shelves at the start, those who listened to them were blown away, eventually picking up their own instruments and trying to recapture the same magic ignited when they heard this music as kids.
Some of these records are still influencing generations of musicians, taking the building blocks of rock and roll and putting different arrangements around them to expose to the world. Rock and roll might have been considered rave-up music just a few years before, but with anthems like this leading the charge, rock and roll had a good chance at changing the world.
The most influential 1960s rock albums:
10. In The Court of the Crimson King – King Crimson
Towards the end of the ‘60s, rock bands were first starting to toy with the parameters behind what constituted a hit. Although the three-minute single hadn’t worn out its welcome just yet, professional musicians were popping up left and right, thinking that there was something more to rock and roll than just a catchy tune to get on the radio. Rock was about constructing auditory art, and King Crimson’s debut album took those principles to new heights.
Throughout In the Court of the Crimson King, each band member pushes themselves to new heights that rock had never seen before. Instead of relying on blues traditions, it’s easy to detect hints of jazz, classical, and even some avant-pieces on songs like ‘Epitaph’ and ‘Moonchild’. As the album goes on, the songs’ lengths also stretch beyond their normal metric, creating musical odysseys as Greg Lake and Robert Fripp play circles around each other for minutes on end.
Even if fans didn’t know it then, this was the beginning of progressive rock music, with acts like Genesis and Yes following in King Crimson’s footsteps to make songs that went on for minutes at a time and created a story in the listener’s mind. King Crimson might have been the first progressive rock band, but as far as the band were concerned, it was always about expanding the capabilities of what music could do.
9. Tommy – The Who
From day one, Pete Townshend always knew there was more to rock and roll than the standard hit song. Although ‘My Generation’ had set the world on fire with one of the first anti-establishment anthems, Townshend wanted to dream bigger, moving beyond the tight single on experimental projects like The Who Sell Out. After inching towards telling a story on his last few records, Townshend had the idea of bringing rock and roll into the world of theatre.
Coming up with a story about a deaf, dumb and blind boy who can only find his outlet through music, Tommy is a bittersweet tale spread out across two slabs of vinyl. Across the track listing, Townshend documents Tommy’s journey from being abused by his family to finding a calling in pinball before eventually being cast out once again when his fans realise that he can’t grant them the spiritual salvation they are hoping for.
Outside of the premise, the addition of strings played a hand in bringing a baroque sensibility to rock and roll, giving every one of Townshend’s melodies an operatic scope, especially when paired with the vocals of Roger Daltrey and the thunderous sounds of Keith Moon’s drums. More than anything, this album set in motion the genesis of the concept album, with everyone from Pink Floyd to Green Day trying their hand at telling a story through music. For all of his hard work, Townshend did end up proving that music could mean something more.
8. Are You Experienced – Jimi Hendrix Experience
As the Summer of Love began sweeping across both sides of the Atlantic, the English music scene also saw a rise in blues bands. Although there were just as many people wanting to sing about living in a utopia, some of the best acts in the scene were making songs in the mould of The Rolling Stones, with caustic riffs and songs that were lowdown and dirty. In a world where blues and psychedelia seemed to be on two separate sides of the spectrum, one transplant from Seattle wondered if it was too much to ask for both.
Once Jimi Hendrix burst onto the scene, fans were blown away at what he was pulling out of his guitar. From the minute that the opening groove of ‘Purple Haze’ began, an entire generation of aspiring guitarists had found their new guitar hero, as Hendrix played a strange mixture of both rhythm and lead guitar while infusing elements of soul, blues and hard rock into his weird little concoction.
While some acts get their proper recognition in hindsight, there aren’t too many modern guitar players who will say that they weren’t influenced by Hendrix in some capacity, from his way of weaving notes together to his aesthetic as a wild drifter who turned into a wild animal when he strapped his guitar on. Other artists might leave a dent in rock history based on their output, but in a little over a half hour, Hendrix rewrote the rulebook on what lead guitar was supposed to be.
7. The Stooges – The Stooges
Most music to come over the radio in the mid-1960s tended to be more family-friendly than anything else. Although some bands were making some experimental music that wasn’t exactly meant for kids, they were mainly reserved for niche audiences rather than on the hit parade. As the decade ended, though, a band emerged from Detroit looking like one of the most dangerous acts of all time.
As fans got used to Iggy and The Stooges, their debut album became the clarion call for punks everywhere, with Iggy singing about everything from being bored to wanting to cause as much destruction as possible by the song’s end. Though some anarchism was involved, Iggy knew exactly what he was doing, using his performance art to relate to his audience more profoundly than just a catchy tune.
Although most potential fans kept their distance at their first handful of shows, The Stooges’ army quickly began to show their colours, becoming some of the first punk rock bands when the next revolution started nearly a decade later. Rock and roll might be about the song at the end of the day, but there’s nothing wrong with introducing a little anarchy into the fray every now and then.
6. Highway 61 Revisited – Bob Dylan
There will likely never be another artist whose work will be mulled over quite like Bob Dylan’s. Throughout his career as a folk-rock songsmith, Dylan was heralded as one of the most foundational artists of his generation, garnering fans in acts like The Byrds and The Beatles while penning some timeless anthems like ‘Blowin in the Wind’. While Dylan might have been on the road to legendary status, one of his greatest works happened with the sharpest pivot of his career.
After the experimentation with rock music on the flip side of Bringing It All Back Home, Dylan dared to dream bigger on Highway 61 Revisited, writing songs with the same amount of depth as his earlier work with an added punch in the arrangements. Though folk purists cried ‘sell-out’ when Dylan decided to pick up an electric guitar, the sounds he made on this record still reverberate throughout the music world, like the takedown of journalists on ‘Ballad of a Thin Man’ or people trying to find their way through a cruel world on ‘Desolation Row’.
While this might have been everything Dylan fans wanted out of their hero, he doesn’t claim to have all the answers on this album, either. Listening to a track like ‘Like A Rolling Stone’, Dylan is looking to tear down the movement that he’s built around himself and pave a way towards something different. It wouldn’t be easy, but Dylan needed this kind of album to hold onto his humanity.
5. The Doors – The Doors
When talking about some of the most influential acts of the ‘60s, it usually involves some of the biggest bands out of England. Even though artists from the US may have started rock and roll, it took acts like The Beatles and The Animals to turn it into a global phenomenon, making electric guitars look like one of the coolest things in the world. Although The Doors may have grown up in the early rock scene, Jim Morrison had other plans when he began his journey of musical self-discovery.
On The Doors’ debut album, Morrison paints vivid pictures of what he thinks life should be about, whether trying to break into another consciousness on ‘Break On Through’ or trying to satisfy his sexual desire on ‘Light My Fire’. As Morrison tried to make a mental breakthrough, the rest of the band brought new elements to rock and roll, with no bass player to speak of and some of their greatest songs being carried by Ray Manzarek’s amazing keyboard work.
Although The Doors were only out for their own version of fun, the next generations of rock fans latched onto their innate sexual nature, from how Morrison conducted himself onstage to the warped view of reality they created when making their masterpieces. For all of the great sonic vignettes coming out of the Haight-Ashbury scene at the time, there was always a dark side to flower power, and it took The Doors to hold a mirror up to those dark images.
4. Pet Sounds – The Beach Boys
In a world when rock and roll was progressing, The Beach Boys were starting to look more and more passé by the day. As acts like The Beatles began making their own masterpieces, the pop machine from California still pumped out disposable tunes having to do with driving cars or surfing up and down the beach. The Beach Boys could have kept their schtick going until the end of time, but that wasn’t quite good enough for Brian Wilson.
After hearing The Beatles’ Rubber Soul, Wilson wanted to make a musical statement great enough to match the Liverpool band, crafting Pet Sounds from the vivid sounds in his head. Although Wilson initially got pushback from the rest of the band for his strange concepts, his work with studio legends The Wrecking Crew made for some of the smartest pop arrangements ever made, weaving intricate chords into beautiful songs such as ‘Wouldn’t It Be Nice’ and ‘God Only Knows’.
While The Beach Boys eventually got their masterpiece, it would cost Wilson a little bit of his sanity as well, having a meltdown while on the road and never having his initial follow-up Smile come to pass until years later. Even without Wilson’s mega follow-up, there are only so many pop songwriters today who could even hope to reach the heights of what Pet Sounds achieved.
3. The Velvet Underground and Nico – The Velvet Underground
Art rock was never meant to be on the charts for long. Although massive acts at the time were progressing by leaps and bounds, some of the greatest artists were often relegated to the bottom side of the Hot 100, either tapering off or never seeing any of their songs on the pop charts. If some of the experimental music by The Beatles was too much to bear, the public was practically horrified when The Velvet Underground got the ball rolling.
Born in the seedy underbelly of New York City, Lou Reed’s odes to life on the wrong side of the tracks became a commercial disaster. Although songs from German singer Nico sounded immaculate, like ‘All Tomorrow’s Parties’, Reed’s songs about life in the gutter were a shock to the system at the time, using songs to talk about his dependency on drugs or his sexual desires outside of playing rock and roll.
Although every single reviewer panned The Velvets’ debut, between the grooves of the record was the beginning of every countercultural movement that would come later, from the punk movement that would start in the next decade to the ramshackle production that would become customary once grunge became the biggest genre in the world in the ‘90s. Lou Reed had no shame in showing the dark corners of himself, but by being emotionally naked before his fans, a million other artists also found the courage to be themselves.
2. Led Zeppelin I – Led Zeppelin
Throughout the early 1960s, Jimmy Page seemed to have found his niche playing with The Yardbirds. After years of playing as a session musician, Page’s time as a young blues player informed most of his biggest successes, taking over for legend Eric Clapton and trading licks with Jeff Beck. Page always knew there was something bigger beyond just the blues, and it took one of the first supergroups to burst the blues wide open.
While most of Led Zeppelin’s first record relied heavily on blues traditions, their way of inhabiting the songs made the whole rock world stand at attention. With the howling of Robert Plant and the thunderous stomp of John Bonham, no one had heard anything like this kind of blues, making songs that were meant to soundtrack the apocalypse, like ‘Dazed and Confused’ and ‘Communication Breakdown’.
Even with their acoustic material like ‘Babe I’m Gonna Leave You’, Zeppelin always prided themselves on their heaviness, which would go on to influence legions of hard rock and heavy metal bands, often comparing Zeppelin to the first time they heard acts like The Beatles. Zeppelin may never have embraced the metal tag, but the songs on their debut struck a chord with any aspiring rocker who was born to blast their music as loud as it could go.
1. Sgt Pepper – The Beatles
For a brief period in the mid-1960s, it looked like The Beatles had said all they needed to say. After pushing the genre forward with the British Invasion, their departure from the road would have signalled the end for any other act, eventually retiring and becoming another relic of the decade. Instead of bowing out, The Beatles set up shop in Abbey Road Studios and served their muse wherever it guided them.
With Paul McCartney coming up with the idea of an imaginary band, Sgt Pepper marked the beginning of something more inventive for rock music. As if it wasn’t clear from singles like ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’, The Beatles were diving headfirst into experimental territory, with each songwriter making rock and roll subversion, whether it was John Lennon’s circus-themed ‘Being For the Benefit of Mr Kite’ or Paul McCartney’s warped view of short stories on ‘She’s Leaving Home’ and ‘Lovely Rita’.
Although this album kicked off The Summer of Love, some of its best moments are timeless by themselves, including Lennon and McCartney working at the peak of their powers for the song ‘A Day in the Life’, featuring one of the most cathartic swells in the history of popular music. The Beatles may have already revolutionised what rock and roll was supposed to be in 1963, but Sgt Pepper was the beginning of their second phase that gave all future generations permission to use the studio as an instrument.
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