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1967: The summer of love


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1967: The summer of love

It was the moment that flower power went mainstream. But was it really a riot of sex, drugs and rock'n'roll? Forty years on, leading figures recall their part in the revolution

Introduction by John Walsh. Interviews by Charlotte Philby

Published: 05 May 2007

Was there ever a summer like it? It wasn't exactly love that was in the air, but an unbuttoned, flower-scented, music-on-the-breeze, bare-feet-on-the-greensward, long-hair-curling-around-your-neck quality that British youth had never felt before. If the Sixties can be thought of as a year, 1961 and 1962 represented dark, grim winter; the advent of the Beatles and Stones in 1963 a spectacular thaw; by 1965 and 1966, Mary Quant, kipper ties and mini skirts were the nodding daffodils of spring - and 1967 was the summer when everyone took off their clothes and danced.

The music of the summer was Sgt. Pepper, the Beatles' climactic blend of vaudeville and psychedelia, which was released in June. Buying it made you instantly cool. Pink Floyd's first album Piper at the Gates of Dawn announced a new era of resonant musical weirdness. At the Astoria in March, Jimi Hendrix set fire to his guitar and had to go to hospital suffering burnt hands. But the music that changed everything came from California. It was a 28-year-old Floridian called Scott McKenzie singing: "If you're going to San Francisco / Be sure to wear some flowers in your hair…"

The song, "San Francisco", written by John Phillips of the Mamas & the Papas, was a hit all over the world. Otherwise straight people, from City accountants to Wimbledon grammar-schoolboys like me, heard the siren call of hippiedom, as it reverberated from Haight- Ashbury, and were transformed. And however much the nation's parents laughed at the floral revolution, they couldn't stop it. The Establishment began to join in. Clothes, music, advertising, shop design, magazine journalism and even the BBC (with the brand-new Radio 1) took on a new flowery, let-it-all-hang-out garb.

On TV, a manufactured pop group called The Monkees combined surreal high-jinks with dreamy songs (though they didn't play on the records) and stole hearts, while Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In was Middle America's nervous response to the drugs and flowers in San Francisco. Revolution and rebellion were everywhere. On screen, The Graduate thumbed its nose at suburban complacency, and Bonnie & Clyde gave us a pair of sexy, lovable killers. On British TV, Patrick McGoohan's The Prisoner, filmed in Portmeirion, north Wales, gave us modern man as a former spy in a bland, Kafkaesque institution. Late-Night Line-Up on BBC2 drove a coach through traditional arts coverage and embraced the sexual revolution.

"What did we do in the Sixties?" asked John Lennon, "We all dressed up." That's the main memory that participants took from 1967 - trying on cheesecloth shirts, kaftans, beads, headbands, trumpet-sleeve blouses, paisley swirls, all of which seemed to correspond to the new Zeitgeist of sweet-smelling hashish smoke and spacy guitar solos. For a time, the groovy young believed they could change human society, from the King's Road to the White House, by dope, rock'n'roll, random sex and being, y'know, incredibly mellow with each other.

It didn't last, of course. But as belief systems go, it was a pretty good one.

Peter Stringfellow, 67, nightclub proprietor

I have so many wonderful memories of those months. At the beginning of that summer I ran the King Mojo club in Sheffield, which was renowned for soul music and pop art. We drew MASSIVE artists including Ike and Tina Turner, Wilson Pickett and The Who, and it was the time when Jimi Hendrix was just emerging and The Beatles brought out Sgt. Pepper.

Watching the news at home in Sheffield one afternoon, I saw footage of San Francisco, where there were kids jumping around - some naked, some wearing kaftans - with flowers in their hair. I just thought it was fantastic and brilliant and immediately decided to transform King Mojo from a soul and pop art venue to a hub of the Flower Power movement. I gathered students from the university and we went to town redecorating, making it all psychedelic and magical.

As the resident DJ, I went out and bought a kaftan, got a perm and stuffed roses in my hair - a somewhat confused choice of flower! It was the most popular club in the city. I renamed it the Beautiful King Mojo to fit our new-found theme, and its change in direction quickly affected the tastes of the city's population.

It was a beautiful thing and we'd throw flowers at the audience and the whole scene was perfect, but for one significant detail. The Flower Power movement in the US was fuelled by marijuana and LSD, whereas, try as we might, we had no idea about drugs in Sheffield and couldn't get hold of the stuff for love nor money! We were powered by the sunshine and flowers and the loveliness of it all, missing a key ingredient. I've never tried drugs in my life, but if I could have got hold of something at that time, I would have taken it with glee!

Unfortunately, not everyone got the hippy concept and once I'd converted my best friend and he'd bought the kaftan and the flowers, his girlfriend thought he'd turned ***, cried a lot and left him. Nottingham was equally unmoved by the scene and when I turned up to DJ at a club where I was still known as the King of Soul, and I started playing my sitar records while sitting on the floor, it didn't go down too well. I was anticipating waves of love and harmony and when I threw petals from the stage, the crowd chucked Coke cans in return.

Another memorable moment, though slightly less wonderful, was when the Rolling Stones came to play on the TV show Ready Steady Go, on which I was the warm-up act. They'd embraced the movement and performed cross-legged on the floor, Brian Jones with sitar in tow. There I was, in my white polo-neck, and my big deal was to jump around in front of the camera. When they finished, Jones put the sitar down as I jumped on stage to stop the crowd barging the band - and I put my foot straight through his sitar. His face was thunderous and when I tried to apologise, he wouldn't even look at me.

Joan Bakewell, 74, journalist and broadcaster

They say that if you remember the Sixties, you weren't there. I do remember the summer of 1967, and though I wasn't in the thick of the action in the field, as it were, I certainly wasn't untouched by what was going on. It was a time that I could only describe as a haze of good will.

During those months I was presenting Late Night Line-up on BBC2. The combination of that and a busy domestic life - I was raising my young children at the same time - occupied most of my waking hours, preventing me from actually going to those sexually charged festivals of which we hear so much. But, good heavens, what was happening in that scene certainly influenced what we were doing on the show and in fact became the subject of our chats!

Working on Late Night Line-up was quite a place to be at that time, there was a sort of giddy atmosphere running through the studio. The show was somewhat of a partying event in itself and it became my social life. Free-thinking ideas were running through the studio and there was a real buzz in the air. We featured, among a huge range of guests and points of discussion, many emerging rock bands, most of whom were part of the sexual revolution. All of us working on the show were swept along with what was happening elsewhere and through our programme, we reflected those events and the ideas that grew from such freedom.

No one was aware of the long-term impact of what was happening and how it would affect the course of history. We were just so caught up in the atmosphere. It was such a lively time; full of hope and opportunities for young people. It was truly liberating, the first time that the younger generation really came into its own and that was, and is, a wonderful thing.

Caroline Coon, 62, artist and political campaigner

I was studying at Central St Martins College of Art when I learnt that a friend of mine had been arrested for possession of a tiny amount of cannabis, so I spent the summer visiting him at Wormwood Scrubs. Soon after, Mick Jagger was arrested on a similar charge and there was public outrage that the police were arresting heroes of the rock'n'roll generation.

A friend of mine, Clive Goodwin, editor of the radical magazine Black Dwarf, asked me to help him organise a demonstration outside the offices of the News of the World, which was about to print a character assassination of Mick Jagger. Two hundred of us turned up and tried, unsuccessfully, to stop the lorries leaving Fleet Street. We marched from there to Number 10 through Trafalgar Square and into Piccadilly Circus, where I found myself perched under the statue of Eros, feeling depressed that we hadn't done enough. A young student named Rufus Harris was sitting next to me and we struck up conversation about what we could do to make our voices heard. The next evening he came to my studio and we spent the summer setting up the organisation Release, the first welfare organisation for young people, by young people.

At that time, the idea that we believed in - that prohibition was both immoral in principal and unworkable in practice - was a minority view. After persistent campaigning over a 40-year period, most intelligent people now realise that the prohibition policy in relation to drugs has failed.

When we started the movement, I was only 21 years old. Having that incredible optimism of youth gave us the incentive to stand up for what we believed in. It's important that we believed that change would be instant, as this spurred us into action. There was so much to stand up for: Greenpeace, black power, the second wave of the feminist movement, anti-homophobia. Our efforts made a difference to the course of history, though we didn't realise it would take so long for change to come about.

Young people today are just as, if not more, politically active than we were back then. The demonstration against the invasion of Iraq far exceeded the campaign against the Vietnam war. It's a myth that young people today are not politically engaged, and we expect large numbers to attend Release's 40th-anniversary conferences this year.

Looking back, those months were characterised by a surreal combination of the absolute beauty of summer, full of optimism and hope, set against the horror of war.

Joe Boyd, 65, music producer

The Summer of Love was really over before it began, as far as I'm concerned. By that time the idealism and the vibrant atmosphere that was the hallmark of the previous spring, had been swamped by the emergence of the weekend hippies. Previously, there'd been an overwhelming optimism in the air and all the freaks would gather at various clubs around London and suddenly we realised that we weren't alone, which was a very powerful and empowering moment.

At first the press were amused at how swinging London was turning psychedelic, but soon that impression turned sour. Suddenly the media was horrified by what they saw as utter debauchery, and the fact that the Beatles had admitted to using LSD. The scene just got too popular. It became just another British pop phase, with the freaks and hippies thing becoming a tribal fashion.

We became subject to police harassment and were thrown out of the venue for our club night, Club UFO, which was originally held at an Irish Dance Hall on Tottenham Court Road. By the time we resurrected the night, at Camden Town's The Roundhouse, we were competing with all the mainstream British pop promoters. Our first response was probably not the best, in hindsight, as we decided to cash in on the whole thing. I suppose we were trying to get our rightful share, whilst keeping hold of the scene.

There are things that we take for granted today that were a direct result of that period. From the recognition of environmental issues to the emergence of civil rights, and even the use of four letter words in the media; all of these things can be traced back to that summer. If you're in any doubt about that, just mention the Sixties to a right-wing politician and watch their face drop.

In many ways we thought that what we were doing then would have an even greater impact than it did. There was a tremendous optimism about how music and drugs could change the world. By the end of the year we'd abandoned that notion, realising that we weren't going to stop the [Vietnam] war or accomplish all the things we thought we could. It wasn't that we became bitter or resentful, but the whole Summer of Love thing had just become too big for its own good.

Barbara Hulanicki, 71, founder of Biba

That year was truly the happiest of my life, for many reasons. The Biba shop, which I ran with my husband Fitz, was in full swing and there was such energy in the air. I always have the impression of a sunny time, during which I was happily pregnant with my first child. People were hungry and would take whatever clothes we could dream up. We wanted to put things out there and see what people chose to do with them. The British are fascinating; they always put their own spin on things.

These were the war babies and people weren't used to having a lot. Because we were raised on a diet of cabbage and boiled potatoes, everyone was skinny. Eating wasn't the enjoyable experience that it is today and no one really went out to restaurants because there were very few of them around. It was an amazing look really; the girls all had this lanky long hair and lanky legs with all these eyelashes, very Baby Doll. The guys were actually far more dandy than hippy, though it was leaning that way. You could tell the weekend hippies a mile off, those lawyers and clerks who put on kaftans and beads on the weekend. They were too fresh, not grubby enough by far.

Our shop was more than just a place to buy trendy clothes, it was a hang-out where people would mingle before they went out to clubs or parties. There were sofas and cushions for people to lounge around on, and we were the first shop to open late, so it became quite a scene. My husband and I decided we need some form of security, so we hired these amazing stringy-looking creatures, the boyfriends of two of our shop girls. They were incredible, standing by the door for hours on end without flinching. I commented on this to a friend, and asked her, "Why do they constantly chew sugar cubes?" Of course, they were actually taking acid and were completely out of their minds!

There was a calm atmosphere amid the excitement, and the drugs meant that people weren't frantic. In the park across the road from the shop there were often concerts and when I took my baby, I was concerned that there might be trouble. I needn't have worried; most people were lying around gazing at the planets above.

I really don't think that time was as raunchy as everyone says it was. With binge drinking today, people behave far worse! What characterised that summer was the way that everything was so peaceful and dreamy, yet there was such a sense of high energy.

Celia Birtwell, 66, fashion designer

It's always tricky trying to remember that summer, for obvious reasons. A friend of mine says that we fell asleep in a field and didn't wake up again until the Eighties. What is clearly impressed on my mind is the powerful smell of that era. I remember that Pattie Boyd sent me a card from India, which she doused in Petuli perfume. It's this scent that really epitomises that time for me. This, combined with visions of happy people wearing headbands and the light and the outdoors, is what I find when I try to crystallise those moments in my mind. It probably wasn't such an idyllic scene as that which I recall, but things were certainly less hectic. I could never have foreseen the spread of CCTV and parking controls and the effect of a Big Brother state.

It was a sweeter time really, with a bigger sense of innocence, but I was young so inevitably life was different. I was in my early twenties and we were all quite relaxed sexually, and we really believed in the power of music. There was a stream of parties and dancing, which I'll always remember fondly. I was always very scared of acid, though I lived closely to it. The thought that it was a mind-altering drug haunted me. I knew there was a possibility that I'd never come back from a trip and once I took a small tab and everything looked like skeletons, so I didn't pursue it. Weed was quite different, it was a natural drug that I enjoyed.

Park parties were prevalent then, and living in Notting Hill, which at that time was very shabby, the carnival played a big part in my summer. It was a joyous occasion that brought people together. I'll always recall my first experience of carnival, seeing a truck driving down the street with a big steel band on top of it. It makes me sad that it only ever attracted world press for being nasty and presenting trouble.

The summer of love had a lot to do with the pop world in my mind. Programmes such as Ready Steady Go and Top of the Pops informed how we developed and the way we dressed. It spurred a move away from the haute-couture fashion of the Fifties, which was quite formal and awkward, almost restrictive. With the freedom of the Sixties came the more relaxed Botticelli style of clothing and a more laid-back attitude.

Things were more colourful then and were to do with nature, which is something we tried to hold on to. It's been an interesting journey and though sometimes, when I'm alone, I find myself thinking fondly of those times, it's sad when people can't get beyond that era, and only really come to life when recalling the past. I like to treasure the memories but remember that that is what they are, and to fully embrace the rest of my journey.

Felix Dennis, 60, magazine publisher

The defining thing about 1967 was that there was absolutely no down-side to having sex. Here we had a window of about seven to eight years that had never before been seen in the history of mankind. Because the pill was widely available, there was no fear of women getting pregnant. We all believed that venereal disease had been eradicated, and the thought of getting syphilis was so remote it was laughable. Condoms did have a use; we used to blow them up and paint them. And the women felt the same way, so if a girl didn't want to sleep with you, it was simply because she didn't fancy you.

At that time, I had no money and was running around the King's Road trying to sell my magazine, Oz, with little success. To up my sales, I brought in five young women to sell it on my behalf, and in return gave them a share of the profits. In no time I was raking it in!

Most of that time is a blur. We'd think nothing of spending five nights a week taking tons of recreational drugs and having lots of sex. I read that if you told a girl you could teach her tantric sex she'd be much more willing, and it worked! I never worked out what tantric sex actually was, but that line did the job. LSD and pot were the big things then. We smoked this weird hash that doesn't exist now, brown gungy stuff with a sickly sweet smell. It made me sleepy, so I mainly stuck to acid.

I suppose we were a bit like George Bush, as a movement. We had this insatiable appetite for change but didn't know what to do with it when change came. It was like the invasion of Iraq, where all the focus is on changing the world, with no plan for dealing with the consequences. We just made it up as we went along.

Suddenly people were making loads of money from selling brightly coloured posters and pot, which became the downfall of many. It was a vastly hypocritical time in many ways: nobody cared how much money others had, but there was a hierarchy based on who was doing what. If you were part of the underground scene, the girls would be up for having sex with you. The free flow of unprotected sex was really more fundamental than the politics or the liberation or the rage against the Vietnam war. Suddenly, even for the ordinary folk, sex was on the menu and I genuinely believe that was crucial.

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1963 with the Beatles & Stones calling the tunes we were liberated

The Sixties spelled freedom and we could do what we wanted

Of course in good old Sheffield we still had to get up in a morning and go to work.

Sleep was a luxury

The girls were in Quant style clothes

We had buttondown/tab collars and loved ourselves

What a time to be young!

The good old days were very good because we were younger then

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During the early '60s me and my mates were talking to a young lad in a soldiers uniform we met in Chapeltown. He said he was visiting some family he had locally but that he himself came from Manchester. During the conversation he mentioned the fact that he was a decent drummer and had just jacked in with a band and joined the army. The name of the band? HERMANS HERMITS !!!!!!!! That soldier had jacked the band because 'they were'nt getting anywhere'.

Had he dropped a goolie or what??

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Guest Drumbeat62

Spent that fabulous summer of love up in the Troodos mountains Cyprus at a British forces leave/holiday centre where service families from the Med and Gulf postings spent their summer leave.

Our job as Army Musicians was to provide entertainment via concert band, dance band or rock band.

Working day was 0800-0930 rehearsal 1100-1200 concert with dances on Wednesday and Saturday evenings.

The shot below was taken in Cyprus at the time of that summer it is of my beautiful 19 year old Wife who I'd dated in Sheffield whilst gigging throughout the Beatlemania days prior to joining the army

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As a child of the sixties, 17 years old in the Summer of Love, I could not resist this topic.

If flower power and free love seemed a universe away from the smoke stacks of Orgreave Coke Ovens, Skegness was our San Francisco, a trip there on a BSA and sidecar with little money, nowhere to stay and no change of clothes was a Yorkshire version of the hippy experience. Sleeping in an abandoned ice-cream sellers hut on the seafront and bumming around on the beach trying to look tough was the most outrageous thing we did. We never saw drugs, we didn't even smoke. But the thing that defined the Summer of Love was the music, my all-time favourite songs come from that era, even that very year : Waterloo Sunset, Whiter Shade of Pale, All You Need is Love. Whenever I hear them now, 40+ years later, they have that instant ability to transport me back to a better place and time.

What was so special, so unique about the sixties, was it just because we were young? No. This was different, it was as though the whole world was young, re-born after years of depression, war and austerity. The sixties were the rebellious, creative, teenage years of the new world which passed so quickly and gave way to middle aged responsibility, commitment and decline.

I just feel so fortunate to have grown up in one of the most exciting and influential decades in history.

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As a child of the sixties, 17 years old in the Summer of Love, I could not resist this topic.

If flower power and free love seemed a universe away from the smoke stacks of Orgreave Coke Ovens, Skegness was our San Francisco, a trip there on a BSA and sidecar with little money, nowhere to stay and no change of clothes was a Yorkshire version of the hippy experience. Sleeping in an abandoned ice-cream sellers hut on the seafront and bumming around on the beach trying to look tough was the most outrageous thing we did. We never saw drugs, we didn't even smoke. But the thing that defined the Summer of Love was the music, my all-time favourite songs come from that era, even that very year : Waterloo Sunset, Whiter Shade of Pale, All You Need is Love. Whenever I hear them now, 40+ years later, they have that instant ability to transport me back to a better place and time.

What was so special, so unique about the sixties, was it just because we were young? No. This was different, it was as though the whole world was young, re-born after years of depression, war and austerity. The sixties were the rebellious, creative, teenage years of the new world which passed so quickly and gave way to middle aged responsibility, commitment and decline.

I just feel so fortunate to have grown up in one of the most exciting and influential decades in history.

Nice post THYLACINE, I really enjoyed reading it.

Some nice amusing comparisons, - never known San Francisco be compared with Skegness before lol

Although the kids at the school were I teach do refer to Skegness as Skeg Vegas :blink: , and their home town of Chesterfield as Ches Vegas <_<

But everything you say is so true about that time for most English youths.

The world changed dramatically in those 10 years that made up that decade, and whatever happened had this constant soundtrack of some of the best, newest and freshest music to come along, - and better still, - a great deal of it was right here on our doorstep, home grown groups spilling over with talent, new sounds, new ideas. For a while we didn't have to import American music, - we had our own version of it right here, - and the Americans wanted OUR stuff instead of the other way around.

I suppose it was really the whole decade that inspired us.

If 1967 was the summer of love, -

Then wasn't 1966 the summer of the World Cup in England, - which of course, - we won

and wasn't 1969 the summer of that crowning achievement of the 1960's, - putting a man on the moon.

Great times :) , so what went wrong? :(

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Guest Drumbeat62

If 1967 was the summer of love, -

Then wasn't 1966 the summer of the World Cup in England, - which of course, - we won

and wasn't 1969 the summer of that crowning achievement of the 1960's, - putting a man on the moon.

Great times :) , so what went wrong? :(

Maybe the Eagles song 'Sad Cafe' sums it up, there is also a gereat book called 'Hotel California' which is not about the Eagles but more about the time.

I was privileged to have been very much involved with that period and still prefer the music from those great times.

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Maybe the Eagles song 'Sad Cafe' sums it up, there is also a gereat book called 'Hotel California' which is not about the Eagles but more about the time.

I was privileged to have been very much involved with that period and still prefer the music from those great times.

They reckon that as you grow older you become more like all the things you used to hate about your dad, - but you still try to be young and trendy to keep up with your own kids and grandkids.

There was a time when my entire record collection was only 1960's music

OK, - it was in the 1960's at the time and this situation probably ended with the first record I bought in 1970

But now my record collection (not that much of it is on records any more)

Starts in the 1920's with some early Jazz.

Most 1920's recordings are after 1925 when "Electric" recording came in but I do have a few from the early 1920's and even the odd ones from the 19-teens which were recorded "mechanically" and so are much lower sound quality.

It then covers 1930's Jazz and Swing, 1940's Big Band, Modern Jazz and Blues, 1950's American music (mainly rock & roll)

It then hits the 1960's

After that it does contain a lot of 1970's stuff, somewhat less 1980's stuff (the stuff my daughters grew up with0 and 1990's stuff (that my son grew up with) and even some from the current decade.

Then add to that timeless recordings of opera, classical, romantic and other stuff written before recording was possible but recorded by top artists ever since.

Quite a broad field of music, I wouldn't go as far as saying 1960's was the best or even that it is always my favourite choice to listen to.

But it was the music I grew up with, the soundtrack to my formative years and as such holds a very special place in my music collection.

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Guest Drumbeat62

Quite a broad field of music, I wouldn't go as far as saying 1960's was the best or even that it is always my favourite choice to listen to.

But it was the music I grew up with, the soundtrack to my formative years and as such holds a very special place in my music collection.

I suppose I'm looking at more from a musicians point of view due to what happened and emerged on the popular music front throughout the 60s, there has never been a decade like it and I doubt that there ever will

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Maybe the Eagles song 'Sad Cafe' sums it up, there is also a gereat book called 'Hotel California' which is not about the Eagles but more about the time.

I was privileged to have been very much involved with that period and still prefer the music from those great times.

Like to know what was the gist of 'Sad Cafe' and how it summed up the demise of the sixties. I've never heard it. Does it present an American perspective?

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But the thing that defined the Summer of Love was the music, my all-time favourite songs come from that era, even that very year : Waterloo Sunset, Whiter Shade of Pale, All You Need is Love. Whenever I hear them now, 40+ years later, they have that instant ability to transport me back to a better place and time.

OK, the summer of love.

It's Sunday the 25 June 1967

There is a special TV programme about to make history, a show called simply "Our World"

First the first time ever, using 3 Earth orbiting satellites in geostationary synchronous equatorial orbits spaced out by 120 degrees it is possible to broadcast a TV programme live which can be picked up simultaneously (live0 at any point on the Earth's surface.

Suddenly the Earth has been shrunk to a global village, - every single person could be in touch with every other person alive on the planet.

"Our World" was produced to celebrate this achievement, -and the realisation that as all the people on the planet are the same human beings regardless of subtle differences in religious beliefs, skin colour and cultural way of life we all need to get along peacefully with each other (Love and Peace Man B) )

Each country involved in this had to produce something to show to the rest of the World.

So what did Britain do for the show?

Well we put on our top act, the best and most famous group in the world, THE BEATLES.

To mark this special occasion The Fab Four had produced a special song to summarise the attitudes and feelings expressed by this new awareness, a song which would then become their next single and major hit.

The song was of course, -

ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE

<object width="480" height="360"><param name="movie" value="http://www.dailymotion.com/swf/video/x15f3t"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always"></param><embed type="application/x-shockwave-flash" src="http://www.dailymotion.com/swf/video/x15f3t" width="480" height="360" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always"></embed></object>

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OK, the summer of love.

It's Sunday the 25 June 1967

There is a special TV programme about to make history, a show called simply "Our World"

First the first time ever, using 3 Earth orbiting satellites in geostationary synchronous equatorial orbits spaced out by 120 degrees it is possible to broadcast a TV programme live which can be picked up simultaneously (live0 at any point on the Earth's surface.

Suddenly the Earth has been shrunk to a global village, - every single person could be in touch with every other person alive on the planet.

"Our World" was produced to celebrate this achievement, -a nd the realisation that as all the people on the planet are the same human beings regardless of subtle differences in religious beliefs, skin colour and cultural way of life w all need to get along peacefully with each other (Love and Peace Man B) )

Each country involved in this had to produce something to show to the rest of the World.

So what did Britain do for the show?

Well we put on our top act, the best and most famous group in the world, THE BEATLES.

To mark this special occasion The Fab Four had produced a special song to summarise the attitudes and feelings expressed by this new awareness, a song which would then become their next single and major hit.

The song was of course, -

ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE

<object width="480" height="360"><param name="movie" value="http://www.dailymotion.com/swf/video/x15f3t"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always"></param><embed type="application/x-shockwave-flash" src="http://www.dailymotion.com/swf/video/x15f3t" width="480" height="360" allowfullscreen="true" allowscriptaccess="always"></embed></object>

Wow, I didn't know any of that stuff Dave. The Beatles must really have been swept away by the moment, opening the song with their rendition of the Marseillaise!!

Funny, I don't remember where I was when Kennedy was shot, I don't remember where I was when the first man walked on the moon, I don't even remember where I was when the Spice Girls split up :)

But I do remember the moment I first heard All You Need is Love. It was in a roadside cafe on the aforementioned trip to Skeggy. What more could anyone ask for?

Can we keep this thread going ad infinitum? Perhaps not, I'd never get any work done

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Guest Drumbeat62

Like to know what was the gist of 'Sad Cafe' and how it summed up the demise of the sixties. I've never heard it. Does it present an American perspective?

I'll download the Lyrics and send them.

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.

Quite a broad field of music, I wouldn't go as far as saying 1960's was the best or even that it is always my favourite choice to listen to.

But it was the music I grew up with, the soundtrack to my formative years and as such holds a very special place in my music collection.

Thanks Dave, I feel I know you much better now but I'm afraid I am much less tolerant than you and more hard-core sixties in my musical tastes. In fact, I have no interest in contemporary music at all, probably stopped listening in the mid 1970's. Sure, every generation throws up it's classics, I love The Bee Gees, Kris Kristofferson and Carly Simon and songs like Witchita Lineman, Candle in the Wind and Baker Street. But classics are thin on the ground now and popular music today is generally too painfull, offensive and monotonous to listen to. So I don't bother. Instead, I indulge myself with Pavarotti, Bocelli, Maria Callas and the Welsh Male Voice Choir. What a charmed life I have lead!

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The Beatles must really have been swept away by the moment, opening the song with their rendition of the Marseillaise!!

Yes it starts off very French.

But in that long fade out at the end it reverts back to one of their own songs (She Loves You) and ends on fading strains of the very British tune "Greensleeves"

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Can we keep this thread going ad infinitum? Perhaps not, I'd never get any work done

An observant friend of mine at work once commented about the encyclopedic cataloging of music brought about by CD recording and digitisation that, -

"There is more 1960's music about now than there was in the 1960's"

Obviously it can't be true, but you get a feel for what he is saying.

My friend is originally from Liverpool, - and doesn't that quote look very Beatlesque!

It was also said about the long running TV series "Heartbeat" (about a North Yorkshire Police station in the 1960's) that if you played all the episodes one after the other it would last more than 10 years, - longer than the decade that they portray.

..and what about the Bash Street Kids in the Beano.

They have been in class 2b since it first started in 1954, they don't look any older and they still have the same teacher.

Unfortunately in the real world time does move on.

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OK, the summer of love.

It's Sunday the 25 June 1967

There is a special TV programme about to make history, a show called simply "Our World"

First the first time ever, using 3 Earth orbiting satellites in geostationary synchronous equatorial orbits spaced out by 120 degrees it is possible to broadcast a TV programme live which can be picked up simultaneously (live0 at any point on the Earth's surface.

Suddenly the Earth has been shrunk to a global village, - every single person could be in touch with every other person alive on the planet.

"Our World" was produced to celebrate this achievement, -a nd the realisation that as all the people on the planet are the same human beings regardless of subtle differences in religious beliefs, skin colour and cultural way of life w all need to get along peacefully with each other (Love and Peace Man B) )

Each country involved in this had to produce something to show to the rest of the World.

So what did Britain do for the show?

Well we put on our top act, the best and most famous group in the world, THE BEATLES.

To mark this special occasion The Fab Four had produced a special song to summarise the attitudes and feelings expressed by this new awareness, a song which would then become their next single and major hit.

The song was of course, -

ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE

The song was also used just over a year later in the animated Beatles film "Yellow Submarine"

Being such a powerful song the cartoon Beatles use it (and it's message) to beat the Blue Meanies into submission and thus liberate Pepperland from the misery of the Blue Meanies.

<object width="480" height="385"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCQq_O9gykI&hl=en_GB&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCQq_O9gykI&hl=en_GB&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="385"></embed></object>

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Thanks Dave, I feel I know you much better now but I'm afraid I am much less tolerant than you and more hard-core sixties in my musical tastes. In fact, I have no interest in contemporary music at all, probably stopped listening in the mid 1970's. Sure, every generation throws up it's classics, I love The Bee Gees, Kris Kristofferson and Carly Simon and songs like Witchita Lineman, Candle in the Wind and Baker Street. But classics are thin on the ground now and popular music today is generally too painfull, offensive and monotonous to listen to. So I don't bother. Instead, I indulge myself with Pavarotti, Bocelli, Maria Callas and the Welsh Male Voice Choir. What a charmed life I have lead!

I think my interest in contemporary music is fairly limited.

It comes mainly from having my own children and grandchildren that invariably like "the latest craze" and also from the fact that as a secondary school teacher teaching 11 - 18 year olds (teenagers) I pick a lot of it up from them.

My own personal preference in modern stuff is limited to stuff I like or catch on to. I have always enjoyed Jools Holland's Rhythm and Blues band and on his TV shows Jools is keen to introduce and promote new acts, many of which are quite good and listenable.

There are genres of music I don't like or listen to.

I am not a big fan of a lot of Country and Western, mainly because I don't want to listen to rich, wealthy well off Americans singing about how poor they are and how hard their lives are. I don't like rap at all, I'm sure they missed a C off the front when they came up with the name. Then all this house / garage / dance music used by druggies in a night club to me is just an unlistenable noise, - those that listen to it are probably too far out of it to notice.

However, I will listen to modern jazz which frequently uses harmonies so way off that they are discordant. A lot of people can't tollerate that.

Classical music has a beauty and relaxing quality of its own, - but they play it in shopping centres and railway stations because gangs of youths don't like it so go somewhere else instead of congregating to cause trouble.

It takes all sorts of people to listen to allsorts of music.

But, as someone who works in education I believe that you should experience as many different types and styles of music as possible, without passing a personal critical judgement on it, and keep listening and learning.

I am pleased that I have a broad outlook.

Too many people, especially younger ones, have a very limited "blinkered" vision of the subject.

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Guest Drumbeat62

Like to know what was the gist of 'Sad Cafe' and how it summed up the demise of the sixties. I've never heard it. Does it present an American perspective?

Eagles - The Sad Cafe Lyrics

Out in the shiny night, the rain was softly falling

The tracks that ran down the boulevard had all been washed away

Out of the silver light, the past came softly calling

And I remembered the times we spent inside the Sad Cafe

Oh, it seemed like a holy place, protected by amazing grace

And we would sing right out loud the things we could not say

We thought we could change this world with words like "love" and "freedom"

But we were part of the lonely crowd inside the Sad Cafe

Oh, expecting to fly

We would meet on that beautiful shore in the sweet by-and-by

Some of their dreams came true, and some just passed away

And some of them stayed behind inside the Sad Cafe

The clouds rolled in and hit that shore

Now that holy train, it don't stop here no more

Now I look at the years gone by and wonder at the powers that be

I don't know why fortune smiles on some, and lets the rest go free

Maybe the time has drawn, the faces, I recall

But things in this life change very slowly if they ever change at all

No use in asking why, they just turned out that way

So meet me at midnight, baby, inside the Sad Cafe

Why don't you meet me at midnight, baby, inside the Sad Cafe

This song appears in the following album:

The Long Run

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