Another one down!
1965 was picked pretty much at random, but my expectations were pretty high - how did it do?
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Yeah, not bad at all. I'd struggle to say there were too many albums I loved but there were very few I hated and a lot that were interesting, even educational. There was also more variety than I was expecting - the Beatles/Stones kinda sound was certainly the most common but we had a fair few trips away from that core. We also have to bear in mind that a fair few of the classic albums of the year had already been claimed by Rolling Stone - if they hadn't we would have had a LOT of Bob Dylan this year. A couple had also been claimed by our visits to '61 and '65. And, to no-one's surprise, the ownership ratio was a big fat 0%.
Looking at the best selling albums of the year, we're back to relying on the dubious information from bestsellingalbums.org and it tells us The Beatles were at the top with Beatles For Sale, which was released in December '64, was #1 for nine weeks and didn't leave the top five until July. I tell you what though, it took a load of effort to keep Julie Andrews off the top with Mary Poppins (#2) and The Sound Of Music (#3) snapping close behind.
And, for those of you that have been following the top fives throughout the year, it probably won't surprise you to see The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan and The Rolling Stones No 2 complete the top five. Bob & The Beatles have second appearances in the top ten at #6 and #8 respectively, but things also certainly get a bit more easy-listening with Val Doonican and Andy Williams at #7 and #9 and My Fair Lady completes the top ten (and the version we'd previously met was also sung by Julie Andrews). Other albums of interest from the top twenty are Joan Baez (#11 - the only named woman artist), The Bachelors (#12 - this is dreadful), two from The Kinks (#16 & #20). one more from The Beatles (#17) and a most peculiar offering from Burt Bacharach (#18).
Looking at the albums I experienced, we had some looking backwards (which I was expecting), many very much of the time, some also looking forwards (even as far as the 70s) and some being just timeless (this has easily been the folkiest year we've seen so far and I'll be surprised if we see any folkier). There were also a lot more women than I was expecting, with eighteen albums featuring a strong female presence which is the highest we've seen so far from any year from '56 all the way up to '90 - which really surprised me. It's also worth pointing out that's more women than we saw in '20 and '21 combined - it's nice to think that maybe the 60s were the empowering decade they're often claimed to be.
There were also a few artists we saw more than once - and tying in the previous themes of folk and women, the queen of the year was most definitely Joan Baez with four visits which dovetails nicely with our three visits to Bob Dylan making him the king of the year, because they were in a relationship at the time. Other multiple visits were The Rolling Stones (another triple threat) and The Seekers, Andy Williams, Cher, The Kinks, The Shadows, Roy Orbison, Dusty Springfield and The Animals (twice). We'll go into the albums in more detail later, but I will just say here that I've no idea what The Seekers were doing in there even once.
Let's take a look at the ladies and we've got to start with Joan - I generally liked her and she's certainly got a lovely voice and knows her way around the guitar. I think she was a bit unlucky I got a bit bored with her because four visits is probably a bit too much of anyone (only beaten by five visits for Elvis in '61). For me, our first visit to Goodbye, Angelina was my favourite - but I'm going to namecheck 1, 5 and Live Part 2 as well, if only for her incredible imagination in naming them. Sticking with the folk theme, we also have to consider Marianne Faithfull who did a decent enough job with her folk tracks, but also had some very odd spoken word tracks on there as well - she was also unlucky that we didn't get to hear her pop album.
Most of the other ladies were pop-based, with the albums generally featuring covers of variable quality but Dusty Springfield definitely had the best voice and the best selection of covers on A Girl Called Dusty (her other album was certainly patchier). Cher (both with and without Sonny) and Sandie Shaw did a decent enough job whilst Cilla did a lovely job in places and a dreadful job in most. Stepping somewhat away from the pop, Nina Simone also did a load of covers, but they were definitely a step up in quality from most, with her having a great voice and doing a great job on the piano - her and Dusty had the the best female-lead albums of the year, although they're obviously pushed close by the absolute bangers on the Mary Poppins soundtrack. Easily the worst albums featuring female vocals are the pair we endureD from The Seekers - I've had five visits with them now and I remain utterly mystified as to the appeal.
Bands featuring four or five blokes were definitely the main flavour of the year and, as is generally the way with such things, the quality was somewhat variable. Particularly noteworthy were The Rolling Stones No. 2 (the other two visits were not so great), The Beatles not living up to their usual high quality bar, The Pretty Things being surprisingly forward looking and The Bachelors being absolutely dreadful. Most of the rest of it was all pretty much of a muchness, but The Dave Clark 5 and The Hollies did manage to nudge themselves to the front of the pack, Manfred Mann did at least do something a bit different (more on their second album), as did Cliff & The Shadows (but not in a good way) and Wayne Fontana And The Mindbenders was distinctly average (at best).
Looking at other types of male-based music, I have to start with what was, surprisingly, one of my favourite albums of the year from Donovan - I wasn't expecting to enjoy it but really did (and have almost been tempted to listen to it again!). In a similar folky vein, Bob Dylan took up a lot of our time and also surprised me by coming up with an album that I actually almost liked which was Another Side Of Bob Dylan and his other two weren't too bad either. I still can't say I love his voice though - Roy Orbison (both visits), Nat King Cole and Tom Jones were all much more my cup of tea. I also don't mind Andy Williams (both visits), Jim Reeves and Val Doonican's voices but the music is just so old-fashioned - and I guess we also have to mention the obligatory Elvis appearances, which certainly weren't his best offerings.
Which brings us on to the last weird few - Sounds Orchestral and Burt Bacharach were both skilful but I didn't really understand why they existed and P.J. Proby which was just dreadful (and I'm still mentally scarred by his 80s covers I unearthed during my write-up).
Looking at the #1 albums for the year, we only saw six different #1 albums, which feels pretty low considering we saw seven in '61 - but The Sound Of Music (twenty weeks), The Beatles (nineteen) and The Rolling Stones (ten) pretty much had the year wrapped up, occupying the top spot for all but three of the weeks, with the others going to Bob Dylan. There were no debuts at the top all year - but we did meet a surprising number of debut albums, with eighteen of our visits being the first offerings from the artist involved. This suggests 1965 was a good year for new music and there are certainly some reasonably well known names amongst that lot - Manfred Mann, The Animals, Cilla Black, Sandie Shaw, Dusty Springfield, Joan Baez and three who are still going, being Cher, Bob Dylan and Tom Jones.
The generally accepted (by the internet) best albums from the year that I didn't come across were John Coltrane's A Love Supreme (never charted, but a live version got to #83 in '23), The Four Tops' eponymous offering (never charted), The Beach Boys' Today! (#6 in '66), The Zombies' Begin Here (never charted), Them's The "Angry" Young Them (featuring a young Van Morrison - never charted), The Moody Blues' The Magnificent Moodies (never charted), Otis Redding's Blue (#6 in '66), Wilson Pickett's In The Midnight Hour (never charted), Smokey Robinson & The Miracles' Going To A Go-Go (never charted), The Who's My Generation (#5 in '66), Vince Guaraldi's A Charlie Brown Christmas (never charted) and The Sonics' Here Are The Sonics!!! (never charted).
And the most and least read posts of the year? Readership has been higher than I expected but The Rolling Stones No. 2 was still comfortably ahead of anything else and Wayne Fontana & The Mindbenders was comfortably behind anything else (and I'd have been put off by the name as well).
All in all, this was a pretty decent year. Yes, it probably could have had a bit more variety and it was very "four or five guys in a band" heavy but it's also easily been the folkiest year we've had so far, so that was at least different and there were a few other odd diversions which I wasn't expecting. I'd say my favourite albums were those from Donovan, Dusty Springfield and Nina Simone, with The Pretty Things getting a special mention for sounding so forward looking - and P.J. Proby and The Bachelors providing the stinkers.
So where to next? Well, using the somewhat arbitrary rules that I set for myself, it has to be '70, '71, '75 or '79 - I think I'm going for '79 because it will give us the biggest contrast from this year. I'm also expecting it to provide a much greater contrast in quality - '65 was actually pretty consistent.
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