1967: The Year It All Came Together

Rock is Jimi Hendrix’s guitar introduction to ‘Hey Joe’; it is Mick Jagger strutting onstage; it is Bob Dylan singing ‘John Wesley Harding’; it is the harmonies of the Beach Boys – and the menace of The Clash. It can express individual dreams and collective solidarity; political idealism and personal despair; fear, joy and love. When we asked Simon Frith to choose just one year to represent the excitement, the sense of creation, the emotional range and the possibilities of rock, there was no doubt about his answer: 1967.