The year 1968 was an incredible one for music. Twelve months on from the summer of love and Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, many of the best artistes from the psychedelic ’60s were taking their music to new and fascinating places as the hippy movement reached its peak. We look back at eight albums that are celebrating their 50th birthday this year, and why these records have stood the test of time.

THE JIMI HENDRIX EXPERIENCE —ELECTRIC LADYLAND

Released: October 1968

The 1960s was a decade that spoke the language of the guitar and nobody was more fluent than the legendary Jimi Hendrix. Electric Ladyland is the finest hour in his all-too-short discography, which was brought to an end when he overdosed on barbiturates and died at the age of 27. This album features countless all-time classics like Crosstown Traffic, Gypsy Eyes and All Along the Watchtower. Then there’s the absolutely epic Voodoo Chile, in which we can hear Hendrix writing himself into rock music mythology right before our very ears: ‘Oh the night I was born, lord I swear the moon turned a fire red…’. Electric Ladyland oozes virtuosity, confidence and raw sexuality, even 50 years on.

PINK FLOYD — A SAUCERFUL OF SECRETS

Released: June 1968

A Saucerful of Secrets was an album that marked a transition for Pink Floyd. A year on from their debut album The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, the band were slowly beginning to move away from the influence of frontman Syd Barrett, who was largely responsible for their surreal and heavily psychedelic direction. Barrett’s mental state became increasingly fragile as he experimented with LSD, and guitarist David Gilmour was brought in to add to the group’s sound. There is still plenty of trippy, experimental rock music here, but nothing as downright weird as Barrett’s songs about talking gnomes and bicycles.

JOHNNY CASH — AT FOLSOM PRISON

Released: May 1968

Johnny Cash’s most famous release is At Folsom Prison, one of the greatest live albums ever recorded and one that revitalised the man’s career after a period of extensive drug problems. Cash had always cultivated a renegade image in his music, and so a prison proved the perfect venue for a live performance. He indulges in his outlaw fantasy to the fullest here, singing about getting busted by cops, shooting people down and fighting the establishment. The crowd responds with whoops of delight and raucous applause, creating a palpably electric atmosphere that makes you feel like you’re in the room with them. At Folsom Prison has stood the test of time because it is so much fun to listen to, and the quips and banter between Cash and his audience enhance the songs throughout. Highlights include opener Folsom Prison Blues — which features that classic baritone Hello, I’m Johnny Cash — as well as Cocaine Blues and Jackson.

THE MOTHERS OF INVENTION — WE’RE ONLY IN IT FOR THE MONEY

Released: March 1968

Many bands and listeners were swept up by the idealistic views of the 1960s, but Frank Zappa and The Mothers of Invention were not among them. We’re Only In It For the Money is an album that tears down the hippy subculture, and its naive belief that love, drugs and tie-dye T-shirts could change the world. The cover of the album is a parody of The Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper. And the songs, likewise, miss no opportunity to skewer the long-haired stoners flocking to San Francisco and Woodstock: On Who Needs the Peace Corps?, Zappa sings Every town must have a place where phony hippies meet / Psychedelic dungeons popping up on every street. We’re Only In It For the Money is a surreal, satirical concept album that feels very much of the 1960s, but its quirky sense of humour and playful songwriting have allowed it to stand the test of time.

VAN MORRISON — ASTRAL WEEKS

Released: November 1968

Van Morrison’s Astral Weeks is one of the most gorgeous albums ever recorded, but it’s a bit of a difficult record to pin down. Stylistically it is somewhere in between folk, jazz and soul, but its winding songs have an elusive, dreamlike quality. They feature strummed guitar, bass, violin, flute and many other instruments, all combining in semi-improvised harmony. Van Morrison’s wild scat singing style binds it all together, as his voice latches onto words and notes and spins them in dizzying patterns. His lyrics are poetic... always beautiful: From the far side of the ocean / If I put the wheels in motion / And I stand with my arms behind me / And I’m pushin’ on the door…. Astral Weeks is the definition of a cult classic, and its stature has only grown over the course of the last 50 years. It rightly takes its place among the greatest folk albums ever recorded.

THE BEATLES — THE WHITE ALBUM

Released: November 1968

The Beatles wrote much of their classic White Album — officially titled just The Beatles — while travelling in northern India. The group flew in to Rishikesh to visit Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, a guru who taught them the practice of transcendental meditation. It was a trip intended to creatively recharge the group and bring them closer together, after they had burned out on touring and the music industry, in 1966 and ’67. And though it did prove a fruitful period creatively, it also highlighted the growing division between the band’s members. Paul McCartney, John Lennon and George Harrison wrote many of their songs separately and the results were then compiled into one huge double album, 30 songs long. It’s for this reason that The White Album, as brilliant as it is, often feels quite uneven — there are timeless classics like Dear Prudence, While My Guitar Gently Weeps and Helter Skelter, but there are also throwaway tunes like Rocky Raccoon and Piggies that mostly serve as filler. In the end, you have to take the good with the bad and appreciate the whole for the brilliant, indulgent mess that it is.

THE VELVET UNDERGROUND — WHITE LIGHT/ WHITE HEAT

Released: January 30, 1968

This is a band that were relatively unknown when they debuted in 1967, but in the following 50 years, their experimental and noisy songs have been a blueprint for generations of forward-thinking rock musicians. White Light/White Heat is their weirdest and darkest album as well as our favourite — it features scuzzy, lo-fi rock songs as well as The Gift, in which an entire short story is read aloud to music. And to top it all off is the infamous Sister Ray, a controversial, 17-minute noise rock freak-out that is pure, uncensored chaos. The Velvet Underground were always torn between the musical interests of their two primary songwriters: the experimental John Cale and classic popsmith Lou Reed. But on White Light/White Heat, they found the perfect balance of beauty and filth, and created an experimental rock album for the ages.

THE KINKS — THE KINKS ARE THE VILLAGE GREEN PRESERVATION SOCIETY

Released: November 1968

The Kinks’ quirky style and sunny pop songs were a huge influence on the indie rock bands that rose to popularity in the 2000s, and Village Green is, with good reason, the album they are remembered most for. Its songs are catchy and deceptively simple, but there are more psychedelic and experimental passages that betray the influence of The Beatles. Village Green is a concept album centred around an idealised and nostalgic vision of English life, and while this didn’t make it popular in the revolutionary ’60s, it has gained in stature since. 
For English listeners, songs about strawberry jam, steam-powered trains and village churches evoke memories of childhood and family holidays. For the rest of the world, we imagine Village Green as being a little window into English life — one from the top floor of a sunny, summer cottage somewhere deep in the countryside.

— Stuart Wood
The writer is a graduate from Leeds University, who interned with t2