Ready for a Brand New Beat : How "Dancing in the Street" Became the Anthem for a Changing America

from

I read this book as an early reviewer and I'm not so sure what to expect in a pre publication versionso I will get that bit out of the way. There were typos and it seemed to need a bit of editing to get the author's thoughts strung together. Its a good history of early rock and folk and the birth...

from btuckertx

Mark Kurlansky's book, Ready For A Brand New Beat, was an interesting monologue on how music impacted a generation. Beginning with a brief outline of rock and roll's infancy in the 1950s, Kurlansky's focus is on Motown's ability to provide a bridge - whether directly or indirectly - constructed o...

from jazznoir

For those who are unfamiliar with the importance of the March on Washington 50 years ago, Mark Kurlansky's recent book makes for a good introduction to the civil rights movement and understanding why hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets in an effort to end segregation. In 1963, Am...

from Dogberryjr

How do you write an entire book about one short pop song? Filler. Lots and lots of filler. This is not entirely a bad thing, but readers should go into this book prepared to wander, stroll and wade around all things 1960s. Kurlansky has previously written about other strangely singular topics (sa...

from TimBazzett

The central premise of Mark Kurlansky's READY FOR A BRAND NEW BEAT is, to begin with, a pretty thin one: How a single Motown record, "Dancing in the Street," became a major unifying factor in the civil rights movement of the sixties. And how the Motown sound in general served to soften the gradua...