Tomorrow Never Knows: Rock and Psychedelics in the 1960s

by Nick Bromell

Tomorrow Never Knows takes us back to the primal scene of the 1960s and what happened when young people got high and listened to rock as if it really mattered—as if it offered meaning and sustenance, not just escape and entertainment? What did young people hear in the music of Dylan, Hendrix, or the Beatles? Bromell's pursuit of these questions radically revises our understanding of rock, psychedelics, and their relation to the politics of the 60s, exploring the period's controversial legacy, and the reasons why being "experienced" has been an essential part of American youth culture to the present day.

Genres: Music, History, Nonfiction

225 pages, Paperback

First published April 15, 2002

Reviews

[Jake Abrams]

Thanks, Professor!

[Craig Werner · Rating 4 out of 5]

A weird hybrid of personal reflection and cultural history spiced with a bit more academic jargon than I would have preferred. Bromell came up in the sixties and has obviously thought long and hard about the intersection of acid rock, psychic exploration, political activism and psychedelic drugs. His musical points of reference--Dylan, the Beatles, Hendrix--overlap with my own, but, although he gives some serious attention to the blues, it's a very white mix. Given that he's very much aware of his position as a privileged white kid, that's not a huge problem; he advances an interesting argument about the ways white kids responded to the experience of "double consciousness." The style bounces back and forth from memoir to post-modernist "critique." Not surprisingly, I prefer the former, but he mostly avoids impenetrable jargon and when he uses the vocabularies of post-modernism, etc., it mostly makes sense. (No way the University of Chicago Press publishes it if he doesn't make those gestures.)

More fundamentally, I had a whole bunch of arguments with Bromell's readings of particular lyrics and albums. For example, he talks about the Beatles White Album as a group project, where for me it's very much a reflection of three sensibilities arguing with each other. But all of that was fun--I'd love to get a chance to sit around and talk some of the issues through with him, which is exactly his point about the conversations that rock generated in the sixties. The notion that cultural critics who have written about rock's entanglement in commercial capitalism were saying anything new is basically silly. The Who Sell Out. We're Only In It for the Money. I Dig Rock and Roll Music.

It's a white take on the sixties, but a smart white take. Glad I read it. Probably mostly for those who already have the points of reference, but that's cool.

[npaw · Rating 4 out of 5]

A lot of good stuff to work with for anyone interested in the Beatles, their music, and their influence on the 60s. Parts could have been better, but overal a great book.

[Christopher Rush · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a bit of a disappointment. It's a confusing look at the '60s, mainly because the author wants to be both super-important-academic and also reflectively personal and memoirish. In some sections the author is campaigning for a tenure-track position with mind-numbing academic mumbo-jumbo, in other sections he's lauding coarse, vulgar drug-induced flights of non-rational miasma. Which we should all do, apparently, since only people who got high back in the day really knew what the '60s were about. Or something. It's a lot of blah blah blah throughout, sadly. He raises potential engagements with some ideas connected the roots of the musical scene but then switches momentum and focus to other topics and rarely draws the flow of his ideas to a meaningful conclusion, which leaves most chapters feeling incomplete. If you are looking for a personal reflection on some of the events and attitudes of the '60s, this may be a mildly helpful launching point, but I don't think we can take this as any final word on any subject dallied with herein.

[RA · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thought-provoking take on 60s music/culture & how it relates to psychedelics ("not necessarily stoned, but beautiful") - The author uses lyrics, at times to posit ideas concerning the "message" to those of us who sat, usually got stoned, & listened. Probably the 1st generational "get-high-listen-to-the-new-album" experience, which has been repeated, with the hip-hop generation & others.

Nick Bromell uses a wealth of related materials - no, he isn't just riffing in a dreamy mind-game about all this - to present a number of interesting ideas about relationship between "young people" & music (specifically).

Several fascinating ideas - the impact & "power" of the [teenage girl] Beatles fans; the concept of the attraction of the blues as a message from the duality of Black experience by teenagers who recognized the duality in their own lives.

The author also wanted to present a view of the "60s," and not ignore, dismiss or minimize the concomitant use of drugs.

[Adrihanna · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was amazing. I love the music of the 60s and the 70s so when I found it in a bookstore I got really excited. It’s a really thought provoking reflection and analysis of the 60s teen and counterculture movements. It could address things in a confusing manner at times but the topics he was dealing with were very hard to explain therefore if you just reread the paragraph you could get it. This is definitely not a book to skim through. Offered a semi biased opinion but no book is ever really unbiased. The book didn’t glamorize psychedelics but it also didn’t dismiss the power it had towards music. Overall, I would highly recommend this book to any fans of 60s music.

[Jake Marsden · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great analysis of some of musics most iconic lyrics and where they draw inspiration from

[Hilary · Rating 1 out of 5]

Can I give this book less than 1 star? The man can't form a sentence and really likes repeating himself. Ouch.