Flowers in the Dustbin: The Rise of Rock and Roll, 1947-1977

by James Miller

The Barnes & Noble Review
David Lee Roth said that the beauty of rock and roll is that "they're no rules and no schools. You just make it up as you go along." Certainly, the history of the plugged-in genre seems more like a mad romp than a logical development. James Miller sets out here to capture the evolution of early R&R as an industry and as a force in American life. Without descending into diatribe or veering towards critical theory, this former Michel Foucault biographer writes about the metamorphosis of casual basement jamming into a sometimes devious multi-million dollar business. Strewn along the way are epiphanies of music history: Bob Dylan turning the Beatles onto marijuana at their first meeting in 1964; Berry Gordy producing his first big hit by instructing Jackie Wilson to imitate Elvis Presley; the less-than-endearing first appearance of the Sex Pistols on British TV. Both literate and unpretentious, Miller catches the frantic surrealism of the rock scene. As Jerry Garcia said, "By comparison, real life is very dull."
— Jules Herbert

Genres: Music, Nonfiction, History, Cultural, American History, Journalism, Pop Culture

416 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1999

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.

James Miller is a professor of politics and the chair of liberal studies at the New School for Social Research. He is the author of Examined Lives, The Passion of Michel Foucault, and Flowers in the Dustbin: The Rise of Rock & Roll, 1947–1977, among other books. He lives in New York City.

http://us.macmillan.com/author/jamesm...

Reviews

[Paul Bryant · Rating 2 out of 5]

This one really wasn't very good. We don't have to talk about it. I'd much rather talk about something else. What do you suggest? Hmmm. The coalition government here in Britain? Huh? No, I do not want to talk about that. Christmas shopping? No, nor that. Come on - there must be something. Okay, in the absence of any sensible suggestions, I'll tell you about a dream I had. No, it was about music. I was in charge of a great glamorous award ceremony and I was giving out all kinds of strange awards for achievements in music. Yes, a megalomaniacal music dream.

Here's a few of the ones I remember.

Best use of artist’s mother on any record.

This goes to Wild man Fischer for his album "An Evening with
Wild Man Fischer"



As you see, Larry's mum is represented by a life size cutout on the cover, and yes, Larry is holding a knife up to her throat.

Second greatest use of the artist's mother on record is by Iris DeMent, a great country singer, who got her mum to sing an entire hymn called Higher Ground on Iris's first album, and it was really lovely.

Greatest mispronunciation in the history of recorded music: there were some strong contenders here, but this award goes to....Hank Williams for his song "The Battle of Armageddon", which he pronounces as “Am-you-garden”.

Next is the Most Degenerated Voice in recorded music. This is a tie. Marianne Faithfull began way back in the 60s as an angelic soprano - check out Come and Stay with Me or Counting - and after years of drug abuse and an awful lot of yelling and screaming, it would appear, her voice became a froggy croak which she learned to use with great skill - but wow, what a difference. And the co-winner is Mr Bob Dylan - of course many people think he never could sing in the first instance but that's plain wrong, listen to One More Cup of Coffee from Desire or Moonshiner from The Bootleg Series, absolutely beautiful. However after doing 495 gigs per year since 1989 his voice is like something a toad would be frightened of, although, again, he croaks very fetchingly to my ears. But degenerated, yes.

The award for the most cheerfulness in the face of death goes to Jimmie Rodgers, the first country star, who recorded Whippin’ that Old TB in 1932 when he had TB and was not whippin' it. He died the following year.

Next, the Most Amateurish Performance on a Hit Record was won by Louie Louie, recorded in 1963 by The Kingsmen. These days even idiots can press the right knobs on their keyboards to make the software fix all their mistakes, but back then they couldn't, and I really like it when on Louie Louie the drummer loses the beat completely and the vocalist comes in too early at least once. A great record.

The Most Moving Tramp ever recorded is of course the unnamed vocalist on Jesus Blood Never failed me Yet by Gavin Bryars

The Most Embarrassing Record I Own - well, this was hotly contended, but eventually I had to give the Golden Pancreas to Donovan for his song Legend of a Girl Child Linda. Sample lyric:

One hundred small children, they laugh at the white doves
That rest on their hands with the touch of love.
On a hillside of velvet the children laid down
And make fun of the grown-ups with their silly frowns
And the sound of their laughter is the sound of the green sea
As it washed around the foot of the seashell tree.

and so on for 6 minutes.

The strangest instrument ever recorded : a live beetle jaw’s harp. Yes, you get your giant beetle, tie it to a piece of wood and use your mouth cavity to modulate the humming sound it is emitting as it tries to fly away. It's in the BBC archives. Recorded in Indonesia.

The worst record bar none - you may think this was a tough category, but no, one record shone out above all other terrible records ever : Kitty in a Basket by Diane Decker.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Frpo_...

After that I woke up screaming.

[Drew Canole · Rating 1 out of 5]

We all hear the bullshit line, "oh, I was just born in the wrong decade". We should instantly realize how idealistic and insensible this statement is. We can always make the past appear more rosy than it actually was. Jim Miller did live through the 60s though, and even he thinks it was better than it was.

Jim Miller reviewed the latest Jimi Hendrix album Axis: Bold as Love (Dec, 1967) in the Rolling Stones issue of June of 1968. He derided the album stating: "Jimi Hendrix sounds like a junk heap...his songs too often are basically a bore, and the Experience also shares with Cream the problem of vocal ability." This is the album that is ranked #82 on the Rolling Stone's 500 greatest albums list.

Miller was one of the few early Rolling Stone's reviewers to strike a long-lasting career in music reviews. In 1999, 30 years after his initial review Miller wrote a book called Flowers in the Dustbin: The Rise of Rock & Roll: 1947-1977. The book has Miller chronicling the "critical moments in the advent of rock and roll" including the famous moment when Hendrix lit his guitar on fire at Monterey. "At the end of the set, when he sent his Fender up in flames, the bonfire did not seem gratuitous," Miller writes. "It seemed rather a gesture of innocent gratitude, a burnt offering to the unknown pagan gods who had blessed this harvest of creativity, and granted one man-child a moment of rare bliss." Only ten months later, Miller incredulously finds Hendrix sounding like a junk heap. In fact, many of the then present music writers were highly critical of Hendrix's stage antics and guitar heroics.

The history of rock as viewed through rose-tinted glasses.

[Jim Nirmaier · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love reading books that recount the rise (and sometimes the fall as well) of the world-changing cultural musical force known as Rock ‘N’ Roll. I’ve consumed upwards of 20 different versions of this fascinating multi-layered story; some certainly better than others.

I thought it was very interesting that Mr. Miller chose as the title of his tome the lyric from the seismic-shaking “poke-in-the-eye” rock raconteurs from the very end of the time period covered in his book – the infamous Sex Pistols and their lyric from one of the truest Rock And Roll songs ever created – “God Save The Queen” —

“Oh when there’s no future
How can there be sin
We’re the flowers
In the dustbin
We’re the poison
In your human machine
We’re the future
Your future”

The book’s chronicle of this dynamic period of youthful expression also ends coincidentally with the year of my high school graduation, and heavily covers two of the most formative decades of my youth – the 60’s & 70’s. What a glorious time to be young!

And don’t you just love books that “flow off the page” from the beginning and provide such an easygoing enjoyable read that you learn tons of stuff and it’s as if no effort was expended whatsoever? Such is the case with James Miller’s 1999 entertaining chronicle of the Golden Years of Rock.

And it’s no surprise. Mr. Miller was the original editor of The Rolling Stone Illustrated History of Rock and Roll back in 1976 and one of his early record reviews appeared in the third issue of Rolling Stone magazine. This particular book in question was the winner of an ASCAP-Deems Taylor award and a Ralph Gleason BMI award for best music book of 1999.

But, back to the book. Mr. Woods organized this decades-long cultural musical “moment” into 6 broad section categories –

Life Could be a Dream (1947-1955)
Rock and Roll Music (1955)
All Shook Up (1956 – 1960)
Glad All Over (1961-1965)
Break on Through (1965-1971)
Stairway to Heaven (1972-1977)

The first section entitled Life Could be a Dream begins in December, 1947 with “Good Rockin’ Tonight” and wraps up in the Spring of 1955 with “The Blackboard Jungle” (RIP Mr. Poitier). Ir covers the percolation of Blues, R&B, & C&W that boiled over to create a new creative sensation eventually tagged as Rock ‘N’ Roll (originally a Black term for making love), the seismic innovation of amplified electric guitars, the power of radio in the “spreading of the gospel,” doo-wop, & Elvis the Pelvis and his subsequent meteoric rise and cultural impact (among much more).

The second section entitled Rock and Roll Music begins on March 15, 1955 with “Ain’t It A Shame” and wraps up December 19, 1955 with “Blue Suede Shoes.” It includes a detailed emphasis on Fats Domino, Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Frankie Lymon, & Carl Perkins (among much more).

The third section entitled All Shook Up begins on June 5, 1956 with “Elvis From the Waist Down” and wraps up May 12, 1960 with “Elvis Comes Home.” This portion of the book goes into excellent detail about Elvis’ early appearances on TV and the virtual “overnight” impact he had; first on American, and then worldwide, pop culture and the creation of the teenage consumer market, Ricky Nelson, the hugely impactful spread of Black music into the mainstream music and radio industries, the tragic payola scandal (especially for Alan Freed), Dick Clark & American Bandstand, the beginning of Elvis’ enlisted Army period, his eventual return and the beginning of his detrimental movie career (among much more).

The fourth section entitled Glad All Over begins on November 9, 1961 with “Brian Epstein Enters The Cavern” and wraps up October-November, 1965 with “Rubber Soul.” This 48 page chunk of the book entertainingly and minutely covers the origins of the Beatles and Stones, the overall musical milieu in London at the time and the British Invasion, while wrapping with Mr. Dylan’s heretical (from the narrow folk traditionalists’ perspective) transition to electrical instrumentation and experimentation (among much more).

The fifth section entitled Break on Through begins on December 4, 1965 with “The Acid Test” and wraps up July 3, 1971 with “The End.” Covered is the arrival of psychedelics and the rise of drug use in the musical scene, a strange pale man with a mop of white hair called Andy Warhol, the Rock cultural cornerstone album Sgt. Pepper’s, the Monterey Pop festival, the live event disaster known as Altamont, Marvin Gaye’s equally important Rock/Soul cultural cornerstone album What’s Going On, and the many rock icon deaths in the early 70’s (among much more).

The sixth, and final, section entitled Stairway to Heaven begins on July 9, 1972 with “Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars,” and wraps up August 16, 1977 with “My Way.” The book ends with this 40 page segment that obviously covers the arrival of Bowie/Ziggy and the glam rock era, the worldwide emergence of reggae and the influential Jamaican film The Harder They Come, the release of the enormously successful mainstream movie American Graffiti and the ensuing spread of the popularity of movie soundtrack records and the conscious marketing of nostalgia (Golden Oldies, etc.), as well as the emergence of the punk scenes in NYC and England (among much more).

Highly recommended for the like-minded and already initiated, as well as an excellent “jumping off point” for any readers interested in learning about this enormously influential and world-and life-changing magical period of musical history.

“Oh, give me the beat boys and free my soul
I wanna get lost in your rock and roll and drift away
Oh, give me the beat boys and free my soul
I wanna get lost in your rock and roll and drift away”

--- Dobie Gray

[Caitlin Conlon · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars rounded down. A solid account of the first 30 years of rock and roll, good for people (like me) who don’t know a lot about its ins and outs. The prose is a little dry, but never too dense to get through. Miller’s personal opinions on these artists often seeped through the text, and I thought his cynicism towards the genre in the epilogue was a weird choice. Why spend so much time writing about a topic you’re no longer interested in? It makes me wonder if much of this book was just cobbled together from past articles and research.

Even so, I’m glad to have read this and now feel I have a better understanding of rock and roll’s origins.

[East Bay J · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think I’ve been waiting for a book like Flowers In The Dustbin for a long time. There are countless books on rock ‘n’ roll that glorify and idealize the music and performers, but very rarely is there a book that not only takes an honest look at rock music but also examines and determines its state along the way.

What I mean is, rock ‘n’ roll lost any innocence it may have had a good fifty years ago. For a very long time, it has been little more than a commodity on the grand scale. Sure, people continue and will continue to get excited about making and hearing rock ‘n’ roll music, but the ideas a lot of folks have, that rock ‘n’ roll is some kind of youth music, something pure and unsullied, a voice for change and so on, are absurd.

So, what I enjoyed the most about Miller’s book is that, in it, he comes right out and says it. He gives praise to the creativity and spirit of various performers but he doesn’t hold back when saying these musicians were untrained (and in some cases not very good), that Elvis turned into a mess, that the hype surrounding Springsteen was, in fact, unwarranted. Miller remains level headed and honest while still acknowledging how great the music was.

I also dug the connections Miller made, the narrative he chose to highlight. He doesn’t cover every major event in the history of rock ‘n’ roll but what he does cover more than adequately illustrates the ideas he’s trying to convey. These essays/chapters work just like a novel, taking the reader from 1947 to 1977, following the mystery of what rock ‘n’ roll is and what it means.

Another great point Miller makes is that music started as being only regionally divided in this country. It took the involvement of the music industry to create the idea of musical genres. At one time, an album like Sgt. Pepper unified people across the board. This kind of thing may never happen again because we've been taught to fit our tastes to demographic friendly categories.

Flowers In The Dustbin is well written and insightful. Definitely pretty essential reading for people interested in rock ‘n’ roll as a worldwide cultural phenomenon and in the greater implications of rock ‘n’ roll since it began.

[Jeffrey Taylor · Rating 2 out of 5]

The strength of this book is its organization. By focusing on individual songs or albums rather then presenting the entire career of an artist in a single essay, Miller has crafted a detailed timeline that permits the reader to understand the changes of song and artist as the quickly took place.

Miller's major weakness is his declaration that rock and roll reached its zenith and has been experiencing its downfall ever since. What the reader sees is a writer projecting changes his feelings towards the music onto the art form. We see a nine year old child excited by the music he is experiencing and buying, who becomes a guitarists and song writer and transitions into a professional critic published in major print media. As the music transitions from avocation to vocation for him, his enthusiasm changes from excitement to professionalism to routine. Not everyone has shared this private experience.

[M.L. Rio · Rating 3 out of 5]

The first half of this book is much better than the second. It's understandable; in the early years Miller provides a detailed and fascinating history of the birth of rock and roll from the blues, but with the explosion of rock after about 1965, he starts to lose his grip and spends way too much time on certain artists (we get it, the Beatles were a watershed) while neglecting to mention others at all. There's also a whiff of bitterness in the later pages; Miller clearly thinks something went wrong with rock, not surprisingly right around the time it started to make big money. But his pessimism or nostalgia or whatever it is seems to willfully ignore the fact that some great pieces of music appeared after and in spite of capitalism having its way.

[Jill H. · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this book in spurts since it is comprised of stand-alone chapters which can be read at leisure. I have mixed feelings about it. While it does have some good fact filled and unbiased rocker profiles (Jim Morrison, for example), it omits some of the greats who helped shaped what we call "rock and roll". Very little information on doo-wop, nothing about Led Zep and way too much about the Beatles. It would probably take ten volumes to examine all the influences and artists that were instrumental in the creation of rock and we all have our own opinions about who they were..........the author tried but it wasn't quite enough for me.

[Babs M · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really enjoyed the first half of the book because it told me a lot of early artists that no longer get their due. However he neglected some key players in my opinion and praised others a bit too much, i.e. Bruce Springsteen. I highly recommend it up to the Beatles point of the book because you will already pretty much know the rest of what he is going to tell you.

[Trace Reddell · Rating 3 out of 5]

The first half of the book was outstanding as it chronicled various proto-rock threads and their convergence. Hadn't listened to folks like Wynonie Harris, Les Paul, or Patti Page before, and it had been a long time since listening to early Elvis, Carl Perkins, Chuck Berry, and Little Richard. There is an excitement of discovery that carries over through this part of Miller's book, and the narratives were mostly new to me. By the time we hit the Beatles material, and then the Stones, and so on, the biographies, histories, and anecdotes become more familiar, but are still mostly engaging in terms of the overarching narrative that Miller weaves. This is a highly selective narrative, by the way, which focuses on maybe 15 big names of artists/bands over the course of the book, and leaves out a lot of others, a few partially but most completely. But over the course of reading the second half of the book, a kind of weariness on the part of the author starts creeping in, even a kind of crustiness, and by the time I hit the epilogue, it feels certain that the author hasn't really enjoyed the subject matter much, is tired of rock and roll, and trots out a kind of pathetic malaise that coincides with the death of Elvis. In this sense, the book feels more like a highly personal narrative of Miller's relationship to rock and roll, and while I'm not saying it would have been better if written at some of faux journalistic distance, I just felt a kind of emotional disconnect from the subject as it seemed to unduly sour Miller's narrative as history rather than criticism. And that sums it up, there becomes an imbalance between the historical and the critical voice that isn't clearly set up in the book's frame, and so it comes across more as personal emotional response than either historical storytelling or critical assessment. This jumble made it, by the last third, a bit of a slog and ultimately unsatisfying.

[Katy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow, did I enjoy this book. A collection of essays about pivotal moments in rock and roll, from the recording of "Good Rockin' Tonight" by Wynonie Harris in 1947 to the death of Elvis Presley in 1977, and covering (almost) everything in between. More than just a history of rock, it describes how events or recordings or albums, from the most famous of all time to ones you've never heard of, influenced rock and roll's development in ways large and small, and how each moment affected those that came after. There's a fascinating piece on how Patti Page's 1950 "Tennessee Waltz" (not a rock standard by ANY stretch, but the first song to use a primitive form of musical tracks) "created a new standard for the manipulation of artificially produced sounds--a standard that would prove central to the aesthetics of rock and roll." There was even an essay on the creation of the Top 40 radio format.

Miller has the typical baby boomer's loyalties and blind spots, but still, I learned a ton of fascinating stuff. Had to read with my phone nearby so I could listen to clips as I went along. Highly recommend!

[Yavvo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting look into the formation and earlier eras of Rock N Roll. I was previously unaware of Wynonie Harris and the Jump Blues proto-rock era so that was some good exposure. Miller writes on numerous highlights between 47-77 which he feels are important, but I was disappointed that he excluded to mention the Beach Boys and surf rock, instead skipping ahead to the Beatles. Also, he gives way too much praise to Springsteen imo. You can obviously tell he hates punk and wasn't very aware of the mixing genres of the 90s, but overall it was interesting if for nothing else by the introduction into the formulation of early Rock N Roll.

[Scott · Rating 3 out of 5]

An essential read on the pre-history of rock and roll, an indispensable summation of the golden age of rock, James Miller spoils the effect by summarily dismissing and disparaging much of the punk movement of the seventies. He also bungles the timeline of New Wave by placing it concurrently with that of the early punk bands.

This dismissiveness surely speaks to Miller's personal taste, an attitude not apparent in the earliest sections. Worthwhile but disappointing.

[Lauren · Rating 2 out of 5]

Interesting but dammit, he shouldn't have said what he did about Janis' lack of musicality That made me question everything. Interesting ideas about the links between commercial culture and the music business and I won't say I didn't learn anything. I also really liked the structure - significant dates and events in the lives of performers, songs recorded, tecnology. But man, why did you have to take down Janis?

[James · Rating 4 out of 5]

A nostalgic magic carpet ride through rock's back pages, including a scene-setting examination of the pre-rock era, whose music may ultimately prove more compelling than triumphant rock 'n' roll.

If American music fans had only retained their racial, homophobic, and other biases--outlined in this book (e.g., the Monterey Pop, Ziggy Stardust, and Anarchy in the U.K. sections)--instead of jettisoning them for rappers, divas, aggro-rockers, and other weak dudes, this country would STILL ROCK!!!

[Grindy Stone · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not quite as bad as other reviews would have you believe. Some reviewers take exception to the amount of space given over to Elvis and The Beatles, but that's like squawking about a general baseball history that pays too much attention to the Yankees. However, there are some gaps in here - no mention of The Who or Led Zeppelin.

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

A skeptical history of rock and roll.

[Burak Türkel · Rating 5 out of 5]

rock'n roll'un tarihine ışık tutan, başucu kitabı.

[Dan · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good general overview of the history of rock and roll, this includes ink on all your favorite heavy hitters (Sam Phillips, Elvis Presley, Alan Freed, The Beatles, The Sex Pistols, etc). No new ground is really tread on here, but Miller has a great style that flows without being stuffy. My favorite chapters were on rock's more "B-Roll" material: "Sympathy for the Devil" and the Godard film featuring the Stones, Bowie's introduction of Ziggy Stardust as a stage character, a brief bio of Wynonie Harris and a closer look at the song "Shh Boom Shh Boom".

Don't let this be the only book you read on the subject. It's a great companion to Greil Marcus' "Mystery Train" or "The Label" by Gary Mamostein (a hefty history of Columbia Records).

[Gwen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Flowers in the Dustbin is a good synopsis of the rise of rock and roll, just not all inclusive or complete. Buddy Holly has barely a mention (and his death has been touted as the day the music died) nor do the prefab four, the Monkees (while a put together band they did have an impact on rock and roll and how it was marketed and perceived). While some might argue Buddy and the Monkees aren't rock and roll it is my contention they are as much rock and roll as some of the other artists/events mentioned in the book. I do understand not everything or everyone can be included in a book, but the inclusion of these two artists would not have made the book substantially larger.

I do recommend this book to anyone interested in the history of rock.

[M. D. Hudson · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this book -- by far the best rock n roll crit book I've encountered. My only complaint is that it wasn't longer. Unlike so many rock books, this one focuses on individual songs rather than trends or movements or Motown or whatever. There is some general cultural background, but this is always very relevant and very very interesting. Really, I wish this book had been twice as long.

[Frank Taranto · Rating 3 out of 5]

A history of Rock and Roll told in little vignettes about acts and scenes that he considers important. I enjoyed most of the book, especially the parts about Elvis Presley and the Beatles.
I found it interesting when he writes about how Rock started splintering in 1967. I'm not sure about the date, but the idea hit home with me.

[Mary · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book gives a really great history of Rock and Roll, including some very interesting facts about some of my favorite bands. This was required reading for a class but I am very glad I had to read it.

[James Carmichael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Much better written than most rock/pop hagiographies; picks an emblematic moment in each step in the progression of rock and elucidates it with a brief (3-7 page) essay. Terrific.

[Jared Gillins]

For my history of American popular music class.

To finish later.

[Kevin Gallan · Rating 3 out of 5]

i liked this book.written well.learned a few things

[Drew · Rating 5 out of 5]

Essential reading for any music fan. Endlessly fascinating.

[Linda · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you want to know how rock started this is the book to read. Marvelous.

[Dennis McClure · Rating 3 out of 5]

I've apologized to younger people for the fact that my generation took Rock and Roll and used it all up. Miller gets it. But he doesn't.

He's a terrifically eloquent writer. And he gets the very early days. But his narrative leaves Memphis and Sun Records way too soon. And he doesn't even touch Muscle Shoals. I can forgive leaving out The Man in Black--almost. But Jerry Lee?

And then there's the others--Buddy Holly, The Big Bopper... Leave them out. Really?

The Beatles and Dylan were important. Not THAT important. Ditto Motown.

And by the time the history got around to Jim Morrison and the Doors? Like I said, my generation used it all up.