There are tons of soundtracks which will give you a nice '60s mix. The Big Chill for example.
But those collection never have a Beatles song and rarely have a Stones song. I wonder if future generations will see these and think those two groups were not essential to the decade musically.
There have been several mentions of Motown soul, but I don’t see anything by the other great R&B label of the 60’s: Stax/Volt. “Memphis Soul” has a harder edge to it than does Motown. Not quite as polished and produced, but (IMHO) much tastier licks. Artists include Otis Redding, Booker T & the MGs (the Stax house band), Eddie Floyd, Sam and Dave, Carla Thomas, and a host of others.
Check here for some good Stax/Volt compilations.
Also check out the Atlantic soul artists. Stax/Volt had a rather symbiotic relationship with the Atlantic label. The king and queen of Atlantic soul were Wilson Pickett and Aretha Franklin. Plenty of great stuff to choose from there.
Finally, to round out the picture, don’t forget Mr. Dynamite, the Godfather of Soul, the Hardest Working Man in Show Business, Soul Brother No. 1: James Brown! This is an excellent compilation.
Yeah I hear you. I’m sure I’ve typed it that way myself before and freaked out at my own self for even having thought it 
I was pretty sure you knew what you were talking about too - just wanted to make sure Diosa didn’t fall into the same trap right off the bat!
The 13th Floor Elevators – brilliant acid-fried garagey whambang, and the launchpad for one of rock’s true mad genius angels, the great Roky Erickson
**MC5 **-- pure hard rock fury from some of punk’s earliest spiritual ancestors
Iron Butterfly – they really were louder than love. And their cover of Summertime Blues just freakin’ kills.
Frank Zappa and the Mothers Of Invention – because, there are reasons Frank was around in the public consciousness for as long as he was, and this is where it began.
Sly and the Family Stone – acid rock meets soul, and neither side comes out unscathed.
**Ten Years After **and Canned Heat-- two different approaches to electric (in all senses of the word) blues
People have already mentioned Janis, the Velvets, Hendrix and the Forever Changes album, and I second all those. It wasn’t all tambourines and daisies and earnest folkie bleating and hippie ear-candy; there was some cool,dark, **evil **hard rock getting made at the same time which will light a holy fire under anyone who loves The Noise.
Kick Out the Jams! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2LCErRSqIs&feature=related
You have to here the song In The Year 2525 by Zager and Evans released in 1969. It is very much in tune with the nukes will kill us thoughts we all had.
Get don’t ask’s collection, and follow it up with the Complete Monterey Pop Festival:
Disc: 1
Disc: 2
Disc: 3
Disc: 4
Wow. What a Golden Age for music.
I grew up listening to Simon&Garfunkel, the Beatles, Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, Donovan, Leonard Cohen … my opinion is that the best songs of S&G are not their most well-known ones (like “I am a Rock,” and “Bridge Over Trouble Waters,” for instance). My personal favorites are “A Poem on the Underground Wall,” “For Emily,” “Kathy’s Song,” “Slip-Slidin’ Away,” “American Tune,” “April, Come She Will,” “Bleeker Street,” “Cloudy,” “The Dangling Conversation,” and “Still Crazy After All These Years.”
I don’t know why I picked up my parents’ musical tastes. In elementary school, while my friends were listening to New Kids on the Block and Celine Dion, I was singing along to S&G and Joan Baez. It didn’t do much for my social life.
Nitpick: A couple of those are from Paul Simon’s solo career, which is well worth checking out, but which post-dates the Sixties.
I haven’t seen the following:
Dave Clark Five (Glad All Over)
Herman’s Hermits (Mrs. Brown…)
The Lovin’ Spoonful (Summer In The City)
Gerry & The Pacemakers (Don’t Let The Sun Catch You Cryin’ and Ferry, Cross the Mersey)
B.J. Thomas (Raindrops Keep Fallin’ On My Head)
Swingin’ Medallions (Double Shot Of My Baby’s Love)
Sam The Sham & The Pharoahs (Little Red Ridin’ Hood)
Yeah, but, really the “60’s” don’t start 'till what 62, 63, 64 at least? There’s a not quite definite turning point but; the British invasion, Doo Wop turns into Motown, beatniks become hippies, etc… and they don’t really end 'till almost the mid 70’s; disco, another British invasion (punk 
), etc.
John Barleycorn Must Die (Traffic in general) is clearly 60’s music!
CMC +fnord!
Regarding lighter, poppy tunes: The Royal Guardsmen’s “Snoopy” songs.
Wow!
When you’ve worked through all these, check out this song from Krokodil (any relation to the doper of the same name?).
I heard this band on iTunes a couple of months ago and was reminded of …well, groovy 60’s music. The video is from 2006, but they covered the song in the 60’s. I believe the original was written by Tim Hardin.
DLuxN8R-13, are you sure you’re not thinking of Blue Cheer’s cover of Summertime Blues? I can’t find where Iron Butterfly ever recorded it. (Then again, I’ve been wrong before.)
Also “The Unicorn” by The Irish Rovers. Heck, get their “Best of” CD.
Oooops. You’re right, I’m wrong. :smack: Blue Cheer it was, and I think they were who I meant to recommend even and I got 'em mixed up with that OTHER loud-ass band from 1968. :o : Oh, well…I was born in 1959 and only started listening to 60s music sometime in my 20s.
(At least this gives me an excuse to stick one of these comical looking self-smackin’s :smack: into my post.)
Good God, people! No Spirit? (“Mechanical World”) No Crosby Stills and Nash (and later, Young)? (“Ohio,” “Almost Cut My Hair” which is a ridiculously overblown song but fun because of it). No It’s A Beautiful Day? (“Searching for the Dolphin” though best known for “White Bird”).
By the way, does anybody else find that “Not So Sweet Martha Lorraine” is a weird precursor to the Goth movement that somehow appeared a couple of decades early (“The joy of life/she dresses in black/With a parade of angels/engraved on her back”)
Also, B-52’s “Channel Z” MIGHT be far enough back in their history to somehow shoehorn into the 70s-that-were-really-leftover=60s, and their “Summer of Love” although I don’t think it got written til the 80s or 90s, is definitely a 60s kinda tune.
If you are going to go for It’s A Beautiful Day, then the tunes you need are “Don and Dewey” and “Soapstone Mountain,” both off the Marrying Maiden album.
For that matter, we need to add Quicksilver Messenger Service, Moby Grape, and The Fugs.
Oh, those are two of my personal faves, but I felt “Searching for the Dolphin” has a quality of hippy-dippyness that makes it a little more 60s than the others. I mean, Don and Dewey is an instrumental already.
The Sixties, summed up in one video of one song.
We’re all outlaws in the eyes of america
In order to survive we steal cheat lie forge fuck hide and deal
We are obscene lawless hideous dangerous dirty violent and young
We should be together
