Rock Me on the Water, Ronald Brownstein
Rock Me on the Water, Ronald Brownstein
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Rock Me on the Water
1974-The Year Los Angeles Transformed Movies, Music, Television and Politics

Bestseller

Author: Ronald Brownstein

Narrator: Will Damron

Unabridged: 16 hr 14 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: HarperAudio

Published: 03/23/2021


Synopsis

In this exceptional cultural history, Atlantic Senior Editor Ronald Brownstein—“one of America's best political journalists (The Economist)—tells the kaleidoscopic story of one monumental year that marked the city of Los Angeles’ creative peak, a glittering moment when popular culture was ahead of politics in predicting what America would become. 

Los Angeles in 1974 exerted more influence over popular culture than any other city in America. Los Angeles that year, in fact, dominated popular culture more than it ever had before, or would again. Working in film, recording, and television studios around Sunset Boulevard, living in Brentwood and Beverly Hills or amid the flickering lights of the Hollywood Hills, a cluster of transformative talents produced an explosion in popular culture which reflected the demographic, social, and cultural realities of a changing America. At a time when Richard Nixon won two presidential elections with a message of backlash against the social changes unleashed by the sixties, popular culture was ahead of politics in predicting what America would become. The early 1970s in Los Angeles was the time and the place where conservatives definitively lost the battle to control popular culture.Rock Me on the Water traces the confluence of movies, music, television, and politics in Los Angeles month by month through that transformative, magical year. Ronald Brownstein reveals how 1974 represented a confrontation between a massive younger generation intent on change, and a political order rooted in the status quo. Today, we are again witnessing a generational cultural divide. Brownstein shows how the voices resistant to change may win the political battle for a time, but they cannot hold back the future.

About Ronald Brownstein

Ronald Brownstein, a two-time finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of presidential campaigns, is a senior editor at The Atlantic, and a senior political analyst for CNN. He also served as the national political correspondent and national affairs columnist for the Los Angeles Times and covered he White House and national politics for the National Journal. He is the author of six previous books, most recently, The Second Civil War: How Extreme Partisanship Has Paralyzed Washington and Polarized America.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Suzanne on March 23, 2021

I have mixed feelings about Ronald Brownstein’s ROCK ME ON THE WATER: 1974. Brownstein is persuasive that the 1970’s was an extremely creative, productive period for Los Angeles, signaling a shift in the metro area as well as the entire country. But the book itself reads like a series of well-resear......more

Goodreads review by Jim on May 15, 2021

Ronald Brownstein's Rock Me on the Water: 1974—The Year Los Angeles Transformed Movies, Music, Television and Politics is typical of most New York disquisitions about Southern California. That is especially true when dealing with the entertainment industry, which is much more than an industry. I hav......more

Goodreads review by Dave on July 23, 2023

I have heard it said that the music you listen to in high school remains your music of choice throughout your life. This has certainly been true for me. I graduated in 1967 and the Beach Boys, Mamas and Papas, Lovin' Spoonful, and other groups of the mid-60s are still my go-to selections. Ron Browns......more

Goodreads review by Jim on January 27, 2022

"In the struggle for control of popular culture, Los Angeles during the early 1970s was the right’s Gettysburg or Battle of the Bulge: the moment when it definitively lost the war." — Ronald Brownstein, ROCK ME ON THE WATER I was born in 1965, which is another way of saying that I knew the 1970s in th......more

Goodreads review by David on June 24, 2021

Ron Brownstein says that Los Angeles 1974 stood as the pinnacle of the cultural renaissance. I’m not sure if 1974 was the key year, but that specific time period might have represented a transition of eras with a lot of residues of influence that still stands today. I would not get caught up as a re......more