The Musical Lives of Charles Manson

<p><b>Nicholas Tochka analyzes the role of rock music in the life of Charles Manson, the Family, and the August 1969 Tate-LaBianca killings, which also gives larger insight into Sixties counterculture.</b><br><br>Failed singer-songwriter. Devious cult leader. A rock Pied Piper. The product of a sick society. Just another dime-a-dozen singing hippy mystic. Did the guitar-playing guru personify the violence that the rock counterculture inflicted on America? Or did his music diagnose the dehumanizing effects of that society’s broken institutions?<br><br>For over five decades, commentators have debated the meaning of Charles Manson and the Tate-LaBianca killings. Rock music links their narratives: from the aciddrenched singalongs at the Spahn Movie Ranch, to a bizarre theology centered on Beatles songs, to his commune’s alleged links with Hollywood’s elite, to an album, <i>LIE: The Love and Terror Cult</i> (1970). In this first comprehensive examination of the Manson Family’s music, Nicholas Tochka writes with, against, and alongside the many authors—true-crime hacks, gonzo journalists, conspiracy theorists, and rock critics alike—who have told and retold the story of “the Manson murders.” Playing the truth games that these postwar Americans helped invent, <i>The Musical Lives of Charles Manson</i> presents a new take on the story of the commune—and on rock’s role in fracturing the possibility of writing trustworthy histories after the Sixties.<br><br>“They are afraid of it, because it tells the truth,” Manson once claimed, describing his music. Just what truths did the Manson Family’s music-making tell?</p>