ABSTRACT
Within human geography the study of countercultural space is well established, and the term ‘counterculture’ is used to describe the values and norms of behaviour of a social group that functions in opposition to the social mainstream of the day. 1 The term was first used in 1969 by Theodore Roszak (1970) and subsequently assigned more generally to 1960s political, social and cultural activities. Music is important in most writing about countercultural space. Regardless of whether the writer is a historian, journalist or sociologist, the significance of music within the culture is often highlighted. There may be two reasons for this. On the one hand, music has been seen as a mediating tool of the counterculture, because the message of the counterculture was communicated through music. It was by no means the only communicative tool, but it was an effective one. On the other hand, music from the time when countercultural space flourished in the 1960s has lived on and can now arguably be seen as its most potent legacy. It seems strange, therefore, that the subject has not been popular among music scholars.
