Postwar pop realignment

1960

Elvis returns from Germany, the Brill Building sharpens its craft, and Motown quietly assembles the hit factory that will own the decade.

Elvis Returns, Pop Reorganizes

Elvis ships home from Germany and the charts snap to attention — a King returning to reclaim the throne everyone had been holding warm. The Brill Building starts humming with songwriters who treat three minutes like cinema, and Motown is quietly assembling a factory in Detroit. Pop still loves a crooner, but the beat underneath is getting harder to ignore.

• Elvis comeback
• Brill Building
• Motown
• crooners
• early sixties pop

• Elvis discharged from the Army, records 'It's Now or Never'
• The Drifters' 'Save the Last Dance for Me' defines elegant pop
• Motown releases its first national hits
• Chubby Checker launches the Twist craze