(Photo via amazon.com)

"Anatomy of a Song: The Oral History of 45 Iconic Hits That Changed Rock, R&B and Pop" by Marc Myers

The impact of rock and R&B music from 1950s on is hard to measure.

There was Motown, the British Invasion, Folk, Psychedelia, Heavy Metal. How do you narrow all of that down to 45 songs?

That was Marc Myers’ task as he compiled the new book "Anatomy of a Song: The Oral History of 45 Iconic Hits That Changed Rock, R&B and Pop."

We talked with Myers about what he learned.