Daisy Jones & the Six review: glossy Amazon drama about a 1970s rock band
The series has ‘the style and glamour’ of the book, but it feels a bit flat

Taylor Jenkins Reid’s 2019 bestseller Daisy Jones & the Six was about the “exuberant rise and chaotic fall“ of a 1970s band that seemed to be based on Fleetwood Mac, said Lucy Mangan in The Guardian. The novel felt “made for television”; the rights were “duly snapped up” and it has now been turned into a glossy ten-part series for Amazon Prime.
Riley Keough plays Daisy Jones, a “charismatic singer-songwriter” who joins a band from Pittsburgh made up of childhood friends. They begin playing in “dingy clubs”, and learn to navigate the treacherous waters of the music industry. The series has “the style and glamour” of the book – “everyone and everything in it looks ceaselessly gorgeous”, and it’s fun to watch. But it feels a bit flat, because you don’t really care about the characters.
The series’s big problem, said Hugo Rifkind in The Times, is that it is “not cool. Not nearly.” It offers up “those eternal rock’n’roll handmaidens of drugs and nasty sex”, but it just feels like “cosplay”. Somewhere along the way, the story has lost its “dirty soul”, and the result is a “pastiche that doesn’t understand the thing it is pastiching”.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
It didn’t work for me either, said Lili Loofbourow in The Washington Post. “The music really is fun”, but “the politics of the period are surgically stripped out, the dialogue feels quite contemporary”, and the actors fail to capture what young stardom is like. It tries hard to portray a vibe, but it doesn’t feel it.
Watch on Amazon Prime Video
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
-
Taking aim at Venezuela’s autocrat
Feature The Trump administration is ramping up military pressure on Nicolás Maduro. Is he a threat to the U.S.?
-
Comey indictment: Is the justice system broken?
Feature U.S. attorney Lindsey Halligan has indicted former FBI Director James Comey on charges of lying and obstructing Congress
-
Government shuts down amid partisan deadlock
Feature As Democrats and Republicans clash over health care and spending, the shutdown leaves 750,000 federal workers in limbo
-
Mustardy beans and hazelnuts recipe
The Week Recommends Nod to French classic offers zingy, fresh taste
-
Susie Dent picks her favourite books
The Week Recommends The lexicographer and etymologist shares works by Jane Goodall, Noel Streatfeild and Madeleine Pelling
-
6 incredible homes under $1 million
Feature Featuring a home in the National Historic Landmark District of Virginia and a renovated mid-century modern house in Washington
-
The Harder They Come: ‘triumphant’ adaptation of cinema classic
The Week Recommends ‘Uniformly excellent’ cast follow an aspiring musician facing the ‘corruption’ of Kingston, Jamaica
-
House of Guinness: ‘rip-roaring’ Dublin brewing dynasty period drama
The Week Recommends The Irish series mixes the family tangles of ‘Downton’ and ‘Succession’ for a ‘dark’ and ‘quaffable’ watch
-
Dead of Winter: a ‘kick-ass’ hostage thriller
The Week Recommends Emma Thompson plays against type in suspenseful Minnesota-set hair-raiser ‘ringing with gunshots’
-
A Booker shortlist for grown-ups?
Talking Point Dominated by middle-aged authors, this year’s list is a return to ‘good old-fashioned literary fiction’
-
Fractured France: an ‘informative and funny’ enquiry
The Week Recommends Andrew Hussey's work is a blend of ‘memoir, travelogue and personal confession’