Jann and Jane Wenner, along with Ralph Gleason, capture the hippy zeitgeist in the pages of their new counterculture magazine, Rolling Stone. The magazine chronicles the drug busts of the Grateful Dead, the groupies scene and the rise of Ike and Tina Turner. Jann Wenner scores a legendary interview with John Lennon at a pivotal moment for The Beatles.

Wunderkind Cameron Crowe joins the magazine's roster and participates in a grudge softball game between The Eagles, Chicago, and the typewriter jockeys at Rolling Stone. As Rolling Stone plunges into politics, Dr. Hunter S. Thompson and photographer Annie Leibovitz cover the tumultuous 1972 Presidential Election.

Rolling Stone's investigative team scoops the rest of the publishing world with its revelatory story about the kidnapping of heiress Patti Hearst. The music world reels as the Sex Pistols take the spotlight and tragedy befalls John Lennon.

Jann Wenner and Rolling Stone struggle to contend with their commercial success as the punk ethos of the Clash and the Talking Heads take over the vanguard of rock 'n' roll. Cameron Crowe enters the exhilarating orbit of David Bowie, and Hunter Thompson strikes again with a story of wild 1980s excess in Palm Beach.

Ice-T and his band, Body Count, polarise America with their take on police brutality. Jann Wenner, Hunter Thompson and P.J. O'Rourke interview Bill Clinton. Rolling Stone must again come to grips with generation tumult as *NSync and Britney Spears move into the spotlight.

A shocking Rolling Stone expose takes down one of the most powerful U.S. generals in the Afghanistan War. The magazine suffers from a journalistic scandal. Political writers Janet Reitman and Matt Taibbi keep tabs on American democracy.