THE BEATLES

About time some Beatles stuff was got going on here



Richard Astley-Clemas

Well, I think Paul is just dreamy.

Is Klaus Voorman still alive? I could've sworn I remembered him dying a few years ago, but now it seems like maybe he didn't.

[www.voormann.com]

dude seems alive and kickin'

hope he ain't dead cause reading his history page would creep me out in that context....

the mono rain is grungier than nirvana's alice's jam


NP
George
Wonderwall

One of my earliest childhood memories is seeing my sister get Rubber Soul for Christmas back in '65. A Merry Chrimble & A Gear New Year to you all

I remember playing hide n seek cir '67, age 6 while hiding under a neighbors family room window (I have since stopped doing that) and hearing "A day in the Life." When the counting was up and time to run back to home base, I just sat there listening...mesmerized. That is my earliest recollection of hearing music and being completely conscious that it was having an affect on me. Hooked for life.

That was the band Paul was in before Wings, right?

Yes Willie,

You're hired. Your first assignment as honorary procurer is to pass out lighters to your staff so as they can light menorah bongs.



Post Edited (12-24-05 01:26)

Confession : I don't much like the Beatles post-Revolver. Love the records starting at "With the Beatles" through "Revolver" (and think "Beatles For Sale" is wildly underrated). Ah, nothing like some blasphemy at Christmas time.

I've always thought Sgt. Pepper was the most overrated album in history and it's supposed greatness owes more to boomer nostalgia than to the album itself.

Don't get me wrong - it's a decent album and "A Day in the Life" is one of the Beatles' 10 greatest songs, but better than Revolver or Rubber Soul? Please! But it came out the summer most of the hippies were getting high and/or getting laid for the first time so it's "Pepper man....that's the classic." (By the same logic, most people my age should consider Breakfast in America or whatever it's called by Supertramp to be the greatest album of all time...which, now that I think about it, I'm sure a bunch do. But the smart kids know it's really Blondie's Eat to the Beat.)

But at least in the last few years, Revolver has finally started to get its due. I remember it used to be the Beatles album that never turned up on the 100 greatest lists of all time, which I always thought was stupid.

But as long as we're doing some mild Beatle bashing, does anyone else loathe the song "Birthday" as much as I do? I hate that fucking piece of crap song - although to be fair, it may be that I don't hate the song so much as drunken idiots thinking they're cool trying to sing it on people's birthdays. So my hatred of it may be influenced by subsequent usage of it more than the material itself.

Sort of like Pink Floyd. I always hated them with a passion, till one day it dawned on me that I actually hated Pink Floyd FANS, most of whom completely missed out on anything about the band that was actually good and instead focused on how cool it was to get stoned and ponder flying pigs. Once I got past that (well, and heard "Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun" for the first time) I decided yknow, Floyd had their good points.

There's definitely a convergence of events that put Sgt. Pepper in its exalted spot for so long. The band spent a long time making it, they had announced that they would not tour again (this complex music couldn't be recreated live !), it was preceeded by a fascinating non-LP single ("Strawberry Fields"). In addition, the cultural landscape had changed and pop music was now being looked upon as Art (capital A), with new, more complex acts on the scene (Hendrix, Doors, etc. - I'm not a big Doors fan, but it's unquestionably a different thing from say, Herman's Hermits) - so this was the Beatles first foray into this new era that they had helped establish in the first place. Two other cultural icons were off the scene : Brian Wilson, and Dylan (at that point Dylan's ever re-emerging again or for long was a question).....The album was basically declared a masterpiece before it had been heard by alot of people......Not a big fan of Birthday either. I can count the Paul songs I like after Revolver on one hand probably. He's really the reason my love for the Beatles drops post-66 - the Lennon tunes are in a different league for me post-Revolver and the uneven quality of the later albums just drives me mental.

current fave: "cry for a shadow," only lennon-harrison co-write and a guitar instro to boot. Early days, obviously.

The Richard Goldstein review of Sgt Pepper was mostly right:

"Like an overattended child, this album is spoiled. It reeks of horns and harps, harmonica quartets, assorted animal noises, and a 41-piece orchestra"

More fragments I have found in the net, of this clever and brave (Of course, he got stupidly lynched) review:

"For the first time, the Beatles have given us a package of special effects, dazzling, but ultimately fraudulent. In Revolver, I found a simplicity and empathy that was staggering. But in Sgt Peppers I sense an obsession with the surrogate magic of production, and a new sarcasm masquerading as cool".



Post Edited (12-25-05 06:28)

Growing up, only liked White Album. Now prefer Pepper's. It it best viewed as a product of it's time.
Either::
Pop Music owes a debt to this day to this LP
OR
Somebody else would have come along, the time was right for an LP of this type
But, overall...
The Beatles?
meh
When they were a Rock band, the genre was stripped and infant.
When they changed music and made their most interesting pop experiments, they were no longer a Rock band.
Good run, though, I suppose.

My favorite Beatles period is from Hard Day's Night through Revolver, with a nod towards the White Album. It's been nearly 20 years now since their main albums have been out on CD and they haven't been upgraded since then, unlike the catalogs of the Kinks, Who and both Elvises, to name a few, and it's a shame (it was nice that the early American editions were issued, although the packaging was horrible).