Biden called some guy named Doocy a “stupid son of a bitch.” It was inappropriate and impetuous, and he quickly apologized for his intemperate remark. But what about the Beatles?
Not so many years ago I would park my then-new car outside the front door of coffee shops where I was playing guitar and singing on Long Island, hold up the keys and announce, “If you can stump me on the Fabs, I’ll give you my wheels.” Or if I happened to have a hundred dollar bill, I’d pin it to the wall behind me and offer it to anyone who could name a Beatles song I couldn’t produce in three seconds.
But the game was rigged — you couldn’t beat the house.
We watched some of the new video, serialized as “Get Back,” and saw four guys doing the sort of kid stuff four guys might do, particularly notable for being stuff that four guys wouldn’t be allowed to do today, but was ordinary at the time. And then there was Yoko lurking for no comprehensible reason, but every real Beatles fan hates Yoko even if she didn’t cause the break up.
But the question remains how these fab four still own music, still own our heads, all these years later? Yes, this isn’t a deep question to ponder, and with all the serious things happening in the world, like potential war in Ukraine and some teacher telling her students that there’s nothing wrong with being gay, this is a frivolous Tuesday Talk. But so what?
Were the Beatles that good? How did they manage to own a generation? How is it possible they still do? Nobody walks about humming Smith’s “Baby, It’s You,” but many of us can sing the lyrics to 50 Beatles song off the top of our head. How did that happen, and how has that affected music since then?
*Tuesday Talk rules apply.
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Yes they were that good.
The lads grew in their song writing alongside their fans. As the fans got older and wanted something more than a mop-top song, the Beatles were writing what they needed.
How do they still do it? Because no matter where you are in your musical journey, you can jump into the Beatles at the right period and then follow along.
I’ve heard in interviews with some great writers in the Prog Rock world that they all loved the Beatles. They never tried to copy them or write shorter form songs because they figured they couldn’t do it any better. These are folks that have their own gold records. They said after about 10 years and several albums they finally wrote a short song with the basic message of “I Love You”, and it was their first hit, a minor one, but at least they cracked the charts.
Just my theory/ $.02, But I have been doing this music thing as a sideline since I was about 13 years old, and now I’m within a few years of retirement. For a decade I was in a band that specialized on Brit invasion music, so of course the Beatles were heavy in the playlist. I also worked in another group with a guy that could do any song by the Fab Four. Yes even the German versions.
Meh.
The early Beatles were OK, but their later stuff was junk.
Now Hank Marvin, there was a musician!
(Yeah, yeah. Rabbit hole, bop. But it’s Tuesday.)
Well done, HG. Now get ready to defend your position. I would help for disagreement’s sake but I know nothing about music. It’s team HG v. team JR in a TT showdown.
No showdown, it is a very personal thing. I, for example dislike the Stones. Always have even after playing tons of their songs.
I’m sure if I sat down with HG, we would find some common musical ground. Not many styles that turn me off completely.
Sure, matters of taste shouldn’t be disputed ordinarily, but this is a topic and a space where you should argue over such things if you can. Either the Beatles are universally adored or they are not. HG not adoring them completely threatens your side’s hegemony. He’s a heretic who must be burned. Hell, his disagreement threatens your entire understanding of what makes music “good” and you’re in the industry. This should matter to you.
You’re going to let him get away with calling some of the stuff “junk”? He can not like it, but calling it trash is another thing all together. His opinion stinks. Call him out. Please?
For the record, that’s exaggeration for effect, but I would like to stoke the fires and get an argument going if I can.
PK,
Sure you want to stir the pot and see what happens. I’ve been part of plenty of those over the years on-line. The place is long gone, but a bunch of us had a site that was semi-private, and everyone used some funny alias. Part of the reason was that a guy deep in the industry could say they hate artist X and not have to worry that it will kill a job offer for them to do some work playing/producing/mixing, etc on X’s next album. The best/funny discussions where when some “noob” would show up and argue about how something was recorded with the person that actually did it. Of course the new guy never knew why people jumped him so hard. That place made SHG’s moderation policies look like sweet kiss.
It was rough place, but if you what you said was correct and you could back it up, or at least be funny/entertaining, you got treated OK. Even someone that worked with the Lads from Liverpool got his hand slapped for something. All in good fun.
So no PK, I’ve been pushed and poked by real experts, and a few times many of us would get together in person start drinking and then the real pressure would start.
But really, it took me a long time to understand that how I hear music is not how you hear it. There are things I just knew, could tell about music from when I was a kid. I once had a piano major ask me how I knew when to do X, I said, I don’t know it’s just the right point. On one side a woman I knew would say she loved music but had no idea what a chorus was vs a refrain in a song, and could not point them out while listening. On the other side of things, a friend Rick as massively good keyboards player, can almost at once hear every note that is being played. I need to play it and try a few things before I find it all, and I still might miss a few subtle things.
I’m not trying to be nice to HG, I really don’t know what he hears. Think of trying to argue about the vidid colors of a Peter Max painting to someone that is slightly color blind.
I just don’t have the time today for a long drawn out pointless argument that will come down to taste or bad ears. Sorry to disappoint you.
I like Babymetal (actual name, not a typo.)
Close enough. I don’t understand music as well as others and wouldn’t know any of this unless you told me, and you only told me after I prodded, playfully since you might have misunderstood. It wasn’t about burning HG at the stake but expounding on what makes the Beatles timeless instead of saying “they sound good” over and over and over again. I’d rather have had HG express his opinion clearer, but he didn’t. De gustibus non disputandem is worn out and tired. I hoped for something different. I accept your apology.
Mom always said: “You can’t argue taste.” That said, despite being born a couple of decades late to have experienced them live, I like the Beatles. They wrote easy, catchy tunes with beautiful melodies.
However, there will never be another Beatles (or Rolling Stones, Pink Floyd, or Led Zeppelin, etc.) again because the music industry is fundamentally different. You ask, were the Beatles ‘that good’? Well, the power brokers in music thought they were, and that’s what it took to make it big as a bard in the ’60s. They managed to ‘own a generation’ because the industry invested in them and flooded the airwaves with their music.
Rage against the machine, Jake, rage.
If you want to play D&D with me, Jake, just say the word.
Because it sounds good. Melody and harmony. You don’t even have to listen to, or understand the words, which can be the icing on top. Like the very best opera, they just immerse you in wonderful sounds.
Yes, they were really that good. I’m old enough to remember the 1st time they were on the Ed Sullivan Show and how the crowd was so wild you could barely hear them sing. It was a defining moment in entertainment.
Ed Sullivan signed them for his vaudeville show to boost his ratings by pulling in a younger demographic.
If he hadn’t don’t that they would have a couple of hits and faded into obscurity like many British bands.
Only people like Guitar Dave and Howl would know about them.
Marvin defined a complete genre of music and influenced a generation of real professionals.
I reject the couple of hits hunting guy.. as I wrote here aside from Shubert according to a composer on YT the Beatles were prolific tunesmiths writing many many very memorable Melodie’s.
In 1966 I saw the Beatles in Detroit. I won’t bore readers with too many details…. I later researched and discovered the show I attended was not sold out…. And I was home in Ann Arbor an hour away riding my bike by 5p
The Beatles’ place in music history is secure. That said, many covers of their songs beat the hell out of the original.
While I’m at it, the Beatles were good songwriters. They knew how to write catchy shtuff that would sell. As musicians, meh. There are lots of musicians, amateurs included, who can play circles around the Beatles. Some individuals on every instrument.
Then there’s the pros, who like to have some fun.
Agreed.
Since it’s Tuesday Talk, I’ll go off on a tangent. I, for one, am glad to see some honesty in a President when he calls a spade a spade. :p
But seriously, I dont have a dog in the Beatles fight. Never really listened to them. To the point that I didnt recognize Lucy in the Sky with Diaomonds the other day until the chorus. So, judge away.
I hate to raise this very off-topic point, but it is TT and you did raise moderation on Sunday, so as the great philosopher Mr. Loaf was asked, “What’s it gonna be, boy. Yes or no?”
Et tu, Sarge? Which Beatle would the Host be if the Host were a Beatle?
Pete Best
I was thinking Watcho, but Pete Best is good too.
You had me at intemperate.
Dammit ELPePe….you just broke the “name-that-tune” part of my brain. Oy.
A composer music theorist on you tube ( readers will have to trust his expertise) said aside from Shubert…. Whose known for his songs ; the Beatles were the most prolific at melody…. It’s hard to argue with that.
I was 11 or 12 when the Beatles gave it up, so this is the opinion of a child, but I was not a huge fan. I’ve come to appreciate some of their stuff more as an adult but not to the point I’d spend money to own it. On the other hand Pink Floyd was pure greatness.
Of course, between the Elvises my favorite is Costello, so maybe I’m the problem.
I’m a millennial, so for me the Beatles have always been here. They’re an entrenched cultural artifact. Like Hollywood. Like Beethoven.
That they used to be part of ~the counterculture~ is difficult for me to fathom. My grandmother used to have a clock that tinkled out a music box version of “Here Comes the Sun” every hour, on the hour. Their songs had been done and redone a trillion times by the time I “uncovered” the emotional depth hidden in some of them as a young teenager. To this day, I think their talent for coming up with beautiful melodies is second-to-none. In terms of lyrics, I think they were outdone by the Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan, and Leonard Cohen, easy.
Overall, I think they’re great musicians who wrote some really timeless and universally accessible songs and kicked open the door to long haircuts being fashionable for men. They also pissed off Richard Nixon, which is very admirable in my estimation.
You can’t appreciate the Beatles properly until you’ve heard Big Daddy’s take on Sgt. Pepper; here’s a taste:
They hit the sweet spot. They started producing relatively simple, catchable lyrics and good, danceable music just as the front edge (those like me) of the Boomers were ready for something different than their parents stuff, had some money, could buy relatively inexpensive but “listenable” portable phonographs that played both 45 and 33 rpm vinyl records (less breakable than wax), and had access to cars with radios. Maybe if Brian Wilson had not had his problems it would have been the Beach Boys. But he was their heart. And maybe they were a year or two too early.
Personally, I was more of a Stones fan, but their music didn’t seem to ‘listen’ as well on 45s or a car radio. Maybe if more, better FM had existed in the mid-60s.
So tons of Boomers, heard, bought and played the Beatles forever. And their children in all likelihood heard an enormous amount of Beatles music before they hit 15.
Tuesday rules, one of the “hardest” guys I ever knew came rushing into my room shouting “You gotta come listen to this”. It was Sgt Pepper. He played it over and over.