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OT: The Music Thread Part 7

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GordonHowe said:
Yes.

Perhaps more accurately, it was John calling out the Maharishi for what he assumed was sexual assault.

That Magic Alex character, who you can look up, put the idea in John's head. Doesn't mean it wasn't true.
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I remember reading a few Beatles books and learning about Magic Alex, but it has been a long time. I had forgotten (or maybe even never knew) that he put that idea into John's head. Thanks!

That song is still tops for me. Since this is a music thread, top 10 Beatles songs not really but kinda sorta in order:

1. I'm Only Sleeping
2. We Can Work It Out
3. Sexy Sadie
4. And Your Bird Can Sing
5. For No One
6. Day Tripper
7. Happiness Is A Warm Gun
8. I Should Have Known Better
9. Tomorrow Never Knows
10. Here Comes the Sun
 
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Gordon Lightfoot said:
I remember reading a few Beatles books and learning about Magic Alex, but it has been a long time. I had forgotten (or maybe even never knew) that he put that idea into John's head. Thanks!

That song is still tops for me. Since this is a music thread, top 10 Beatles songs not really but kinda sorta in order:

1. I'm Only Sleeping
2. We Can Work It Out
3. Sexy Sadie
4. And Your Bird Can Sing
5. For No One
6. Day Tripper
7. Happiness Is A Warm Gun
8. I Should Have Known Better
9. Tomorrow Never Knows
10. Here Comes the Sun
Click to expand...

1. Across the Universe
2. Nowhere Man
3. Day in the Life
4. Baby's in Black
5. Elenor Rigby
6. While My Guitar Gently Weeps
7. I'm a Loser
8. She's Leaving Home
9. She's So Heavy
10. I'll Follow the Sun
 
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My hottest of hot takes on the Beatles is that I like their early stuff better than their later stuff.

Which isn't saying that it's not good, just that I don't prefer it. Their absolute peak is Help-Rubber Soul-Revolver - pure pop brilliance. Everything from Sgt. Pepper onward was so self-important. They'd gone from making great pop music in dialogue with other bands from 1964-1966 (most specifically the Beach Boys, but even earlier beat groups like the Searchers and Dave Clark Five provided enough competition to push them a little), to basically accepting that they were the trend setters, that pop music would follow them no matter what so they could be as experimental and pseudointellectual as they wanted. Though I do believe they recognized that and Let It Be was attempting to be a course correction with a back to basics approach until Phil Spector went bananas and overproduced it.

I still like their later stuff. Saying Abbey Road or White Album was my least favorite Beatles album is like saying who your least favorite 2011 Bruin is. But personally I find it much more enjoyable to listen to a 2 minute 30 second Motown cover on Meet the Beatles than some droning experimental shit on the White Album.
 
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Gordon Lightfoot said:
I remember reading a few Beatles books and learning about Magic Alex, but it has been a long time. I had forgotten (or maybe even never knew) that he put that idea into John's head. Thanks!

That song is still tops for me. Since this is a music thread, top 10 Beatles songs not really but kinda sorta in order:

1. I'm Only Sleeping
2. We Can Work It Out
3. Sexy Sadie
4. And Your Bird Can Sing
5. For No One
6. Day Tripper
7. Happiness Is A Warm Gun
8. I Should Have Known Better
9. Tomorrow Never Knows
10. Here Comes the Sun
Click to expand...

A fine list. :)

Gordon Lightfoot said:
What, the Willie Nelson cover? It’s so damn good.

Edit: Sexy Sadie, what a song. Definitely in my top Five Beatles songs.
Click to expand...

The Pet Shop Boys do... Willie Nelson.

Now who's high.
 
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Gordon Lightfoot said:
Eleanor Rigby... forgot about that one. Love it.
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John credited himself with largely writing this one.

I can see "Wearing a face that she keep in a jar by the door" -- pure Lennon.

I can also see "Died in a church and was buried along with her name."

I cannot see

"Writing the words of a sermon that no one will hear/No one come near."

"Darning his socks in the night when there's nobody there/What does he care?"

"Wiping the dirt from his hands as he walks from the grave/No one was saved."

All of *that*, prosaic and somewhat trite, is pure McCartney. As is the refrain.

It's sad that Paul feels the need to rewrite and revise history, whatever the truth, to burnish an already sterling legacy. The hackneyed, and untrue, narrative that John was the "real" artist into avant-garde music and the latest this or that, plainly disturbs Paul and bruises his substantial ego.

FWIW, it was Paul who sought out Stockhausen, attended the theater with actress/fiancée Jane Asher, and noodled endlessly with idiosyncratic sounds at his home studio.

At that point -- '66-'67 -- John was more likely to be holed up at Kenwood, zonked out of his mind on acid, watching TV, sleeping his days away. He didn't reemerge and begin asserting himself until 1968 -- after he met Yoko.

In the event, enjoy the music.

After all, as Beatles Forever author Nicholas Schaffner correctly noted, their music is ultimately the reason we love the Fabs,"to which all other trappings of Beatlemania were, and remain, subordinate."

Gordon Lightfoot said:
I remember reading a few Beatles books and learning about Magic Alex, but it has been a long time. I had forgotten (or maybe even never knew) that he put that idea into John's head. Thanks!

That song is still tops for me. Since this is a music thread, top 10 Beatles songs not really but kinda sorta in order:

1. I'm Only Sleeping
2. We Can Work It Out
3. Sexy Sadie
4. And Your Bird Can Sing
5. For No One
6. Day Tripper
7. Happiness Is A Warm Gun
8. I Should Have Known Better
9. Tomorrow Never Knows
10. Here Comes the Sun
Click to expand...

 
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GordonHowe said:
John credited himself with largely writing this one.

I can see "Wearing a face that she keep in a jar by the door" -- pure Lennon.

I can also see "Died in a church and was buried along with her name."

I cannot see

"Writing the words of a sermon that no one will hear/No one come near."

"Darning his socks in the night when there's nobody there/What does he care?"

"Wiping the dirt from his hands as he walks from the grave/No one was saved."

All of *that*, prosaic and somewhat trite, is pure McCartney. As is the refrain.

It's sad that Paul feels the need to rewrite and revise history, whatever the truth, to burnish an already sterling legacy. The hackneyed, and untrue, narrative that John was the "real" artist into avant-garde music and the latest this or that, plainly disturbs Paul and bruises his substantial ego.

FWIW, it was Paul who sought out Stockhausen, attended the theater with actress/fiancée Jane Asher, and noodled endlessly with idiosyncratic sounds at his home studio.

At that point -- '66-'67 -- John was more likely to be holed up at Kenwood, zonked out of his mind on acid, watching TV, sleeping his days away. He didn't reemerge and begin asserting himself until 1968 -- after he met Yoko.

In the event, enjoy the music.

After all, as Beatles Forever author Nicholas Schaffner correctly noted, their music is ultimately the reason we love the Fabs,"to which all other trappings of Beatlemania were, and remain, subordinate."



Click to expand...


Sounds very Lennon like to me.

Not a big fan of religion.
 
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McGarnagle said:
My hottest of hot takes on the Beatles is that I like their early stuff better than their later stuff.

Which isn't saying that it's not good, just that I don't prefer it. Their absolute peak is Help-Rubber Soul-Revolver - pure pop brilliance. Everything from Sgt. Pepper onward was so self-important. They'd gone from making great pop music in dialogue with other bands from 1964-1966 (most specifically the Beach Boys, but even earlier beat groups like the Searchers and Dave Clark Five provided enough competition to push them a little), to basically accepting that they were the trend setters, that pop music would follow them no matter what so they could be as experimental and pseudointellectual as they wanted. Though I do believe they recognized that and Let It Be was attempting to be a course correction with a back to basics approach until Phil Spector went bananas and overproduced it.

I still like their later stuff. Saying Abbey Road or White Album was my least favorite Beatles album is like saying who your least favorite 2011 Bruin is. But personally I find it much more enjoyable to listen to a 2 minute 30 second Motown cover on Meet the Beatles than some droning experimental shit on the White Album.
Click to expand...

You took the words right out of my post!!! I could not agree with you more. :thumbu:
 
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McGarnagle said:
My hottest of hot takes on the Beatles is that I like their early stuff better than their later stuff.

Which isn't saying that it's not good, just that I don't prefer it. Their absolute peak is Help-Rubber Soul-Revolver - pure pop brilliance. Everything from Sgt. Pepper onward was so self-important. They'd gone from making great pop music in dialogue with other bands from 1964-1966 (most specifically the Beach Boys, but even earlier beat groups like the Searchers and Dave Clark Five provided enough competition to push them a little), to basically accepting that they were the trend setters, that pop music would follow them no matter what so they could be as experimental and pseudointellectual as they wanted. Though I do believe they recognized that and Let It Be was attempting to be a course correction with a back to basics approach until Phil Spector went bananas and overproduced it.

I still like their later stuff. Saying Abbey Road or White Album was my least favorite Beatles album is like saying who your least favorite 2011 Bruin is. But personally I find it much more enjoyable to listen to a 2 minute 30 second Motown cover on Meet the Beatles than some droning experimental shit on the White Album.
Click to expand...

Fair, and largely agree.

My favorite period is late 1965 through early 1967. My favorite album remains Revolver.

I love all of their earlier work, from Please Please Me through With The Beatles, to, in my view, the songwriting and performance culmination of that early period, A Hard Days Night.

Beatles For Sale and Help! each boast many strong tracks, but they're not my favorites. Just a personal preference.

All of the singles are gold, and entered a golden hour beginning with
"Ticket to Ride," "Day Tripper"/"We Can Work It Out."

Again, personal preference.
 
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aguineapig said:
The song in which the Beatles took the music industry backwards.







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Hey, thank you for this.

I'll have a listen to "take 5," and Giles Martin's remarks.

Lennon's claim of how the backward loop was born is at variance with George Martin's recollection. Unsurprisingly.

John also boasted that before their Member of the British Empire investiture, the four Beatles repaired to the Palace loo for a pre ceremony joint.

I don't know about George, but Paul and Ringo laughed this assertion off as yet another fanciful Lennonism.
 
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McGarnagle said:
My hottest of hot takes on the Beatles is that I like their early stuff better than their later stuff.

Which isn't saying that it's not good, just that I don't prefer it. Their absolute peak is Help-Rubber Soul-Revolver - pure pop brilliance. Everything from Sgt. Pepper onward was so self-important. They'd gone from making great pop music in dialogue with other bands from 1964-1966 (most specifically the Beach Boys, but even earlier beat groups like the Searchers and Dave Clark Five provided enough competition to push them a little), to basically accepting that they were the trend setters, that pop music would follow them no matter what so they could be as experimental and pseudointellectual as they wanted. Though I do believe they recognized that and Let It Be was attempting to be a course correction with a back to basics approach until Phil Spector went bananas and overproduced it.

I still like their later stuff. Saying Abbey Road or White Album was my least favorite Beatles album is like saying who your least favorite 2011 Bruin is. But personally I find it much more enjoyable to listen to a 2 minute 30 second Motown cover on Meet the Beatles than some droning experimental shit on the White Album.
Click to expand...
I agree with all of this, i think it goes back to when they stopped playing live. They had all the resources, money and time in the world to get creative without the constraints of needing to make any of it work live
 
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Lobster57 said:
I agree with all of this, i think it goes back to when they stopped playing live. They had all the resources, money and time in the world to get creative without the constraints of needing to make any of it work live
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There's a definite relationship between their music getting experimental and their decision to stop touring. Even on their last tour they couldn't even play anything from Revolver and had a hard enough time playing Day Tripper.

It's probably a chicken-and-egg thing as to whether they wanted to stop touring so they could make experimental music or they started getting more experimental because they were no longer touring, I can see it being a little of both. Primarily they wanted to stop touring because of the massive clusterf*** that was their final tour in the summer of 1966. They got roughed up by the Philippine army in July, then in August went to tour the US while John stupidly spouted off about Jesus, at the same time that race riots were breaking out in a lot of the cities they had to perform in (if their tour was a month or two earlier they probably wouldn't have had a bad time). Even if John and George wanted to stop, Paul still wanted to tour until late in that US tour when even he'd had enough of it.

The two other effects of the decision to stop performing live which probably shape their sound going forward were 1. Brian Epstein losing his influence over the group and 2. not having to get up to perform every night, their recreational substances of choice went from uppers to downers (especially John).
 
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