Say Something *NEW* about the Beatles...

Say Something Interesting About The Beatles

(warning: i may have dreamt this)

-- mark s (mar...) (webmail), March 9th, 2005 1:31 PM. (link)

No, you are quite right. The story was, he received a copy of their album and took it away with him to Ibiza or somesuch on holiday with a friend. On his return, he said it will always bring back happy memories. Guess he liked it.

I assume the Beatles heared it too.

So, you know all that masking stuff was bullshit.

in 1966 paul mccartney told roger mcguinn to ditch the rickenbacker and granny glasses as he didn't much like them.

(I dunno, these schmucks off the Internet and their Exclusive! Undiscovered! Rarities!)

Here's another:

They never did a song as good as Little Animal by the Raveonettes which is quite possibly the second best song of the past ten years.

I think he already sold those rights, as he couldn't afford to keep them. You have to pay quite an amount for a good lawyer, you know...

Coincidentally (or not!), today is little Emmanuel's birthday.

-- Geir Hongro (geirhon...), March 9th, 2005.

I love Geir! So true...

actually, def leppard's on through the night and judas priest's british steel were both recorded at ringo starr's house. actual true fact!

This has been said before, by lots of people who were not yet 5 years old when The Beatles broke up in 1970, plus Thousands of fans of metal, R&B, funk, soul, hip-hop, jazz, rock'n'roll, classical, avant garde, electronica, dance or other musical styles that The Beatles rarely touched.

Oh, wait. You said about, not by...

but that's not true. they had a lousy reissue campaign, with questionable remastering, no bonus tracks and perfunctory packaging.

I don't know which Beatles thread to post this in, so this'll have to do. I've been listening to "Sgt. Pepper" lately (40th anniversary and all) and there is a line in "She's Leaving Home" that has bugged me for many years. The line in question?

"Fun is the one thing that money can't buy."

My reasons for hating this line are thus:

1. Not three years before, the Beatles themselves informed us that money cannot buy love.
2. Of all the things that money can't buy, Macca lists FUN as the ONE THING that MONEY CAN'T BUY? Fun would seem to be one of the easier things to procure through the use of currency. Go see a movie or something, for Christ's sake.

God, I'm a nerd but I had to get this off of my chest.

that line bothered me too

oh wells

i enjoyed reading johan kugelberg's beatles are so awesome piece in the old issue of ugly things with kim fowley on the cover the other day.

As if Paul actually believed every line of lyric that he wrote. I always thought he was more into the idea of putting words together that sound good with the song, rather than emphasizing his words.

To be fair, the speaker in the other song mostly emphasizes that money can't buy HIM love, weakly suggesting that it can't buy YOU love as a sort of trailing afterthought.

Also the original 45 pressing had "YMMV" etched along the run-off groove.

xx-post

Agreed, fully! However, the rest of the song is so evocative (especially for Paul) and carefully put together that I'm surprised he chose such a cop-out line to conclude the whole story (and then stuck poor John with the task of delivering it).

how do you know john didn't write that line?

Well, I don't.

also, how can you say "so evocative for paul" when he was writing stuff like for no one and and eleanor rigby and penny lane around that time??

I don't think it's so bad if you hear it in the voice of rich parents trying to figure out why their daughter ran away after trying to buy her off for years.

paul says in 'many years from now' that they wrote it together: "(john) was doing the Greek chorus, the parents' point of view: 'we gave her most of our lives/we gave her everything money could buy'."

also, how can you say "so evocative for paul" when he was writing stuff like for no one and and eleanor rigby and penny lane around that time??

Those are also especially evocative for Paul. They're the exception, not the rule. For the record, I'm one of the biggest Macca supporters I know - I just had issues with that one line.

And Pete, I do think the line makes sense if you imagine the parents saying it - something that's reinforced by the fact that John sings all of the parents' lines. I'd never noticed this before. I do believe you've saved the song for me!

paul says in 'many years from now' that they wrote it together: "(john) was doing the Greek chorus, the parents' point of view: 'we gave her most of our lives/we gave her everything money could buy'."

See, this is why I love ILM. I can now listen to this line with contentment.

you're content because john wrote it??

I'm content because I'd never imagined that particular line as the parent trying to rationalize their daughter's departure - "oh well, fun is the one thing we couldn't buy for her."

parent -> parents

indeed - problem solved!

Man, I was on fire on this thread.

also, how can you say "so evocative for paul" when he was writing stuff like...

Ah, I think you misread Davey D. He meant that the line was evocative for paul! Since he knows that it was, obv "Davey D." is Paul.

...when he was writing stuff like for no one...

oh come on, even though Davey could only describe his own feelings about the lyrics, I'm sure he was aware that there was an audience out there as well.

1st comment is funny but you lost me on the 2nd one!

I don't know if this has been said, but the version of "I'm Looking Through You" is much, much better on Anthology 2, not just for the superior arrangment and sonics, but because it doesn't yet have the bridge, which is weak musically, and which corners the song into being about love, when it can be about many other kinds of relationships otherwise.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eedLQ006ciM

Bridge:
Why, tell me why, did you not treat me right?
Love has a nasty habit of disappearing overnight

I prefer the Anthology versions of 'Something' and 'Can't Buy Me Love'. 'Something' has more of a sitar-y guitar and a new verse, and 'Can't Buy Me Love' has a call and response structure that works really well, too bad it was scrapped.

IIRC john wrote all of the parents' chorus and took it largely from things his famously cranky aunt mimi used to tell him ("never a thought for ourselves...")

There is nothing new to say about The Beatles. But their music is still great nevertheless. Both as a listen in itself, and as a source of musical influence for new generations of musicians to come.

You are a true patriot.

musical influence for new generations of musicians to come.

That could very well be needless wishful thinking, Geir. I say let young people create their own music.

They will anyway.

Ah, I think you misread Davey D. He meant that the line was evocative for paul! Since he knows that it was, obv "Davey D." is Paul.

Have you heard my amazing new album, Memory Almost Full? It like, a stunning return to form, or something, y'know?

I don't know if this has been said, but the version of "I'm Looking Through You" is much, much better on Anthology 2, not just for the superior arrangment and sonics, but because it doesn't yet have the bridge, which is weak musically, and which corners the song into being about love, when it can be about many other kinds of relationships otherwise.

I agree about the bridge cornering the song lyrically, but I prefer the original arrangement. Anthology 3's version of "Ob-La-Di" completely slays the White Album version, though.

It's been a long time since I've heard it, but I seem to remember the acoustic version of "All Things Must Pass" on "Anthology 3" being pretty amazing.

1st comment is funny but you lost me on the 2nd one!

Insert commas in your mind before and after "like".

In my early teens the family had a CD player that had buttons for intro and repeat. You could program a single song and use both buttons so that it'd play the first ten seconds endlessly. I discovered this worked rather well with "Girl," such that you get asked "Is there anybody going to listen to my story all about the girl who came to stay?" over and over. What was once a rhetorical question starts to seem rather desperate after a while.

You know, I read recently that Paul wrote "for no-one" while on holiday abroad (switzerland?) with Jane Asher.

Must have been one hell of a downer holiday!

I say let young people create their own music.

Yes. But based on the legacy of The Beatles. Just like Beethoven created his own music based on the legacy of Mozart and Haydn.

The bridge is the best thing about "I'm Looking Through You"

The 'pre-' version without the bridge is better.

but geir there have already been generations that have done something with the legacy of the beatles. i don't know how long you expect it to go on.

It reads like a Minor Threat song without the bridge.

Stephen King shot John Lennon.

but geir there have already been generations that have done something with the legacy of the beatles.

Not as much as it ought to. Other than progrock, pomp pop and Britpop, not a lot of post 60s music has built that much on The Beatles.

(And powerpop obv)

Nirvana

Geir, contemplating the musical future you envision is boring me to near suicide.

I hope you have fun listening to Ben Folds and the Friends theme song for the rest of your life.

pomp pop?

(tell me less)

Pomp Pop Defined.

ta.

There's no frickin' way John is saying "cranberry sauce" at the end of "Strawberry Fields."

At about age 10, after finally recieving the courage to listen to it all the way through with headphones (cos the end is really fucked up sounding and scared the shit out me at age 7 and kept me up at night and I literally had bad dreams about those sounds haunting me), I thought he was saying "clap very slow."

Man, I was on fire on this thread.

Alex in NYC

I confess to nearly laughing out loud at my Magical Mystery Tour comment above. (And I usually hate encountering my old posts

Did anyone else know about this?!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1AHrMQa-Iro

When the Rush vs. Yes vs. Beatles poll happens, I expect the Beatles will win.

xp - now I want a Mellotron even more than i used to.....

In my early teens the family had a CD player that had buttons for intro and repeat. You could program a single song and use both buttons so that it'd play the first ten seconds endlessly. I discovered this worked rather well with "Girl," such that you get asked "Is there anybody going to listen to my story all about the girl who came to stay?" over and over. What was once a rhetorical question starts to seem rather desperate after a while.

― eatandoph, Thursday, 21 June 2007 07:30 (5 years ago) Permalink

ROFLing at this.

There was no fifth Beatle, the substitutes all wore the number 8 shirt

Did anyone else know about this?!

wow no! wacky

Beatles guitarist George Harrison was the starting linebacker for the 1968 New York Giants. He recorded 40 tackles and 4 1/2 sacks.

The Beatles formed in Tower, Minnesota in 1958. They started out playing polkas at local dance halls, but quickly added popular country & western songs of the day to their repertoire.

Yeah, the intro to the Kinks Phenomenal Cat is a mellotron preset too. And all of the flute and guitar in that song are also mellotron.

The Beatles' Paul McCartney is a lifelong devotee of knitting. He recently opened an online website, Paulspets.com, which specializes in selling handmade knitwear for pets.

this looks like it's going to do the opposite

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WqDgm2XJ9SA

http://beatlephotoblog.com/photos/2013/07/ghjsrs.jpg

Little did he know the bloke on his right would be making movies about his career

i think it'll be an interesting doc, there hasn't been anything that explicitly focused on one topic like that and while there is a lot of live footage around, it's of varying quality. but i'm a sucker for all this shit.

Why hasn't The Beatles at the Hollywood Bowl ever been reissued on CD? Surely by now they have the technology to reduce the crowd noise further than was possible in 1977, and if not - shouldn't there be enough other live recordings out there of sufficient quality that they could cobble a real live (as in, before a paying audience) album together?

Anyway, cross your fingers that there's a soundtrack to the above-previewed doc. Even if there isn't, we already know that they're charismatic enough personalities to carry a feature-length, even one by Mr. Beautiful Mind himself.

anyone here read the Albert Goldman book on Lennon? out of print, but worth buying online for a buck... very juicy, very trashy, extremely homoerotic...

Was there anything made of the longterm Fluxus artist choosing to marry a populist pop star?

Yeah, I have that Albert Goldman book.

It's nowhere near as 'damning' as Bono (etc) have made out, it gives an awful lot of bumf and expects you to unpick it.

e.g. that whole "John hit Stu and that's why Stu died", bottom line there is that nobody thought that except for John himself, possibly racked with guilt over some fight they had.

urgh Goldman. i'm glad that book's pretty much been forgotten about in the UK. his lack of any decent footnotes AT ALL tells the real tale there imo.

the recently-edited-together live footage from Shea on the '1+' dvd (as a video for Eight Days A Week) looks killer, and seems to suggest the Shea footage has been remastered/cleaned-up for an upcoming release. possibly tied with the Ron Howard film?

that book is poorly sourced rubbish

It only had the one edition, I believe.

oh yeah, a lot of it is bullshit, but it's a great, grim read. like the opening scene of Lennon in the late-70s "smoking thai stick" in his Howard Hughes period. dark as all hell. and Goldman is just an insane writer, he's so nasty and obviously repressed - it comes out in the prose. a lot of very flowery penis descriptions and allusions

yeah the goldman book isn't necessarily "good" as a reliable biography of an actual person but it's kind of a sick masterpiece. def remember being somewhat traumatized by a lot of it when i first read it as a teenage beatles fan. goldman's style is undeniably ridiculous and over-the-top but writing a 600+ page book without a single dull sentence in it is some kind of accomplishment.

Did you read the Elvis book too, J.D.?

yeah, the elvis book is amazing and deplorable for similar reasons. for pure unadulterated goldman nastiness, though, you need his other elvis book:

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41n1UB9KkML._SL500_SY344_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg

That Goldman book opening: it's a young guy (named Kit?) couriering heroin up to John's Dakota apartment and the ensuing wasted ennui he sees, iirc. V memorable, given I read it 20+ years ago.

It's been a while since I read it but I remember the Goldman book being massively entertaining, and actually pretty good when talking about the actual music.

feel like the mark lewisohn book was so good and actually made the early days beatles story feel fresh i never want to read anyone else write anything about the beates except his next 2 upcoming books

^^^

ha i should give it another try, got a little exhausted around page 150 ... though I"m excited for that level of detail on the actual Beatles years

Lewisohn was very enthusiastic about the prospects for this film.

"Something new about the Beatles"

Cool band

As far as I can gather, the people of the Philippines are still more than a bit embarrassed about the way the Beatles were handled here.

Yeah, "We're sorry about Imelda Marcos", they've said that a few times.

#9 Dream sounds an awful lot like an Ariel Pink song, doesn't it? (or the other way round if you're offended by this comparison)

^ yes, it does

https://i.redd.it/bea2nydimowz.jpg

A better thread would be "Say something about a band that aren't The Beatles"

(and I'll bet 'Carnival of Light' is terrible)

haha, that's great

I always thought "From Me to You" was the weakest of their early singles, but I like it more now - pretty classic Beatles.