I remember the days that nobody admitted to drinking Watneys Red Barrel because it was awful yet consistently was a top seller (possibly because of captive markets at places like Charlton).
It's not "hip" or to use the phrase of their time "with it" to admit to liking the Beatles but the facts are that they sold one hell of a lot of records, even the maligned early stuff, and were the first British band to really conquer America.
I'm not ashamed to admit that I would pick an early Beatles track everytime over some modern music particularly rap with a silent c! Then I am an old git!
Saying you hate the Beatles is like saying you hate Elvis Presley. If you can't find one thing you like in their catalogue then your musical taste is so narrow you really shouldn't offer an opinion.
Given the amount of cover-versions of R&B songs on the Beatles first couple of LPs, theye could have been founder-members of MOBO!
My only liking for them was their giving credit to their soul/R&B influences 'early doors'. I have long been sceptical of the ability of two Liverpool youths to write so many songs- there are 'conspiracy theories' which cite the involvement (un-credited as a writer) of veteran MD George Martin in their creative process.
If the EMI publicity machine could get unknown Motown singers/groups into the charts of the time, the Liverpool quartet would have been a marketing doddle.
[cite]Posted By: Solaraddick[/cite]Given the amount of cover-versions of R&B songs on the Beatles first couple of LPs, theye could have been founder-members of MOBO!
My only liking for them was their giving credit to their soul/R&B influences 'early doors'.
I have long been sceptical of the ability of two Liverpool youths to write so many songs- there are 'conspiracy theories' which cite the involvement (un-credited as a writer) of veteran MD George Martin in their creative process.
If the EMI publicity machine could get unknown Motown singers/groups into the charts of the time, the Liverpool quartet would have been a marketing doddle.
People will find conspiracy theories in anything, moon landings, 9/11attacks, Elvis, Princess Di etc. Lenon & Maca will have these theorise levelled at their material as well. Shame, IMO, a British band to be proud of.
[cite]Posted By: Solaraddick[/cite]
I have long been sceptical of the ability of two Liverpool youths to write so many songs- there are 'conspiracy theories' which cite the involvement (un-credited as a writer) of veteran MD George Martin in their creative process.
How ridiculous. Give one example of another similar song that George Martin ever wrote before or after. Do you really think they would have let the beatles have all those royalties when someone else wrote the songs.
In terms of "over rated" I think there is a tendency to see their whole cannon as fantastic when there are some real stinkers such as O bla de O bla dhah and much of the White Album but at their best (Revolver IMHO) they were very good.
You have to put their work in the context of the time as well. What know sounds cheesy and over familiar was then fresh and innovative. Have a look at a 10 ten from any week in the 60s and decide how well the Beatles songs stand up
This is a list of all the singles to top the UK charts in the year 1963.
Issue Date Song Title Artist
4 January "The Next Time"/"Bachelor Boy" Cliff Richard and the Shadows
25 January "Dance On!" The Shadows
1 February "Diamonds" Jet Harris and Tony Meehan
22 February "Wayward Wind" Frank Ifield
15 March "Summer Holiday" Cliff Richard and the Shadows
29 March "Foot Tapper" The Shadows
5 April "Summer Holiday" Cliff Richard and the Shadows
12 April "How Do You Do It?" Gerry & The Pacemakers
1
3 May "From Me to You" The Beatles
21 June "I Like It" Gerry & The Pacemakers
19 July "Confessin'" Frank Ifield
2 August "(You're the) Devil in Disguise" Elvis Presley
16 August "Sweets for My Sweet" The Searchers
30 August "Bad to Me" Billy J. Kramer and the Dakotas
13 September "She Loves You" The Beatles
11 October "Do You Love Me" Brian Poole and the Tremeloes
1 November "You'll Never Walk Alone" Gerry & The Pacemakers
29 November "She Loves You" The Beatles
13 December "I Want to Hold Your Hand" The Beatles
Every generation needs their own heroes and maybe you needed to be there.
Those early Beatles songs may not sit well in the modern age, but they heralded an exciting new sound that captured the imagination of the younger generation.
More importantly it was the Beatles themselves that developed their sound and taking the lyrical influence of Dylan, led the way for all the others to follow.
From Love me Do to I Am the Walrus in 4 short years!!!
Can I quote from Ian MacDonald's superb book "Revolution in the Head" referring to the release of Penny Lane: -
"Anyone unlucky enough not to have been aged between 14 and 30 during 1966/67 will never know the excitement of those years in popular culture. A sunny optimism permeated everthing and possibilities seemed limitless. Bestriding a British scene that embraced music, poetry, fashion and film, The Beatles were at their peak and looked up to in awe as arbiters of a positive new age in which the dead customs of the older generation would be refreshed and remade through the creative energy of the classless young".
I think some Beatles classics will last forever, but others taken out of the context of the times in which they were made may not compare favourably as time goes on.
I luv 'em.
Nobody - nobody - pulled people together from different tastes and cultural cliques like the Beatles did. And lay off the early stuff - it's fine, just adjust your ears.
In the excitable world of popular music everything gets either overrated or underrated, but the Beatles (like Elvis, like Dylan and a few others) have endured to the point where I think their artistic achievements cannot be disputed. As someone suggested above, to say you don't like them at all is merely to admit to a defficiency in taste. It says nothing about them.
[cite]Posted By: Algarve Addick[/cite]Saying you hate the Beatles is like saying you hate Elvis Presley. If you can't find one thing you like in their catalogue then your musical taste is so narrow you really shouldn't offer an opinion.
Elvis was shit too. And as for narrow musical taste - here's the last twenty artists I've listened to accoprding to last.fm:
Paradise Lost
Muse
Public Enemy
Steve Roach
Cynic
Chemical Brothers
Radiohead
Nile
The Clash
Paul Weller
Deftones
Cannibal Ox
Roots Manuva
Minnie Riperton
The Carpenters
Ennio Morricone
Kyuss
Foo Fighters
Digable Planets
Slayer
[cite]Posted By: Algarve Addick[/cite]Saying you hate the Beatles is like saying you hate Elvis Presley. If you can't find one thing you like in their catalogue then your musical taste is so narrow you really shouldn't offer an opinion.
Elvis was shit too. And as for narrow musical taste - here's the last twenty artists I've listened to accoprding to last.fm:
Paradise Lost
Muse
Public Enemy
Steve Roach
Cynic
Chemical Brothers
Radiohead
Nile
The Clash
Paul Weller
Deftones
Cannibal Ox
Roots Manuva
Minnie Riperton
The Carpenters
Ennio Morricone
Kyuss
Foo Fighters
Digable Planets
Slayer
Yeah, really narrow-minded taste there.
Interesting that Chemical Brothers play a version of The Beatles' Tomorrow Never Knows as an encore; Radiohead are clearly influenced by The Beatles (Radiohead's The Bends was voted as the second best album of all time. Behind Revolver); likewise The Clash; Paul Weller started off by playing Beatles covers; The Carpenters had a hit with a cover of Ticket To Ride; and Foo Fighters (and Nirvana) were influenced by The Beatles.
So, you may not like The Beatles, but most of the music you like was influenced by them.
I was born in 1959, and grew up with the Beatles. My first ever single was She Loves You. Not all the music was brilliant but being intertwined in the fabric of the swinging sixties, there is no doubt that they were/remain a phenomenon.
If you then look at their works such as Rubber Soul, Abbey Road and the concept album Sergeant Pepper, their musical achievements were considerable. Bear in mind that Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys went into a tailspin from which he has only recently recovered during the making of his concept album Smile, as a result of hearing Sargeant Pepper and realising that they had shot his fox.
If you add to that the effect they had on the social fabric of the country, the irreverent humour which viewed now seems at the bottom end of mundane; at the time was simply unprecidented.
My parents were outraged at their long-hair and their lack of deference. Sure there were contemporaries whose behaviour was worse but The Fab Four were placed on a wholesome pedestal, only to be knocked off by a combination of their own journeys of discovery, and the natural conservatism of the combined weight of earlier generations.
I was never a Beatles fan, but they were a massive influence on the social development of the time generally and on music specifically. Sergeant Pepper, in particular, for me is a tour de force.
[cite]Posted By: Algarve Addick[/cite]Saying you hate the Beatles is like saying you hate Elvis Presley. If you can't find one thing you like in their catalogue then your musical taste is so narrow you really shouldn't offer an opinion.
Elvis was shit too. And as for narrow musical taste - here's the last twenty artists I've listened to accoprding to last.fm:
Paradise Lost
Muse
Public Enemy
Steve Roach
Cynic
Chemical Brothers
Radiohead
Nile
The Clash
Paul Weller
Deftones
Cannibal Ox
Roots Manuva
Minnie Riperton
The Carpenters
Ennio Morricone
Kyuss
Foo Fighters
Digable Planets
Slayer
Yeah, really narrow-minded taste there.
Okay then, so you are just a plain old fashioned contrary idiot then Leroy, there's always an exception to the rule... ;-)
Thank god a lot of folk jumped on board here with some very sensible and poigniant posts...I went to bed last night feeling a bit sad to be honest.
The Beatles are very very close to my heart and what it meant to be a teenager back in the wonderful 60''...I was twelve on Jan 20th 1960, how little I realised what a great time lay ahead of me....shit, was I ever a lucky fella.
If you do not like the Beatles you do not like music....... or popular music.
Not everything they wrote was a 'classic' but they influenced music yesterday, and still do today. Name a better song that Yesterday, Something in the air, Let it Be, Norwegian Wood,Hey Jude,Eleanor Rigby,Twist and Shout, In my life. What a cannon of work.
There recording methods were way ahead of there time with the great George Martin and there music became a progression on simple but catchy tunes. They made modern pop music respected as modern popular music mass entertainment. Buddy Holly was hardly complicated music, but of its type the 3 minute single has hardly been bettered?
Before the Beatles there was Adam Faith, Cliff Richards , and Acker Bilk, safe, music in a grey, postwar Britain starved of colour and excitment which the beatles brought. More important than there hits, were there LP's . Lennon's work especially was influentiall to virtually any band , ( ask Oasis) including the Beach boys, Hendrix, Oasis, Coldplay, Pink Floyd, Bowie, Queen, the Who and so forth.
They were not the worlds greatest musicians, and never claimed to be. They were and are some of the worlds greatest songwriters, any any student of popular music will testify to that. When they released a single it was a national event , when they released there later albums after Sgt Peppers, which had tape reversal and multitrack overdubbing was unique and first. To deny the Beatles the part they played in modern music and culture is in it's way to eliminate Mozart,Beethoven,and Tchaikovsky from the part they played as well.
The fact that they were popular, and there songs covered,widely unlike my particular favourites, Dylan, Hendrix, and Pink Floyd does not diminish there rightful title as the most important group off all time. ' I suppose you might argue that Michael Jackson and Abba should be added to the list , but Jackson's music has yet to be fully evaluated, and Abba's clever and well written material was of a 'type' and not really experimental beyond the 3 minute single although hugely popular. Bit like Hendrix really, nobody ever wanted to follow him on stage though whoever they were........
I don't think you can deny the influence or talent of the fab four. They were great performers of their own songs and were able to replicate live what they recorded ( until their musical arrangements became more complex) It is fair to say some of it may seem or sound a bit dated but in the main theirs is an impressive body of work , which any musician would rightly be proud of. Their sound was unique and had a youthful exuberance to it that you can still hear in those early songs which are still great pop songs by the way. Yes they were overblown in many ways but that were a "sensation" with all the hype that implies. In the end they were just 4 blokes in a band who worked extremely hard and had their music heard and played all round the world. And it still is. So it must have something going for it eh.
Ken. However good yr case may be (and it's a well constructed post), at the end of the day it's still only yr opinion. I've no doubt they had talent, but to me they're just another band. The case that there has been no one else like them has been flogged to death. They just happened to have the popular sound when it mattered most. The music industry is a fickle beast and the consumers tastes change constantly. Next month there'll be another big band being talked about, maybe not on the scale of the Beatles hyped image, but causing mass excitement none the less.
Yes of course it is my opinion, it really only can be! I may or may not be right in that opinion, and my opinion is no more valid than anyone else's.....
Agree with you about the music industry, and that is why I have always liked acts like Rory Gallagher who did not seek to 'shift product ' and have hit singles.
My personnal taste in music is more blues and jazz, more Frank Zappa and Robert Johnson, so the hit single to me is only 1 form of popular music.
I always used to listen to the pirates, and not radio 1, I am too old nowadays to enjoy Radio 1, but I am sure the music played is popular and valid, and I am sure some of it is very good.
But like the 60s there was an awful lot of crap as well!, remember the Archies! catchy pop pap, candyfloss for the masses! sorry not a fan so I guess I am a bit of a musso snob I just choose not to hear it.
If you are talking about a band that had mass excitement 20 million people trying to get tickets for Led Zep at the 02 for a band that never appeared on British tv and sold and sell millions of LP's and were not too shoddy live stack up against any group today! So who would you nominate!
P-Air "They just happened to have the popular sound when it mattered most. "
To me you have hit the nail on the head some what. The fact is there was no one else on the planet like them at that time and many copied it then and since.
Andy Warhol once painted cans of soup, the American flag and other every day items. An art critic made a remark something like," anyone could do that." The fact was no one had done it, it was original.
If you wern't there, or old enough to really know what was going on at that time, then you can have little or no idea of how they singlehandedly and totally changed the face of popular music for ever......I realise me saying this may irritate some of you somewhat but it's an inescapable fact.
What I think is quite interesting is how they were ground breaking in all sorts of areas that now seem pretty tame, but someone had to do it the first time. It's like a lot of influential things, they often may seem less revolutionary with the passing of time than they really were back then. I think also I see the older bands as still vital and new when of course they are really part of musical history now in the way I viewed glen miller etc as old stuff when I was a kid. I think it is called getting old....:-) But I do still think the Beatles were pretty fab ;-)
Have to say that the writings of this individual are those of a mid west , American, born ten years after the Beatles broke up in April 1970, or at least when paul announced he was leaving.
I remember writing about this for Melody Maker as I worked in the High court in London as a junior reporter.( I still have the letter from Chris Charlesworthy the news editor saying apple were unaware of this!)
So I can claim a little about this subject, or should I claim I am a little less ignorant about the subject as the writer of this blog alludes to.
Ironic that he cities Tom Wolfe, the cream suited dandy who was part of the 'beatles set' and U2 a band that I have met and photographed, who incidentally cite the Beatles as an influence and the edge unvelled Rory Gallagher's statue in Ireland and like slash sites Rory as one of his greatest influences. Like Brian May, check out the website.( Gallagher was also asked to be in the stones long before Mick Taylor, and wrote the riff start it up for the glimmer twins.) Quite what the point, or points this writer is making is somewhat obscure, shrouded in poorly researched theory based upon pr spin, the stones were friends of the beatles, rivals in a commercial sense only.
It is a bit claiming that 'the stones never made a decent record since Brian Jones died', an easy cheap shot, and that Bowie has done nothing creative valid since 'sound and vision'. So who are these great bands and artists that were so original that I have missed. Oasis..... the Gallaghers have long cited John Lennon as a great influence, Paul Weller..... he is into Nick Drake...... Slash...... Rory I am afraid. Creedence Clearwater Revival, great band but who did they ever influence the Dude!.....
Anyone who does not cite influences is deluding themselves, let alone others. Let's admit it Hendrix cites Dylan, and Led Zep virtually stole the delta blues songbook for there songs......
And yeah George Best was never a great footballer, Shanks was never a great manager they just were in the right place at the right time ......
'Who's best: The Beatles or The Stones'
'I hate The Beatles'
Such threads have rightly received a lot of condemnation, I'm pleased to say.
I try to think of reasons to be proud to be English or British. There aren't a hell of a lot to be honest except The BBC, Football and Music. The latter has undoubtedly been majorly influenced by The Beatles (except of course if you listen to Shalamar and Shakatak like Large).
The Beatles are as important to British music as The 12 Founder Members of the English League are to British Football.
Comments
It's not "hip" or to use the phrase of their time "with it" to admit to liking the Beatles but the facts are that they sold one hell of a lot of records, even the maligned early stuff, and were the first British band to really conquer America.
I'm not ashamed to admit that I would pick an early Beatles track everytime over some modern music particularly rap with a silent c! Then I am an old git!
My only liking for them was their giving credit to their soul/R&B influences 'early doors'.
I have long been sceptical of the ability of two Liverpool youths to write so many songs- there are 'conspiracy theories' which cite the involvement (un-credited as a writer) of veteran MD George Martin in their creative process.
If the EMI publicity machine could get unknown Motown singers/groups into the charts of the time, the Liverpool quartet would have been a marketing doddle.
I don't hate the Beatles but they are not my cup of tea at all.
People will find conspiracy theories in anything, moon landings, 9/11attacks, Elvis, Princess Di etc. Lenon & Maca will have these theorise levelled at their material as well. Shame, IMO, a British band to be proud of.
How ridiculous. Give one example of another similar song that George Martin ever wrote before or after. Do you really think they would have let the beatles have all those royalties when someone else wrote the songs.
In terms of "over rated" I think there is a tendency to see their whole cannon as fantastic when there are some real stinkers such as O bla de O bla dhah and much of the White Album but at their best (Revolver IMHO) they were very good.
You have to put their work in the context of the time as well. What know sounds cheesy and over familiar was then fresh and innovative. Have a look at a 10 ten from any week in the 60s and decide how well the Beatles songs stand up
This is a list of all the singles to top the UK charts in the year 1963.
Issue Date Song Title Artist
4 January "The Next Time"/"Bachelor Boy" Cliff Richard and the Shadows
25 January "Dance On!" The Shadows
1 February "Diamonds" Jet Harris and Tony Meehan
22 February "Wayward Wind" Frank Ifield
15 March "Summer Holiday" Cliff Richard and the Shadows
29 March "Foot Tapper" The Shadows
5 April "Summer Holiday" Cliff Richard and the Shadows
12 April "How Do You Do It?" Gerry & The Pacemakers
1
3 May "From Me to You" The Beatles
21 June "I Like It" Gerry & The Pacemakers
19 July "Confessin'" Frank Ifield
2 August "(You're the) Devil in Disguise" Elvis Presley
16 August "Sweets for My Sweet" The Searchers
30 August "Bad to Me" Billy J. Kramer and the Dakotas
13 September "She Loves You" The Beatles
11 October "Do You Love Me" Brian Poole and the Tremeloes
1 November "You'll Never Walk Alone" Gerry & The Pacemakers
29 November "She Loves You" The Beatles
13 December "I Want to Hold Your Hand" The Beatles
Those early Beatles songs may not sit well in the modern age, but they heralded an exciting new sound that captured the imagination of the younger generation.
More importantly it was the Beatles themselves that developed their sound and taking the lyrical influence of Dylan, led the way for all the others to follow.
From Love me Do to I Am the Walrus in 4 short years!!!
Can I quote from Ian MacDonald's superb book "Revolution in the Head" referring to the release of Penny Lane: -
"Anyone unlucky enough not to have been aged between 14 and 30 during 1966/67 will never know the excitement of those years in popular culture. A sunny optimism permeated everthing and possibilities seemed limitless. Bestriding a British scene that embraced music, poetry, fashion and film, The Beatles were at their peak and looked up to in awe as arbiters of a positive new age in which the dead customs of the older generation would be refreshed and remade through the creative energy of the classless young".
I think some Beatles classics will last forever, but others taken out of the context of the times in which they were made may not compare favourably as time goes on.
I luv 'em.
In the excitable world of popular music everything gets either overrated or underrated, but the Beatles (like Elvis, like Dylan and a few others) have endured to the point where I think their artistic achievements cannot be disputed. As someone suggested above, to say you don't like them at all is merely to admit to a defficiency in taste. It says nothing about them.
"Blah blah the Monkees were a manufactured group blah blah blah."
And the Beatles weren't? Mop tops and the like, pah.
Paradise Lost
Muse
Public Enemy
Steve Roach
Cynic
Chemical Brothers
Radiohead
Nile
The Clash
Paul Weller
Deftones
Cannibal Ox
Roots Manuva
Minnie Riperton
The Carpenters
Ennio Morricone
Kyuss
Foo Fighters
Digable Planets
Slayer
Yeah, really narrow-minded taste there.
So, you may not like The Beatles, but most of the music you like was influenced by them.
If you then look at their works such as Rubber Soul, Abbey Road and the concept album Sergeant Pepper, their musical achievements were considerable. Bear in mind that Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys went into a tailspin from which he has only recently recovered during the making of his concept album Smile, as a result of hearing Sargeant Pepper and realising that they had shot his fox.
If you add to that the effect they had on the social fabric of the country, the irreverent humour which viewed now seems at the bottom end of mundane; at the time was simply unprecidented.
My parents were outraged at their long-hair and their lack of deference. Sure there were contemporaries whose behaviour was worse but The Fab Four were placed on a wholesome pedestal, only to be knocked off by a combination of their own journeys of discovery, and the natural conservatism of the combined weight of earlier generations.
I was never a Beatles fan, but they were a massive influence on the social development of the time generally and on music specifically. Sergeant Pepper, in particular, for me is a tour de force.
Okay then, so you are just a plain old fashioned contrary idiot then Leroy, there's always an exception to the rule... ;-)
The Beatles are very very close to my heart and what it meant to be a teenager back in the wonderful 60''...I was twelve on Jan 20th 1960, how little I realised what a great time lay ahead of me....shit, was I ever a lucky fella.
Not everything they wrote was a 'classic' but they influenced music yesterday, and still do today. Name a better song that Yesterday, Something in the air, Let it Be, Norwegian Wood,Hey Jude,Eleanor Rigby,Twist and Shout, In my life. What a cannon of work.
There recording methods were way ahead of there time with the great George Martin and there music became a progression on simple but catchy tunes. They made modern pop music respected as modern popular music mass entertainment. Buddy Holly was hardly complicated music, but of its type the 3 minute single has hardly been bettered?
Before the Beatles there was Adam Faith, Cliff Richards , and Acker Bilk, safe, music in a grey, postwar Britain starved of colour and excitment which the beatles brought. More important than there hits, were there LP's . Lennon's work especially was influentiall to virtually any band , ( ask Oasis) including the Beach boys, Hendrix, Oasis, Coldplay, Pink Floyd, Bowie, Queen, the Who and so forth.
They were not the worlds greatest musicians, and never claimed to be. They were and are some of the worlds greatest songwriters, any any student of popular music will testify to that. When they released a single it was a national event , when they released there later albums after Sgt Peppers, which had tape reversal and multitrack overdubbing was unique and first. To deny the Beatles the part they played in modern music and culture is in it's way to eliminate Mozart,Beethoven,and Tchaikovsky from the part they played as well.
The fact that they were popular, and there songs covered,widely unlike my particular favourites, Dylan, Hendrix, and Pink Floyd does not diminish there rightful title as the most important group off all time.
'
I suppose you might argue that Michael Jackson and Abba should be added to the list , but Jackson's music has yet to be fully evaluated, and Abba's clever and well written material was of a 'type' and not really experimental beyond the 3 minute single although hugely popular. Bit like Hendrix really, nobody ever wanted to follow him on stage though whoever they were........
They were great performers of their own songs and were able to replicate live what they recorded ( until their musical arrangements became more complex)
It is fair to say some of it may seem or sound a bit dated but in the main theirs is an impressive body of work , which any musician would rightly be proud of.
Their sound was unique and had a youthful exuberance to it that you can still hear in those early songs which are still great pop songs by the way.
Yes they were overblown in many ways but that were a "sensation" with all the hype that implies.
In the end they were just 4 blokes in a band who worked extremely hard and had their music heard and played all round the world. And it still is.
So it must have something going for it eh.
Agree with you about the music industry, and that is why I have always liked acts like Rory Gallagher who did not seek to 'shift product ' and have hit singles.
My personnal taste in music is more blues and jazz, more Frank Zappa and Robert Johnson, so the hit single to me is only 1 form of popular music.
I always used to listen to the pirates, and not radio 1, I am too old nowadays to enjoy Radio 1, but I am sure the music played is popular and valid, and I am sure some of it is very good.
But like the 60s there was an awful lot of crap as well!, remember the Archies! catchy pop pap, candyfloss for the masses! sorry not a fan so I guess I am a bit of a musso snob I just choose not to hear it.
If you are talking about a band that had mass excitement 20 million people trying to get tickets for Led Zep at the 02 for a band that never appeared on British tv and sold and sell millions of LP's and were not too shoddy live stack up against any group today!
So who would you nominate!
To me you have hit the nail on the head some what. The fact is there was no one else on the planet like them at that time and many copied it then and since.
Andy Warhol once painted cans of soup, the American flag and other every day items. An art critic made a remark something like," anyone could do that." The fact was no one had done it, it was original.
I think also I see the older bands as still vital and new when of course they are really part of musical history now in the way I viewed glen miller etc as old stuff when I was a kid.
I think it is called getting old....:-)
But I do still think the Beatles were pretty fab ;-)
http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/thelife/news/story?id=4474313
(sorry, but I've tried 3 times and can't get the linky bit to work)
I remember writing about this for Melody Maker as I worked in the High court in London as a junior reporter.( I still have the letter from Chris Charlesworthy the news editor saying apple were unaware of this!)
So I can claim a little about this subject, or should I claim I am a little less ignorant about the subject as the writer of this blog alludes to.
Ironic that he cities Tom Wolfe, the cream suited dandy who was part of the 'beatles set' and U2 a band that I have met and photographed, who incidentally cite the Beatles as an influence and the edge unvelled Rory Gallagher's statue in Ireland and like slash sites Rory as one of his greatest influences. Like Brian May, check out the website.( Gallagher was also asked to be in the stones long before Mick Taylor, and wrote the riff start it up for the glimmer twins.) Quite what the point, or points this writer is making is somewhat obscure, shrouded in poorly researched theory based upon pr spin, the stones were friends of the beatles, rivals in a commercial sense only.
It is a bit claiming that 'the stones never made a decent record since Brian Jones died', an easy cheap shot, and that Bowie has done nothing creative valid since 'sound and vision'. So who are these great bands and artists that were so original that I have missed.
Oasis..... the Gallaghers have long cited John Lennon as a great influence, Paul Weller..... he is into Nick Drake...... Slash...... Rory I am afraid.
Creedence Clearwater Revival, great band but who did they ever influence the Dude!.....
Anyone who does not cite influences is deluding themselves, let alone others. Let's admit it Hendrix cites Dylan, and Led Zep virtually stole the delta blues songbook for there songs......
And yeah George Best was never a great footballer, Shanks was never a great manager they just were in the right place at the right time ......
'I hate The Beatles'
Such threads have rightly received a lot of condemnation, I'm pleased to say.
I try to think of reasons to be proud to be English or British. There aren't a hell of a lot to be honest except The BBC, Football and Music. The latter has undoubtedly been majorly influenced by The Beatles (except of course if you listen to Shalamar and Shakatak like Large).
The Beatles are as important to British music as The 12 Founder Members of the English League are to British Football.