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Great music is timeless.
The remasters had little, if any, to do with your "discovery".
I suspect you were simply a bit more open minded or receptive.
Even dinosaurs like stanwal may get it some day. |
Audiofeil again with his constant refrain that anyone who disagrees with him is wrong. The uninformed might think this arises from an excess of ego but those of us trained in psychology know that it comes from feelings of inadequacy. |
Most over rated group of musicians in history. |
Chasmal - couldn't disagree more and find yours an amazing comment since in the view of many they changed music history. |
I have heard that they 'changed music history' so many times, but it still doesn't change anything. It is simply a case of the cart leading the horse. Critics, fans, and everyone else jumped on that Beatle bandwagon. Did they change history or did history change to accommodate their run of fame? Everyone loves a winner, especially when there is money to be made! I think they would have nothing if not for the American music they lifted and adapted. Yes, they had some great innovations, I do not deny this. But greatest composer/musicians in history? Hardly. |
ok folks...i think my post/question might have been misinterpreted or too vague. wasn't looking to start a fire or anything like that.
was just wondering if the remaster's have in some way, turned others on (or back on) to the band?. maybe gave them a 2nd look/listen and discovered that you enjoyed it alot more then you'd thought?.
touchy subject around here or what? =) |
It is probably touchy because of the 50 or 60 beatle posts already on this site. I am so sick of the beatles! It has been beaten to death. |
People that weren't there when it happened cannot understand and their intellectual arguments are without merit to those who experienced that historical era. |
Why does Chashmal respond to this post? You've repeatedly stated your opinion of the Beatles elsewhere on this site. If anything, you're beating it to death. What is the purpose of you posting here?
Cyclonicman, living through the period would add to your understanding of the Beatles phenomena, but it could just as easily bias you towards the significance of their music. If they produced great music, and I think they frequently did, then it should be recognizable as such with the passage of time. |
It wasn't only the music, it was an entire cultural movement. I lived through it, and in my opinion, some of these posts are obviously from people that don't know what they are talking about. It's like some 14 year old trying to explain WWII to a veteran that was there! No one needs to defend the Beatles, their place in history is already established. |
No doubt.
Chasmal, you WILL be converted and sing the praises of the Beatles (and McCartney too) before its all over.....there is no other way! |
Cyclonicman,
Please don't presume to speak for an entire generation. I was there and actively listening to and collecting the current artists. There was so much talent and good music available The Beatles only rated two albums in my collection and they did not get much play. Beatles--music and historical impact overrated to the max. |
One must understand that the curmudgeon must raise its head from time to time to catch some air.
Levy03,
I'm afraid you've unwittingly given them another opportunity.
IMO: Your original post was more than reasonable but seems its been sabotaged. |
Levy03 -
Apologies if I contributed to the "sabotaging" of your thread. I was/am a Beatles fan without the remasters and frankly doubt I'll get them. Glad they gave you a reason to listen, however. I lived through the original "Beatlemania" as an early teen (7th & 8th grade when they first hit) and for me it was amazing. My post in response to Chasmal was simply based on shock at his opinion. I didn't realize he'd posted before on the topic of the Fab 4.
Chasmal - With all sincerity, you are more than welcome to your opinion (but you don't need me to tell you that) and I'm glad to hear what you think. Such differences are what 'make the world go 'round'. |
Well Don, Let's say that I may not be speaking for you and I certainly am not such an ass to presume that I would be speaking for an entire generation, but thanks for pointing that out. Don if you were there who do you think was leading the charge?? I never said that the Beatles were the only musical influence, just the biggest. I do not know how anyone, can disagree with their musical and cultural influences during the 60's, even the folks that do not like them. There sure are a lot of books written about them, more than any artist I know, except maybe Elvis. I'm outta here. Don't want to offend anyone else. |
Truthfully, I had not listened to them in over a decade.
I was curious to rehear the mono mixes when the set was announced. I visited Vegas last year and was amazed at the Love show and what a great job George Martin and his son did in putting together that mixed sound collage. Made me appreciate the depth and creativity of the Beatles in an entirely new light and how good the sound was in the source tapes.
I think the team at Abbey Road did an amazingly good job with the remastering. The tapes are in pristine condition and you can fully grasp the wonder of seeing a small band from the North blossom over a short period of a half of decade. So many great songs.
You can look at Stevie Wonder in the 1970s and maybe Madonna, Bruce Springsteen, Prince and Michael Jackson in the 1980s putting out a similar body of quality "popular" releases, but only the Beatles can claim the impact of dominating and defining a decade in the fashion that they did. You will never see that again, as music tastes now are highly fragmented and there is no persistent genre tied to this generation. |
Chashmal=The Grinch that stole the Beatles. 8^)
I hadn't listened to the Beatles in a while either. I purchased stereo versions of everything from Rubber Soul and Revolver on up just to check them out. I'd always been disappointed by the sound quality of previous CD releases.
I think these new CDs are definitely a nice improvement over what was available. Although I was never a rabid fan I do like a lot of their stuff and the remasters got me listening again. I've always liked the later stuff more than the earlier.
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Rja: That line made me laugh so hard I spit tea through my nose. A job well done! |
ok...i get it now. no sweat. not a problem or sabotage as long as we're having fun.
leave it to a greenhorn to step into a mine field =).
i would agree that living through the entire experience would add to the understanding of what the Beatles were and meant to many folks. would have loved to check it out but was a few years late.
i do remember the giant leather peace sign emblems my sisters wore around their necks. you shoulda seen my dads face!. what a hoot! =) |
Chashmal,
I hope it wasn't a nice single estate darjeeling or assam. |
Bongofury: "only the Beatles can claim the impact of dominating and defining a decade in the fashion that they did. You will never see that again, as music tastes now are highly fragmented and there is no persistent genre tied to this generation."
Very well stated. No one else will again attain that monolithic shaping of music and culture because Western culture itself has become diverse, multicultural, decentralized.
As for me...I was too young to appreciate the Beatles in their time. I remember listening to them as a kid in the sixties and liking their more accessible material, but the complex stuff didn't resonate with me. I remember listening to Abbey Road and liking it, but my favorite song was "Octopus's Garden", so that gives you an idea of my mental development at that time.
It wasn't until my early teens that I realized there was an entire alternate music world out there...
Since buying the remasters, I have definitely discovered a new-found musical appreciation for this seminal band.
It's incredibly hard to create true art that speaks to people. How many authors write more than one great book? How many directors have more than one great movie? How many bands are even one-hit wonders, let alone create one good album, let alone produce an entire series of great songs and great albums.
The Beatles a true anomaly, a group comprised of talented musicians and brilliant songwriters who came together and became an artistic, political and social phenomenon unlike anyone before or since.
Like them or not, none of us remain untouched by their influence. |
"...none of us remain untouched by their influence. "
Not even Chasmal. He is not a pop/rock music guy in general I'm inferring from his posts, but subconciously, I believe he really likes them more than he will admit and is in denial.
What say you, Chasmal? |
Yeah, I like some of the Beatles later material. I intensely dislike the early stuff.
I just think there was much better rock n roll from that period, and I think their influence is blown out of all proportion. But yeah, I like them all in all. |
" I think their influence is blown out of all proportion"
It is ironic how the BEatles, as well as other BRitish Invasion bands of the early-mid 1960's took late 1950s American Rock and roll and its related genres, repackaged it, and then sold it back to mainstream America, where it had originated several years earlier and had by then already largely gone its way and faded in popularity.
Then those nasty BEatles became artists as well and led the charge to take rock and roll to new horizons where it largely lost the "roll" part and became more of an artistic form created for listening as much if not more so than it was for dancing, as was original and true "rock and roll".
And yes, the origins of the BEatles music, which they openly have always acknowledged, was what used to be known as American "race" music, before Elvis, Stoller/Lieber and crew, etc. made it more digestible to the American mainstream (in the form of R&B as well as R&R).
My only regret is that I wish many more of the black musicians that helped create these new forms of uniquely American music in the first place could have benefited as much as the Beatles and many others did later. |
Well Mapman, I think you will find the answer to this puzzle in the great repositories of record companies like chess, king, and sun, and many others. You certainly won't find any trace of it in today's popular black music. However jazz IS still alive... |
" I think you will find the answer to this puzzle in the great repositories of record companies like chess, king, and sun, and many others."
Agreed.
I had the opportunity to visit the Sun Studio in Memphis this past summer and picked up their 50th anniversary box set.
Since then, I have have spent a good amount of listening time playing tunes from that set off my music server mixed in randomly with all my Beatles stuff (including new mono remasters, BBC, and Anthology collections) and others. It is a very eye and ear opening experience. |
It is amazing how the R&B of that period sounds so much more alive than so much of its British counterparts.
Take blues artists such as Slim Harpo, Howlin Wolf, Otis Rush and Sonnyboy Williamson for example. Stack them against their British blues counterparts and I think there will be some black vinyl 12 inch frisbees flyin' out the window in a hurry!!! I listened to some John Mayall recently and had to turn it off and immediately cleanse my palate with a whole lot of chess material to get that whiney sound out of my head. As much as I give grief about the beatles, I can give triple that on the subject of Eric Clapton (most over rated guitar player in history). Remember "Clapton is god"? |
"It is amazing how the R&B of that period sounds so much more alive"
Yes, I would agree that the R&R and R&B and "race" music has a certain air about it that is refreshingly raw and alive in a way that makes it stand uniquely on its own, especially with the quality repackagings and remasters available for these also these days played on a good system.
The Beatles in particular though did breathe a new, different and unique sense of life into their covers of many of the these tunes that they performed live in their early years though IMHO. I could take or leave most of the other early BRitish Invasion acts that covered these same grounds early in their careers in comparison however, including the Stones. I do still have a soft spot for most of the early Moody Blues recordings from their days with Denny Laine, I must admit, but that may be more because I have always been a Moodies mark to start with. |
In the early 80's there was a 3 or 4 volume set of vinyl (sold separately) called "British blues" or something like that. It has more or less obscure British blues acts like Stone's Masonry, Savoy Brown Blues band, and of course early not-very-obscure Fleetwood Mac (and some rare stuff in this set).
The Brit stuff is fine, for an imitation. It is great when musicians breathe new life into something and make it uniquely their own, but it is always best to hear it in context with the original. I think the English guys didn't really do anything truly original until at least the mid-sixties, and then blues became something entirely different. LSD had something to do with that....
When I was a kid I heard the British stuff first, then discovered the originals. At that point I threw my early Rolling Stones albums out with yesterday's trash! |
Savoy Brown is still a favorite of mine. Kim Simmonds still tours both with a group as Savoy Brown and solo. They are one of my last remaining must see classic rock acts out there that I have never had the opportunity to see live.
The british blues guys, especially those that were in their prime in the later 60's and early to mid 70's, were a definitely a different breed. And yes, The Beatles (and Stones too I suppose) were major artistic influences as well at that point as well as were the earlier American bluesmen. |
When I was about 9 I used to run home from the schoolbus every day to play my copy of Savoy Brown's "Street Corner Talkin'". I played it so many times on my cheapo Laffayette compact stereo that I wore it out almost completely. I still love that album for sentimental reasons, and am looking for a good vinyl copy of it! |
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J65HA5D1SGA |
YEs, I have I good vinyl copy of "Street Corner Talking". Sorry, not for sale. You could probably find a good copy on ebay for not much I bet.
"Jack The Toad" is another favorite of mine that is underrated and fantastic from start to finish over and over again. 'Some People" is one of my all time favorite blues tinged rockers. Love to crank that sucka up!!! |
They are before my time as well. I am not a huge fan of the Beatles. But I do like some of their music especially as I am able to hear more of their songs. |
Chasmal,
A friend of mine who knows my concert wants just scored tickets for SAvoy Brown live, front and center at one of the best small venue concert locations around coming up in January. I am VERY psyched for that!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Ft833vCPPo&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zEAkK6sQgQo&NR=1 |
I know frieds who are fans since they listened to remasters, i dont like them too much. |
