What younger folks miss not being there to hear the albums in real time is how bands from The Beatles onward developed and grew musically as their careers progressed. From I Wanna Hold Your Hand to A Day In The Life was only a four year span calendar-wise but an immense jump musically - and that jump effected many artists from The Stones to Brian Wilson and many more. Look at bands such as Yes, ELP, The Moody Blues, Jethro Tull etc as they started out with a pretty high bar to begin with and then usually topped it, with technology and exceptional musicianship.
Someone looking back to those days that wasn't alive then has an understandably completely different viewpoint. Think of how Hendrix effected guitarists, how Steely Dan’s albums, with their addictive earworms and brilliant playing kept reaching higher with each successive release. Clapton’s path from blues with Mayall and the Yardbirds thru Cream and then into Layla, mellowing a bit into 461 Ocean Blvd etc holds more intrigue when witnessed as it happened. Think about how Woodstock changed music and society.
Another interesting event was how Sting/The Police, Elvis Costello and Joe Jackson all entered the business as ostensibly punk rockers but ended up writing symphonies (Joe), working with classical string quartets (Elvis) and writing Broadway musicals (Sting) and operas (Stewart Copeland).
An amazing journey and what a long strange trip it’s been!
Someone looking back to those days that wasn't alive then has an understandably completely different viewpoint. Think of how Hendrix effected guitarists, how Steely Dan’s albums, with their addictive earworms and brilliant playing kept reaching higher with each successive release. Clapton’s path from blues with Mayall and the Yardbirds thru Cream and then into Layla, mellowing a bit into 461 Ocean Blvd etc holds more intrigue when witnessed as it happened. Think about how Woodstock changed music and society.
Another interesting event was how Sting/The Police, Elvis Costello and Joe Jackson all entered the business as ostensibly punk rockers but ended up writing symphonies (Joe), working with classical string quartets (Elvis) and writing Broadway musicals (Sting) and operas (Stewart Copeland).
An amazing journey and what a long strange trip it’s been!