Parlaphone released the Beatles 'Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band'. What other albums can be considered having as much impact, actually altering the direction of a music genre?
Hi Hack, You're right. Pet Sounds came out over a year earlier. I do recall seeing an interview recorded around that time, of John saying how much Pet Sounds played a influence on Sgt Pepper.
Hi Ncarv, Thanks for sharing. I was too young to appreciate the impact at that time but I felt it's influence in rock music well into the 70's. The timing of it release, looking back on it, was absolutely perfect. A exceptional moment in history at the time of it's release. How much do you think this recording influenced the well documented cultural revolution of that summer?
It had a huge influence on Jimi Hendrix who performed it in it's entirety the day before it's release. It was not the first of it's kind, but because the Beatles were so popular at the time everyone took notice. A lot of techniques that had not been used much prior were employed. Most are simple to replicate today but the songwriting is a little more difficult.
Hi Urn975, Interesting that 'Days of Future Past' came out in November of that year, almost six months after. Did Sgt. Pepper have an influence on it? Or was it just the pharmaceuticals at that time?;-)
Hi Loomisjohnson, Velvet Underground is a good one. It was the beginning of the punk movement IMO. In regards to Sgt. Pepper I will disagree with it being hyped more then any other Beatle album.They were all hyped pretty good. These are the Beatles during the sixties! The real hype was after it's release with everyone from Brian Wilson, Morrison, Mcquinn, Crosby and John Phillips playing it 24/7 as if they hadn't heard ANYTHING like it before.
Hi Rockadanny, To gauge its impact you need to remember what records where like prior to SPLHCB. Perhaps being released at the beginning of the 'summer of love' had a lot to do with its impact. How much you like the album is a matter of opinion. Personally it is not my favorite Beatles album.That isn't what I intended this thread to be about. I wanted to see other important albums that changed the playing field. What is not debateable is that anyone significant in the rock industry at the time of it's release were listening to it and heavily influenced by it.It sparked an era of intense creativity in music. I will through in Dylan's Highway 61 as well into the conversation
i gotta agree with rockadanny--sgt. pepper was certainly eagerly awaited and massively hyped, but aside from more lavish production didn't really do anything musically that different from rubber soul or revolver (or for that matter, from pet sounds or some of the other ambitious pop of the era like the left banke or the zombies). i was also kinda underwhelmed by sgt. pepper--other than day in the life, the songs just don't move me like virtually the rest of their catalogue. just my biased and likely misguided opinion, of course.
to the original question, in addition to many of the above-named records, it seems like virtually everyone who heard "velvet underground and nico" was inspired to form a band to remake it.
Will someone please explain how Sgt. Pepper "altered the direction of a music genre"? What did we get after SP that we did not have before that was directly influenced by SP? I was alive and listening to music back then, but apparently unaware of its "impact". I do know I did not care for it then. Never have, until recently. Once I got the CD mono box set and played on my vastly improved (vs. back then) rig, so I do like it now, but don't see its signifigance.
I love Nirvana, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, but there is no album that has had anywhere near the impact on popular music that Sgt Peppers had, not even close.
It could be argued that without Sgt Peppers, some of those great albums mentioned above would never have been made. The impact was that huge.
Bright moments footnote: in the early seventies between classes, the carillon atop Memorial Hall on the University of Delaware campus blasted Sgt. Pepper's far and wide through speakers installed to preserve the original chimes.
Well if it IS 44 years ago today that "it WAS 20 years ago today", does that mean we have a Sgt Peppers Reunion on the Isle of Wight? Vera? Chuck? Dave? Are you there?
Many great albums that influenced other artists and the direction of music have come out, but I can't remember any one of them having the impact of Sgt. Pepper. I remember when it came out. Even if you didn't sit around and listen to it, it was everywhere and you knew all the words to all the songs, it was that ubiquitous. It came out the windows and doors, in the hallways, in the car, everywhere you went. I was more a Stones fan (you were either a Stones fan or a Beatle fan), but Sgt. Pepper was the s**t! Sgt. Pepper changed the course of pop music then and forever. It was a singularity that no record has achieved before or since.
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