Beatles Archives - Page 13 of 34 - Ramblin' with Roger

Music Throwback Saturday: Beatles for Sale songs

The two-timed character in the Beatles’ song was more tame than the earlier character.

To American album collectors of the 1960s, Beatles for Sale was an odd duck. Unlike other albums, it neither shares the name of an American collection or primarily matches up with any US release. It became the basis of both Beatles ’65 and Beatles VI, as usual by adding a non-album single, such as I Feel Fine/She’s A Woman.

And note the weariness on their faces, a function, it is believed, of constantly touring, making records or appearing in films.

This continues my reflection of Steve Turner’s “The Beatles: A Hard Day’s Write,” subtitled “the stories behind every song.” Sometimes, the Beatles were as much influenced as influencers. Links to all songs.
I Feel Fine:

It was obviously inspired by Bobby Parker’s riff on his 1961 track ‘Watch Your Step‘.

I’m A Loser:

[Early in 1964] After hearing Freewheeling, which was Dylan’s second album, they went out and bought his debut album Bob Dylan, and according to John…we all when potty on Dylan.

Here’s Bob Dylan’s Dream from Freewheelin’.
Dylan also inspired the thoughtful lyric on You’ve Got To Hide Your Love Away, from Help!

No Reply:

It was based, John said, on ‘Silhouettes‘, a big hit in 1957 for the Rays…His repetition of the line “I saw the light’…could possibly be an illusion to Hank Williams’ song of personal salvation ‘I Saw the Light‘ (1948).

Interesting that the two-timed character in the Beatles’ song was tamer than the earlier character in Silhouettes, who threatens to smash her door down.

I received for Christmas, Reading the Beatles: Cultural Studies, Literary Criticism and the Fab Four, edited by Kenneth Womack and Todd F. Davis. The first article, by Ian Marshall, talks about the Beatles archetypes Ringo the goofball, George the quiet spiritual one, John the intellectual activist, and Paul the cute, melodious one. Marshall posits that those distinct personality types” account for some of the enduring appeal of Beatlesmusic.”

ALSO

Paul McCartney weaves in new bits amidst familiar tunes at Fenway Park July 17

Pure McCartney: Early Days – which should segue into other videos

George Harrison estate slams Trump: Don’t use ‘Here Comes The Sun’— try ‘Beware of Darkness’

The First Trailer for Ron Howard’s Beatles Doc Eight Days a Week: The Touring Years

15 Rare, Behind-the-Scenes Photos of the Beatles

Guitarist Randy Bachman: Demystifying the opening chord of “A Hard Day’s Night”

How I (fictionally) met someone: “I was attending a meeting of the I Hate The Beatles Club, and you walked in and dragged me out by the collar without saying a word. Seemed odd at the time…”

Drinks at the Gadang Sports Bar

Google Eight Days A Week

Music and communication

I do have affection for Chester A. Arthur.

More Ask Roger Anything questions from Chris:

How do you explain to your daughter how to vet sources?

It must be from an example. Just recently, my daughter said, of a tabloid cover in the supermarket, “Cher isn’t really dying, is she?” We watch a couple of news networks, plus Comedy Central, not every day, but often enough, so she can clearly see that shows often offer different emphases.

In your opinion, is Wikipedia a reliable source?

Depends on the topic, and the compiler. There’s an old cliche about a newspaper providing perfect information for topics I know nothing about, but less so for things with which I am familiar. I recently linked to the Wikipedia for the band Blotto, and I noticed that it NEVER mentioned the band members’ actual names. This was a failing.

Some posts are frozen in amber, perfectly accurate as of November 2013, e.g., but not so much today. Whereas other posts are updated regularly to reflect new music released or films made. Deaths are often, but not always, caught.

I specifically remember that back in 2004 or 2005, I corrected a mention that the next Presidential election would be in 2007, when, of course, it was 2008.

Still, when I’m doing research for a topic about which I know nothing, Wikipedia can be very useful, ESPECIALLY the links to the various footnotes.

What’s one area of scientific research that you think we should be funding more (other than medicine and climate change)?

Well, climate change is huge and would include the potential for everything from island nations flooding to the future loss of the maple syrup industry from the continental United States. Once you’ve eliminated climate change and medicine, what I think you have left is space exploration. It has very often answered many questions for answers here on earth, including those two topics.

What’s been the most surprising world change in your lifetime?

Communication, for good and for ill. You make friends on Facebook with people around the world, you have fights with total strangers on Facebook, often about really stupid stuff. You text your friends, while you ignore those physically around you.

I’ve been the guy reading the newspaper, maybe only a dozen years ago, and someone, as often as not, would comment on a story, or maybe just quietly read over my shoulder. Or I’d read over someone else’s shoulder. Those electronic devices don’t seem to open one up to one’s immediate environment, even as one can learn about the most recent terrorism in Turkey.

The Internet allows for more information, but also misinformation, disinformation, satire, lies. We can see Arab Spring or police misconduct, but also LOL cats and Stare-down Sammy, which got 34 million views on Facebook, and was shown on the CBS morning news; I thought it was a waste of air time.

There have been conspiracy theories for a long time, but they can propagate far more freely these days. Even objective facts will be disputed, and as a person dealing with, ideally, objective information, this can be both frustrating and exhausting. (See also my answer about Google.)

I’ve actually had this conversation about an article someone read. (I’m a librarian; a variation of this happens a LOT.)

Her: Is it true?
Me: Where did the information come from?
Her: Facebook!
Me: But what was the ORIGINAL SOURCE of the information?
Her: I TOLD you, Facebook!

Who is your favorite president and why?

Franklin Delano Roosevelt. He was rich and rather pompous and arrogant. His ailment thought to be polio at the time, but now believed to be Guillain-Barre syndrome, humbled him, and made him a champion for those less well off. And he had a great partner in Eleanor, with whom he seemed to have achieved an understanding regarding his infidelity.

He was imperfect, the Japanese internment being chief among his failures. But he initiated a lot of useful programs, some of which are around today, such as Social Security and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation.

I do, though, have affection for Chester A. Arthur, a product of the spoils system who became a reformer for civil service.

Tom the Mayor queried:

What is your Favorite Beatles song?

The last time I made a list, it was 3. Help 2 Got To Get You Into My Life 1 Tomorrow Never Knows. Re: TNK, I recently saw Paul, Ringo, and Georges Harrison and Martin discuss its intricacies. But Help! is something I can sing with my daughter.

What is your Favorite Aretha Franklin Song?

The last time I made a list, it was 4. (Sweet Sweet Baby) Since You’ve Been Gone 3. (You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman 2. Sweet Bitter Love (1966). 1. Respect
Of course, Respect is a great cover. Since You’ve Been Gone has always been a favorite because it stifled deejays. But Sweet Bitter Love was in a quartet (or more) of songs that I played when romance went south.

What is your Favorite Joni Mitchell song?

The last time I made a list, it was 2. A Case of You 1. River. River reminds me of my late friend Donna George. But the poetry of A Case of You touches me too.

Music Throwback Saturday: songs from A Hard Day’s Night

I listened to some early Wilson Pickett , but I’m not hearing the connection at all.

The Beatles, as influential as they were on other musicians, were also influenced by their predecessors and peers. I’m rereading Steve Turner’s “The Beatles: A Hard Day’s Write,” subtitled “the stories behind every song.”

Fairly often, the members of the group are quoted as having been inspired by a piece for their own creations. I thought I’d put some of their songs up against the source material, with links to most.

Actually, the videos I’m having the most difficulty finding recently are those of the Beatles themselves, with several of them banned at least in the United States by some UK entity. The links I’ve used WERE working…

Anytime at All (at 16:52):

[John] later admitted [it] was a rewriting of his earlier song ‘It Won’t Be Long’, using the same chord progression from C to A minor and back, and when it came to recording, employed the same bawling vocal style.

I hear the connection. Yet the latter song is arguably better.

When I Get Home (at 23:39):

Influenced by his love of Motown and American Soul Music. Around the time it was recorded, he was asked what song he wished he had recorded…His first choice would be Marvin Gaye’s ‘Can I Get A Witness‘.

Wouldn’t we all have liked to have written that?

You Can’t Do That (at 26:00): “The musical influence, John later said, was Wilson Pickett…who had only released three singles under his own name, only one of which had been a minor hit.” I listened to some early Pickett – I Found a Love, If You Need Me, It’s Too Late – but I’m not hearing the connection at all.

Beatlesebooks confirms this:

The problem is that Wilson Pickett had not come into his own as of January of 1964 when this song was written. By that time, Wilson had only released four early singles which were 6/8 ballads far unlike anything he’s known for, such as ‘In The Midnight Hour’ and ‘Mustang Sally,’ which were much closer to what Lennon was talking about… John obviously was thinking retrospectively and originally found inspiration elsewhere, such as the R&B classics coming out of Memphis at the time. Confirmation of where the inspiration actually came from may never be known.

Memory is a peculiar thing, I’ve discovered. And John’s recollection of events in the early 1960s was taking place in 1980.

I’ll Be Back (at 28:40):

John found the chords while playing a Del Shannon song. This was probably ‘Runaway‘, which the Beatles had played in their early shows and which also starts with a minor chord and has a descending bass line.

This is so transformative that even though I was well aware of the earlier song, I never made the connection.

***

If I Fell – MonaLisa Twins

The Lydster, Part 145: Hip hop

“It’s SO annoying, but it’s still fun.”

The youth of our church, ages 6 to 18, did a hip hop performance of original readings, one extant reading, plus three dance numbers, and one song, at the beginning of March.

The Daughter’s first contribution was like pulling teeth. She was supposed to write a poem about her good qualities, but she was so self-effacing, I sat with her to suggest what she was good at, such as dancing, and being a good friend.

In a collective piece called Church and Family Rule, she ended up saying: “Mom: tucks me into bed at night. Dad: watches the news with me at midnight.”

Now, what she had ORIGINALLY written was that I watch the news with her, then something entirely different about our cats Midnight and Stormy. So, NO, Albany, I don’t watch the news with my daughter at midnight, unless she’s having insomnia.

Her solo reading, though, was particularly popular with the crowd. I was glad I had heard it a few times before she delivered it. And I had NOTHING to do with its composition, except, apparently, as its inspiration.

My dad and I dance to The Beatles.
Well, I wouldn’t call what he was doing DANCING, but something like that.
I dance to I Saw Her Standing There, Help, Hey Jude, and Revolution.
My dad sings, “She was just seventeen if you know what I mean.”
And as soon as he starts to sing, I start to sing.
It’s SO annoying, but it’s still fun.
We do it a couple of times a year, usually around the Beatles’ birthdays.

SHE added the extra “if” to the song lyric.

It was well-received by the audience that was clearly not a traditional hip hop demographic.

Music Throwback Saturday: songs from the With the Beatles album

They became familiar with three-part harmonizing .

Here’s another article about how the Beatles influenced many other artists; there are plenty more examples.

But they too were influenced by other musicians. I’m rereading Steve Turner’s “The Beatles: A Hard Day’s Write,” subtitled “the stories behind every song.” Fairly often, the members of the group are quoted as having been inspired by a piece for their own creations. I thought I’d put some of their songs up against the source material, with links to all.

She Loves You:

Paul got the initial idea of using ‘she’ and ‘you’, instead of the familiar ‘me’ and ‘you’, from Bobby Rydall’s then current British hit ‘Forget Him‘ in which the narrator told a girl to forget about a boy who doesn’t appear to truly love her. ‘Yeah yeah’ was frequently used as an aside in Fifties skiffle music, as well as by Cliff Richard in ‘We Say Yeah‘ (1962).

I’ll Get You:

One of the songs musical tricks, the shift from D to A minor to break the word ‘pretend’ was taken from Joan Baez’s version of the traditional song ‘All My Trials‘ (1960). There, the shift takes place underneath the words ‘don’t you cry’.

Hmm. I own that Baez song but never made the connection.

All I’ve Got To Do:

John appears to have used Smokey Robinson’s ‘You Can Depend on Me‘ as the model.

Little Child:

Paul remembered that part of the song’s melody was inspired by ‘Whistle My Love‘, a 1950s song by the British folk singer Elton Hayes and used in the Walt Disney film Robin Hood.

Hold Me Tight: It was influenced by the Shirelles, though no specific song is mentioned. Here’s their ‘Baby It’s You‘, which the Beatles covered.

I Wanna Be Your Man (first link):

It was meant to emulate the feel of the Shirelles’ song ‘Boys‘, which Ringo sang in concert. The dragged out ‘maaaan’ of the chorus was inspired by Benny Spellman’s song ‘Fortune Teller‘.

This Boy:

They became familiar with three-part harmonizing by singing Phil Spector’s ‘To Know Him Is To Love Him‘.

Note: Yes, the first two songs weren’t on With the Beatles, but appear in that chapter in Turner’s book.