The Beatles Thread

It's kinda cool in that by most accounts, it was one of the very first songs J/P came up with after they first met at age 15-16 in Liverpool in 1957, and they kinda let it sit in the can for 12-13 years until they decided to bust it out for "Get Back"/ "Let It Be."

And it would have fit in fine with their 1964-65 stage rockers. Kinda surprised they didn't just put it out then, especially since they went through a slightly dry period in late '64, around "Beatles For Sale," when they padded the album with a bunch of slightly duff covers.

 

I hope "Maxwell's Silver Hammer" was not among their top 100. IMHO, it's one of McCartney's real clunkers. (sorry, couldn't resist )

 

John could get awful snippy about Paul's "granny music," but there's really not much other way to describe MSH.

Just like at the end of "Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da," he threw in the weird gender bending line, he thought he could "de-grannyfy" the song with slightly creepy lyrics.

Which actually turned out to be not even "slightly" creepy but fully creepy, when only weeks before the release of "Abbey Road" containing "MSH," a song about a psychotic murderer, came the Manson murders, which Charlie claimed were inspired by messages in, yes, Beatles songs.

 

Exactly, after being off the road for years and sequestered in the studio the version they did of this on the rooftop showed they could still rock. Their early days are my fave Beatles era and this was a great reminder of that.

 

Public Service Announcement: the countdown on Sirius XM is about to start over in about 3 or 4 minutes.

 

New albums out today include Ringo's latest and Foo Fighters with Paul McCartney drumming on a track.

 

Which is worse, MSH or run for your life?

I enjoy both if I can ignore the lyrics.

 

WHY WOULD THEY LET HIM GET ANYWHERE NEAR THE JUDGE WITH THAT HAMMER??!!???

I actually like the song as a fun goof.

 

One thing led to another today and I watched the Jeopardy video by Greg Kihn Band. Because of the video, I always thought he was interesting when I was a teenager even though I had no idea why. So I Googled him just now and stumbled upon something he said a few years ago:

Just about every rock and roll musician my age can point to one cultural event that inspired him to take up music in the first place: the Beatles on Ed Sullivan. If you were a shy 14-year-old kid who already had a guitar, it was a life-altering event. ... In a single weekend everything had changed. I'd come home from school the previous Friday looking like Dion. I went back to class on Monday morning with my hair dry and brushed forward. That's how quickly it happened. ​

... which led to a different rabbit hole and this story:

10 musicians who saw the Beatles standing there

Kind of cool to read about how each reacted to The Beatles appearing on Ed Sullivan.

Anyway, the Jeopardy song and video have aged pretty well.

 

I just heard "Taxman" on the XM radio a few minutes ago and it struck me how rarely I actually hear The Beatles.

 

Flipping to Channel 18 will fix that.