I think I am getting old and sentimental....

[WCGreen]

I just watched a History channel show called The Beatles on record.

It was great reliving those moments. But when they started to look over how Abbey Road came to be, near the climax of the show, they played the song In The End, and it l hit home. All four of them were talking about how they knew this was it, that they wanted to leave all the arguing and spats behind and produce the best album they could. They talked about pulling all these half songs together and making it all flow through, like they were getting rid of all the stuff they had that could be deemed Beatle material.

I started to tear up. Because that album truly marked the end of my childhood, the sixties, all that went into that. It was as if the whole world suddenly changed when that last cord of In The End played out and hit the end part static of the album. The Beatles were gone. Everything that was good for me about the 60's was over and what was coming was going to belong to someone else’s childhood.

It is hard to remember how important the Beatles were. There hasn't been a band that comes close to the popularity, the creativity and the camaraderie that they dragged from the late 50's all the way through to 1969. They grew in their artistry and were not afraid to let the past fall away.

Believe me, I am a sentimental man but I am not trapped in my youth. I love the music that sometimes breaks through the mundane background pop music to make me take notice. But we have become so segmented in every part of our lives that it is hard to envision anything but disaster bringing us together.
Snark and a hipster cynicism have replaced the joy and optimism that the Beatles and the best of the 60's brought about.

I think one of the reasons so many people embraced Obama so emphatically was that they hoped he would be the one who could unite us with hope and not fear, that he would take us places we really wanted to go. That he would hold our hand and take us all on a magical mystery tour where we could forget all about the fear and hatred and just Let it be.

You know the bank crisis really destroyed his chance to be all that he could be. In these cynical times, I cannot help but think the timing of the financial meltdown was by design and not by mistake, that there were real life Blue Meanies manipulating events because they knew he was going to win and that they had to hobble him or face the music.

But hey, I’ll get over all these crazy thoughts. I’ll settle into my scaled back dreams. Because in the end, all you really need is love. You could feel it tonight. Some things will indeed make us all come together. Why else would arch conservative Mel Gibson be sitting next to some of Hollywood’s most liberal voices taking phone call pledges to help the people of Haiti?

Maybe that is why I was so sad for that second or two. That kind of sentimentality can only last for short, sweet moments in time. It’s just not practical in this day and age.

But then again, maybe John was on to something when he sang All You Need Is Love….

[CaliforniaPeggy]

1. John sure was right...

Beautifully put...

The time of the Beatles was a signpost for all of us alive then...

A coming of age.

K&R


On edit: #5.

[EmeraldCityGrl]

2. That the meltdown happened in the final days of Bush is

no coincidence. They knew the new president would take the hit. I'm getting to the point of wondering why anyone would

want to be president unless they were a narcissist like Edwards or a sociopath like Bush.

Your thoughts are hardly crazy. Thanks for the memories.:)

[johnnie]

3. Great post Chris!

I was only 6 when they split up but I remember hearing their music on Wixy 1260 when the tunes were new. I knew who they were but didn't quite get it back then, but I loved the songs. I really "discovered" The Beatles when the red and blue albums came out in 1973 (only 3 years after they split) and I was blown away and have been a fan ever since.

The Beatles have played a huge part in my life <--ha, reference... and I became a musician because of them. I also got a lot of my philosophies from what they said and sang and they directed me into discovering a lot of my beliefs in life and love.

Do all we need is love? I really don't know, but it is a good start. It's strange to me that the whole "peace and love" thing has become such a joke. We seemed to be heading in the right path in the 90s, but somewhere we took a turn and the whole idea has seemed to been flooded over with what we have now. In a lot of ways I'm glad I didn't grow up in the era you did because that would make today seem that much harder to take. \


I don't know...I'm just saddened by it all.... Still love The Beatles though. :)

[WCGreen]

4. It's not really all that hard, but it really is different...

I can't get use to all this segmentation of popular music.

The thing about WIXY was you could hear Frank Sinatra, Aretha Franklin, The Kinks and the Beatles all in the space of an hour...

[villager]

5. Great post, WC, and let me echo about that "cohesion" we used to have, musically

(which maybe represented other kinds of "cohesion" that have been lost?)

And while it's great being able to find obscure tracks, download music, etc., there is no longer one place where all the music comes together -- like the AM stations I used to listen to, where I'd hear soul, country, rock -- anything that blended into the Top 100 or so of the moment...

And God, I loved those Beatles (also grew up watching the corny/sweet cartoon show of them on ABC...)

They did represent a kind of hope that I thought, briefly, Obama could possible reignite.

Meanwhile, a couple of "radio stations" online that are worth checking out for their eclectic blends: Radio Paradise, and Santa Cruz's own KPIG.

[WCGreen]

6. Thanks....

That's cheesey show is one of the reasons And Your Bird Can Sing is one of my favorite Beatle songs of all time. for some reason, that song was shosen to be the theme song of that show.

[Art_from_Ark]

7. Even my local 1390 AM radio station had an eclectic mix in 1968-69

Roger Miller, Buck Owens, Diana Ross & The Supremes, Dionne Warwick (Do You Know the Way to San Jose?), Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass, Henry Mancini, Frank Sinatra, Simon and Garfunkel, even 1910 Fruitgum Company (Simple Simon Says) were among the artists whose songs they played. One group I can't remember ever hearing on that station, however, was The Beatles.

At night I listened to WWL in New Orleans and they also had a similar mix. I remember "Tuesday Afternoon", "Mrs. Robinson", and "Here Come Da Judge" all being played by WWL. They would also have a plug for a set of classical music records that included "Waltz of the Flowers" by Tschaikovsky.

It's not so surprising when you look at the Top 100 for 1968-- lots of instrumental music (Love Is Blue, Classical Gas, The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, Time Is Tight), Motown, Rock, Pop, Easy Listening and even preteen/adolescent stuff like Yummy Yummy Yummy and 1-2-3- Red Light.

I didn't hear much about The Beatles in the day, though. The only song of theirs I remember hearing between the time the cartoon show was cancelled, and our music teacher had us sing "Let It Be", was "Penny Lane", which I heard at the roller skating rink.

But it also seems to me now that it all sort of ended with The Beatles. Today, I can listen to very little music that came out after 1970 or so, but most of that 1963-69 stuff seems to strike a special chord deep down inside me.

[WCGreen]

9. Before Clear Channel and other corporate conglomerations...

local business concerns owned most of the radio and TV station in the smaller markets.

The Beatles were purposely boycotted in the Southern USA because of Lennon's overblown and ill timed comment that The Beatles were now more popular than Jesus. Of course the media failed to make the distinction that Lennon was talking about what it says about our modern society that I remember they took a huge hit in the market.

They burned records, books, effigies, the whole gamut of actions taken by the right wing when given a chance to lash out at the secular world.


This is what he said in 1966 that created the backlash against the Beatles in the Southern Part of the US...


Christianity will go. It will vanish and shrink. I needn't argue with that; I'm right and I will be proved right. We're more popular than Jesus now; I don't know which will go first - rock and roll or Christianity.


Here is what he said afterwords and of course, the southern Christian infrastructure did not accept the abomination of the original comment...

I suppose if I had said television was more popular than Jesus, I would have gotten away with it. I'm sorry I opened my mouth. I'm not anti-God, anti-Christ, or anti-religion.



http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/j/john_lennon.html

That could very well explain why you did not hear too much about the Beatles when you were growing up.

[Art_from_Ark]

10. I bet your explanation is correct

I always wondered later how I could remember hearing all those other artists and songs (and I can even remember where I was when heard a lot of them), but couldn't remember hearing any Beatles songs after the cartoon show except for Penny Lane-- and Let It Be (sung by my music teacher)-- It was almost like the Beatles had just disappeared. But now that you mention it, living in the Bible Belt during that time (not the buckle, but close enough) probably had a lot to do with it.

[Art_from_Ark]

12. 1966

If I'm not mistaken (and I may well be), that was the year that the Beatles cartoon show was cancelled, and the year that the Monkees made their appearance. It seems to me that the Monkees were set up to be a sort of Saturday morning replacement for the Beatles.

[jotsy]

8. Really dig the way you share you.

You use the thing that brings us together in a less hectic setting to make your point. Music, and the messages in it.
I'm roughly a decade behind you, not music's finest moment, but thanks to Fleetwood Mac, the Eagles and Steely Dan, I got through.

My kids are separated in total by 15 years, my youngest has just begun her teens. They of course follow the new and trendy stuff, but also favor the likes of Def Leopard, Aretha Franklin, Pink Floyd, years and years of different kinds of music that all try to speak to their own moment but reach generations. A lighter and brighter bit of unity through the tunes as compared to a society too busy for anything but disaster is a layered consideration likely to cause a nostalgic well. It just means you're not numb, and that's a good thing. At least I think it is.

[WCGreen]

11. You forgot Roxy Music and Bruce....

Thank you for your kind words.

I graduated from HS in 1975...

[jotsy]

14. Then my math is a little off

Class of '79.

[Toots]

13. While I would agree the Beatles were great I actually like the Stones better.

It was a really good show though. I also came of age in the sixties..

[Bluerthanblue]

15. beautifully spoken- deeply felt-

thank you for this moving post.

Along with the Beatles there were others who spoke to my heart with similar words at that time- S&G's "Bridge over troubled waters", JT-(Carol King's) "You've got a friend" CSN's "Teach your children", Withers "Lean on me", Hollies' "He ain't heavy"... and so many more...

:grouphug:

[blues90]

16. Very nice post .

I was 14 when the Beatles came along. I picked up the guitar that year because of them. We formed garage bands during that time.

Lennon always stood out to me. He had this way of playing with words that took you to places and sparked ones imagination to think about what language really meant.

I could not wait for the next album to come out , had then all , still do on LP's. They put out many ablums each year which made their time seem much longer than it really was. I was a short 6 years with a lifetime packed into it.

Once in a while I will play a few Beatles tunes on guitar yet I have to stop because it brings back a rush of memories I would prefer to be in now.

Once in a great while I'll hear a song that catches my attention but little is on the radio these days.

I do feel being a teen in those times makes today even more difficult to try to adapt to , at least for me.

[branders seine]

17. yep.

you are.



me too. thanks for the post.