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Post by Ardo Whortleberry on Jul 27, 2009 0:13:37 GMT -6
A problem with "routing" all the people who wanted to see the "talking-machine" demonstration would have been that the tin-foil covered cylinder was only good for a few times use & then it was pretty much no good for anything after that...
I think it's fascinating that at the time of the demonstration, in spite of the exceedingly poor, rough quality of the recording, people were so astounded, amazed & mesmerized and so excited to see (and hear ) this talking machine for the first time - but after all, there had never been anything quite like it before -- It really must have been a truly astonishing thing for these people to see....
Yes, we have always only had Dial-Up, and with our old computer, we tended to have problems - mainly with slowness, "freezing up", errors & the like, but I never got disconnected as frequently as with this new set-up... Tonight, it took me close to an hour of struggling with this machine, having to sign in over and over and over, before finally being able to reach this stage, where I can write without being interrupted every five seconds... [ maybe the computer finally "settled down"? ] At least, not everything is lost everytime there is one of these interruptions, ( it is still there after I finally get re-connected ) - but it all still a royal pain in the patootie....
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Post by Ardo Whortleberry on Jul 27, 2009 0:29:27 GMT -6
Just a couple of "Beatles Tales"...
The first time I ever saw & heard The Beatles was when they made one of their appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show - way back in either 1963 or 1964...
I was living with my aunt & uncle & my cousins out in the suburbs/countryside at the time, where the boys ( at least, us younger boys, for sure ) got lined up for crew-cut haircuts out on the front lawn, administered with an electric razor... I can't recall if we had already seen some pictures of the Lads from Liverpool already, or had just heard rumors about the length of their hair, or if we saw their hair-styles for the first time on the TV, but we had a debate going on amongst ourselves as to whether or not that was actually their own real hair they were wearing! I think, like the people who crowded into that room to see Edison's talking machine, we had never, ever before seen anything quite like it before - men with such long hair...
A little later on, when some of us kids were at the town drug-store, ( while my aunt did her shopping ) we pointed at some mops or dusters and joked: "Look! Beatles' wigs!" [ we probably put them on our heads, as well, to complete the play-gag ] ===
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Post by Ardo Whortleberry on Jul 27, 2009 1:02:04 GMT -6
A little bit more "Beatlemania" ===
At some point in the mid-later 1960's, a small movie-house ( which considered itself to be an "Arts Cinema" - showed a lot of foreign films and fairly "underground" fare ) in Downtown Berkeley was showing "A Hard Day's Night" and "Help!" concurrently...
I'm sure my mom had no great interest in seeing these movies, but I cajoled her into taking me in to see them one afternoon... Almost everyone loved the Beatles music already, and all the tunes were familiar to me ( I think ) - The Beatles were so omnipresent, so influential, so popular and frequently played in those days... But I think I was more fascinated with the imagery ( also, aside from "Mary Poppins", with its faux-British veneer [ not that I didn't believe it was all real, when I saw that movie ] ) I hadn't seen too many actual real-live British films just yet... and with the humor, the silliness in the Beatles' films... [ although I took the plot of "Help", with all those sinister Thuggees chasing Ringo around & wanting to cut that ruby ring off of his finger at least half-seriously - it's hard not to, when you're a kid ] -- [ as an aside, it was only recently I discovered that the late, great Leo Mc Kern had played the role of one of the prominent "baddies" in "Help" - he who I had come to adore, many years later, for his portrayal of Rumpole in "Rumpole Of The Bailey" -- It's too bad Mr Mc Kern couldn't have wound up with a role in a cinematic version of LOTR - he would have made an excellent Barliman Butterbur, at least ]
The Beatles' music then was still mostly so fresh, very upbeat, full of high spirits and energy, and infectious in its allure...
But, as I mentioned, I was mainly mesmerized by the movies themselves - I know I sat through two viewings of at least one of them ( if not both of them - something you were allowed to do in those days ) but I remember my mom finally putting her foot down and dragging me out of the theatre as the opening credits of "Help" were coming on the screen again....
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Post by Ardo Whortleberry on Jul 27, 2009 1:14:44 GMT -6
Well, it took me almost an hour to get set up so I could write stuff down here, but now I have been writing for over an hour - and, I'm getting kinda tired ... up until recently, I always had the stamina for late night [ into the early morning ] Internet sessions, but nowadays I tire more easily - anyway, I've already gabbed on quite a ways tonight already, so I'd better say goodnight and see you all later -
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Post by Stormrider on Jul 27, 2009 6:16:13 GMT -6
I can imagine how astounded everyone had to have been when they listened to that first tin foil music player. Did Edison play music or was it someone speaking? Was it the tin foil that the sound was embedded into? or was the tin foil, the mode of conduction? I wonder how much it would cost to purchase a new tin foil each time you wanted to listen to something? The BEATLES! When they were on the Ed Sullivan Show, my sister, best friend, and I watched them on TV and then went outside in the back yard and ran around screaming and cartwheeling and acting like Beatlemania had set in on us! I don't think the longer hair really surprised me all that much other than it was different for the times. After all, some of our Presidents had long hair when our country was young and men throughout history had worn their hair long here and in other countries. I remember going to see "A Hard Days Night" when it first came out. The theater was packed and lines were waiting outside for the next showing for those who didn't make the current showing! The girls (and guys ) screaming during the whole movie kind of ruined it for me because I wanted to hear what they were saying and singing. But it really was interesting to see the Beatlemania in full swing around me anyway. The Brits do have an odd sense of humor, don't they? When "Help" came out, there was still screaming, but I don't think it was quite so bad. People were getting more used to hearing the Beatles by then and the movie was pretty funny and had a cool plot so they watched it a bit more in between the screaming. I have a DVD of "A Hard Days Night" and want to get a DVD of "Help" but it is so expensive! I had mentioned I wanted "Help" for a Christmas, Birthday, or Mother's Day gift and was rather miffed when Desi all of a sudden had found a copy and purchased it for herself instead of me (her mother). I am still hinting that I want that DVD or another one just like it!
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Post by Stormrider on Jul 27, 2009 6:22:04 GMT -6
I have to admit that Paul is gorgeous (even now) and has a wonderful voice, John had an awesome singing voice (although he was rather cocky and smug), Ringo was cute with his rings and sad eyes, but I really liked George the best. I can't say exactly what it was about him that I liked because he didn't stand out like the others did. I liked his voice and he was rather interesting to look at with his chisled facial bones. I guess I just "go" for the more unnoticeable types--I liked Peter Tork of the Monkeys the best, too!
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Post by Ardo Whortleberry on Jul 27, 2009 20:20:38 GMT -6
Hello, Stormrider! ( & Everyone ) ~~~ Yes, it was always a 'girl thing' to be picking out which of the Fab Four was the cutest... I guess I was so young at the time ( either six or seven years old ) when I first saw them on TV ) that my view of reality was skewed mostly to my own experiences - that is to say, even though I saw men with long hair in my childhood books - Nursery Rhymes for instance, or Fairy Tales or Dr. Seuss's "Bartholomew Cubbins" books, & I must have seen pictures of Abe Lincoln & such, the only men or boys I knew or had ever seen in my own life wore short hair, so the Beatles' long hair ( which by later standards wasn't even all that long ) seemed preposterously long to me ( & some of my cousins, as well - at least there were two male cousins who who right around my same age at the time who felt that way - although some of their sisters who close to their age range might have had the same reaction --- Later on down the road, when I was living with my mom again ( back in Berkeley ) I came across a little joke in one of our magazines - ( it could have been LOOK or LIFE or maybe even The Saturday Evening Post ) where there were four conceptualized caricatures of John, Paul, George & Ringo - as they might look when they got old - 65 or older - ...balding, wrinkles, etcetera, although still with long hair ( whatever hair they had left! ) It was hard to imagine, in those days of yore, just how this would come to pass, forty, fifty years into the future... Of course, the sad bit is that John & George never made it that far -- ( an unexpected and unforeseen occurrence ) Both Paul and Ringo are holding up a lot better so far than they way they were depicted in those cartoons from the mid-60's....
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Post by Ardo Whortleberry on Jul 27, 2009 20:39:23 GMT -6
Come to think of it, even most of the men I saw on TV or in the movies ( when I was still young - six or seven ) had short hair as well - even the ones that SHOULD have had long hair - like cowboys from the 19th Century - Short hair had been established as the predominent style for so long, that when Hollywood & TV Land represented these guys, they always had 20th Century shorter hair styles...
Another little "Beatlemania" story: Over ten years later, being a Senior in High School, ( or perhaps even the summer after I had graduated ) - I had finally gotten into the "Performing Arts Department" at BHS, after having been desiring to do so for years before that... Not that I had any acting ability - I was terrible - but I did get involved in a few productions, and after the play was put on, there was almost invariably some sort of "Cast ( and Crew ) Party" going on somewhere --- Anyway, I have this vague memory of being inside a van - ( perhaps a Volswagen Bus ) with a bunch of other folks - ( just outside The Berkeley Community Theatre ) and I think we were on our way to a party somewhere, but in the meanwhile, people ( mostly girls, I seem to recall ) were singing Beatles tunes ( such as: "Eight Days A Week" ) at the top of their lungs and laughing and giggling... It was the funniest feeling - sort of like a nostalgia-deja vu experience - except we we all rather young to be experiencing real nostalgia - and yet there it was - halfway through the 1970's and harking back to some indefinable joy or ( feelings of innocence ) from ten years before when we were all still children - although some of us had been growing up much faster than others - ( not me, I was slow to get older [when I was younger] )
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Post by Stormrider on Jul 28, 2009 6:34:51 GMT -6
Hi Everyone! I remember those caricatures. They were pretty funny. I am glad Paul and Ringo are holding up better than they were pictured. It is too bad John and George didn't live to ripe old ages to negate those caricatures of them, too. I wonder if we can find those images online somewhere! In a quick search of the net this morning, I didn't find those particular caricatures, but I found this one: drawn.ca/2009/04/27/david-okeefe/(its rather scary!)
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Post by Ardo Whortleberry on Jul 29, 2009 3:24:36 GMT -6
yes, the David O'Keefe "sculpted caricatures" of Paul, George & Ringo are rather scary! "Grotesque" indeed, as the notes say... Bordering on a bad LSD trip, those images...
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Post by Ardo Whortleberry on Jul 29, 2009 3:39:52 GMT -6
I can imagine how astounded everyone had to have been when they listened to that first tin foil music player. Did Edison play music or was it someone speaking? Was it the tin foil that the sound was embedded into? or was the tin foil, the mode of conduction? I wonder how much it would cost to purchase a new tin foil each time you wanted to listen to something? Hello, Stormrider! --- There was no music being recorded yet - only voices... No one had thought of that just yet... As you put it, the sounds were "embedded" in the tin-foil, which had been wrapped around the cylinder - ( it was sort of like a "sound encoding & decoding device" - with the recording instrument on one side of the cylinder and the playback instrument on the other side ) -- But I have a hunch the tin-foil bit never made it onto the public market - ( on account of its drawbacks ) - I haven't gotten that far along in the book yet, but I think what comes next is the invention of the wax cylinder, which would have been more durable than the tin-foil...
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Post by Ardo Whortleberry on Jul 29, 2009 4:04:09 GMT -6
Hello, Once More, Stormrider ( & Everyone ) ~~~
To my mind, the canon of Beatles works could be divided up into different phases ( with overlaps, throwbacks and foreshadowings, of course! ) ---
"The Lads From Liverpool" Phase - Mostly carefree, lively tunes with some lovely love ballads tossed in - "I Wanna Hold Your Hand" "Twist And Shout" "You're Gonna Lose That Girl" "Michelle" - & etc.
The "Getting Deeper, More Sophisticated Phase": With songs like "Eleanor Rigby ( All The Lonely People )" "She's Leaving Home" "Fool On The Hill"
The "Getting Political Stage" "Revolution" "Little Piggies" "Happiness Is A Warm Gun"
The "Getting Mystical Stage" "My Sweet Lord" ( George Harrison's influence, I surmise )
The "Getting Silly & Absurd Stage" "We're So Sorry, Uncle Albert"
Followed by The End - the big breakup...
I'm sure if there are any real Beatles scholars out there who happen to be reading this right now, they must be tearing their hair out and going: "No, no, no, no, no! He's got it all wrong!" But this is just the way I recall it all being...
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Post by Stormrider on Jul 29, 2009 7:39:46 GMT -6
My favorite Beatles tune has always been Norwegian Wood. I don't know why when they made so many other awesome tunes. Practically every one of them is great. I have put a midi of Norwegian Wood on my handcrafted soap company's website, too. www.oliveleafsoap.com It isn't their original song but a midi made for websites and such. It has a light touch and i think it works well with my site. Some of my favorite albums by the Lads from Liverpool are: Help!, Rubber Soul, Magical Mystery Tour, and Sargent Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club band. I don't think you are too far off in categorizing the Beatles phases of song writing.
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Post by Ardo Whortleberry on Jul 29, 2009 23:35:11 GMT -6
Hello, Stormrider! ~~~
Yes, "Norwegian Wood" is a lovely tune - slightly melancholy - dreamy - nice...
Another "phase" I should have mentioned could be called: "The Psychedelic Phase" ( which tended to overlap several of the other phases ) I read once somewhere that "Norwegian Wood" was possibly suggestive of the use of marijuana ( I don't know if that's true or not, although it certianly sounds plausable ) --- Of course, much has been made of "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds" ( "LSD"' ) [although the Beatles themselves claimed it didn't mean anything of the kind - ( although they definitely were into hallucinagenic drugs - although none of them ever got into "hard drugs", that I have heard of ) ] ---
Anyway, all those wonderful Beatles tunes came out because each of the four Beatles used to contribute their individual ideas, styles, talents, etc. to the "mix" - Sometimes, one individual's influence or presence was felt more strongly than the others in a particular song, but there was still that unique Beatles 'blend"...
After they broke up, and went their seperate ways, the result was similar to the "Seinfeld Curse" - that is, where the individual members of the Seinfeld "team" all tried to have their own shows, mostly with limited or no success - because that "chemistry" between the cast members was what made the show click - the "whole was greater than its parts" and all that... Alone on a stage, they still had their own talents, but they basically had no one left to "bounce off of" ( besides themselves ), so it always felt like something was "missing" ---
The same thing ( I feel ) with the Beatles after they went their seperate ways - They all produced quality music afterwards, ( in their own rights ) but for each one, it was the kind of music they preferred most to make, ( still with some echoes of the collaborative era ) which is fine, but it's too bad it couldn't have remained: "Four for All, & All for Four" ~~~
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Post by Ardo Whortleberry on Jul 30, 2009 0:46:49 GMT -6
When I was a kid, I was always a little behind the times, when it came to Rock Music appreciation... I think a lot of my friends and aquaintances, my schoolmates, were way ahead of me on this... By the time they were in their early teens they had already been listening to different groups, and deciding which ones they liked best... ( of course, many of these same kids had older brothers and sisters, which might help to account for their exposure to all this music )...
I have another childhood memory recollection - this would have happened anytime from the Fall of 1964 on, but still somewhere in the mid-60's range: My mom and I were sitting in a donut shop on Telegraph Avenue - the shop had probably been a liunch counter or "Malt Shop" previously, because at all the booths, they had those small Jukebox- song selector thingamaggies, where you flip through the selections on offer, examining the song titles and the names of the singers or the bands that had made them --- We couldn't believe all the kooky names of musical groups that we had never heard of before - I can't remember most of them now, but they most likely included names like: "The Strawberry Alarm Clock" "The Froogs" and whatever other weird & wonderful names they were coming up with in those days...they were a bunch more, I just can't remember all those outrageous names now... ( well, it has been well over forty years ago )... I believe at this point, we still only had an AM radio at home - ( not even FM ) and if we listened to music, it was on a station that tended to play the more traditional stuff, ( like Frank Sinatra & Tony Bennett & Peggy Lee & Petula Clark ) and whatever was high on the charts at the moment, ( like Beatles songs ) -- I wouldn't say they avoided the "New Wave" of Pop Music completely, but I still think my exposure was somewhat limited at this point - Of course, every once in a while, there would be something new shown on TV - like on the variety shows - "The Smothers Brothers Hour" seemed to showcase a lot of new and different music - I seem to recall seeing "Donovan" for the first time on there - & it's possible that's where they did some numbers from "Hair" too ( not the naked scene, of course ) - although that could been on some other variety show ---
Around 1969, one of my friends had brought with him to school the Beatles' "White Album" - most of the songs on which I hadn't been hearing anywhere, I think - and reading the lyrics that came with the album, I was rather shocked and scandalized - especially at a song like "Little Piggies" Once you listen to the song "Revolution", of course, you realze the Beatles were not being all THAT "revolutionary", after all - at least, they were certainly not advocating violence and the overthrow of governments, but rather a kind of philosophical revolution... The problem was, where I was growing up ( in Berkeley ) I had picked up on the fact there were a lot of people around who took all this "political revolution" stuff too seriously... "Power To The People" and all that - [ just think about the craziness with the "SLA" which occurred in the early 1970's out here ] - so, "Little Piggies" seemed like dangerous, incendiary stuff to me at the time...
So sorry - drifted off rather far afield from the main topic of this thread - although there is often a lot of politics mixed up with music at times - ( contemporary protest songs, folk songs that evoke political themes [ songs of rebellion or resistance ] - although I don't think this has so much to do with "Appreciation of Music" - but I just got carried away a little here...
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