GirlsAloudFan
Blue Crack Addict
I read Playboy for the articles
Revolution in the Head is the first Beatles book that comes to mind for recommendation. It's excellent. I had a hard time putting it down.
Wait, what? Referring to people who speak Arabic living in Tripoli as "Arabs" is racist? It was an incredibly dumb idea but racist? Enjoyed the rest of your post but this had me scratching my head.I'm coming late to this as I didn’t have a chance to watch the series until this weekend. This was so good, I kind of got emotional when it ended. We might neve ever get a similar look at such a significant band (let alone the greatest band of all time) at such a pivotal time. It was thrilling. I'm not sure what Peter Jackson and co. did to make this film look as good as it did, but it was awesome to get such pristine footage of the band. I don’t have much to add beyond what others have already said, but some general thoughts:
1. For all their inability to communicate properly with words at this point, their musical understanding remained unparalleled. From those moments when one of them starts with a riff or underdeveloped musical idea and the others just seamlessly join in (Get Back being the best example), to the dozens and dozens of time when John or Paul just basically start playing an old cover and they all just jump in. It’s quite astonishing to see it happening as it does. Paul and John, in particular, have such a deep musical understanding with each other, they can convey entire sentences with one quick look.
2. A related point: their repertoire is just incredible. It seems as though they can easily play through hundreds of songs on the spot. Laz alluded to how their Hamburg days made them truly professionals, and it’s absolutely true.
3. I was surprised that how many moments of pure joy there were in these sessions. All the old covers. The jokes. The humorous renditions of many of their songs. John and Paul singing Two of Us without opening their mouth. George is the only one who is generally more reserved here, but you can see him enjoying himself several times.
4. It’s so hard not to get into “what ifs” after watching this. The series has this underlying undertone of a Greek tragedy almost: small decisions that take them to the ending we know, but that could have been avoided in an alternate reality. One of these “what ifs” for me is the insane schedule they had at that time. Like, at one point they say that “it has been more than 6 months since we released a single”. LOL. They would have benefitted from Bono’s counsel. I know that the recording industry was quite different then, but they basically just needed more time, I think - solo albums would have helped, but it’s just too intense to spend that much time with other people. They couldn’t recharge between albums.
5. The exasperating character for me was not Paul, contrary to my expectations. He was annoying at times, and lacked the desire or ability to communicate better with George, but you can see it comes from a good place, and that he truly cared about the band. I think joyful is on point when she said that it’s hard to be a musical genius and know that you generally have the right instinct… But the true villain here was Lindsay-Hogg. What an utterly awful, casually racists dude (“we’ll fill that arena with 2,000 Arabs”). The greatest band in the world is disintegrating in front of you and all you can think about is about your stupid idea of taking them to a coliseum in Tripoli, or what kind of film they will make? And then he comes up with THAT film? Fuck that guy.
6. This series is worth it for the Get Back inception scene alone. It gave me chills, really. I can’t say it better than the New Yorker review, so here it goes:
Really great stuff. It made me wish to have more of this types of films. Imagine getting something like this for the Achtung Baby sessions.
A question for the Beatles specialists here: what’s the best Beatles book to read? I have seen conflicting suggestions, and would appreciate some ideas to remain in this world a bit longer.
Wait, what? Referring to people who speak Arabic living in Tripoli as "Arabs" is racist? It was an incredibly dumb idea but racist? Enjoyed the rest of your post but this had me scratching my head.
Yes his ideas all-around were just stupid. I'd forgotten about the children's hospital! According to a quick search though, Arabic is the official language of Lybia and is also the majority ethnic group wirh various forms of Berber are minority vernacular. Point being I don't see the comment as racist.the vast majority of people who live in Tripoli (in 1969 and now) aren't Arabs. they're Libyans by nationality and primarily Berber in terms of ethnicity. so the "2000 Arabs" line might not be racist per se, but it's undoubtedly extremely ignorant. it's somewhat along the lines of saying you're going to hold a concert in Washington DC and fill the stands with thousands of Anglo-Saxons.
i personally found lindsay-hogg's bit about doing the concert at a children's hospital "but not one for really sick kids" to be far more problematic.
. It's not like Julian Lennon was in The Beatles.
Nothing, Laz? you're pretty quick to jump all over stuff like this when it's a band like Wilco...
As long as everyone is on board, I have no issues at allSo, how are we feeling about this upcoming new, "last" Beatles song "Now and Then"?
As I understand it, it's John's vocal from 1978(separated from the original piano using AI...this is apparently why this song didn't get done with "Real Love" and "Free As A Bird" for the anthologies, because they couldn't separate John's vocal from the piano back then), George's guitar from the anthology sessions, and Paul/Ringo's parts are new(I think?).
Both John and George's families have approved and are promoting it.
As I understand it, it's John's vocal from 1978(separated from the original piano using AI...this is apparently why this song didn't get done with "Real Love" and "Free As A Bird" for the anthologies, because they couldn't separate John's vocal from the piano back then), George's guitar from the anthology sessions, and Paul/Ringo's parts are new(I think?).
As long as everyone is on board, I have no issues at all