imo, It's darn near impossible to overrate The Beatles.
Reasons:
1. The vocals of Lennon, McCartney, Harrison and Starr individually and when harmonizing.
The Beach Boys, The Temptations, The Supremes, among few others, had an equal to or greater than vocal sound.
Separately, The Beatles each had a distinct and extremely recording friendly voice that spawned thousands of imitations, none being as good.
2. The musical marriage of their producer, George Martin, and engineer, Geoff Emerick, with the group. Never in the history of music has a producer and engineer joined together with the artist to create such state of the art recordings both aesthetically, ground breakingly and technically.
3. The sound of the group was unarguably, and uniquely, their own. Often duplicated. Never equaled.
The early Beatles sound was influenced by Carl Perkins. Also by Chuck Berry, Little Richard, The Everly Brothers, Motown, Roy Orbison, the American songwriting team of Gerry Goffin/Carole King, Elvis and the other Mersey Beat bands as well as all the other things they heard on the radio.
Mid/Late period influences include The Beach Boys, Bob Dylan, Ravi Shankar, The Band, Zappa, The Who, Cream and just about anything they heard in the mid to late sixties which was probably the most creatively fertile era of pop music in history.
4. The songwriting of Lennon/McCartney with the recordings being brought to fruition by Geoff Emerick and George Martin.
5. Their cultural impact at the time was huge and there is really nothing in the last 40 years that has equaled it.
Long hair?
Singers that belt/scream instead of croon?
Groups writing their own material?
Sold out concerts at baseball stadiums?
Groups putting as much effort into each of their songs instead of just hit singles?
Groups forming their own record label?
Groups experimenting in the recording studio and their engineers listening to what they want and then creating the necessary techniques and devices to realize them?
A member of an English group returning his MBE medal to the government as a political/social rallying point?
The Beatles are in a class of their own.
I don't believe there will ever be anything like them again.
As such, people who weren't "there" at the time don't realize just how big a deal they were.
The first Beatles album I bought in 1967 was Magical Mystery Tour followed by Sgt. Pepper, to give you a perspective of where I'm coming from.
And, sure, after all this you may say "They're overrated".
Well, that is a subjective term and I can respect it while disagreeing with it.
Last edited by Winsomemore; April 18th, 2009 at 08:54 PM.
Never in the history of music has a producer and engineer joined together with the artist to create such state of the art recordings both aesthetically, ground breakingly and technically.
imo, It's darn near impossible to overrate The Beatles.
Win, I think you're construing overrated with not great. No one is doubting the impact or the talent of them. It's more that they've become almost a sacred cow at this point and tend to be regarded as the creators of all things good/great in music. They had a big influence in rock, yes. So did the Sex Pistols. So did Black Sabbath. So did a lot of other bands. It's not really a knock on The Beatles as much as it's a knock on lazy opinions I would say.
Win, I think you're construing overrated with not great. No one is doubting the impact or the talent of them. It's more that they've become almost a sacred cow at this point and tend to be regarded as the creators of all things good/great in music. They had a big influence in rock, yes. So did the Sex Pistols. So did Black Sabbath. So did a lot of other bands. It's not really a knock on The Beatles as much as it's a knock on lazy opinions I would say.
Yes.
Since the group ceased to exist it's public perception to the next generation has been evolving into a kind of Elvis/Mickey Mouse/merchandising bonanza/sacred cow entity.
with the exception of a few things, i don't agree win with at all. but i don't want to get into an argument because this is exactly why i said this thread is silly.
alls i'll say is, Joe Meek was already dead by the second week of February, 1967.
with the exception of a few things, i don't agree win with at all. but i don't want to get into an argument because this is exactly why i said this thread is silly.
alls i'll say is, Joe Meek was already dead by the second week of February, 1967.
Emerick's Leslie idea was pretty nifty though.
ges, i was not familiar with Joe Meek. I read his Wiki entry. thanks for the info!
Winsomemore
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