John Lennon wrote some great songs didn’t he? He’s responsible for more great songs than your average band manages in a lifetime twice as long as Lennon’s musical career. As it would have been Lennon’s birthday this weekend, everyone has been heaping praise on The Beatles’ number one corpse.
However, we don’t much care for eyeless fawning at hecklerspray and knowing damn well that all musicians deserve to be treated with utter contempt, we’d like to put forward the reasons why John Lennon, when he was in the mood, was one of the worst song-writers on the planet.
And he was y’know?
Of course, there’s some of you out there who will be appalled at the very notion of such a list. Sure, everyone is entitled to make a few duff records now and again… but with Lennon, it’s worth reminding ourselves of just how utterly awful he could be.
Seriously. Don’t canonise him. He made some absolute howlers. And, for once, this is a Worst Lennon/Beatle list that won’t include Revolution #9.
Why? Mainly because it’s a boring choice and furthermore, Revolution #9 is really funny. It’s a lovely artefact of what happens when the lunatics take over the asylum.
Anyway, here’s a bunch of really crappy John Lennon songs.
Dear Yoko
‘Dear Yoko’ is, no questions, the worst thing Lennon ever committed his voice to. It’s saccharine and topplingly woeful. This is from 1980’s ‘Double Fantasy’ album which is dreadful start-to-finish and perhaps a beacon of what would have come should Lennon have survived Mark Chapman’s murderous afternoon. It’s listening to this that, pop-culturally at least, we can be grateful that Lennon is no longer with us.
Imagine
A terrible record. Lennon preaches about imagining no possession and being a dreamer. Fair enough, if you’re a multi-millionaire who has piss-all else to do in a day. Life in the late ’60s and early ’70s wasn’t that great for people, so mewing at them with sixth form philosophies is a bit rich. It’s like a fat man telling you to eat healthily. Of course, this is not a new theory and has been wheeled out time and time again against Lennon, but y’know, that’s for a very good reason.
Luck Of The Irish
One of the posterboys for why musicians and politics shouldn’t mix. Lennon creates a half-baked protest song which naively suggests that certain Irish people might wish they were English. It’s around this time that (allegedly) Lennon gave a load of money to the IRA, which is nice. Some of his ‘world peace’ vision may well have contributed to a nail-bomb that killed someone completely innocent. Give peace a chance, eh John?
Do You Want To Dance?
Here’s an idea. When you’ve completely run out of ideas, why not do a covers LP? Hey! Why not take a stone-cold classic and do a cod-reggae version of it? That’s a good idea isn’t it? No? WELL WHY DID NO-ONE TELL JOHN PISSING LENNON THEN?
Woman Is The Nigger Of The World
Ah! Lennon drops the N-bomb to shock us all and junk! Yeah man! RIGHT ON! Wimmins Lib! You tit.
Come Together
A Beatle classic that remains as one of the most underwhelming album openers ever cut to wax. It’s slow, plodding and despite a couple of evocative lyrics in there, is incredibly dull indeed. Michael Jackson tackled it and couldn’t even spice it up.
(Just Like) Starting Over
Listening to this track is amazing painful. A happy John Lennon is not necessarily a talented one. The backing vocals in this song sound like the house band on an Eighties chat show. You can feasibly imagine Tom O’Connor tapping along on his driving wheel to this and imagining it as the theme-tune to his comeback show. Awful.
Watching The Wheels
“People say I’m crazy… doing what I’m doing…“. Nope. People say “Shit. He’s lost it.” Hokey ‘Oooh! People don’t understand me! I’m a bit of a maverick see?’ shows that Lennon is completely divorced from reality. Throughout the ’70s, men started staying home more often and baking bread after the fall-out of hippiedom, but here we find Lennon under the illusion that he’s the only man in the world who decided to take a step-back from the rat-race. Songwriting so stationary that you could hang your coat on it.
Have we missed any? Feel free to inform us of other Lennon turkeys in the comments. Or, if you prefer, you can simply say “OH YEAH? AND WHAT HAVE YOU EVER DONE FOR THE WORLD?” It’s entirely up to you.
Colin says
Soundgarden did a cracking cover of Come Together althopugh I haven’t actually heard the original!
krunk_marine89 says
You cant leave A man alone can you? john lennon was talented way beyond the piece of shit hack that wrote this article above. he had more talent in his FOURSKIN than you. this man wrote Imageine, working class hero, let it be… the list of his genius is endless. What have you done lateley? repeatedly slag off someone who would be too old to understand how to internet to reply even if he was still alive which he isnt. well done you, your nothign but a bully. i bet your just angry because your parents gave you such a stupid name “mof gimers” HAHAH idiot.
David Bordeaux says
Look, I agree that John went off the deep in when he left the Beatles and started hanging with Yoko Stanko but this blog is a bit over the line to say the least. John was an incredible song writer and yes a communist but everyone has their own view of the world and honestly, who knows whos really right or wrong. I am a vouch conservative and believe liberals are the main reason why we havn’t had work peace or illiminated poverty but let’s honor a man that brought and in still bringing much happiness through his music. And I completely DISAGREE with your assesment of John’s wonderful music, let’s see you write some songs! Happy Belated Birthday John, we love you buddy!!
krunk_marine89 says
Crap.
Note to self – when ranting, with one big all-caps word as the centerpiece, make sure it’s spelled correctly.
My apologies to any FORESKIN who was offended.
hoohaahee says
@krunk_marine89
FIRSTLY you have the word “marine” in your sig. So you’re obviously a fanny.
SECONDLY if you cannot spell “FOREskin” correctly, then for fucks sake, don’t try and appear intellectually superior to anyone.
Cleave says
Wearing granny glasses is worth at least one bullet….plus he wrote “Yesterday” which makes me physically sick whenever I hear it. Dodgy taste in women too. I wouldnt have gone on the pull with him, no matter how much he begged me.
krunk_marine89 says
help admin this man above has hacked my hecklerspary account – ban plz.
Dana says
@ Cleave: Paul wrote Yesterday, not John. If you’re going to insult an artist/musician at least take the time to know their work.
@Krunk_Marine89–Paul also wrote Let it Be, not John.
Roger Harris says
“…mewing at them with sixth form philosophies…” sounds good, but take the lines from Beautiful Boy about his youngest son “Before you cross the street, take my hand, life is what happens to you, while you’re busy making other plans”.
If I’d written just that I’d die a happy man.
I’m sure there’s some anal retentive who’ll say it’s cribbed from an obscure 12th century scribe.
All I can say is nice one John!
Melissa says
Listen Heckle Spray. John Lennon was the best songwriter and don’t go fucking with Imagine and say it is crap! It is not! If it was people wouldn’t listen to it like they are. It is played a lot. Maybe you should take this off your blog, you are getting many haters! >:( I am eighteen, and John Lennon is my hero and if you go bad-mouthing him you are bad-mouthing me! Okay, say that to every beatles fan, and you are hurting them personally. So take it off your blog! Or whatever this thing is sorry state of a blog >:(
If this was for grown ups, they wouldn’t say Come Together is a bad song. Are you one of those people that hates peace and loves war? Hm? If you are, the reason there is wars is because of selfish people who just want money.
Do you even know what imagine means? It mean to think what it would be like to have no possessions etc. It is a dream that he dreamnt of. Doesn’t mean he had no possessions, he was hoping one time the world would be a better place. Being a dreamer is better than someone who is not. Dreamers have an open mind, optimistic about the future and so on and so forth.
THERE ARE TONS OF PEOPLE WHO LOVE JOHN LENNON SO YOU ARE HURTING A LOT OF PEOPLE (ESPECIALLY ME!) WITH THIS CRAP FOR A BLOG.
John Lennon did not deserve to be shot, maybe you do, but not him! >:(
LONG LIVE JOHN LENNON!!!!!! WE LOVE YOU!!!!!!!
Cookie Monster says
Good list, and the MJ reference was golden. This could be a nice series of articles, if only these folks didn’t have the habit of dropping dead. Imagine if Joplin and Hendrix had lived. She would be mimming songs, having spat-up her vocal cords around 1982 – no thanks to blowing Leonard Cohen – and Hendrix would be, well, dead a little while later, most likely.
Another couple of lists could be ‘Zep’s Post-Zep Crapathon (Especially Robert, not so much Paul, Page at least recognized he’s now meh, and the other is fertilizing)’, and ‘The Who’s Post-The-Who’s Internet Habbits’. I would also suggest the Stones, but they don’t make web pages large enough to allow one to list their complete and utter poo.
As for the other Beatles (iznit spelt beehtuls?), Paul has done wonderful things, aside from the one one-legged thing. He and Heather became known as heroes here in Canada, with their anti-seal-hunting. By ‘heroes’, I mean ‘famous folks who are mentaly impaired to the point of hilarity’. Harrison did a little bit of good fun stuff, before the pot demanded payment. Ringo; fucking Ringo. He will outlive them all, because the world is a shitty, shitty place.
Cleave says
Lennon wrote Yesterday, its well documented. He did the words and Macca did the spelling. Then John added some of his little cartoons to the lyric sheet (of himself naturally) and then they all had a brew and a laugh with Cilla.
Cel says
I have never understood the appeal of the Beatles, always preferred the Rolling Stones.
John Lennon came across as a sanctimonious dickhead.
Renniks says
Relax Melissa – or have you forgotten hwat Hecklerspray is all about?
Anyway, for a commie, and someone who wrote Imagine (about having a dream about having no possessions), he sure bought enough material goods didn’t he?
What was it – an apartment to house all his fur coats – nice…
What a shame Mark Chapman didn’t have the foresight to put a bullet in Yoko after doing John – it would’ve made the world a better place (and given him a chance to make parole)
Chillax!
Larry says
sorry you are so unhappy.
hope you feel better some day
Melissa says
Don’t tell me to chillax. Don’t go bad mouthing John! Who doesn’t? Do you not understand imagination! That is why it is call imagine, if you don’t have a brain to figure it out in your own head, without someone explaining to you about it, don’t comment on it! I wish people and Imagine people with no possessions and yet I have things of my own!
Besides Yoko was the one that wanted to buy everything!
Mark David Chapman, can fucking die in prison! Where belongs! Yoko is doing the world a favour. And besides the judge won’t let him out, there was a petition going around. And if he got out, he’d be murdered by some beatle fan! So if he ever does (and pray to god he doesn’t) he’d be murdered! So he is safe in prison anyways.
Yoko did nothing to you!
Melissa says
Do not call john a dickhead>:( You all are making too many enemies with Beatlesfans! Trust me!
mark says
You’re pretty much bang on with this, though I do quite like Come Together. But John Lennon really did write some terrible rubbish.
Rachel E. M. says
Astounding. Bold enough to place the actual songs right under the criticism. I was raised listening to the Beatles, as well as John Lennon and although I quite enjoy the tune of “Imagine”
…..the lyrics are pure shit.
YES! Let’s all frolic to Bible times and be mindless Adams and Eves! Everything would be perfect! All we would have is the world and it’s natural beauties. No thought, no free will. Hippies are shit. World peace is a delusional statement within itself, therefore confirming your thoughts on his detachment from reality. Hasn’t anyone ever heard of taking the good with the bad, smiling with sad, loving what you’ve got, remembering what you had?
John Lennon…. clearly did not.
John Lennon may have created music to tap your foot to..
but I would NEVER live by his words or acts.
Take it from someone who has “Lucy” tattooed on them from a past of LSD and FREE LOVE, as well as WORLD PEACE.
JOHN LENNON IS OVERRATED.
p.s. Who gives a shit about a few misspelled words? I still got the fucking point. OH YEAH, John Lennon wouldn’t want you being so MEAN in response to this innocent, free-minded blogger! Clearly, he would just sit down in front of his door until the guy said, “Well, shit.. looks like I have to convince this guy that he’s right so he’ll move out of my fucking way.”
That does not mean he would’ve changed his mind about how he really felt.
I love you for writing this.
dave says
Yep John was capable of some shiite, but that’s the way it is with great men. When they succeed it’s genius and when they fail it’s, by comparison, seemingly an epic failure. However don’t attack ‘Imagine’. That is akin to blasphemy in my humble opinion, ‘Imagine’ is a timeless masterpiece that is relevant in any age and the performer being rich and famous in no way, shape or form diminishes its message. I’m sure if more of the rich actually cared that much there would be far fewer problems in this world.
Melissa says
JOHN LENNON ROCKS THIS WORLD!!!!!!!!!!! SO FUCK OFF ALL OF YOU IDIOTS!!! MORE PEOPLE LIKE THE BEATLES, JOHN LENNON SO ON AND SO FORTH MORE THAN GIRL HEAD JUSTIN BEIBER!
Cherry says
Ive had enough with these people hating, if you have had enough too, please sign my petition to hecklespray management to apologize for these awful articles
http://www.petitiononline.com/hecklenn/petition.html
Mandi says
Alright first you ungrateful ass hole, John Lennon was an awesome song writer and wrote amazing songs.
John Lennon was the best songwriter and don’t go fucking with Imagine and say it is crap! It is not! If it was people wouldn’t listen to it like they are. It is played a lot. Maybe you should take this off your blog, you are getting many haters! :( I am fifteen, and John Lennon is my hero and if you go bad-mouthing him you are bad-mouthing me! Okay, say that to every Beatles fan, and you are hurting them personally. So take it off your blog! Or whatever this thing is sorry state of a blog :(
If this was for grown ups, they wouldn’t say Come Together is a bad song. Are you one of those people that hates peace and loves war? Hm? If you are, the reason there is wars is because of selfish people who just want money.
Do you even know what imagine means? It mean to think what it would be like to have no possessions etc. It is a dream that he dreamnt of. Doesn’t mean he had no possessions, he was hoping one time the world would be a better place. Being a dreamer is better than someone who is not. Dreamers have an open mind, optimistic about the future and so on and so forth.
THERE ARE TONS OF PEOPLE WHO LOVE JOHN LENNON SO YOU ARE HURTING A LOT OF PEOPLE (ESPECIALLY ME!) WITH THIS CRAP FOR A BLOG.
John Lennon did not deserve to be shot!!!
Long live John Lennon, I Love you!!
JOHNLENNON&PAULMcCARTNEYWEREBRILLIANT! says
Many of the posters on here are disgusting,nasty and sick themselves to say that John’s tragic sensless death was a “good” thing and the total sick horrible piece of ignorant garbage Cleave who said John wearing granny glasses deserves at least one bullet (he actually made wearing them cool because The Great John Lennon wore them!),and because John was emotionally messed up for most of his life,because of the traumas he had as a child and teen,he,the extremely talented singer song writer and musician,father of a 5 year old son and 17 year old son,loving husband of Yoko,like a son to his poor aunt Mimi who raised him as her own son from the time John was 5 and her younger sister Juila John’s mother gave him away to be raised by her,and she had no children of her own and she was an old lady when this happened,and had to live to know it(and John’s two sisters in their 30’s also had to live through this horrible tragedy!),deserved to be shot at close range(or any range!) by a crazy fan 4 times,right in front of the wife he loved very much and she loved him very much,as he was innocently walking to his home and after he even gave his killer an autograph just hours before?! And he has even admitted he wanted to kill other innocent celebrity people!
There are quite a few recent online articles including from CBS news quoting him about a whole list of other celebrities he wanted to also kill,he had actress Elizabeth Taylor on his list,Johnny Carson,president elect President Reagan,the mayor of Hawi,Paul McCartney,and former first lady Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis! He was asked in his recent parole hearing why he wanted to kill those celebrities too and he said because they are famous.He said John’s apartment was less cloistered than the other celebrities homes and that John was an easy target!
This sicko had been a huge Beatles fan and John was his favorite too.He used to play Beatles albums for hours and play John songs on guitar while he wore an army jacket like John did in the early 70’s.He also married a Japanese woman because John did,he thought he was John and signed his name John Lennon,and he even got John’s autograph just hours before he shot and killed him for no rational reason!
He also admited years later that he met John’s 5 year old son Sean just 2 days before he killed John and he said he was the cutest little boy he ever saw,and that it never occured to him that he would never see his father again.
ThE FBI Crime Library reports that he was making threatening phone calls to people at random and making bomb threats and he harassed a group of Hare Krishnas months before he killed John.He also tried unfortunately unsuccessfuly 2 times to kill himself once when he was 20 he tried to gas himself to death but sadly someone rescued him.
Just like the crazy horrible Lee Harvey Oswald who shot beloved President Kennedy before I was born,right in front of his wife,and he was a father of two young children too.There would also be many Beatles fans like Jack Ruby wanting to kill the killer of a great beloved young man!
Not only did he kill John for no rattional reason but right in front of his beloved wife Yoko,and John was an extremely talented singer,song writer and as Eric Clapton said a pretty good guitar player himself,but he was the father of two young sons,a friend,loved by millions of fans and still is,and like a son to his poor aunt Mimi who had no chldren of her own and raised John as her son from the time he was 5 and John’s mother,her younger sister Julia gave him away to her,she was in her late 70’s early 80’s when John was tragically killed and she had to live to know this! He should have been given the death penalty in 1980,he’s crazy but he wasn’t legally insane,he knew what he was doing enough to plan it,which is of course crazy itself!
John said in his last interviews that he regretted being violent getting into fights with men and hitting women,and said that is why he felt so strongly about being peaceful and promoting peace.Yoko changed him for the better,because of their love,and great relationship and her feminism,John went into scream therapy with psychologist Dr.Arthur Janov and dealt with his traumas for the first time,and he made a brilliant album out of it,his first solo album,John Lennon Plastic Ono Band and he became a feminist,and a nurturing caring husband and father to Yoko and his son Sean.If you listen to the radio interviews he did hours before it happened,he sounded much more together,and happy and not angry and bitter any more.He talked about how he regretted not spending enough time with his first son Julian and that he was in his 20’s like most men too involed with their careers to be a real involed father.He said that he regretted this and that he and Julian would have a relationship in the future.
And as many problems John had,he(and Paul McCartney) gave millions of people happiness with their musical brilliance,and John never would have shot and killed anyone! And do you think his forever grieving sons Julian and Sean would feel if they read what some of you inhuman cr*p have said about their father deserving to be shot 4 times at close range in the back when he was innocently walking to his apartment,and he lost 80% of his blood and the police heard his bones breaking when they lifted him up into the police car! What if this happened to you are your loved ones!
The world is certainly sadly filled with really ignorant,sick hateful people and so it’s not that surprising so many are posting on internet sites!
JohnLennon&PaulMcCartneyWereBrilliant! says
Cel, I never understood the appeal of The Rolling Stones ,I always totally prefered and still prefer The Greatest most creative,brilliant,innovative,rightfully critically acclaimed,popular,prolific rock band ever,The Beatles! and if you want to see a sanctimonious d*ckhead,look in your own mirror!
strawberrylawnsforever says
As The All Music Guide says in their excellent Beatles biography “That it’s difficult to summarize their career without restating cliches that have already been digested by tens of millions of rock fans, to start with the obvious,they were the greatest and most influential act of the rock era and introduced more innovations into popular music than any other rock band of the 20th century.”
“Moreover they were among the few artists of *any* discipline that were simultaneously the best at what they did *and* the most popular at what they did.” THey also say as singers John Lennon and Paul McCartney were among the best and most expressive in rock.
Also on an excellent site,The Evolution of Rock Bass Playing McCartney Style by Dennnis Alstrand,Stanley Clarke,Sting,Will Lee,Billy Sheehan,George Martin and John Lennon are quoted saying what a great,melodic and influential bass player Paul has always been’
And Wilco’s John Stirratt was asked in Bass Player which bass players have had the most impact on his playing and the first thing he said was, Paul McCartney is one of the greatest bass players of all time,if you listen to what he was tracking live in the studio it’s unbelievable.” “With his tone and musicality he was a huge influence,he covered all of his harmonic responsibilities really well but his baselines were absolutely melodic and inventive.”
And in an online 1977 Eric Clapton interview,Eric Clapton In His Own Words he says that there was always this guitar game between John and George,and he said partly because John was a pretty good guitar player himself.He played live with John as a member of John’s 1969 Plastic Ono Band.
And there is a great online article by musician and song writer Peter Cross,The Beatles Are The Most Creative Band Of All Time and he says that many musicians besides him recognize Paul as one of the best bass guitar players ever.He too says that John and Paul are the greatest song composers and that to say that John and Paul are among 2 of the greatest singers in rock and roll is to state the obvious,and that John,Paul and George were all excellent guitarists and that George is underrated by people not educated about music but that ERic Clapton knew better,he also says that both John and Paul played great leads as well as innovative rhythm tracks.
John Lennon co-wrote,sang and played guitar on one of David Bowie’s first hits Fame in 1975 and David invited John to play guitar on his version of John’s beautiful Beatles song Across The Universe.Brain May,Ozzy Osbourne,and Liam Gallagher and many more call The Beatles The Greatest Band Ever.
Also on MusicRadar Tom Petty,Joe Perry and Richie Sambora in What The Beatles Mean To Me all say how cool and great they thought The Beatles were when they first saw them on The Ed Sullivan Show in February 1964 when they were just teen boys,Richie was only 5.Tom Petty said he thought they were really really great.
Robin Zander of Cheap Trick said he’s probably one of the biggest Beatles fans on the planet.Brad Whitford of Aerosmith said that a lot of that Beatles influence comes from Steven Tyler’s collaborartion with Mark Hudson both whom are absolute Beatles freaks and he said I guess the goal is to try and emulate probably some of the best music of the last 50 years which has to be The Beatles.
strawberrylawnsforever says
Also in an excellent Beatles book Ticket To Ride by Denny Somach where so many other well known popular respected rock musicians and artists are interviewed about The Beatles praising them including Jimmy Page,Brian Wilson who says he’s always loved The Beatles. And Brian Wilson called John & Paul the greatest song writers of the 20th century on a 1995 Nightline Beatles tribute show,(which had on music artists from every type of music,a young black jazz musician,a middle aged black opera singer,Steve Winwood,Meatloaf,and classical violnist Isak Perleman,who said he plays his children Bach,Beethoven Mozart and The Beatles)and he played With A Little Help From My Friends on the piano and he said he just loves this song. He also said that Sgt.Pepper is the greatest album he ever heard and The All Music Guide says in their Beach Boys biography,that Brian had a nerveous breakdown after he heard it. Brian also said that when he first heard The Beatles brilliant 1965 folk rock album Rubber Soul he was blown away by it.He said all of the songs flowed together and it was pop music but folk rock at the same time and he couldn’t believe they did this so great,this inspired him to make Pet Sounds.
John Lodge and Justin of The Moody Blues are interviewed in this book and Bill Wyman and Ron Wood says how The Rolling Stones became good friends with The Beatles in 1963 after John and Paul wrote 1 of their first hits,the Rock n Roll song,I Wanna Be You’re Man.
Ron Wood was asked what his favorite Beatles songs and he said there are so many apart from the obvious like Strawberry Fields I Want To Hold Your Hand is one he said he used to like a lot ,and he said he really loved We Can Work It Out.He also says that The Beatles used to have a radio show every Friday where they played live and spoke and he would never miss an episode. He said infact whoever has the rights to those shows should dig them up,because they are incredible.
Justin Hayward says that the album he always really loved ,and he said it was when they started experimenting with chord structures ,was A Hard Day’s Night.He says they began to move away from the standard 3 chord thing and just went into more interesting structures .He said A Hard Day’s Night was the album for him and their song If I Fell was the song.He said it started in a different key to how it ended up,and it’s a beautifully worked out song and that there are some songs on that album that were very emotinal and evocative. He said that for everybody just starting to write songs as he was,it was a real turn on and eye opener.
strawberrylawnsforever says
Many of the posters on here are disgusting,nasty and sick themselves to say that John’s tragic sensless death was a “good” thing and the total sick horrible piece of ignorant garbage Cleave who said John wearing granny glasses deserves at least one bullet (he actually made wearing them cool because The Great John Lennon wore them!),and John was emotionally messed up for most of his life,because of the traumas he had as a child and teen,he,the extremely talented singer song writer and musician,father of a 5 year old son and 17 year old son,loving husband of Yoko,like a son to his poor aunt Mimi who raised him as her own son from the time John was 5 and her younger sister Juila John’s
mother gave him away to be raised by her,and she had no children of her own and she was an old lady when this happened,and had to live to know it(and John’s two sisters in their 30’s also had to live through this horrible tragedy!),deserved to be shot at close range(or any range!) by a crazy fan 4 times,right in front of the wife he loved very much and she loved him very much,as he was innocently walking to his home and after he even gave his killer an autograph just hours before?! And he has even admitted he wanted to kill other innocent celebrity people!
There are quite a few recent online articles including from CBS news quoting him about a whole list of other celebrities he wanted to also kill,he had actress Elizabeth Taylor on his list,Johnny Carson,president elect President Reagan,the mayor of Hawi,Paul McCartney,and former first lady Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis! He was asked in his recent parole hearing why he wanted to kill those celebrities too and he said because they are famous.He said John’s appartment was less cloistered than the other celebrities homes and that John was an easy target!
This sicko had been a huge Beatles fan and John was his favorite too.He used to play Beatles albums for hours and play John songs on guitar while he wore an army jacket like John did in the early 70’s.He also married a Japanese woman because John did,he thought he was John and signed his name John Lennon,and he even got John’s autograph just hours before he shot and killed him for no rational reason!
He also admited years later that he met John’s 5 year old son Sean just 2 days before he killed John and he said he was the cutest little boy he ever saw,and that it never occured to him that he would never see his father again.
The FBI Crime Library reports that he was making threatening phone calls to people at random and making bomb threats and he harassed a group of Hare Krishnas months before he killed John.He also tried unfortunately unsuccessfuly 2 times to kill himself once when he was 20 he tried to gas himself to death but sadly someone rescued him.
Just like the crazy horrible Lee Harvey Oswald who shot beloved President Kennedy before I was born,right in front of his wife,and he was a father of two young children too.There would also be many Beatles fans like Jack Ruby wanting to kill the killer of a great beloved young man!
Not only did he kill John for no rattional reason but right in front of his beloved wife Yoko,and John was an extremely talented singer,song writer and as Eric Clapton said a pretty good guitar player himself,but he was the father of two young sons,a friend,loved by millions of fans and still is,and like a son to his poor aunt Mimi who had no chldren of her own and raised John as her son from the time he was 5 and John’s mother,her younger sister Julia gave him away to her,she was in her late 70’s early 80’s when John was tragically killed and she had to live to know this! So did his two sisters who were in their early 30’s at the time. He should have been given the death penalty in 1980,he’s crazy but he wasn’t legally insane,he knew what he was doing enough to plan it,which is of course crazy itself!
John said in his last interviews that he regretted being violent getting into fights with men and hitting women,and said that is why he felt so strongly about being peaceful and promoting peace.Yoko changed him for the better,because of their love,and great relationship and her feminism,John went into scream therapy with psychologist Dr.Arthur Janov and dealt with his traumas for the first time,and he made a brilliant album out of it,his first solo album,John Lennon Plastic Ono Band and he became a feminist,and a nurturing caring husband and father to Yoko and his son Sean.If you listen to the radio interviews he did hours before it happened,he sounded much more together,and happy and not angry and bitter any more.He talked about how he regretted not spending enough time with his first son Julian and that he was in his 20’s like most men too involed with their careers to be a real involed father.He said that he regretted this and that he and Julian would have a relationship in the future.
And as many problems John had,he(and Paul McCartney) gave millions of people happiness with their musical brilliance,and John never would have shot and killed anyone! And do you think his forever grieving sons Julian and Sean would feel if they read what some of you inhuman cr*p have said about their father deserving to be shot 4 times at close range in the back when he was innocently walking to his apartment,and he lost 80% of his blood and the police heard his bones breaking when they lifted him up into the police car! What if this happened to you are your loved ones!?
The world is really full of sick,hateful,ignorant people so it’s not really too surprising that a lot of them post on internet sites like this!
strawberrylawnsforever says
The Beatles revolutionized popular and rock music and were very innovative,prolific and creative,more than any other group. And their great timeless songs are the most covered in music history by everyone from jazz musicians,classical,Motown,rock,pop and even heavy metal recording and playing their great timeless music.
Many academic musicologists and music scholars have done serious studies,analyses and praise of their great timeless music,like university of Penn gradutate musicologist Alan W.Pollack who did an extensive 11 year detailed analysis of every Beatles song.He says he hadn’t even listened to The Beatles in 20 years until they came out on CD for the first time in 1987.
And university of Michigan music professor and musician Walter Everett who wrote the 2 volume,The Beatles As Musicians:The Quarry Men Through Rubber Soul and The Beatles As Musicians:Revolver Through Anthology.And British musicologist and classical composer and music professor (who is dead now)Willifred Mellers 1973 book,Twilight Of The Gods:The Music Of The Beatles,and he also wrote about Beethoven,Mozart and Bob Dylan.
And award winning music professor Dr.Glen Gass who has been teaching a course on what brilliant composers The Beatles were and a rock music course at Indiana University School Of Music since 1982.Dr.Gary Kendal’s Beatles course is the most requested at North Western university ,university of California also has one and Oxford university had a recent Beatles course.
How many serious music scholars and award winning music professors are teaching and writing serious academic works studying and prasing what “brilliant” composers The Rolling Stones or any other rock bands were?
strawberrylawnsforever says
As The Rolling Stone Album Guide said,not liking The Beatles is as perverse as not liking the sun. And Ozzy Osbourne said not loving The Beatles is like not loving oxogen. And a guy who runs Keno’s Classic Rock n Roll Site and who runs a Rolling Stones and John Lennon fan site says in his review of The Beatles 1967-1970 Red Album damn The Beatles were one great group and he said in his great review of The Beatles 1962-1966 Red album, that if you don’t love or at least like The Beatles and their music then you are not a true rock fan and more than likely will never ever get it.
He also says that John Lennon showed on Paul’s rocker Get Back why he should have played lead guitar more often because he did such a good job of it. He also said he played a pretty good slide guitar on George’s For Your Blue and he said John also played one of the first and best acid guitar parts on his great rocker Revolution.
strawberrylawnsforever says
Bob Dylan ,Roger McGuinn of The Byrds and music critic William Mann of The London Times as early as 1963 and 1964 pointed out that even in early Beatles songs like She Loves You and I Want To Hold Your Hand had unusual and interesting chords and they arranged them.
And as early as late 1963 a music critic Richard Buckle in The London Times called John and Paul the two of the most briliant composers since Beethoven after John and Paul composed the music for a ballet Mods and Rockers.
And John and Paul wrote one of The Rolling Stones first hits, I Wanna Be Your Man in late 1963 right in front of them. And Keith Richards and Mick Jagger were impressed and said wow,how can you write a song just like that and it inspired them to start writing their own songs.
John Lennon and Paul McCartney were such amazingly talented singer song writers that they were already writing hit songs for other artists as early as 1963 when their own song writing success was getting off the ground,besides The Rolling Stones,they also wrote hit songs in 1963 for Billy J.Krammer and The Dakatos,Celia Black,and Peter and Gordon etc.
Paul wrote his first song at age 14 and was playing guitar,John wrote heavy deep poetry but didn’t start writing songs until he met Paul and was impressed that he wrote his own songs,and he too started to write his own songs at age 17,and they wrote together and never stopped from then on.Paul wrote the very pretty song I’ll Follow The Sun at only 16!
strawberrylawnsforever says
Not only did The Beatles give The Rolling Stones one of their first hits with their rock n roll song I Wanna Be Your Man in late 1963,and they wrote it right in front of them and Keith Richards and Mick Jagger were impressed and like wow how can you write a song just like that and it motivated them to start writing their own songs.The Rolling Stones were good friends with and fans of The Beatles.
Mick Jagger was at 4 Beatles recording sessions and Keith Richards was at 2 of them with him.Also Mick Jagger was such a big Beatles fan that in May 1967 when The Beatles were redording their song Baby You’re A Rich Man he came there and stood on the sidelines to watch and listen to them recording it. His name is also on the tape box and he likely sang at the end verses.
The Beatles remastered albums sold much more 40 years after their break up than The Rolling Stones remastered albums and they are still together! The Beatles have the best selling album of the last decade with their CD 1.
And Brian Jones played the saxaphone on the strange Beatles song, You Know My Name Look Up The Number and he and Mick Jagger’s girlfriend at the time Marriane Faithful contributed sound effects on the song Yellow Submarine.
As this guy Sal66 who has also posted on sites debunking ignorant cr*p about The Beatles has rightfully pointed out, The Beatles wrote,played and recorded I Feel Fine (which The All Music Guide says has brilliant,active ,difficult guitar leads and riffs) in the Fall of 1964 which was the first use of feedback guitar on a pop rock record and it also had a prominent guitar riff throughout this very good song almost a year *before* The Rolling Stones’s Satisfaction came out.
And on John’s great Norwegian Wood recorded in the Fall of 1965,George Harrison was the first to play a sitar on a pop rock song and it was released on their great album Rubber Soul in December and then in May 1966 The Rolling Stones song Paint It Black came out with Brian Jones playing a sitar!
And in Paul McCartney’s authorized biography Many Years From Now, Mick Jagger’s former girlfriend singer Marriane Faithful says that she and Mick used to go over to Paul’s house a lot and hang out in his music room. She said he never went to see them at their house they always went to visit him because he was Paul McCartney.She also said that Mick was intimidated by Paul but that Paul was totally oblivious to this.
Paul also says in this book that he turned Mick on to pot in his music room and he said which is funny because a lot of people would assume it was the other way around.
Also Mick Jagger is quoted on a Rolling Stones fan site,timeisonourside.com saying that Keith Richards liked The Beatles because he was quite interested in their chord sequences and he says he also liked their harmonies which he said were always a slight problem for The Rolling Stones.He said Keith always tried to get the harmonies off the ground but they always seemed messy.Mick then says,that what they never really got together were Keith and Brian singing backup vocals
and he said it didn’t work because Keith was a better singer and to keep going,oooh,ooh,ooh(he laughs) and he said Brian liked all of those oohs which Keith had to put up with.He also said Keith was capable of much stronger vocals than ooh,ooh,ooh.
On this same fan site Keith Richards is quoted from 1971 saying that The Beatles were perfect for opening doors,when they went to America they left it wide open for them and he said that The Rolling Stones could never have gone to America without them.He also said that The Beatles are so f*cking good at what they did.
strawberrylawnsforever says
And George Martin himself said in an online interview I found around 2002 said that he has worked with many different music artists but that he has never known or worked with anyone as brilliant as The Beatles!
In his biography All You Need Is Ears he refutes that he was the one who had most to do with The Beatles music. He admits most of the ideas came from them. He also said in the great only authorized 1968 Beatles biography by Hunter Daviesn that in their music they were always ahead of everybody else and he also said that in their music they have an instinctive awareness of what to do and he said they were always ahead of everyone else.
And if anyone ever reads the excellent book,The Beatles Recording Sessions by Mark Lewisohn which is a very detailed music diary of of every recording session in their amazing only 8 year career, which has interviews with their recording engineers,tape operators,George Martin quotes,and a very good interview with Paul in the beginning,they would see how truly creative,and innovative especially John and Paul were in the recording studio and that most of these great musicial ideas came from them.
George Martin was also once inerviewed on a rock station Beatles program and he said what is clearly obvious and true, John Lennon and Paul McCartney were incredibly talented people(and he said it like he still couldn’t belive it.), they both were extrodinarily talented song composers and great singers.And notice how Ringo working with George Martin for 8 years didn’t turn him into a brilliant song writer like John and Paul,and George Martin has produced many other music artists but non of them have had as much critical acclaim,success or popularity as THe Beatles!
strawberrylawnsforever says
And Watching The Wheels is a very good song,and in the 1970’s it *wasn’t* that common for a man to reverse gender roles with his wife,and him be the full time care taker and stay at home dad,it’s still not the majority today! People including news reporters made fun of him for it,and they would ask him what he was doing and why.
And John said he really learned a lot about what women experience and that being a house husband was really a liberatin experience for him because it was totally the opposite of his own upbringing.And he said it was the way of the future and he was glad to be on the forefront of this.
Come Together is a really *great* rocker on the brilliant,excellent so amazingly modern sounding rock album,Abbey Road which sounds like it came out this second not like it was recorded in 1969,0r the 60’s at all,,except it’s much better than anything that came out this second and only The Beatles could have made such a brilliant modern sounding rock record in the height of the 1969 hippie movement!.And Imagine is a beautiful song,with John’s typical beautiful great singing voice,beautiful melodies and harmonies,nice piano playing by John,and great lyrics with a great message! He wasn’t saying that he or anyone else had to give up their material things,he was saying that even if you have them they aren’t what is the most important things in life,like having no wars,living in a peaceful world,loving relationships with people etc.
strawberrylawnsforever says
I have been a huge highly impressed Beatles fan(specifically a big John and Paul fan) since I was 11 when I got my first Beatles book for my 11th birthday,I started collecting their albums at age 9,and I had every great album by age 13,I was born after 1964 too.
My father had a lot of different music in the house and was a big Bob Dylan fan and had many of his albums,he also had a Peter Paul and Mary album,a Leonard Cohen album and Herb Alpert and The Tijuana Brass albums which I liked even at age 4.I also had my own radio at age 9 and I listened to a lot of music.
My sister 4 years older had an even bigger diverse music collection, and she always loved The Beatles too.She bought Paul McCartney and Wings great 1975 rock album,Venus and Mars when it came out in 1975 and she said years later it’s one of the best rock albums she ever heard and that it’s unique and she knows no album like it and it is a great album.
When I was 9 I had a teacher in library class play The Beatles great rock album Abbey Road on a little record player and she said they were genuises.When I was 11 my music teacher asked us to guess who he was talking about when he said they were genuises and they wrote about 200 mostly popular acclaimed songs and many great albums in just an 8 year recording career,and I already being a big fan guessed it exactly right and said,John Lennon and Paul McCartney,The Beatles and he smiled and said yes thats right!
I’m really very happy to say that most people I have known throughout my life recognized they The Beatles specifically John and Paul were brilliant singer song writers and very good musicians.The only Beatles haters I ever knew were 14 and 15 year old boys in school and one of them became a huge Beatles fan on his own.
A guy I was friends with for many years who lived down the street and was 2 years older was a big fan too and he also liked Frank Zappa and his brother who was 10 years older than me had a big music collection and he loved The Beatles too,so did his mother and sister.I once spoke with their stepfather about how John and Paul are rightfully widely rearded by most people,most rock and music critics,and many other well known respected rock musicians and artists as 2 of the greatest song writers of the 20th century and he said I think so too.
Below is part of a Beatles review by a Epionions reviewer.
Home Epinions Music Please Please Me by The Beatles
Please Please Me by The Beatles
Overall Rating:
20 consumer reviews
Lowest Price: $5.90
at Amazon Marketplace
<< Back to All Reviews About the Author
The Beatles Debut – Please Please Me
Written: Apr 28 '06 (Updated Sep 28 '09)
Product Rating:
Pros: Good Debut
Cons: Only eight original songs
The Bottom Line: The Birth of The Beatles, well in the UK anyway.
scapp70's Full Review: Please Please Me by The Beatles
and now a word from Scapp70 straight from his Beatles Soap Box
Are you a Beatles fan? Are you a Beatles nut? Are you insane for The Beatles? No? Yes? Well, I am – I'm not sure if you noticed. One of the duties of being a Beatles fan, which should really be a non-existent duty, is defending The Beatles. The Beatles were and are the greatest band in history, yet oddly not everybody knows that. The people that do not know that The Beatles are the greatest will more likely than not, argue that they aren't. It is the same thing as debating politics with a person who is not informed of the arguments, yet they passionately will tell you how you're wrong. Does that mean that any person who argues that The Beatles are not musical god-men, that they do not have all the albums and therefore do not know the position and the reasons why The Beatles are the greatest? Yes, I say to you – YES!
If you as a Beatle fan have to argue that an album like say The White Album or Abbey Road are not five star albums, just sit and be quiet and let them talk. They will soon give hints of their Beatle un-savviness. For example, they may say that Sgt Pepper is a concept album, does any real thinking Beatles fan think that? They may say something as silly as Paul McCartney's bass playing ability is any less than stellar, or even worse…mediocre. Do we have ears? What are we comparing The Beatles to? Phish? U2? '90s College Music? What or who is out there who is better? The Beatles are not kings of the musical hill, they are an island unto themselves.
So far no one has been able to come close to what The Beatles have accomplished. The Beatles were not just pioneers with each new release, The Beatles were amazing songwriters, fine musicians, forward thinkers and they are pretty funny too. Any other musician or musical group who would wish to accomplish the magnitude of what The Beatles had done in just six years would need a magical pocket watch that stops time. Six short years includes thirteen albums, four movies, and three world tours, enough singles to fill up two CDs and not to mention they changed the face of pop rock with each new release.
When the Beatles broke up, each member had varied success, some more than another. No matter how successful The Beatles were individually in the 70s and 80s, and no matter how great the songs were during these times, it was apparent that the four guys still needed one another in order to change the world every six months as they did in the sixties. So even if the uniformed debater tries to come across as musically intellectual by praising dopey bands from the 90s that no one has ever heard of, just remember theyre still just uninformed. They try to mask their unsavvy musical taste by pointing to pointless music that you had never heard of.
and now
strawberrylawnsforever says
A few months ago I read an online article that had an interview with Ernie Isley of The Isley Brothers about a recent tribute to Jimi Hendrix,in which he says that Jimi played for The Isley Brothers & lived with them & that they & he were fans of The Fab Four from the moment they all watched them on The Ed Sullivan Show in February 1964. I always thought that Jimi was only a later period Beatles fan,I knew he played Sgt.Pepper live the weekend it came out,& he played Day Tripper live also,& several people on different message boards said that when he was asked where the direction of music was going,he said ask The Beatles.
strawberrylawnsforever says
Pete Townsend along with John Bonham, John Paul Jones and David Gilmore played on 2 songs on the last Wings album Back To The Egg that came out in 1979 . They also all played with Paul and Wings in the last Wings concerts in December 1979.
Pete also along with Phil Collins who is also a big Beatles fan since he was 13 in the concert scene in the Beatles film A Hard Day’s Night, played on Paul’s 1986 album Press To Play.
And I have found about 100 former Beatles haters on different message boards who are now big Beatles fans,many call them The Greatest Rock Band Ever and most say they now think they were brilliant song writers. I didn’t communicate with these people, but they said in their posts that they hadn’t even heard most of their songs and albums,and had inaccurate misperceptions of them like the ridiculous one that they ever were a “boy band.” Which besides knowing even most of their music and knowing their history knows is totally false.
Last year a musician posted on some message board about the new John Lennon biography, and he said watch The Beatles Anthology video series and learn how truly immensely talented this band was.
Most people don’t hate The Beatles in the first place and people don’t usually go from hating a band to loving them, so it just goes to show how great and timeless their music really is/was!
I once found a post a few years ago of a 35 year old musician in Jamaica who said on his blog that when he was younger and a big Who fan he used to think The Beatles were overrated, but that he did a 300 degree turn around and he said he now truly believes that The Beatles were the greatest rock band ever.
strawberrylawnsforever says
Many people have said about The Rolling Stones ,that their albums have a few good or great songs but the rest is filler.
But a radio host who was a former DJ once said that The Beatles are one of the only if not only bands that almost all of their songs were great including the album tracks that weren’t released as singles.
On a message board discussion some years ago about what bands and artists people consider overrated,quite a few said The Rolling Stones and some said The Beatles or both,and a guy said if you ask almost anybody in the music business they will tell you that The Beatles were the Greatest Band Ever!
I once spoke to a rock DJ about The Beatles and even though he said they aren’t his favorite,he said nobody can say that The Beatles weren’t great,he said especially John Lennon and Paul McCartney as song writers.
And I once spoke to another rock DJ who is a huge Beatles fan & who has hosted a 2 hour Breakfast With The Beatles radio show for over 20 years & I said that The Beatles work in the recording studio described in details in The Beatles Reording Sessions by Mark Lewisohn,is so impressive & brilliant & he said oh it’s the work of genuises. I said how can anyone not recognize what extraordinary singer song composers John Lennon & Paul McCartney were? And he said oh you can ask anyone in the music business & they will tell you that.
strawberrylawnsforever says
My step cousin who was born in 1958 saw Paul & Wings in 1976 & he said it was a great show & he said The Beatles probably were The Greatest Band Ever & my first cousin who was born in 68 (he & his older brother who was born in 62 and are both lawyers,and his oldest brother born in 60, his parents & sister have always been fans)said when I asked him when he was 23 if he still liked them,he said best band that ever was.
He told me that when he was at the British Museum where Lennon & McCartney’s song lyrics are in a glass case next to Sahkespeare,Dickens,Wodsworth & Keats everyone was like forget them lets go over to the Lennon & McCartney lyrics.
strawberrylawnsforever says
Home
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Syd Birrell discovers Beatles in 2009
Posted By WERNER BERGEN , EXAMINER ENTERTAINMENT EDITOR
For most of Syd Birrell’s music life it has been about “learning about Bach and how to direct an orchestra,” he says.
Sure he knew and heard about the Beatles but it wasn’t until a year ago that the director of The Peterborough Singers “discovered” the Fab Four.
Now he’s a convert to the extent that the Peterborough Singers will present a concert of Beatles music on Saturday, Feb. 27 at Calvary Church, Lansdowne St. W.
The Singers will be presenting 25 songs in two hours in various combinations including the 100-
MUSIC:Performed by Cosima Grunsky
voice choirs, various smaller ensembles, duets, and solos, Birrell, said in an Examiner interview.
The choir will also be joined by a full band of musicians: Andrew Affleck -bass guitar, Barry Haggarty -guitar, Curtis Cronkwright -drums, Paul Grecco -keyboard, Rob Bulger – guitar, Doug Sutherland -trumpet, Marlowe Bork -trumpet and Steve McCracken sax/clarinet.
“They’re all Beatles nuts,” said Birrell. In fact Haggarty recorded an album at Abbey Road, the same studio the Beatles used.
Master of ceremonies will be Mike Melnik, of Kruz-FM, who is also a Beatles nut, said Birrell, who will share Beatles stories with the audience. There will be some special guests who will also share Beatles stories.
Birrell explained a friend in New York City was trying out a new piano in his home overlooking Central Park.
“He put music in front of me…Strawberry Fields,”said Birrell. The view included The Dakota where John Lennon had lived and the original strawberry fields of Central Park.
“I got really interested. I find their music incredible. These guys are the Shuberts of the 20th century,” said Birrell. “They have really great melodies. They are the greatest composers of the 20th century.”
Birrell said he searched the internet for Beatles information listened to their albums like Revolver, Sgt. Pepperand the White Albumfor three months.
“I found their music incredible,” he said
The Singers are known for performing classical music and Birrell said in years to come the music of the Beatles will be considered the classical music of the century.
Birrell said the Singers are not trying to replicate the Beatles but we’re “celebrating what the songs mean to us.”
He said some of the music had to be changed because the audience wouldn’t be able to sing along in the keys the songs were originally written in….including Hey Jude.
There will be displays of memorabilia and even trivia opportunities
(Why is Feb. 7, 1964 important?).
Concert facts
What: Come Together! The Music of the Beatles
Who: The Peterborough Singers
When: Saturday, Feb. 27 at 2 p.m.
Where: Calvary Church, Lansdowne St. W., with guest MC Mike Melnik, of KRUZ-FM.
Tickets: $28 (adult and senior) and $10 (students). Tickets available at Titles Bookstore, Emmaus Family Books, Graingers Cleaners, Pammett’s Flower Shop in Peterborough, Happenstance Books & Yarns (Lakefield) or call 705-745- 1820 or email [email protected].
Beatles in 1964
January 20: Meet The Beatles LP. (Capitol Records) is released in the U.S. It hits the #1 spot on Billboard chart and stays for eleven weeks.)
January 27: MGM Records releases My Bonnie/The Saints single.
January 30: Vee Jay Records re-releases Please Please Me/From Me to You in the US.
February 1: I Want To Hold Your Hand makes #1 on the U.S. charts selling 2,000,000 records. She Loves You sells 1,000,000 copies in the U.S.
February 3: MGM Records releases The Beatles with Tony Sheridan LP (recorded for Bert Kaempfert in Germany and originally marketed as Die Beat Brothers und Tony Sheridan)
February 5: The Beatles return from Paris.
February 7: The Beatles arrive at Kennedy Airport in New York, aboard Pan Am’s Yankee Clipper, flight 101, greeted by some 3,000 screaming fans. New York pop radio stations play Beatles records practically around the clock for days.
February 9: The Beatles make their first appearance on CBS television’s Ed Sullivan Show in New York. The network claims some 50,000 applied for 728 available studio seats. They open with All my Loving, followed by Till there was You and She Loves You and close with I Saw her Standing There and I Want to Hold your Hand.
February 11: The Beatles make their first live concert appearance in the U.S. at the Coliseum in Washington, D.C., drawing an audience of 20,000 fans.
February 12: The band gives two concert performances at Carnegie Hall in New York City.
February 16: The Beatles make their second appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show at the Deauville Hotel in Miami Beach, Florida, performing She Loves You, All My Loving, This Boy, I Saw her Standing There, From Me to You and I
Want to Hold your Hand.
From http://www.Beatles.ws/1964
Article ID# 2465776
strawberrylawnsforever says
On Last FM. The Rolling Stones only had 80 members of their fan group in 2007, The Beatles had over 2,000 which is now over 12,000 and the average age of fans is 22 more guys than girls and they are from all over the world!
In 2006,2007 and 2008 The Beatles were the # 1 most listened music artists on Last.FM and they are very popular on YouTube and Rate Your Music where many male and female fans in their teens and 20’s call them The Greatest Rock Band Ever!
The Beatles are still rightfully regarded by most people,most rock critics,and many other music and rock artists as The most creative,innovative,and prolific rock band ever! In 1995 25 years after they broke up their Anthology CD’s went straight to # 1 around the world and I heard a rock DJ say that 40% of the people buying them were teenagers,the same exact thing when their 1CD came out in 2000 30 years after they broke,up and in 2009,39 years after they broke up,they were the second biggest selling artists in the last decade,and their 1CD was the biggest selling album!
The Beatles wrote *plenty* of great rock songs including hard rock on The White Album and Abbey Road and as many have rightfully pointed out Paul invented heavy metal with his 1968 song Helter Skelter and people have also said John’s I Want You She’s So Heavy on Abbey road was also one of the first heavy metal songs.
Even in their early days they wrote some great rockers that were very rocky for the times, as The All Music Guide said,in their very good review of Past Masters Volume 1 that they proved they could rock really really hard,with John’s I Feel Fine from late 1964 which featured the very recorded feedback guitar on a rock song,and Paul’s great blues rocker,She’s A Woman also from late 1964,and what they called the peerless I’m Down which is Paul’s screaming rocker from mid 1965 which they performed even harder rocking, and screaming in August 1965 at Shea Stadium.
Also John’s You Can’t Do That from early 1964,is a great rock song, so is Day Dripper,Paperback Writer, And You’re Bird Can Sing,Oh Darling,Hey Bulldog, She Said She Said,Taxman, Revolution,Get Back,Come Together, etc!
lucyintheskywithrubies says
Cel, I never understood the appeal of The Rolling Stones,always preferred The most creative,brilliant,innovative,critically acclaimed,popular,and prolific Rock Band Ever,The Beatles! If you want to see a sanctimonious d*ckhead,then you should really look in your own mirror!
Oh and I’m sure you don’t also know that John and Yoko helped raise a lot of money for retarted children and adults in their One To One Madison Square Garden performances.And that just one year before John was shot and killed for no rational reason,John donated a 1,000$ &which was a lot of money in 1979) to New York police officers to get bullett proof vests!
lucyintheskywithrubies says
John and Yoko’s One To One concert performances was in the summer of 1972.
And to Mof,Woman Is The N*gger of The World was a very important true powerful important song,(and as Yoko said recently it’s still true today unfortunately) and John was pretty brave to co-write it,sing it and get banned off of the radio,and sing it live in their Madison Square Garden concert,and also on The Dick Cavet Show all in 1972.
lucyintheskywithrubies says
The Beatles wrote, played and recorded so many great critically acclaimed, popular songs and albums of all different styles of music and wrote about 50 or more years worth of mostly great music in just an 8 year recording career.
When The Beatles were playing live in 63,64, 65& 66 they had very limited primitive sound systems at the time,only 100 watt amplifiers,(and George Harrison says in the excellent video series,The Beatles Anthology that special 100 watt amplifiers were made for their August 1965 Shea Stadium concetts,and he said they went up from the only 30 watts before!) no feedback monitors so they couldn’t even hear themselves play and sing(yet they amazingly managed to sing and play in sync and in tune with each other anyway!) plus all of the screaming from the crowds.
In their January 1969 live rooftop concert they sounded great, the sound systems had improved some by then ,although still pretty primitive compared to today’s, and there were no screaming crowds anymore.
When I was a teenager I met 3 people who saw The Beatles in concert, 2 saw them in 1966 and 1 saw them in 1964, they all told me they could see and hear them and that they were great.
On the site Artist Facts in The Rolling Stones section a guy Steve from Canada said he saw The Beatles in concert in 1966 and The Rolling Stones in 1996(and the sound systems by then were a million tines better!) and he said don’t get me wrong The Stones were great but they were no match for The Beatles and he said The Beatles were The *GREATEST* Band ever!
And former Kiss guitarist Bob Kulick who produced the heavy metal tribute Beatles album,Butchering The Beatles, said he saw The Beatles at Shea Stadium in 1966 and he said he only heard them in bits and pieces but he could hear parts of Baby’s In Black and Paperback Writer and he said they sounded amazing. He also calls them the *GREATEST* band ever.
Ali-son says
Your’e all-…You all are hateful….
MartZ says
I completely agree with the folks who believe that when the Red album was reissued on CD in 1993, it was too bulky (or at least it appears that way now), the price was out of line, and that it really should have been on a single CD. Now here is the album’s second CD reissue, 17 YEARS later, and it’s STILL two CDs?! I don’t really have any qualms about the packaging or the sound quality. I certainly don’t have any complaints about it not being all in mono. As long as a stereo mix is good enough to suit me, you can have your mono, in my opinion (well, in most cases, anyway). But, returning to the two-CD issue, people say the retail price is better this time, although I don’t quite agree. Also, I feel that this business of refusing to put the album on a single CD in order to preserve the double-album feel of the original 1973 release is nonsense. I can’t figure it out. I really don’t think that there are many people who miss having to switch the records. In fact, younger fans of the group, like myself, have never owned (or have probably never owned) the original 1973 version. The argument that the “pause” to switch CDs heightens the listening experience boggles my mind. Vinyl records had (and have) two sides. Whenever you wanted to listen to an entire record, you had to go through a “pause” to change sides. I don’t hear (or see) anyone complaining about albums that were originally on just one record being reissued on a single CD, with no pause to switch CDs. After all, wouldn’t putting a one-record album on two CDs and making listeners have to switch CDs (thereby replicating the between-side “pause” of the original record) really be more “true” to the original record than putting the whole album on one CD? (Oops…I hope I didn’t just give Capitol an idea for their third round of Beatles album reissues.) So as far as I’m concerned, the Red album should still be just one CD, and the retail price should still be lower (somewhat, anyway). The tracklisting is great, but Capitol is STILL ripping us off here. If it hadn’t been for the remastered sound, I wouldn’t have bothered with this reissue. (THANK GOD it’s not FOUR CDs!!)
Max says
Who the Fu** do you think you are sayin that John Lennon was a bad song writer!!!!!
How dare you even say sucha thing!!!! AND HOW DARE YOU SAY IT’S GOOD HE’S GONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! He was Fu**** murdered man!!!! you should be shot for sayin that just to see how it feels you prick!!
You should be ashamed for sayin that. I can forgive you sayin hes a bad song writer, but that was just curle and unessisary to say. I know this is a free country and all, but that was just sick to say. Your a jerk :(
Some Beatles Fan says
Although I do support the idea that music taste is subjective, and everyone is entitled to their own opinion on music taste, I find this to be pathetic. And terrible. Although you may not like John’s music, it was of bad taste to say it was a “good thing” that he was assassinated. At first sight, I saw the title and knew you were an asshole. You should acknowledge the contribution he made to music in his day; he and the Beatles helped shape an entire generation of music that will never be emulated by any other artist today. People may try to say that a certain group will be the next Fab 4 (I’ve seen claims that The Jonas Brothers and Justin Beiber will reach their level of talent and fame) but there will truly never be a group as talented as John, Paul, George, and Ringo. I understand you are not a Beatles fan, but this article came off as ungrateful, bigoted, offensive, and hurtful to people who dream that the world will live as one.
R.I.P. John.
Jacques Foreskinn says
Lennon was a horrible person. Thankfully we’ve been spared all those Beatles reunions that were inevitable. Imagine having to look at that 70 something year old Yoko screeching into a microphone.