Simon Weil

I saw Tim Berne and Herb Robertson there - the gig that turned on to Herb. RIP.

People's self-confidence is so low nowadays...Yet, under the surface...It's mostly a self-confidence issue (IMHO).

I was kind of obsessed with Soft Machine 1 for a few years from 19 onward. This is when I was listening to Rock because everyone else of my age was and this was part of that. But there was group improvisation (Rock-Jazz-Psychedelia-Whatever) on there which really got to me. I was probably always going to want to listen to Jazz.

The book's a great read. Don't know the series.

A lot of the drop seems to have come in the last 2 years. This from FT.com (30th October): "[GE] is forecasting it will require $3bn to pump into GE Capital next year. To understand how much the division used to prop up the entire GE enterprise, two years ago it paid its parent company $16bn in dividends."

https://www.axios.com/general-electric-ge-stock-value-drop-171e4fac-f1e8-455d-ad32-7d2dbc4d99c6.html

I don't believe you can explain Rock wholly in terms of great artists. Rather, in so many cases, the important milestones are achieved by lesser figures operating (as above) within the frame of "a group". There's a magic that helps to creates there and you get a "more than the sum of the parts" effect. So that, with so many (most?) groups, the individual artist (say Lennon, McCartney) never quite achieves that level of creativity.

This brings up how Rock is seen in terms of "the band" - the Beatles and the Stones in this thread - as against Jazz being seen in terms of individuals - Armstrong, Ellington, Parker etc.. The concept of the Rock band has always seemed akin to that of a nuclear family to me (hence perhaps the addictiveness of Rock Family Trees by Pete Frame), to bring us back to the idea of "home".

That's an interesting review - especially the thing about them having to work to sound spontaneous. 6CDs???!!!...I've just started to go back to this period and it's amazing the number of super-duper, "deluxe" versions of various albums out there. I just confess to finding this over the top.

You're not that much younger than I am (three years) and I'm a 60s person so how did you miss it, unless you were being facetious. Maybe I wasn't old enough to partake of the whole 60s experience is a central way. I mean I was there dancing and listening to the Beatles White Album in 1968, when I was just 15 - so I was "there" in that sense, did feel part of whatever was going on. But, I also felt, say, that Sergeant Peppers wasn't for me (at 13). And I would say there was a general sense of stuff going on which was somewhere else from where I was.

"well, sorry, you missed it" I did miss it. I'm a 70s person. That is to say I came of age (21) in 1974. There is a whole cohort of us who wonder what the 60s were about - because we "weren't there". I question whether the " it" you experienced was necessarily the core "it" of the 60s - After all they named "IT" (International Times) because they had "it" (Sue Miles "Well, call it IT. We've got IT."/Green p119).

"If you saw the place [The Roundhouse, London October 1966, IT Launch Party. Seminal event in UK Rock History] in daylight you would have been horrified. It was dank, really cold and wet and horrible, but the excitement at the gig was enormous. It was like 'Wow! This is our place'"/Peter Jenner* The Beatles flip to psychedelia is often put down to Paul McCartney's presence at this gig and related interactions. 'Wow! This is our place' sounds related to Buddy Bolden "calling his children home". Our place...home. *From Days in the Life, Voices From the English Underground/ Jonathon Green p121

I agree - I wish the album were longer. On the UK reissue, there's other psychedelia relayed stuff added - but.... Of course this is the "music of the [TV] movie" - and I think the movie is the more satisfying experience - thoroughly flawed, but quite disturbing in parts. Not at all the "wholesome" Beatles we know. I get the feeling you're not quite addressing my point. Which is of the universality of this music. Specifically, it's true that Japanese culture remains Japanese - but it has had a real ad-mixture of Western culture since Meiji times.

It works for me. I recently bought this (and some other Beatles CDs) as part of a background thing I'm doing on Rock of that time (I've got the LPs, but somehow I wanted to start fresh) and I found it lived. Sometimes - with other artists - they can sound flat, or, in one case, the whole thing falls to bits and it sounds curiously mechanical. I think frame of mind is part of it.

Whenever I go up to my dentist (I cycle up), I go past Abbey Road. I actually turn off just before the zebra crossing on the cover of Abbey Road. It's always got a bunch of people standing there - having their pictures taken in the exact same position as the Beatles. Or I guess just being there in this iconic place (as they see it). They come from all over the world, making this updated version of a pilgrimage. There's always guys from Japan or China there.