Brad

Christ, I just found out that Paul played the solo on "Good Morning, Good Morning," which is one of the best Beatles solos for me, period. A fine, fine rock soloist. There were also those rumors that Clapton played some of the solos on the White Album (an old teacher of mine tried to convince me that he played the lead breakdown on "I Want You," but I don't buy it--the articulation is all wrong). The recording notes on the stereo version of the White Albums says that Harrison asked Clapton to play the solo "On While My Guitar Gentlyl Weeps."

Where did you read that Paul was playing that solo?

and this, one of the best they did in my view.

Great cuts Jim. I know that record company execs probably dictated the length of the songs, but in listening to some of these songs after all these years, in my mind I always thought they were longer than the 2:10 to 2:45 they were; shows that the Beatles got the message succinctly and skillfully.

Based on the photos, that's probably from the BBC disc, which I've got on order.

This needs to be asked? Plus, I can't believe five people out of the 13 who voted said no?

I loved them as a kid (before rock) and played the one album I had incessantly, especially "If I had a Hammer." Big part of my childhood. RIP Mary.

Ah, you remember the old moniker. Might be confusing for a lot of people. Re Ringo: I've always been a gut-feeling kind of guy and what has fascinated me about his playing is that you can actually hear that he was having fun. I have absolutely nothing theoretical or else to back that up with (although I often notice that loose and relaxed approach to what he was doing), but there are so many tunes that just ooze that "fun" vibe and that is something that - in my eyes (to my ears) - has become more and more rare. There are too many highly-skilled drummers out there today that have had excellent schooling from before they were able to walk and are today, often at a rather young age, able to play things that people a decade or two before them wouldn't have been able to wrap their brains around. And then they start playing ... and it bores me. To. Death. It all sounds so forced and so damn polished, every note placed meticulously and every other tune streamlined to death. Sometimes you can even predict this or that change just because their upbringing and teaching told them to shift the beat, to insert a radically different break or to entirely drop out of a song just to "surprise" the listener. It's like watching those formulaic slasher films in which you just know that someone had planned that one single scene nobody was supposed to expect. Nevertheless, if you have seen more than 5 or 10 of those films, you know that it's time for that "surprising/let's trick the audience" moment ... again. Predictable. Boring. Tiring. In short, I never get/got that feeling when I listen to Ringo play, and that makes him an excellent drummer in my book. Everyone else's mileage may vary considerably on this. You know, I've ranted and raved against Charlie Watts' style for ages, simply because I thought he played the same beat over, and, over and over again, but today, as I have grown older, I'm beginning to appreciate that approach a lot more as well. Yes, predictable like hell, but so much better than all that modern wanking too many players display who are, unfortunately, idolized by the next generation of drummers growing up. Note: Yes, there is a slew of excellent drummers today as well, I know, but ... I have the same feeling about a lot of instrumentalists these days, both classical and non-classical. Many of them are technically flawless and sometimes even brilliant, but the "feeling" (or whatever you want to call it) is lacking, at least to my ears; the music sounds emotionally detached and lifeless to me. Might have something to with that it's more of a profession today, more of a job and sometimes the love goes out of it. I know it's not the same thing but a baseball player once said "you have to be a man to play this game but you have to have a lot of little boy in you."

Sadly, it looks like they can. Tell me when Alfred has stopped spinning.

It really should all act the same way.

What we would have given to be there.

Yeah yeah yeah on "Yer Blues!" As well as the off-meter buzzsaw-sounding solo on "I Call Your Name." I agree that Lennon's guitar-playing is underrated, and I would also argue that one could make the case that Lennon was one of the best rhythm-guitar player ever, right up there with Chuck Berry and Keith Richards. Agreed. Lennon could definitely rock. Played a hell of a lead when given the chance. One of my musical heroes, and the reason my daughter is named Julia! Well, that's cool about your daughter. Very neat.

Usually any emails or what have you from a Nigerian source is a scam. Glad you caught this timely.

I was thinking of a box set but some of these things are not rarities. Verve did put out some when they were doing the LPR series.

Covering the impulse catalog would seem to be an obvious choice for future projects. Lot of good stuff there, not just Coltrane, etc. I have cds by Art Blakey, Curtis Fuller, Sonny Rollins, Lucky Thompson, McCoy Tyner and Sonny Stitt on the one hand and Benny Carter, Paul Gonsalves, Freddie Hubbard, Earl Hines, and Pee Wee Russell on the other. Perhaps you could get some interesting Selects out of these, at the least.

How prescient was Chuck a couple of years ago about buying the Fantasy CDs you could. In their heyday not that long they used to put out some great stuff. What a damn shame for us .

A CDR program? I would think that would cause some legal problems, unless royalties are paid.

I might agree with the analysis but these are just recently introduced. Perhaps they never sold well so they're just writing it off.

Very nice voice. Sad that she passed away so young.

I was pretty frickin' obvious wasn't it. And btw, on the Abbey Road remaster I can hear a whole 'nother layer of crickets. In fact I think I can them breath. Funny about the crickets. I was driving listening to it and said, "damn, how'd those crickets get in my car?" Then, I realized it was the song.

Interesting article. Thanks. One of the linked articles referred to a Box of Vision. Does anyone know anything about this?

Ditto on that.

I had a funny feeling you'd fold. :rhappy: I have not as of yet. As a kid I had the Hunter Davies book The Beatles which was written before they broke up. I now have: The Complete Beatles Recording Sessions: The Official Story of the Abbey Road by Mark Lewisohn A Hard Day's Write : The Stories Behind Every Beatles Song by Steve Turner Anthology (which should be called Mythology but makes a nice coffee table book) The Beatles: The Biography by Bob Spitz I think the Spitz and Lewisohn are two that offer good insight without a lot of personal interpretation by the authors. Here, There and Everywhere: My Life Recording the Music of the Beatles by Geoff Emerick and Howard Massey looks like a good read that I want to check out. I don't know if it's still in print, but I always loved this book: Nobody recommending "Revelution In The Head"????? :unsure: I think it's amazing. As I hadn't read anything in print about them, I wanted a more general history and the Gould book has some glowing reviews. I saw the Revolution in the Head book yesterday and took a brief glance at it but it seemed more like a song by song analysis or is that too cursory a conclusion on my part? I ordered one last week from Amazon and it's supposed to arrive between October 8 and 20.

The Bob Spitz. A friend loaned it to me a couple years ago. At around thousand pages and having thought I knew everything or wanted to know about the Beatles I never got around to it till a couple weeks ago. Once you get to when Beatlemania starts to pick up it's a great page tuner which really takes you right there with what was going on. The early part while not as fun does give you insight into their personality traits/issues. The book’s intent is not to mythologize or slander anybody but I will say after finishing it probably the only Beatle I would have wanted to “have a beer with” would have been Ringo. More on the Abbey Road re-master. She’s So Heavy just rocks the house down now, on Here Comes The Sun when Paul’s bass comes in it is now a wow moment. I had forgot that song even had bass on it. On You Never Give Me Your Money the reverb on the little guitar solo is so luscious. The three guitar solos on The End you can really pick up on who is playing which solo now. Listening to the suite that closes Abbey Road I found myself chuckling in disbelief at how good it is and the flood of happy memories it brought back. Ok, time for the Grant Green to get the same remaster box and Rock Band treatment. ☺ Have any of you read the Jonathan Gould book, "Can't Buy Me Love." I picked it up tonight and find it hard to put down.

I watched the Revolver one. Thought it was neat. Is the DVD in the box just the accumulation of what's on the indidvidual cds?