Saturday, November 29, 2014

The Beatles - Discovering their Genius Through their Songs

The Beatles were the most successful, influential, and popular rock group of all time. This is a bold statement debated by a few; however the debate is moot and can be discounted by a review of global Newspaper, Magazine, Television and written archives of each and every day during their remarkable career.

It's also likely that the Beatles could be considered the most successful musical act/composers of all time, irrespective of any musical genre.

Reader, this is not an advertisement for the Beatles.  You absolutely don't have to consider them your "favorite" group, or even be a fan -- to learn about the importance of creativity and genius and how it might have effected or influenced your own favorite artists.

How did they achieve this huge fame and respect?  Many have written opinions, which have included:

Media exposure creating an undeniable Pop Phenomenon
Timing,
Blind Luck,
Excellent management,
Birth of Television
Songwriting
Musicality

...and on and on.  But the passage of time has proved that the answer lies ultimately in the product they produced -- their songs, and how they wrote them and recorded them.  This is what we will focus on in our blog articles.

Although it seems an "infinite"number, The Beatles recorded about 250 songs which were published on their albums and various singles.  The success of these songs has been documented on various charts (Billboard, Rolling Stone in the U.S.), airplay, album sales, and on a remarkable volume of covers by other artists. 

Of these 250 or so songs, roughly 100 can be considered "hits" and instantly recognizable classics, still played daily over the radio airwaves and satellite stations of today.  Although our blog will focus on all of these 100 songs, and perhaps (eventually) include most of the 250 or so songs, we will begin our journey with the Beatles top 20 songs.

First, it must be understood that one of the most important factors which contributed to the ultimate historical success and legacy of the Beatles - and the fact that separates them from other Pop Phenomenons" such as the Bay City Rollers, Tommy Roe, The Spice Girls, Back Street Boys, etc. and so on, is the that The Beatles wrote or composed all of their songs, including words and music - and performed these songs in the studio themselves.  

We will examine each song in 3 areas, and hopefully capture the true "Genius" of the Beatles.  These 3 areas include the following evaluations and analysis:

Inspiration (What inspired the song)
Songwriting (Melody and Lyrics)
Studio Log (What transpired in the studio and what techniques or innovations were used).

In the end, you will enjoy an introduction to what really was behind it all; the creative genius and performing excellence of the 4 young men from Liverpool, England --
The Beatles.

Sunday, November 9, 2014

The Beatles Page: What we're all about...

Welcome to The Beatles Page!  

The Beatles page is an interactive blog which focuses on in-depth analysis of many aspects of The Beatles and the "Beatles Phenomenon" as it were.  There are a number of questions that hopefully, over time, the information/insights/opinions/analysis that are presented in this blog will help to answer.  Here are some of them:

Musically, how "good" were the Beatles anyway?
Musically, how "good" were the individual Beatles (John, Paul, George and Ringo)?
Did the Beatles really write their own music?
What musicians, past and present, list the Beatles as a major creative influence?
Why were the Beatles so popular? 
How did the Beatles write their songs?
How did the Beatles record their songs?
What chemistry between the (4) Beatles helped to create their legacy?
Can it/Will it happen again someday?
Who were the Beatles early influences?
What were the influences at the peak of their creativity?
How important was promotion to the success of the Beatles?
What instruments did each Beatle play/what instruments did the Beatles use in each recording?
Were Paul McCartney and John Lennon the best songwriters of all time?
Did George Harrison influence guitarists then and now?
Was Paul McCartney a "decent" bass player?
Why is Beatle memorabilia so valuable?
What is the best Beatle song?
How many top ten songs did the Beatles have?


And on, and on, and on...

By and large, the opinion that the Beatles were the most significant and influential musical combo in history is still widely held, even today.  Why?  Were they really that good?  Did they really reach that many people?  Surely there are other bands from the period that have better musicians, aren't they equally as important?  That's what we hope to explore during the active life of this blog.

INTERACTION -- Although many of the posts will be reflecting to a certain extent the researched opinion of Thomas Herr, your opinion and your comments are HUGE to raise awareness to your beliefs about the Beatles and how they may have influenced you.  I encourage interaction from musicians and artists, scholars, today's generation and people who were there at the very beginning...the posts and comments will be repeated thousands of times on Twitter and other social media venues.

CONTRIBUTION -- We will encourage contribution by blog readers -- and would love to include many posts by followers as "guest contributors" -- subject to our approval of course, because we want to keep the quality of the writing of the blog at a high level (what we mean is that we may edit).  Simply put -- we are open to posting your submits!!!

So sit back and "enjoy the show" as it were.  Let's roll-up and roll-on, the Mystery Tour is about to begin.

-- Thomas Herr