THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, November 19, 1995 TAG: 9511210465
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY RICKEY WRIGHT, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 123 lines
IF YOU'VE EVER doubted the widespread influence of the Beatles, consider this story.
Nine years ago, former Parliament/Funkadelic leader George Clinton was promoting a new video on a cable show. Asked his favorite group, the brightly braided mastermind replied: the Beatles.
The interviewer seemed taken by surprise, but Clinton explained that he had always been a fan of the group's anything-goes attitude - a fearlessness that can certainly be detected in his own music.
So, putting aside talk of multimillion-dollar deals and ``A-Beatle-C'' for a moment, let's consider the Beatles' music.
After all, that's what people have bought all these years, music that put across four unique personalities and their ideas. That's what they'll be shopping for Tuesday, when the first of three ``Beatles Anthology'' double CDs, full of previously unreleased tapes, hits the bins.
That album contains the first of two ``new'' Beatles songs planned for release in the next few months. Without anyone outside Fab Four business circles having heard it, ``Free as a Bird'' has stirred all the excitement, and all the backlash, you might imagine.
Should the surviving trio have gone into the studio to finish demo tapes John Lennon left behind? Is it a betrayal of the Beatle spirit? Of the existing back catalog? Of good taste?
Maybe. But even many naysayers will no doubt be ready to hear it. Word is the track is ``grungy,'' which can't help but be a little intriguing to fans of slow-drag rockers like ``Come Together'' and ``I Want You (She's So Heavy).''
And it all goes to show that, 33 years after ``Love Me Do'' became their first British chart entry, lots of people are still captivated by this story, a story that began with a sound.
Whole books have been written in attempts to explain the magic of the songwriting, the strains that aligned to produce the Beatles. But the bigger truth is contained in the records.
``Revolver,'' for instance.
When that album appeared in August 1966, the Beatles were nearing the midpoint of their public life as a band. They stopped touring that month, partly because of the stress, partly because the music was getting too complex for four guys to handle onstage. Amid rumblings of a breakup, they came up with their greatest LP.
On the 14-song British version available as a CD, ``Revolver'' found everyone at their best. George Harrison got the first word in with the bile-spewing ``Taxman''; didn't let up on his attitude-laden ``Love You To,'' and finally confessed to a crush on the bouncy ``I Want to Tell You.''
John Lennon, typically, contributed great songs in celebration of two ends of the spectrum - sleep (``I'm Only Sleeping'') and amphetamines (``Dr. Robert,'' an ode to a quack popular among show-biz types). His sharp ``And Your Bird Can Sing'' catchily questioned material values, and also provided one of the period's best showcases for the Fabs' vocal harmonies.
And Paul McCartney, perhaps the most often-maligned Beatle (sometimes for good reason), sustains one of his finest performances. ``Eleanor Rigby,'' ``For No One'' and even the sweet ``Here, There and Everywhere'' stand with his most complex ballads. ``Got to Get You Into My Life'' starts out trying to sound like Motown and ends up sounding just like the Beatles. That's Paul, too, ripping the shrapnel-throwing lead guitar on George's ``Taxman.''
Don't forget, either, that McCartney gave Ringo Starr one of his shining moments here, too, with ``Yellow Submarine.'' How many other albums, by what groups, would that one have fit so snugly?
``Revolver'' echoed through the music of many of the Beatles' peers, and in time came to overshadow even the worshiped ``Sgt. Pepper'' for many ears. It spawned covers by the likes of Aretha Franklin, Ray Charles, Earth, Wind and Fire, Emmylou Harris and Ted Nugent. It resonated in the work of '80s college-radio favorites like the Bangles and Echo and the Bunnymen. Put it on when you haven't heard it in a while, and you might end up shaking your head in something akin to amazement.
Especially when you recall that they did it again and again, before and after. ``Love Me Do,'' ``A Hard Day's Night,'' ``Norwegian Wood,'' ``Penny Lane,'' ``Strawberry Fields Forever,'' ``A Day in the Life,'' ``While My Guitar Gently Weeps,'' ``Get Back,'' the ``Golden Slumbers'' medley and ``Let It Be'' span a period of just seven years.
That amazement isn't going to disappear anytime soon. This week's TV extravaganza will no doubt bring us the thrill of the moments when the Beatles transformed the world and every step their fans took.
But the records - ah, the records. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. ILLUSTRATION: Graphic
THE BEATLES' CATALOG
The Beatles' Capitol Records CD catalog conforms to the British
editions of the albums, which through 1966 were broken up into U.S.
albums containing fewer songs on each record. Here's what's
available:
Please Please Me (1963; contains songs heard on the U.S.
``Introducing the Beatles,'' ``Meet the Beatles'' and ``The Early
Beatles'')
With the Beatles (1963; U.S. ``Meet the Beatles'' and ``The
Beatles' Second Album'')
A Hard Day's Night (1964; U.S. ``A Hard Day's Night,''
``Something New'' and ``Beatles '65'')
Beatles for Sale (1964; U.S. ``Beatles '65'' and ``Beatles VI'')
Help! (1965; U.S. ``Help,'' ``Rubber Soul'' and ``Yesterday and
Today'')
Rubber Soul (1965; U.S. ``Rubber Soul'' and ``Yesterday and
Today'')
Revolver (1966; U.S. ``Yesterday and Today'' and ``Revolver'')
Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967)
Magical Mystery Tour (1967)
The Beatles (white album, 1968)
Yellow Submarine (1969)
Abbey Road (1969)
Let It Be (1970)
Live at the BBC (recorded 1962-65, issued 1994; though
temporarily discontinued by Capitol, should still be in stock)
The Beatles/1962-1966 (collection)
The Beatles/1967-1970 (collection)
Past Masters Volume One (single and EP sides not heard on British
albums)
Past Masters Volume Two (single and EP sides not heard on British
albums)
The Beatles Anthology (first volume in a series of collections of
previously unreleased material, this features the ``new'' song
``Free as a Bird''; available Tuesday)
- Rickey Wright
by CNB