That End Of An Era, Half A Century Ago
Thanks to this lousy Covid infection I had the time to sit through the 3 part documentary put together by Peter Jackson. As with any historic document from the era, the power to evoke the era's ambience is powerful. There was even one moment Paul McCartney mentions the 1968 Hong Kong Flu pandemic, and somehow that felt really quant.
I have a soft spot for all the stuff in the film. The Beatles, the 1960s, the equipment, the look of the fashion, the mood on the streets, the cars, the ambience. All of it. So it's a relatively easy thing to take it all in but I do wonder how much of this would make sense to somebody who grew up with the internet and mobile phones. They try calling John but his phone remains off the hook. They sort of give up on phoning him - no messages are left. What kind of technological Dark Ages were they doing this in?
Jokes aside, the overall elegiac feeling is that the 1960s are coming to a close, like it or lump it. Somewhere on the horizon is the feeling that The Beatles just can't keep going on. They don't see the drama that is about to engulf the management of the band and their company, Apple Corps. All of that is in their future; for the present, they are trying to play themselves into shape for an unknown outcome.
What's Good About It
The documentary delivers a pretty comprehensive account of how the Beatles worked, and captures a vast trove of communication between the members. It is not clear for a long time if the Beatles are heading towards any particular outcome beyond doing another album, but as the episodes progress, there is an accelerating feel of cohesion that climaxes on the rooftop concert.
We get a pretty good view of the side players like Glynn Johns, Mal Evans, George Martin, and their respective roles in keeping The Beatles functioning. Mostly, it is the nuanced dynamic of the members that we come to understand, and it blows away all the conjectured theories about why The Beatles broke up, that have plagued us since the day they split up. The story is a lot more nuanced than that - and in some ways very difficult to articulate. To see the interpersonal dynamic between these people was priceless.
What's Bad About It
It's really long. I wondered if it really was worth sitting through the 3rd jam on 'Blue Suede Shoes'.
It could have been chopped into 6 parts and still been equally compelling. I had to stop each episode somewhere in the middle just to get a rest and have a think about what I was watching.
Peter Jackson must have an elephant's bladder.
What's Interesting About It
All of it is interesting if you like the Beatles. I imagine it's a weird kind of torture if you don't. My significant other couldn't possibly sit through all of this because she does not like the Beatles at all. But if you're a fan, this series is a must.
It's basically a story of how The Beatles pull out an album's worth of material in under a month - with a week missing in there because George quits at the end of week 2. It's impressive how quickly they work up the outline of the material but equally impressive is how they spend long days honing the arrangements and working out the harmonies. We know where the end point is and how the songs go and for the vast majority of the time we see those songs in a very loose state as they feel their way towards a solid arrangement.
Some of the songs are not quite right as they close out rehearsals the day before the rooftop concert, but miraculously, the versions with which we are so familiar, manifest themselves on the winter rooftop. It's so weird to see through to the Beatles' music in the hot molten state back through the history reification that has taken place to their music.
Yoko Ono, International Woman Of Mystery
Yoko does stick out. Apart from the wives and girlfriends, the inner circle surrounding the Beatles is pretty blokey. Billy Preston turns up and his blackness is in stark contrast to the essential whiteness of London 1969. That was the world then, and therefore all the more reason why it is so strange to see Yoko Ono in that space.
There's a funny bit where Linda brings in her daughter Heather who watches Yoko do her scream thing in an impromptu jam. I'm sure it adds fuel for the people who want another reason to hate on Yoko. The next thing you know, Heather is copying Yoko's screams into the microphone. It's delightful, charming and funny.
In most part she seems to sit there quietly taking it all in, reading her Japanese magazines. With everything going in the series, it's abundantly clear that the Beatles did not split up because Yoko turned up.
Take These Broken Wings And Learn To Fly
A wag out there on the internet made the observation that the problem with The Beatles at this point in their career is that McCartney is trying to do a dress run for Wings, and the other members simply do not want to be subjected to this project. It's funny, but also a bit unfair. We can clearly see George is chafing under Paul's hectoring instructions because he has his own creative needs that are burgeoning quickly. At the same time we see John is drifting deeper into Yoko and drugs, politics and activism. Keeping the Beatles together is a Herculean task of the will. It is clear by the effort McCartney puts in that Wings, which follows the demise of The Beatles is his second option given he cannot keep The Beatles going.
The truly amazing thing about the Beatles between 1967 and 1970 might be how much good stuff they manage to produce. There's Sgt Peppers, followed by Magical Mystery Tour. Then there's the magnum opus of 1968, The White Album; and all the while they are producing enough single to fill yet another disc of its own (which got released as 'Hey Jude' in America) and then the Let it Be sessions followed by Abbey Road. That's 7 discs in 3 years 6 months. It might be the most productive 3 years and 6 months of any band ever.
After their break up, the respective Beatles keep the pace up until about 1982. John Produces 7 albums, 5 of which take place between 1970 and 1975 plus Double Fantasy and his posthumous Milk & Honey. Paul produces 11 albums up until 1982's 'Tug of War'. He does more after that but it doesn't seem to belong to the same creative impulse after 1982. George produces 7 albums 9 discs up to 1982's 'Gone Troppo'. Even Ringo produces 8 albums up to 1981. It's a lot of work, and you have to figure if they tried doing it as The Beatles, they would have been pumping out double albums every year between 1970 and 1982 or so.
Granted, not even half of it is good, but it is still a lot of music. It's easy to argue contractual obligations and grubby commercial incentives led to this overproduction, but it highlights the extraordinary nature of the Let it Be sessions for what they were, a band at the peak of their powers grinding out the hits. It's an inside look at the sausage factory of the best band of the 1960s doing their thing - and we are grateful to be able to witness so much of it.
The Smallness Of Rock History
Because I grew up in the era, Rock music seemed like it was this gigantic social artistic phenomenon and movement. Of course, this might have been overstated. Rock goes from Chuck Berry and Elvis to the debut of the Beatles in a mere 7 years. Then the Beatles define recorded music with their own stamp for 7 years. Afterwards, it is a short 5-6 years until Punk emerges and from there it is a short 3 years before New Wave. When you consider the longevity of a band like The Foo Fighters today, you sort of have to marvel at the how quickly Rock music's market and target demographics moved through the genre.
At each juncture, rock added an extra digit of global fans. Rock music had tens of thousands in the early days. That became hundreds of thousands during the Sixties, and then became millions in the maturation phase. This compounding growth of its fans clouds our appreciation of what The Beatles were to their peers as well as fans in real time, through the 1960s. Today the music landscape cannot encompass a fan base as broad and deep as The Beatles commanded. This series goes a long way to casting some light on the breadth and depth of their impact.
The Beatles And Reification
If one thing works to the disadvantage of the music by The Beatles today, it is that through 60 years of their music being in the public sphere has led to a fixing of meaning. The people know the catalogue well have had so much time to settle upon the personal meaning of these songs. Those who do not know the catalogue well are confronted by a gigantic cultural icon replete with generational zeitgeist of sometime in the middle of the last century. What this means is that it is actually quite hard to have a fresh, fluid vantage point on the meaning of The Beatles' song catalogue. The entirety of the project has become fixed in the public consciousness like World War II or Seinfeld.
As such, it is interesting to be confronted by alternative readings of the famous songs as they are being worked up. Suddenly the meaning of a song like Get Back is not fixed in our minds on the basis of having heard it for 50-odd years. It is a song that is seeing a dynamic process of creation unfolding in front of us. What this presents is an opportunity - a rare one at that - to remove ourselves from our own sense of the reified art that surrounds our perception of The Beatles' work.
In that light, the documentary series is interesting in its ability to undo some of the reification that has taken place over the decades. I'm sure the marketing machine will think of new ways to re-package The Beatles and sell it to us all over again, but this might be the last time they find anything actually fresh and unexpected - and for that this series deserves more than a little commendation.
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