The group’s more somber Beatles For Sale album, coming off their hectic touring/filming/appearance schedule, set a more cynical tone for its 4 December 1964 release. Still, it represented a maturing work, and another highly successful LP in the UK (eleven weeks at #1).
“The fresh sounds revealed on Life in the Tropics are sure to please you because of their melodic elements, rhythms, brass, and great guitar of Russ Freeman.”
The Beatles A Hard Day’s Night album was the third album in eighteen months to be released by 10 July 1964. Timed to coincide with the release of their first movie. One that completed the catapult to worldwide superstardom. The album reached #1 in the UK charts and was cemented there for 21 of the 38 weeks spent in the Top Twenty. The U.S. soundtrack LP spent 14 weeks at the top of our album register.
The With The Beatles album was going to make an impression no matter what. The important sophomore release for the newly in-demand group would gather attention from fans and critics eager to catch more of the British Invasion. Witnessing the expansion of Pop music, in the bargain. That it was released on November 22, 1963, the day John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas, would be its counterpoint.
The Beatles Please Please Me album was rush-released by Parlophone on 22nd March, 1963 to capitalize on the enormous success of the title track that had been the group’s second single and their first no. 1 on most UK charts.
In honor of the New Year now upon us, I selected another song from the Ye ‘Ol Decade of the 1970s to christen 2014. Wake Up Everybody (1975) was Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes’ last Top 40 hit. The smooth and soulful lead vocal was performed by none other than Teddy Pendergrass, in one of last numbers with the group.
Through the years I’ve gravitated to different songs for the holiday season. I even have a playlist I spring on my family members when I have…
If I do anything on this blog, it is to examine the arts of books, music, and movies. Along with my history (or angst), with them. I confess it’s a tad self-absorbed, and so typical of my generation. With that said, I’ll add my set to the well-known contributors AARP selected for each of their Essential Boomer picks. Next up, Nelson George takes on the music albums with his potent list.
I thought I’d end the holiday week with a forgotten song post for the last Friday in November. Since I mentioned it on Thanksgiving Day, I’ll…
This is the next entry in Best Album Covers, a series begun right here. The first successful long-playing microgroove record for the phonograph was introduced by Columbia Records back in June of…
Back to the vital things in life. Besides movie-watching and reading, it’s music for me. A shared facet that my colleague Kevin highlighted last week. Though I’ve put a turntable back into my life (thereby forcing me to re-collect those LPs I thoughtlessly let go more than two decades ago, to my wife’s consternation), listening to my Compact Disc collection has taken up much of my non-work-movie-book listening time.
If there’s one often demanding mission some of my fellow Beatles fans undertake, it’s tasking themselves with the supreme labor of ranking their songs. The numbers…
This is the next entry in Best Album Covers, a series begun right here. The first successful long-playing microgroove record for the phonograph was introduced by Columbia Records back in June of…
Being a child of the 1960s and The Cold War offered a unique opportunity to be on the periphery of being in the right place and the right time for music. A bit too young to catch the allure of The Beatles. Though something of a prodigy to follow the raw, early, up and coming, cover days of The Rolling Stones. I quickly developed an appreciation for lyrics.
Built almost entirely around Roeser’s stellar guitar riff — it being the one song I taught my children how to air guitar as toddlers (much to their mother’s chagrin) — the track has gathered fans from each subsequent decade thereafter. Certainly, enough to collect movie acclaim over the years. If you listened to the lyrics carefully, that is. Two of which utilized the driving barre chords and the poetry of the lyrics to great effect from two distinct and contrary decades. The tune reverberated best in a pair of films from the 70s and 90s in striking backdrops by two wholly different directors dealing with death in their films.
Two things drove me to write this awhile back. The first started the idea fermenting in my sub-conscious — something my wife thinks happens way too…
“Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.”
This is the next entry in Best Album Covers, a series begun right here. The first successful long-playing microgroove record for the phonograph was introduced by Columbia Records back in June of…
I know why I think of this old song. Usually, the month of March does it to me. Since 1978, it is the month when I…
Written by: Mike Nesmith Acoustic Guitars: Bernie Leadon, Kenny Edwards, Al Viola Harpsichord: Don Randi Bass: Lyle Ritz Drums: Jim Gordon Concert Master: Sid Sharp Produced…
It Rains... You Get Wet 