frederick w. harrison

"AllYourBaseAreBelongToUs" <AllYourBaseAreBelongToUs_member@newsguy.com>

Music + image + zeitgeist (the spirit of the times) = "it" factor

Years ago I saw the Romantics at Ontario Place Forum. It was just after the
release of their first (and best) album. "What I Like About You" was
receiving some airplay and I checked out the band with a couple of friends
because a) we liked their early singles on Bomp! b) Bob Segarini had tipped
us off to them being the "next big thing" in post punk power pop c) one of
my friends wanted to book a band at the Palais Royale to generate seed
capitol towards holding a Beatlefest and thought the Romantics might be the
band to book. (Both plans came to nought, sadly.)
We arrived early and got front row seats, watched the band go through the
soundcheck then chatted with them. In hindsight, it was a good choice to
arrive early as the Forum soon filled to capacity.
The excitement continued to build until the moment the band came on, at
which point sheer mania broke loose - screaming girls, and this incredible
energy from band to crowd to band and back again.
My friends and I looked at one another as we realised this was analogous to
Beatlemania - only it was happening with a new generation of teens (I think
we were all in our mid 20s at the time). More to the point - the band was
probably known more through word of mouth since radio would only manage to
get the single to scrape the Top 50. This wasn't a crowd waiting patiently
for the one hit they recognized from the radio - the girls sang and
responded to every tune. Also every move or gesture from the band. Loudly.
"The men don't know but the little girls understand..." indeed! (Thank you
Willie Dixon & Chester Burnett a.k.a. Howlin' Wolf)

I've been to other concerts where the shows were equally great in terms of
the electricity between performer(s) and audience (Simple Minds at Massey
Hall touring New Gold Dream, King Crimson at the Masonic Temple touring
Discipline, John Hiatt at the Diamond touring Bring The Family, Flamin'
Groovies at the El Mocambo touring themselves) but not to the point of
screams. (Then again I can't see Robert Fripp as a pin-up boy on some 15
year old girl's wall.) Whether it was the music (which was great), the look
of the boys in their matched red leather suits and skinny ties, or something
about the times (the Knack had ushered in a return to rock the previous year
so rock bands with guitars were big again, take that Dick Rowe and disco!),
The Romantics, for that brief moment in time, were "it" or, to borrow a
phrase from Murray The K, "what's happening, baby!" Until the Police came
along later that year, that is. The Romantics wouldn't trouble the charts
again until 1984's "Talking In Your Sleep".

I remember Paul (or was it John) talking about how the Beatles were trying
to keep an ear/eye out for the Next Big Thing in pop music only to discover
to their utter surprise that it was them.

Sometimes the "it" factor is very transitory; sometimes "it" lasts a bit
longer. Few have had "it" last as long and as intense as the Beatles. Proof
of which is the existence of this newsgroup and the ongoing debates/concerns
of its followers. Further proof is the continued interest of the outside
media and the average citizen. It's a warm sweet afterglow, diminished only
by the loss of two of the magic makers, and the lack of their recordings in
a sonically
immaculate form. (Release of their complete promo videos on DVD would be
nice too.)

Can't say that for Freddie & The Dreamers, Uriah Heep, Kajagoogoo, or Milli
Vanilli, can we? (What's that? Uriah Heep are still together and playing?!?!
Incomprehensible!)

The spirit of the times also plays a part. Forgoing the use of deodorant
hair and long hair seemed right to the hippies, as did 3 days of mud and
inadequate toilets (Woodstock), fondly remembered by them as their finest
hour. Dressing up the band and/or stage as part of a "concept" (glam and
prog-rock early 70s), or doing outrageous things with/to one's hair (new
wave and 80's hair-metal) also seemed the right thing to do at the time.
Remember that platform glitter boots and white polyester suits also seemed
"right", as were Pierre Cardin suits and cuban heeled boots ten years
earlier. But this goes beyond fashion - attitudes are also involved.
Witness the "music should be free" arguments first voiced by those who
revered Abbie Hoffman's "steal this book" attitudes in the late 60s, now
espoused by the rip and burn crowd for whom Napster and its progeny are seen
as the great liberator.
Likewise the "lay down the jams" vs. "kick out the jams" debate. Ditto
acoustic vs. electric, man vs. machine, live vs. studio, and all
aspects/dialectics of performance.
Music isn't created in a vacuum (unless you've got one of those programs
that doodles electronic "music" based on randomly selected snippets of
programmed midi files); it influences and is influenced by its environment.
If you're in a band playing acoustic old timey music, you don't stand a
ghost of a chance of success against the electronic DJs who sample and remix
music that is itself largely sampled and remixed - until O Brother Where Art
Thou? comes along and then it's your fifteen minutes under the klieg lights.
And hope your time isn't cut short by the next big thing (which, at this
moment in time might be the new Radiohead or Dandy Warhols. For me it's the
new Bruce Cockburn.)

(Further to the previous thought: Of course, you wouldn't be playing
acoustic old timey music in the first place if you didn't like it. If it
somehow enters the mainstream consciousness of society via use in a movie or
commercial so much the better. But beware of the novelty factor/fate from
poisoning your appreciation of it, especially when the song you once loved
becomes a cliché. Like "Imagine".)

Much like Robert Johnson did with the blues music of his time, the Beatles
took the best of their musical influences and focused it like a laser -
compact, intense, and very, very hot. R&B, Brill Building pop, C&W, English
music hall, trad jazz, Sun and Chess rock 'n' roll, skiffle, folk, blues,
pop vocal standards, broadway - it all ended up filtered through the local
musical melting pot called Merseybeat and purified in the crucible of
Hamburg.

Brian Epstein tweaked their image to help get them access to better venues,
which meant better exposure, which meant more people became fans, and so on.
(The Stones tried the suits - and decided they'd rather make it with scruffy
clothes, thank you very much.) British youth playing American rock and R&B
without watering it down or messing it up appealed to other British youth,
many of whom were trying to learn the craft themselves so they could form
their own bands. Clubs and discos were a welcome respite from the routine of
day job, local pub and bedsit or life with the parents - a little excitement
to break the tedium of an Empire watching the sun go down on itself.
To crew-cut North America the Beatles' hairstyle was an outrage and hence
guaranteed them coverage in the press, which only fuelled a desire among
youth to let one's hair grow. Sporadic radio airplay of the Beatles in the
US and Canada had taken place in 1963 (in Winnepeg Neil Young and Randy
Bachman discovered there was a more exciting British band than the Shadows),
word of the four lads had made its way across the pond to Canadian and US
relatives and anglophile strangers. George had even visited his sister in
the States pre-1964 vortex. Del Shannon had covered one of their songs. And
wasn't there a mention of them on American TV the day BEFORE Kennedy took
his final ride in Dallas? It was just a matter of time before America put
the pieces all together - and Ed Sullivan had done exactly that after seeing
their fans crowd an English airport and wanting to know what the fuss was
about. The Brits had come to the same conclusion months earlier: the Beatles
were "it".

I think the post-Profumo (UK) and post-Kennedy (US) reactions of the press
theories are erroneous in that there was much more going on and to single
out a debateable deliberate attempt to change the timbre of the news to
something a little lighter and fresher as a single factor ignores other
contributing factors.
How about:
1) the growing network of news gathering/dissemination which could bring
otherwise local stories to the attention of communities otherwise far
removed and unconcerned? (The process has gone too far - I read last week
about a man who awoke nude on the street in someplace in Germany;
sleepwalking was the suspected cause. Also on the same page was news of a
circus monkey running berserk in a pizzeria. This is news? And was I that
desperate to read it?)
2) the growth of the teenager as a regular consumer of recorded music and
the changes that brought to the music industry, especially radio in the
aftermath of the Payola scandals?
3) the growth or domination (key factor) of national radio/TV networks
and/or TV shows? Two words: Ed Sullivan.
4) the counter-growth of specialized local market radio stations and the
need for new product (key factor) for them to broadcast? WINS, WABeatleC,
etc.
5) the shrinking world (technology and transportation advances) and the need
to know what is going on in other parts of the world - especially behind the
borders of one's enemy (both sides in the cold war) and one's allies?
6) more leisure time and income opportunities (jobs) for youth with
consequent need to find something to do and something to spend money on?
7) the growth of magazines geared to the youth market? Mad, 16, Melody
Maker, and thence to Rolling Stone, Cream, New Musical Express, National
Lampoon.
8) cheaper electronics so that one could actually own a record player, even
if it was a cheap pressboard Clairtone or Dansette? Cooler yet - a
transistor radio from Japan. With an earpiece so you can listen in school or
in bed. Music at your fingertips - and under your control (as opposed to
pleading to use the "grown-up's" radio/record player and having to suffer
their commentary/censorship while you tried to enjoy your hard-earned 79¢
worth of plasticized aural ecstasy.) Oh yeah? Turn THIS down! ("Gunning down
the old man with a transistor radio" - one of George iVAN Morrison's most
poetic lines about the generation gap. Or "Won't you tell your dad "get off
my back"/ Tell him what we said 'bout "Paint It Black" " from Big Star's
"Thirteen". Or "What do you call that noise that you put on? THIS IS POP!"
by XTC. )
9) increased distribution of music, especially as the major labels got onto
the rock 'n' roll bandwagon, or foreign labels started releasing material
from their associates in other countries (i.e. the Capitol T6000 series
which started out releasing British records in Canada that were deemed too
"English" for release Stateside, then later became a pipeline for British
Invasion bands).
10) the emergence and self-recognition of youth culture as a whole? (See #8
above) It had already begun to define itself and its tastes (though others
would argue that tastes were being dictated - see the cover of the Residents
Third Reich & Roll which takes a nasty poke at Dick Clark and American
Bandstand); radio that had once played pop vocal (Frank Sinatra, Dean
Martin, Andy Williams, Nat King Cole) and country music alongside rock and
teen pop now narrowed their formats and playlists. It was either country,
adult contemporary (with some crossover between them) or Top 40 Rock 'n'
Roll. By the mid-60s it would spin off the older members who embraced the
heavier, more progressive sounds, labelling those who still followed Top 40
radio as "teenyboppers". The spirit of exclusiveness and self-awareness was
also expressed by the teenyboppers who, by 1966, were considering the
Beatles as has-beens compared to the Monkees and Herman's Hermits. (I love
Paul's response to this, knowing that Sgt. Pepper was about to be unleashed:
"Just you wait!") That the Beatles managed to retain fans in both camps
without arousing widespread derision from either side is one of their minor
miracles. They still made the charts to keep them in the ears of the teens,
and they were still the bellwether of cool for the hippies.
Plus they bridged the gap to the parents via Hollyridge Strings and cover
versions, some of which are still wretched, until the parents were able to
tolerate the real thing unadulterated.

and in the spirit of lightheartedness of George Harrison and the Rutles...
11) I think it was the trousers... --
Frederick Harrison <><
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"A stone may change the course of the river."
C.S Lewis


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