50 years ago, the critics swung on, and missed with the Beatles

http://www.latimes.com/opinion/commentary/la-oe-beatles-quotes-20140209,0,4475060,full.story#axzz2svCqKhjh

Yikes. Out of touch.

 

Harrumph, harrumph, harrumph!!

 

They must have been taking cues from Decca Records, who passed on signing The Beatles in 1962 because "guitar groups are on the way out."

Decca signed The Rolling Stones the following year, but ouch ...

 

The hair was clearly an issue that colored people's perceptions. These weren't the properly groomed, matinee idols pre-packaged for America's youth like Bobby Vinton, Cliff Richard and the like.

The reviews really highlight the great divide between adults and youth at the time; certainly greater then than anywhere near that today, baggy pants, tats and all. Almost a tsk, tsk, don't bother yourselves with such silliness, my young sons and daughters, this too shall pass....

And a preaching tone to much of those comments that illustrates an objective to control and influence rather that strictly report on the facts from a media perspective.

I guess little did all these straight laced, 3 button suit, crew cut types realize, that their world was about to be blown up over the course of the next half decade.

 

I'm shocked to learn that William F. Buckley was clueless as a rock critic.

 

The Parade magazine insert in my Sunday paper yesterday had a good piece on the Beatles' arrival and Ed Sullivan Show performance. Near the end they had an item where the show's musical director was quoted as saying he would give them a year, but no more.

 

To be fair to those critics, the history of groups or acts followed by screaming teens is thick with acts whose shelf life was pretty short. Sinatra had made the transition away from bobby soxers, and Elvis in '64 was in the thick of a movie career instead of a musical career, but they were among the few then, and now, who got an audience to grow with them.

In particular with the Beatles, who the hell could have known that they would be one act who were as musically great as they were popular? Or that they would symbolize the rise of a new, huge Baby Boomer generation? Of course, even taking that unknown into account, some of those reviews were pretty awful. I wonder if they were people who realized the kids weren't going to be hitting the symphony anymore -- that rock 'n' roll wasn't going to die.

 

in 1964, if you were to bet whose legacy would greater Ed Sullivan or The Beatles, I don't think you could have found anyone to bet on the lads from Liverpool

 

Before the Beatles arrived, there really weren't any aspirations on the part of music idols to have multi-decade careers: both Lennon and McCartney were quoted several times in the 1963-64 period as expecting to last a couple years as teen idols, then maybe transition into 'grownup' careers as songwriters and producers.

But then, they heard Dylan, and Dylan heard them, and ...

 

No kidding. Talk about a moronic review.

 

it wasn't moronic, it was the general consensus of the establishment class. WFB Jr lacked insight and an open mind.

 

It's before my time, but I can't help but think that must have been a real intense time with the JFK assassination followed by the Beatles just a couple of months later.