Human settlement in England
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3 episodes with woolton
2 episodes with woolton
3 episodes with woolton
3 episodes with woolton
2 episodes with woolton
2 episodes with woolton
Stuart Maconie – broadcaster, prolific author – has a brilliant and original new perspective on the Beatles. His latest book With A Little Help From Their Friends identifies the 100 people who had the greatest impact on their story, from the inner circle to bit-part players – schoolfriends, girlfriends, managers, muses, support acts, advisors and exploiters. It's immensely entertaining – and revealing, even for obsessives like us. Look out for these in particular … … memories of his Mum taking him to see the Beatles in Wigan when he was three. … the Shakespearian supporting cast – “we know the Othellos and King Lears but there are a lot of Rosencrantz and Guildensterns” such as Marsha Albert, Melanie Coe, Pablo Fanque, Mr Mustard and the night with the poet Royston Ellis that inspired Polythene Pam. … villains of the piece who might have been misunderstood like the Maharishi and Allen Klein. … what Derek Taylor shouted at Peter Blake at the Q Awards. … the full extent of the Beatles' American merchandise catastrophe. … the “moving and spooky” sensation of standing on the spot in Woolton where John and Paul first met - and its repercussions. … the Sliding Doors moments and why no other band merits this kind of depth and detail. … the hoary redundant old saw about John v Paul – “guerilla genius v slick vaudevillian” and how Peter Jackson's Get Back made us all fall in love with them even harder and deeper than before..… the regrettable question he asked McCartney about Gerry & the Pacemakers. … the tragedy of Jimmie Nicol – “being a member of the Beatles, even briefly, was the nearest equivalent to going to the Moon”. … the impact of Paul's life with the Ashers on the band's intersections with art, theatre and poetry. … how the ‘Oldies But Goldies' album broke the band beyond the Iron Curtain. .. why Penny Lane is like a Play for Today. … and the greatest song the Beatles recorded. Order With A Little Help From Our Friends here: https://harpercollins.co.uk/products/with-a-little-help-from-their-friends-the-beatles-changed-the-world-but-who-changed-theirs-stuart-maconie?variant=54870051815803Find out more about how to help us to keep the conversation going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Stuart Maconie – broadcaster, prolific author – has a brilliant and original new perspective on the Beatles. His latest book With A Little Help From Their Friends identifies the 100 people who had the greatest impact on their story, from the inner circle to bit-part players – schoolfriends, girlfriends, managers, muses, support acts, advisors and exploiters. It's immensely entertaining – and revealing, even for obsessives like us. Look out for these in particular … … memories of his Mum taking him to see the Beatles in Wigan when he was three. … the Shakespearian supporting cast – “we know the Othellos and King Lears but there are a lot of Rosencrantz and Guildensterns” such as Marsha Albert, Melanie Coe, Pablo Fanque, Mr Mustard and the night with the poet Royston Ellis that inspired Polythene Pam. … villains of the piece who might have been misunderstood like the Maharishi and Allen Klein. … what Derek Taylor shouted at Peter Blake at the Q Awards. … the full extent of the Beatles' American merchandise catastrophe. … the “moving and spooky” sensation of standing on the spot in Woolton where John and Paul first met - and its repercussions. … the Sliding Doors moments and why no other band merits this kind of depth and detail. … the hoary redundant old saw about John v Paul – “guerilla genius v slick vaudevillian” and how Peter Jackson's Get Back made us all fall in love with them even harder and deeper than before..… the regrettable question he asked McCartney about Gerry & the Pacemakers. … the tragedy of Jimmie Nicol – “being a member of the Beatles, even briefly, was the nearest equivalent to going to the Moon”. … the impact of Paul's life with the Ashers on the band's intersections with art, theatre and poetry. … how the ‘Oldies But Goldies' album broke the band beyond the Iron Curtain. .. why Penny Lane is like a Play for Today. … and the greatest song the Beatles recorded. Order With A Little Help From Our Friends here: https://harpercollins.co.uk/products/with-a-little-help-from-their-friends-the-beatles-changed-the-world-but-who-changed-theirs-stuart-maconie?variant=54870051815803Find out more about how to help us to keep the conversation going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Stuart Maconie – broadcaster, prolific author – has a brilliant and original new perspective on the Beatles. His latest book With A Little Help From Their Friends identifies the 100 people who had the greatest impact on their story, from the inner circle to bit-part players – schoolfriends, girlfriends, managers, muses, support acts, advisors and exploiters. It's immensely entertaining – and revealing, even for obsessives like us. Look out for these in particular … … memories of his Mum taking him to see the Beatles in Wigan when he was three. … the Shakespearian supporting cast – “we know the Othellos and King Lears but there are a lot of Rosencrantz and Guildensterns” such as Marsha Albert, Melanie Coe, Pablo Fanque, Mr Mustard and the night with the poet Royston Ellis that inspired Polythene Pam. … villains of the piece who might have been misunderstood like the Maharishi and Allen Klein. … what Derek Taylor shouted at Peter Blake at the Q Awards. … the full extent of the Beatles' American merchandise catastrophe. … the “moving and spooky” sensation of standing on the spot in Woolton where John and Paul first met - and its repercussions. … the Sliding Doors moments and why no other band merits this kind of depth and detail. … the hoary redundant old saw about John v Paul – “guerilla genius v slick vaudevillian” and how Peter Jackson's Get Back made us all fall in love with them even harder and deeper than before..… the regrettable question he asked McCartney about Gerry & the Pacemakers. … the tragedy of Jimmie Nicol – “being a member of the Beatles, even briefly, was the nearest equivalent to going to the Moon”. … the impact of Paul's life with the Ashers on the band's intersections with art, theatre and poetry. … how the ‘Oldies But Goldies' album broke the band beyond the Iron Curtain. .. why Penny Lane is like a Play for Today. … and the greatest song the Beatles recorded. Order With A Little Help From Our Friends here: https://harpercollins.co.uk/products/with-a-little-help-from-their-friends-the-beatles-changed-the-world-but-who-changed-theirs-stuart-maconie?variant=54870051815803Find out more about how to help us to keep the conversation going: https://www.patreon.com/wordinyourear Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
A thousand facets sits with the incomparable Carol Woolton, Historian, Writer and jewelry editor of Vogue. In the season finale of A thousand facets we discuss about her ancestors in the gemology world, her beginnings on her career and some of the incredible projects she is spearheading. Hope you enjoy our conversation. About: Carol Woolton is a Jewellery Historian, Editor, Broadcaster, Stylist and Jewellery Editor at British Vogue for over twenty years where she remains as Contributing Jewellery Director. She was the first jewellery editor of Tatler Magazine and has contributed widely to magazines, newspapers and online supplements around the world including The Financial Times, Vanity Fair, Air Mail, American Vogue and the Daily Telegraph. She curates jewellery exhibitions she is the author of five books covering the broad spectrum of antique and historic jewels to contemporary styles. More recently, she explored a century of style in Vogue: The Jewellery and Ideas and inspiration for living with crystals in The New Stone Age. You can follow Carol Woolton on Instagram @carolwoolton , visit her website https://carolwoolton.com/ Listen to her podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/if-jewels-could-talk-with-carol-woolton/id1564034433 Leopards: https://www.theleopards.co.uk/ Please visit @athousandfacets on Instagram to see some of the work discussed in this episode. Music by @chris_keys__ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
No podemos ni imaginar como sería el mundo de la música si ese día no se hubieran alineado los astros para que dos de los grandes talentos del mundo de la música pudieran haberse conocido. Sería 6 de julio de 1957 cuando John Lennon conocería a Paul McCartney en una fiesta en la Iglesia de San Peter, en Woolton, Liverpool, con la actuación de The Quarrymen, grupo que daría origen 3 años después a The Beatles. Hoy los recordamos en La Gran Travesía. https://vkm.is/lagrantravesiadelrock Por otro lado, comentaros que ya hemos iniciado la campañaoficial de la publicación de nuestro primer libro, La Gran Travesía del Rock. Un libro que trata sobre la Historia del Rock y los viajes en el tiempo, donde dos protagonistas, Jimi y Janis, dos periodistas de 27 años contactan con un miembro de la Resistencia y deciden viajar en el tiempo a los momentos más impactantes de la Historia del Rock... con la ayuda de Christopher Lloyd, Michael J Fox y el DeLorean de Regreso al futuro. ¿Su misión? Combatir el Reguetón y rescatar los archivos ocultos de la Historia del Rock… para darles difusión. Os dejamos el enlace a la campaña en la descripción del programa para que podáis acceder a nuestra página en Verkami. https://vkm.is/lagrantravesiadelrock Muchas gracias a los mecenas y colaboradores para la publicación del libro por el apoyo y la colaboración. Rafa Roca, Nacho, Santi Oliva, Peter, Carlos Escriva, Leandro Giménez, Mati Balseiro, Tankarworld, Jose Angel Candel, Carme T, Alejandro Luna, Verónica Castelo, Conchi, Antonio Fabregat, Mónica Salamanca, Karl Suarez, Pere Rovira, Luis Fernando, Lucas Cloquell, Luis Palomares, Miguel González Duarte, Jose Luis Rapun, Salvador Alcobas, Mamen Malagón, Morgan Stanley 666, José Luis Saura, Juan Manuel Alonso, Lirios, Joaquín Roca, Luis Cardeña, David López, Asier, Aida Fernández, José Diego, Dora Martínez, Ginés Huertas, Daniel Pérez, Javi Santaella, Juan Pignatelli, Coque, José Luis Saura, Álvaro Oliva, Javier Pradera, Jose Corbella, Tomás Pérez Martínez, José Antonio Gelado, Oscartelford, Iñaki Sánchez del podcast True Music, Alicia Quesada y la Fundación Amigos del perro, José Ángel Tremiño, Esther El Rugido de Mi Impala, Juankar Riveiro (bajista del grupo Vacío), Atlántida Flor, Sergio Rebollo, Tete (batería de The Blue Bananas), Alejandro, Jose Sánchez, Sergio Castillo, PapáDragón, Curro, Ángel Rodríguez, José Ángel Martín y Strawberry Fields Beatles Podcast, Miguel Ángel Torres, El Vuelo de Yorch, Raquel Jiménez, Minguín, Javier Aldaba, Pelao (cantante y guitarrista de Los Recortables), Diaso11, Carlos Rodríguez, Tole, Luz García, Mar Rodríguez, Sofía G., Emma Fernández, Vanessa López, Julio Martos, María Sántillana, Ana Pérez, Paco Gómez y Antonio Martín. ▶️ Y ya sabéis, si os gusta el programa y os apetece, podéis apoyarnos y colaborar con nosotros por el simple precio de una cerveza al mes, desde el botón azul de iVoox, y así, además acceder a todo el archivo histórico exclusivo. Muchas gracias también a todos los mecenas y patrocinadores por vuestro apoyo: Dani Pérez, Santi Oliva, Vicente DC, Edgar Xavier Sandoval, Pilar Escudero, Juan Carlos Ramírez, Daropa, Leticia, JBSabe, Huini Juarez, Flor, Melomanic, Felix Lorente, Johnny B Cool, Iñaki Zuñiga, Jarebua, Piri, Noni, Arturo Soriano, Gemma Codina, Nicolás, Raquel Jiménez, Francisco Quintana, Pedro, SGD, José Luis Orive, Utxi 73, Raul Andres, Tomás Pérez, Pablo Pineda, Quim Goday, Enfermerator, María Arán, Joaquín, Horns Up, Victor Bravo, Fonune, Eulogiko, Francisco González, Angel Hernandez, Marcos Paris, Vlado 74, Daniel A, Redneckman, Elliott SF, Guillermo Gutierrez, Sementalex, Jesús Miguel, Miguel Angel Torres, Sergio, Suibne, Javifer, Javi Dubra, Matías Ruiz Molina, Noyatan, Sergio Castillo, Estefanía, Ramorlia… y a los mecenas anónimos.
John Lennon was playing guitar with his skiffle band, The Quarrymen, who were performing on a bill alongside the Liverpool police dogs display team and the Band of the Cheshire ...
This month has been one of the most sparkly in ages. First, we had the Met Gala in New York, the Metropolitan Museum of Art Costume Institute's annual black-tie fundraiser, to kick off its latest blockbuster exhibition, Karl Lagerfeld: A Line of Beauty, on show until July 16. Invitees were asked to dress in homage to Karl Lagerfeld, the longtime designer of Chanel, Fendi, and Chloé, as well as his own namesake brand. Karl died in 2019, at the age of 85. That dictate meant high glamor on the red carpet, with lots of important jewelry. A few days later, there was the coronation of King Charles III at Westminster Abbey, and while, in these difficult economic times, guests were asked not to wear coronets and tiaras, there was still a lot of remarkable jewelry on display, most notably the King and Queen's crowns. And now we have the Cannes Film Festival, a two-week-long glittering Red Carpet parade on the Riviera, and, by far, the glamest cinema event of the year. Anything and everything goes at Cannes.To talk about all this shimmer and shine, and how it's sustainable–because, yes, it is–we have leading jewelry expert Carol Woolton. When Carol joined Tatler magazine in London in 2001, she created the role of jewelry editor, one she later carried on to British Vogue, and one that is now an important post at all major glossy magazines. She has written several books on the subject, including The New Stone Age, and coming this fall, Dolce & Gabbana High Jewelry, published by Rizzoli. And Carol has her delightful podcast, called If Jewels Could Talk. On it, she speaks with owners of important jewelry collections, and about the history of famous jewelry. This fall, a book inspired by the podcast, also called If Jewels Could Talk, will be published by Simon & Schuster.Read the transcript of this episodeGet to know Dana Thomas and her book FashionopolisLearn more about Carol Woolton and If Jewels Could TalkDiscover the fashion brand Another TomorrowExplore the new Green Dream website, thegreendream.studio
For this Coronation bonus episode, we're bringing you a great conversation with Suzy on If Jewels Could Talk, the podcast presented by Vogue's jewellery contributing editor Carol Woolton. They speak about Suzy's jewel predictions for the big day, who she thinks is the best-jewelled Royal, what it truly means for an item of jewellery to "belong" to the Royal Family - and much more.Thanks from Carol to Suzy, for letting her share the episode!For more of Carol's podcast, visit http://carolwoolton.com/podcastsThis episode is brought to you by @fuligemstonesFollow Carol Woolton: @carolwooltonProduced by Natasha Cowan @tashonfashMusic & editing by Tim Thornton @timwthorntonSuzy's theme by @joergzuberCreative direction by Scott Bentley @bentleycreativeIllustrations Jordi Labanda @jordilabandaRead Carol Woolton in Vogue magazine – vogue.co.uk/fashion/jewellery and carolwoolton.com Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Joining me on today's episode is Sam Mount, Managing Director at Kentish Pip Cider and Woolton Farm in Bekesbourne near Canterbury. Sam grew up on the farm where his parents, Mark and Rosie, grew apples, pears and soft fruits and was encouraged to muck in with all aspects of farming life from an early age. After travelling and living abroad in his early 20s, Sam settled in London and built a career as an event producer and operations manager working on projects such as the London 2012 Olympic ceremonies and British Summer Time Festival in Hyde Park. He also worked on events for global brands including EE, Corona, Nintendo and Coca Cola. Meanwhile, the family business at Woolton Farm was evolving with the planting of a vineyard in 2011 and the launch of cider brand Kentish Pip in 2012. Sam moved back to Kent full time in 2019 and now oversees all operations on the farm, which includes a collection of cottages and bell tents where guests can stay overnight.To find out more about what's going on at Woolton Farm Vineyard, follow @wooltonfarm on Instagram and Facebook or visit wooltonfarm.co.uk This episode of The English Wine Diaries is sponsored by Wickhams, The Great British Wine Merchant. Visit wickhamwine.co.uk to see their award-winning range of English wine with free deliver on orders over £40.Thanks for listening to The English Wine Diaries. If you enjoyed the podcast then please leave a rating or review, it helps boost our ratings and makes it easier for other people to find us. To find out who will be joining me next on the English Wine Diaries, follow @theenglishwinediaries on Instagram and for more regular English wine news and reviews, sign up to our newsletter at thesouthernquarter.co.uk.
Here is BDJ's remix of the 2022 Revolver SDE. All tracks are only sourced from the 2022 stereo version and the outtakes.Some tracks are similar, but subtly different; there are also some mash-ups, where there just wasn't enough material (outtakes) on the Revolver SDE.GILES MARTIN: Horrible! It doesn't sound like the 1966 original at all!RINGO STARR: Peace and Love!PAUL McCARTNEY: And then I went to this church fete in Woolton, close to where John lived.GEOFF EMERICK: George Martin asked me to cut up the tape in small pieces, and I threw them in the air. I picked up the pieces, glued them back together again and so we made Here There and Everywhere.YOKO ONO: Eeeeeeeeeehhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!
Este sábado mostramos en Revista Beatles la página mas icónica de la historia: La canción de los Quarrymen el día en que se conocieron John y Paul. Sábado 6 de julio de 1957 en la feria de Woolton en Liverpool. Además, seguimos con "Los '80 de Paul" en su tercera entrega con "Give my regard to Broad Street" de 1984. Y en el suplemento de Revista Rock Nº 68: "The Last Waltz", la despedida de The Band en 1976 con Martin Scorsese dirigiendo un documental épico.
Im Interview: Der Luftfahrtexperte Heinrich Großbongardt und der Cockpit Vorstand Matthias Baier versuchen die Schuldfrage zum Flug-Chaos 2022 zu klären und machen wenig Hoffnung auf Besserung der Lage. Der ukrainische Botschafter Andrij Melnyk verlässt Deutschland. The Pioneer Chefredakteur Michael Bröcker spricht mit dem DIHK Präsidenten Peter Adrian über den drohenden Gas-Notstand! Die Börsen-Reporterinnen Anne Schwedt und Annette Weisbach berichten über insolvente Fluglinien und über schlechte Zeiten für den Euro Heute vor 65 Jahren kommt es auf dem Kirchenfest der St. Peters Church in Woolton zur Supernova der Rock-Musik! Pferdesport-Experte Carsten Sostmeier ist der König der Sportreporter.
Welcome Inside the Jewel Vault hosted by me, jeweller and gemmologist Jessica Cadzow-Collins, with a guest drawn from the great and the good from across the jewellery world. In this episode I ask Vogue jewellery editor, author, historian and fellow podcaster, Carol Woolton, to select six pieces from her life and career in jewellery and put them into a fantasy Jewel Vault, ultimately choosing that one special treasure to keep safe forever. I hope you enjoy listening! Guest Bio: Vogue jewellery editor, author and historian, Carol Woolton stands as a leading light across both fashion and jewellery industries, renowned for her discerning judgement of style and meaning in jewellery design. In this conversation with Jessica, Carol describes six superb gems & jewels which have influenced her during the course of her life and career in jewellery. I want to hear from you! What special treasures would you put into your fantasy jewel vault, and why? Every so often I'll compile your stories into a podcast of their own. To get in touch with me and also to access show notes and images, go to: https://vipjewelvault.com/podcast/ Produced by broadcast & media guru Lizzie Wingham. https://www.tinydinosaur.tv/ Engineered by sound genius Asa Bennet. My grateful thanks to you both!
Making a Scene Presents Gerry Casey's Interview with Colin Hanton of The Quarrymen!Colin played drums with the Quarrymen from 1956 until 1959, appearing with John, Paul and George and he has been playing with the revived Quarrymen since 1997. For Colin's full story see Hunter Davies' biography of the Quarrymen.“I was born in Walton Hospital on 12 December 1938 and lived in Bootle during the war years. The family moved to Woolton in 1946 when I was about seven or eight, together with my elder brother, Brian. This was where I first got to know Rod Davis, who lived in a nearby street and used to come and play football with the lads in my road.My sister Jacqueline was born in Woolton and then a not long after my mother went into hospital with tuberculosis where she eventually died. Meanwhile we had gone to live in Bootle with my grandparents.
Al numero 8 di Vale Road, nel sobborgo di Woolton di Liverpool, nel 1895 nasce una bambina che non conoscerà mai suo padre perché morì poche settimane dopo essere diventato papà. La madre e la bambina restano a vivere in quella casa. Vale Road incrocia Menlove Avenue e il numero 8 si trova proprio lì, nell'intersezione tra le due strade. La bambina cresce e all'età di quindici anni sua madre si risposa, proprio della chiesa di St. Peter a Woolton. Siamo nel 1911. La ragazza cresce e lavora in un ospedale, si sposa nel 1930. Morirà all'età di 44 anni, il 10 ottobre del 1939 e verrà seppellita nel cimitero attorno alla St. Peter Church. Esattamente un anno dopo (poiché il 1940 fu un anno bisestile), nascerà John Lennon, il 9 ottobre del 1940. Per ascoltare su Spotify la playlist di oggi clicca qui! https://rbe.it/?p=69774
This is a 'Musical Steps' podcast as I walk along Old Pewterspear Lane in Appleton to the site of the bungalow Beatle George Harrison bought for his parents in 1965. The bungalow allowed his parents some tranquillity away from the hundreds of fans that swamped their existing Woolton home. It is at the Appleton bungalow that George Harrison wrote 'While My Guitar Gently Weeps'. A corresponding video of this walk can be found at the link below. https://youtu.be/HmZKnIaGVQA
In the latest episode of History Gems, Dr Nicola Tallis is joined by writer and one of Britain's leading authority on jewellery and gemstones, Carol Woolton, to discuss the jewellery in the Netflix series Bridgerton.According to Carol, "parallels can be drawn between the uncertain times which influenced Regency sparkle on the hit TV series, and the jewel-loaded runways for spring/summer 2021 during our Covid era." Listen and make up your own mind!Carol Woolton is Britain's leading authority on jewellery and gemstones and has entertained and informed the readers of British Vogue and Tatler as Jewellery Editor for more than 25 years. She is a writer, lecturer, historian, editor, curator, stylist, and author of five books on the fascinating subject of jewellery. She has contributed widely to magazines, newspapers and online supplements around the world including the Financial Times, Vogue China, Vanity Fair, Air Mail, American Vogue, Tatler and the Daily Telegraph.Read Carol's take on the jewellery in Bridgerton in Vogue here.Join the conversation on social media and check out some of the items discussed in this episode by visiting @historygemspod on both Twitter and Instagram.
Fifty-five years since the release of The Beatles' album Revolver, their music still casts a long shadow over the people of Liverpool. For many growing up and working in Liverpool during the 50s and 60s, The Beatles have cast a long shadow. They breathed the same air, inhabited the same streets and felt the same promise of a new, postwar culture. The story of the 'Fab Four' has been told and told again. But for a young couple like Gwen and her ex-soldier husband Ken, and young people like Barrie (a biology teacher who taught sex education to thousands of 'Scousers' before moving to Manhattan) and Keith (the son of a bookie's runner and Cavern member), the experiences of the 60s formed the basis of their lives - and all played out to a Beatles soundtrack. The album Revolver confirmed The Beatles' transition from young lovable moptops to maturer, somewhat troubled artists. In a collage of music, voices and location atmospheres, Tomorrow Never Knew accompanies Gwen, Barrie and Keith through the intervening years and, simultaneously, retraces the band's origins to an encounter at a fete in a field next to St Peter's Church, Woolton, with some of those who were there. Produced by Alan Hall A Falling Tree production for BBC Radio Three. If affected by substance misuse, please contact: www.changegrowlive.org
On the 6th July 1957, John Lennon and Paul McCartney of The Beatles met for the first time at the St. Peter's Church garden fête in Woolton, ...
From Hungry Books Podcast @hungrybookspodcast Presented by: Rocio Carvajal Food history writer, cook and author. This episode reviews: “Eggs or Anarchy, The remarkable story of the man tasked with the impossible: to feed a nation at war” By William Sitwell The setting is Britain at war: WWII looms over Europe and Churchill is at the brink of becoming the world's most admired Prime Minister. And you might think that the war was fought and won in the fields, and war rooms, but it was actually a combination of Homefront strategies and the feistiness of a man who made sure every briton at home and abroad was fed and strong to fight and survive. This book follows the events that lead to the creation and operation of The Ministry of Food and the man who shaped it: Frederick James Marquis 1st Earl of Woolton. Commonly known as Lord Woolton. A man of humble origins compared to the Westminster elite, used his entrepreneurial genius and firm ideals of social justice to run a clock work machine to ensure that Britain survived Hitler's attempt to starve it by ensuring supplies, rationing and distributing them. This is a book about the work of one of Britain's most transcendent leaders whose name has almost been forgotten in history. Subscribe to Hungry books Podcast: https://anchor.fm/hungry-books
Agradece a este podcast tantas horas de entretenimiento y disfruta de episodios exclusivos como éste. ¡Apóyale en iVoox! Hoy queríamos recordaros otro de esos momentos clave de la Historia del Rock, que ocurriría un 6 de julio de 1957, y que no podemos ni imaginar como sería el mundo de la música si ese día no se hubieran alineado los astros para que dos de los grandes talentos del mundo de la música pudieran haberse conocido. Sería 6 de julio de 1957 cuando John Lennon conocería a Paul McCartney en una fiesta en la Iglesia de San Peter, en Woolton, Liverpool, con la actuación de The Quarrymen, grupo que daría origen 3 años después a The Beatles. El vídeo del programa con las actuaciones en directo e imágenes, lo tenéis en nuestra web https://radiofreerock.com/podcast/the-quarrymen-cuando-john-conocio-a-paul/Escucha este episodio completo y accede a todo el contenido exclusivo de La Gran Travesía. Descubre antes que nadie los nuevos episodios, y participa en la comunidad exclusiva de oyentes en https://go.ivoox.com/sq/489260
Support us on Patreon for just £1 per episode https://www.patreon.com/legitpodcast Zach Washington Young - Worlds First to Walk the London Marathon with a Severed Spinal Cord Injury. Zach Washington-Young was catapulted through the windscreen when the coach smashed into a tree after its tyre exploded on the way back from Bestival, a music festival on the Isle of Wight. Three people including Zach's close friends, Michael Molloy, from Woolton, 18, and Kerry Ogden, 23, from Maghull, died in the September 2012 crash, as did the coach driver Colin Daulby, 63, from Warrington. Support us on Patreon for just £1 per episode https://www.patreon.com/legitpodcast Follow us on Social Media Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thelegitpodcast Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/legpodcast Listen to the podcast; Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/the-leg-it-podcast/id1449038179 Spotify: https://spoti.fi/2DGLtVb Other Podcast Providers: https://www.linktr.ee/thelegitpodcast Contact us: thelegitpodcast@gmail.com Watch on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCWoCyImTwCV8Dzjv6PrS-lQ We release a new episode every Monday – please hit the subscribe button so you are notified every single time a new episode is released.
When did we begin to rely on crystals for healing rituals? What is the significance of crystals? Why are we gravitating to these stones more than ever?On today's show we have the jewellery historian, stylist and British Vogue's jewellery editor for twenty years, Carol Woolton. Carol is a complete expert in stones, jewels and gems and we dive into her new beautiful book, The New Stone Age, exploring the history and power of crystals in helping us relax, ease anxiety, create safety and help manifestation.Please find The New Stone Age book here: https://www.amazon.com/New-Stone-Age-Inspiration-Crystals/dp/1984856596Please find Carol Woolton here: https://www.instagram.com/carolwoolton/?hl=enThis episode is supported by a brand I LOVE, Aromatherapy Associates! Honestly, fully obsessed with them and suggest you check out their shower oils. They really do transform the shower experience into something that's mind, body and soul refreshing. I passionately believe high quality essential oils is highly effective in soothing the mind and body. To launch their latest shower oils, a line that gives you a full mind and body experience in the bathroom by maximising the therapeutic benefit of the oils, we are teaming up to celebrate and encourage us all to take 5 minutes from our day to reset, refresh and look after our spirit. There is no better and easier way to do this, then jumping in the shower!To find out how you can turn your shower into a deeply soothing session, visit www.aromatherapyassociates.com. A little bit about the NOT PERFECT podcast. Thank you for reading this and thank you for being here. The intention for this podcast is to share conversations on the subjects that can nurture our life from the inside. Just like physical exercise takes work and commitment, I believe our emotional health requires the same attention. Life throws curve balls unexpectedly and these can feel much more manageable when we know more about our mind. I hope these episodes are helpful in sharing tools, tips and insights into our brilliant hardware that can feel faulty but always fixable. I would love to hear from you if you have any feedback or guest suggestions, please find me on instagram @poppyjamie and @happynotperfect.Want to feel a bit happier? Download my mindfulness app Happy Not Perfect. The app gives you a daily work-out for your mind that helps you to rest, process thoughts and trains positive thinking. Perfect as a morning mind-set routine or when you need to calm down in moments of anxiety or stress. On IOS and Android. www.happynotperfect.comThe music on my podcast is by Myndstream. Please find more information on their music made to relax, sleep, focus and move at www.myndstream.com and on any music streaming platform See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.
Grab a comfortable chair or find a cosy corner and tune into this month’s Gold Digging Podcast with Carol Woolton; author, historian, editor, stylist, curator and Contributing Director of British Vogue. Imminently releasing her 5th book: The New Stone Age, Stephen and Carol discuss the power of crystals, their experiences at Tucson Gem Show, and the beauty of imperfection.
Hungry Books is presented by: Rocio Carvajal Food history writer, cook and author. The book: Eggs or Anarchy, The remarkable story of the man tasked with the impossible: to feed a nation at war. By William Sitwell Ep 2 This book follows the events that lead to the creation and operation of The Ministry of Food and the man who shaped it: Frederick James Marquis 1st Earl of Woolton, commonly known as Lord Woolton. A man of humble origins compared to the Westminster elite, used his entrepreneurial genius and firm ideals of social justice to run a clock work machine to ensure that Britain survived Hitler’s attempt to starve it by ensuring supplies, rationing and distributing them. This is a book about the work of one of Britain’s most transcendent leaders whose name has almost been forgotten in history. ——————————————————— Links mentioned on today’s episode: ›To get "Eggs or anarchy!" - Click here ›To get some wartime memorabilia - Click here ——————————————————— Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hungrybookspodcast/ web: www.passthechipotle.com/hungrybooks email: hello@passthechipotle.com Twitter: @rocio_carvajalc Make a donation to the show: Buy me a cup of coffee! ☕
Episode fifty-two of A History of Rock Music in Five Hundred Songs looks at "Twenty Flight Rock" by Eddie Cochran, and at the first great rock and roll film Click the full post to read liner notes, links to more information, and a transcript of the episode. Patreon backers also have a ten-minute bonus episode available, on "Teen-Age Crush" by Tommy Sands. ----more---- Resources There are several books available on Cochran, but for this episode I mostly relied on Gene Vincent and Eddie Cochran: Rock and Roll Revolutionaries by John Collis. I'll be using others as well in forthcoming episodes. While there are dozens of compilations of Cochran's music available, many of them are flawed in one way or another (including the Real Gone Music four-CD set, which is what I would normally recommend). This one is probably the best you can get for Cochran novices. And as always there's a Mixcloud with the full versions of all the songs featured in today's episode. Patreon This podcast is brought to you by the generosity of my backers on Patreon. Why not join them? Transcript To tell the story of rock music, it's important to tell the story of the music's impact on other media. Rock and roll was a cultural phenomenon that affected almost everything, and it affected TV, film, clothing and more. So today, we're going to look at how a film made the career of one of the greats of rock and roll music: [Excerpt: Eddie Cochran, "Twenty Flight Rock"] Eddie Cochran was born in Albert Lea, Minnesota, though in later life he would always claim to be an Okie rather than from Albert Lea. His parents were from Oklahoma, they moved to Minnesota shortly before Eddie was born, and they moved back to Oklahoma City when he was small, moved back again to Minnesota, and then moved off to California with the rest of the Okies. Cochran was a staggeringly precocious guitarist. On the road trip to California from Albert Lea, he had held his guitar on his lap for the entire journey, referring to it as his best friend. And once he hit California he quickly struck up a musical relationship with two friends -- Guybo Smith, who played bass, and Chuck Foreman, who played steel guitar. The three of them got hold of a couple of tape recorders, which allowed them not only to record themselves, but to experiment with overdubbing in the style of Les Paul. Some of those recordings have seen release in recent years, and they're quite astonishing: [Excerpt: Eddie Cochran and Chuck Foreman, "Rockin' It"] Cochran plays all the guitars on that (except the steel guitar, which is Foreman) and he was only fourteen years old at the time. He played with several groups who were playing the Okie Western Swing and proto-rockabilly that was popular in California at the time, and eventually hooked up with a singer from Mississippi who was born Garland Perry, but who changed his name to Hank Cochran, allowing the duo to perform under the name "the Cochran Brothers". The Cochran Brothers soon got a record deal. When they started out, they were doing pure country music, and their first single was a Louvin Brothers style close harmony song, about Jimmie Rodgers and Hank Williams: [Excerpt: The Cochran Brothers, "Two Blue Singing Stars"] But while Hank was perfectly happy making this kind of music, Eddie was getting more and more interested in the new rock and roll music that was starting to become popular, and the two of them eventually split up over actual musical differences. Hank Cochran would go on to have a long and successful career in the country industry, but Eddie was floundering. He knew that this new music was what he should be playing, and he was one of the best guitarists around, but he wasn't sure how to become a rock and roller, or even if he wanted to be a singer at all, rather than just a guitar player. He hooked up with Jerry Capehart, a singer and songwriter who the Cochran Brothers had earlier backed on a single: [Excerpt: Jerry Capehart and the Cochran Brothers, "Walkin' Stick Boogie"] The two of them started writing songs together, and Eddie also started playing as a session musician. He played on dozens of sessions in the mid-fifties, mostly uncredited, and scholars are still trying to establish a full list of the records he played on. But while he was doing this, he still hadn't got himself a record contract, other than for a single record on an independent label: [Excerpt: Eddie Cochran, "Skinny Jim"] Cochran was in the studio recording demos for consideration by record labels when Boris Petroff, a B-movie director who was a friend of Cochran's collaborator Jerry Capehart, dropped in. Petroff decided that Cochran had the looks to be a film star, and right there offered him a part in a film that was being made under the working title Do-Re-Mi. Quite how Petroff had the ability to give Cochran a part in a film he wasn't working on, I don't know, but he did, and the offer was a genuine one, as Cochran confirmed the next day. There were many, many, rock and roll films made in the 1950s, and most of them were utterly terrible. It says something about the genre as a whole when I tell you that Elvis' early films, which are not widely regarded as cinematic masterpieces, are among the very best rock and roll films of the decade. The 1950s were the tipping point for television ownership in both the US and the UK, but while TV was quickly becoming a mass medium, cinema-going was still at levels that would stagger people today -- *everyone* went to the cinema. And when you went to the cinema, you didn't go just to see one film. There'd be a main film, a shorter film called a B-movie that lasted maybe an hour, and short features like cartoons and newsreels. That meant that there was a much greater appetite for cheap films that could be used to fill out a programme, despite their total lack of quality. This is where, for example, all the films that appear in Mystery Science Theater 3000 come from, or many of them. And these B-movies would be made in a matter of weeks, or even days, and so would quickly be turned round to cash in on whatever trend was happening right at that minute. And so between 1956 and 1958 there were several dozen films, with titles like "Rock! Rock! Rock!", "Don't Knock The Rock" and so on. [Excerpt: Bill Haley and the Comets, “Don't Knock the Rock”] In every case, these films were sold entirely on the basis of the musical performances therein, with little or no effort to sell them as narratives, even though they all had plots of sorts. They were just excuses to get footage of as many different hit acts as possible into the cinemas, ideally before their songs dropped off the charts. (Many of them also contained non-hit acts, like Teddy Randazzo, who seemed to appear in all of them despite never having a single make the top fifty. Randazzo did, though, go on to write a number of classic hits for other artists). Very few of the rock and roll films of the fifties were even watchable at all. We talked in the episode on "Brown-Eyed Handsome Man" about the film "Rock! Rock! Rock!" which Chuck Berry appeared in -- that was actually towards the more watchable end of these films, terrible as it was. The film that Cochran was signed to appear in, which was soon renamed The Girl Can't Help It, is different. There are plenty of points at which the action stops for a musical performance, but there is an actual plot, and actual dialogue and acting. While the film isn't a masterpiece or anything like that, it is a proper film. And it's made by a proper studio. While, for example, Rock! Rock! Rock! was made by a fly-by-night company called Vanguard Productions, The Girl Can't Help It was made by Twentieth Century Fox. And it was made in both colour and Cinemascope. The budget for Rock! Rock! Rock! was seventy-five thousand dollars compared to the 1.3 million dollars spent on The Girl Can't Help It. [Excerpt: Little Richard, “The Girl Can't Help It”] Indeed, it seems to be as much an attempt to cash in on a Billy Wilder film as it is an attempt to cash in on rock and roll. The previous year, The Seven-Year Itch had been a big hit, with Tom Ewell playing an unassuming middle-aged man who becomes worryingly attracted to a much younger woman, played by Marilyn Monroe. The film had been a massive success (and it's responsible for the famous scene with Monroe on the air grate, which is still homaged and parodied to this day) and so the decision was taken to cast Tom Ewell as an unassuming middle-aged man who becomes worryingly attracted to a much younger woman, played by Jayne Mansfield doing her usual act of being a Marilyn Monroe impersonator. Just as the film was attempting to sell itself on the back of a more successful hit film, the story also bears a certain amount of resemblance to one by someone else. The playwright Garson Kanin had been inspired in 1955 by the tales of the jukebox wars -- he'd discovered that most of the jukeboxes in the country were being run by the Mafia, and that which records got stocked and played depended very much on who would do favours for the various gangsters involved. Gangsters would often destroy rivals' jukeboxes, and threaten bar owners if they were getting their jukeboxes from the wrong set of mobsters. Kanin took this idea and turned it into a novella, Do-Re-Mi, about a helpless schlub who teams up with a gangster named "Fatso" to enter the record business, and on the way more or less accidentally makes a young woman into a singing star. Do-Re-Mi later became a moderately successful stage musical, which introduced the song "Make Someone Happy". [Excerpt: Doris Day, “Make Someone Happy”] Meanwhile the plot of The Girl Can't Help It has a helpless schlub team up with a mobster named "Fats", and the two of them working together to make the mobster's young girlfriend into a singing star. I've seen varying accounts as to why The Girl Can't Help It was renamed from Do-Re-Mi and wasn't credited as being based on Kanin's novella. Some say that the film was made without the rights having been acquired, and changed to the point that Kanin wouldn't sue. Others say that Twentieth Century Fox acquired the rights perfectly legally, but that the director, Frank Tashlin changed the script around so much that Kanin asked that his credit be removed, because it was now so different from his novella that he could probably resell the rights at some future point. The latter seems fairly likely to me, given that Tashlin's next film, Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?, which also starred Jayne Mansfield, contained almost nothing from the play on which it was based. Indeed, the original play Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? was by the author of the original play on which The Seven-Year Itch was based. The playwright had been so annoyed at the way in which his vision had been messed with for the screen that he wrote Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? as a satire about the way the film industry changes writers' work, and Mansfield was cast in the play. When Tashlin wanted Mansfield to star in The Girl Can't Help It but she was contractually obliged to appear in the play, Fox decided the easiest thing to do was just to buy up the rights to the play and relieve Mansfield of her obligation so she could star in The Girl Can't Help It. They then, once The Girl Can't Help It finished, got Frank Tashlin to write a totally new film with the title Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?, keeping only the title and Mansfield's character. While The Girl Can't Help It has a reputation for satirising rock and roll, it actually pulls its punches to a surprising extent. For example, there's a pivotal scene where the main mobster character, Fats, calls our hero after seeing Eddie Cochran on TV: [excerpt: dialogue from "The Girl Can't Help It"] Note the wording there, and what he doesn't say. He doesn't say that Cochran can't sing, merely that he "ain't got a trained voice". The whole point of this scene is to set up that Jerry Jordan, Mansfield's character, could become a rock and roll star even though she can't sing at all, and yet when dealing with a real rock and roll star they are careful to be more ambiguous. Because, of course, the main thing that sold the film was the appearance of multiple rock and roll stars -- although "stars" is possibly overstating it for many of those present in the film. One thing it shared with most of the exploitation films was a rather slapdash attitude to which musicians the film would actually feature. And so it has the genuinely big rock and roll stars of the time Little Richard, the Platters, and Fats Domino, the one-hit wonder Gene Vincent (but what a one hit to have), and a bunch of… less well-known people, like the Treniers -- a jump band who'd been around since the forties and never really made a major impact, or Eddie Fontaine (about whom the less said the better), or the ubiquitous Teddy Randazzo, performing here with an accordion accompaniment. [Excerpt: Teddy Randazzo and the Three Chuckles, “Cinnamon Sinner”] And Cochran was to be one of those lesser-known acts, so he and Capehart had to find a song that might be suitable for him to perform in the film. Very quickly they decided on a song called "Twenty Flight Rock", written by a songwriter called Nelda Fairchild. There has been a lot of controversy as to who actually contributed what to the song, which is copyrighted in the names of both Fairchild and Cochran. Fairchild always claimed that she wrote the whole thing entirely by herself, and that Cochran got his co-writing credit for performing the demo, while Cochran's surviving relatives are equally emphatic in their claims that he was an equal contributor as a songwriter. We will almost certainly never know the truth. Cochran is credited as the co-writer of several other hit songs, usually with Capehart, but never as the sole writer of a hit. Fairchild, meanwhile, was a professional songwriter, but pieces like "Freddie the Little Fir Tree" don't especially sound like the work of the same person who wrote "Twenty Flight Rock". As both credited writers are now dead, the best we can do is use our own judgment, and my personal judgment is that Cochran probably contributed at least something to the song's writing. The original version of "Twenty Flight Rock", as featured in the film, was little more than a demo -- it featured Cochran on guitar, Guybo Smith on double bass, and Capehart slapping a cardboard box to add percussion. Cochran later recorded a more fully-arranged version of the song, which came out after the film, but the extra elements, notably the backing vocals, added little to the simplistic original: [Excerpt: Eddie Cochran, "Twenty Flight Rock"] It was that simpler version that appeared in the film, and which took its place alongside several other classic tracks in the film's soundtrack. The film was originally intended to have a theme tune recorded by Fats Domino, who appeared in the film performing his hit "Blue Monday", but when Bobby Troup mentioned this to Art Rupe, Rupe suggested that Little Richard would be a more energetic star to perform the song (and I'm sure this was entirely because of his belief that Richard would be the better talent, and nothing to do with Rupe owning Richard's label, but not Domino's). As a result, Domino's role in the film was cut down to a single song, while Richard ended up doing three -- the title song, written by Troup, "Ready Teddy" by John Marascalco and Bumps Blackwell, and "She's Got It". We've mentioned before that John Marascalco's writing credits sometimes seem to be slightly exaggerated, and “She's Got It” is one record that tends to bear that out. Listen to “She's Got It”, which has Marascalco as the sole credited writer: [Excerpt: Little Richard, “She's Got It”] And now listen to “I Got It”, an earlier record by Richard, which has Little Richard credited as the sole writer: [Excerpt: Little Richard, “I Got It”] Hmm… The Girl Can't Help It was rather poorly reviewed in America. In France it was a different story. There's a pervasive legend that the people of France revere Jerry Lewis as a genius. This is nonsense. But the grain of truth in it is that Cahiers du Cinema, the most important film magazine in France by a long way -- the magazine for which Godard, Truffaut, and others wrote, and which popularised the concept of auteur theory, absolutely loved Frank Tashlin. In 1957, Tashlin was the only director to get two films on their top ten films of the year list -- The Girl Can't Help It at number eight, and Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter at number two. The other eight films on the list were directed by Chaplin, Fellini, Hitchcock, Bunuel, Ingmar Bergman, Nicholas Ray, Fritz Lang and Sidney Lumet. Tashlin directed several films starring Jerry Lewis, and those films, like Tashlin's other work, got a significant amount of praise in the magazine. And that's where that legend actually comes from, though Cahiers did also give some more guarded praise to some of the films Lewis directed himself later. Tashlin wasn't actually that good a director, but what he did have is a visual style that came from a different area of filmmaking than most of his competitors. Tashlin had started out as a cartoon director, working on Warner Brothers cartoons. He wasn't one of the better directors for Warners, and didn't direct any of the classics people remember from the studio -- he mostly made forgettable Porky Pig shorts. But this meant he had an animator's sense for a visual gag, and thus gave his films a unique look. For advocates of auteur theory, that was enough to push him into the top ranks. And so The Girl Can't Help It became a classic film, and Cochran got a great deal of attention, and a record deal. According to Si Waronker, the head of Liberty Records, Eddie Cochran getting signed to the label had nothing to do with him being cast in The Girl Can't Help It, and Waronker had no idea the film was being made when Cochran got signed. This seems implausible, to say the least. Johnny Olenn, Abbey Lincoln and Julie London, three other Liberty Records artists, appeared in the film -- and London was by some way Liberty's biggest star. Not only that, but London's husband, Bobby Troup, wrote the theme song and was musical director for the film. But whether or not Cochran was signed on account of his film appearance, "Twenty Flight Rock" wasn't immediately released as a single. Indeed, by the time it came out Cochran had already appeared in another film, in which he had backed Mamie Van Doren -- another Marilyn Monroe imitator in the same vein as Mansfield -- on several songs, as well as having a small role and a featured song himself. Oddly, when that film, Untamed Youth, came out, Cochran's backing on Van Doren's recordings had been replaced by different instrumentalists. But he still appears on the EP that was released of the songs, including this one, which Cochran co-wrote with Capehart: [Excerpt: Mamie Van Doren, "Ooh Ba La Baby"] It had originally been planned to release "Twenty Flight Rock" as Cochran's first single on Liberty, to coincide with the film's release but then it was put back for several months, as Si Waronker wanted Cochran to release "Sitting in the Balcony" instead. That song had been written and originally recorded by John D Loudermilk: [Excerpt: John D Loudermilk, "Sitting in the Balcony"] Waronker had wanted to release Loudermilk's record, but he hadn't been able to get the rights, so he decided to get Cochran to record a note-for-note cover version and release that instead: [Excerpt: Eddie Cochran, "Sitting in the Balcony"] Cochran was not particularly happy with that record, though he was happy enough once the record started selling in comparatively vast quantities, spurred by his appearance in The Girl Can't Help It, and reached number eighteen in the charts. The problem was that Cochran and Waronker had fundamentally different ideas about what Cochran actually was as an artist. Cochran thought of himself primarily as a guitarist -- and the guitar solo on "Sittin' in the Balcony" was the one thing about Cochran's record which distinguished it from Loudermilk's original -- and also as a rock and roller. Waronker, on the other hand, was convinced that someone with Cochran's good looks and masculine voice could easily be another Pat Boone. Liberty was fundamentally not geared towards making rock and roll records. Its other artists included the Hollywood composer Lionel Newman, the torch singer Julie London, and a little later novelty acts like the Chipmunks -- the three Chipmunks, Alvin, Simon, and Theodore, being named after Al Bennett, Si Waronker, and Theodore Keep, the three men in charge of the label. And their attempts to force Cochran into the mould of a light-entertainment crooner produced a completely forgettable debut album, Singin' to My Baby, which has little of the rock and roll excitement that would characterise Cochran's better work. (And a warning for anyone who decides to go out and listen to that album anyway -- one of the few tracks on there that *is* in Cochran's rock and roll style is a song called "Mean When I'm Mad", which is one of the most misogynist things I have heard, and I've heard quite a lot -- it's basically an outright rape threat. So if that's something that will upset you, please steer clear of Cochran's first album, while knowing you're missing little artistically.) “Twenty Flight Rock” was eventually released as a single, in its remade version, in November 1957, almost a year after The Girl Can't Help It came out. Unsurprisingly, coming out so late after the film, it didn't chart, and it would be a while yet before Cochran would have his biggest hit. But just because it didn't chart, doesn't mean it didn't make an impression. There's one story, more than any other, that sums up the impact both of "The Girl Can't Help It" and of "Twenty Flight Rock" itself. In July 1957, a skiffle group called the Quarrymen, led by a teenager called John Lennon, played a village fete in Woolton, a suburb of Liverpool. After the show, they were introduced to a young boy named Paul McCartney by a mutual friend. Lennon and McCartney hit it off, but the thing that persuaded Lennon to offer McCartney a place in the group was when McCartney demonstrated that he knew all the words to "Twenty Flight Rock". Lennon wasn't great at remembering lyrics, and was impressed enough by this that he decided that this new kid needed to be in the group. [Excerpt: Paul McCartney, “Twenty Flight Rock”] That's the impact that The Girl Can't Help It had, and the impact that "Twenty Flight Rock" had. But Eddie Cochran's career was just starting, and we'll see more of him in future episodes...
Episode fifty-two of A History of Rock Music in Five Hundred Songs looks at “Twenty Flight Rock” by Eddie Cochran, and at the first great rock and roll film Click the full post to read liner notes, links to more information, and a transcript of the episode. Patreon backers also have a ten-minute bonus episode available, on “Teen-Age Crush” by Tommy Sands. —-more—- Resources There are several books available on Cochran, but for this episode I mostly relied on Gene Vincent and Eddie Cochran: Rock and Roll Revolutionaries by John Collis. I’ll be using others as well in forthcoming episodes. While there are dozens of compilations of Cochran’s music available, many of them are flawed in one way or another (including the Real Gone Music four-CD set, which is what I would normally recommend). This one is probably the best you can get for Cochran novices. And as always there’s a Mixcloud with the full versions of all the songs featured in today’s episode. Patreon This podcast is brought to you by the generosity of my backers on Patreon. Why not join them? Transcript To tell the story of rock music, it’s important to tell the story of the music’s impact on other media. Rock and roll was a cultural phenomenon that affected almost everything, and it affected TV, film, clothing and more. So today, we’re going to look at how a film made the career of one of the greats of rock and roll music: [Excerpt: Eddie Cochran, “Twenty Flight Rock”] Eddie Cochran was born in Albert Lea, Minnesota, though in later life he would always claim to be an Okie rather than from Albert Lea. His parents were from Oklahoma, they moved to Minnesota shortly before Eddie was born, and they moved back to Oklahoma City when he was small, moved back again to Minnesota, and then moved off to California with the rest of the Okies. Cochran was a staggeringly precocious guitarist. On the road trip to California from Albert Lea, he had held his guitar on his lap for the entire journey, referring to it as his best friend. And once he hit California he quickly struck up a musical relationship with two friends — Guybo Smith, who played bass, and Chuck Foreman, who played steel guitar. The three of them got hold of a couple of tape recorders, which allowed them not only to record themselves, but to experiment with overdubbing in the style of Les Paul. Some of those recordings have seen release in recent years, and they’re quite astonishing: [Excerpt: Eddie Cochran and Chuck Foreman, “Rockin’ It”] Cochran plays all the guitars on that (except the steel guitar, which is Foreman) and he was only fourteen years old at the time. He played with several groups who were playing the Okie Western Swing and proto-rockabilly that was popular in California at the time, and eventually hooked up with a singer from Mississippi who was born Garland Perry, but who changed his name to Hank Cochran, allowing the duo to perform under the name “the Cochran Brothers”. The Cochran Brothers soon got a record deal. When they started out, they were doing pure country music, and their first single was a Louvin Brothers style close harmony song, about Jimmie Rodgers and Hank Williams: [Excerpt: The Cochran Brothers, “Two Blue Singing Stars”] But while Hank was perfectly happy making this kind of music, Eddie was getting more and more interested in the new rock and roll music that was starting to become popular, and the two of them eventually split up over actual musical differences. Hank Cochran would go on to have a long and successful career in the country industry, but Eddie was floundering. He knew that this new music was what he should be playing, and he was one of the best guitarists around, but he wasn’t sure how to become a rock and roller, or even if he wanted to be a singer at all, rather than just a guitar player. He hooked up with Jerry Capehart, a singer and songwriter who the Cochran Brothers had earlier backed on a single: [Excerpt: Jerry Capehart and the Cochran Brothers, “Walkin’ Stick Boogie”] The two of them started writing songs together, and Eddie also started playing as a session musician. He played on dozens of sessions in the mid-fifties, mostly uncredited, and scholars are still trying to establish a full list of the records he played on. But while he was doing this, he still hadn’t got himself a record contract, other than for a single record on an independent label: [Excerpt: Eddie Cochran, “Skinny Jim”] Cochran was in the studio recording demos for consideration by record labels when Boris Petroff, a B-movie director who was a friend of Cochran’s collaborator Jerry Capehart, dropped in. Petroff decided that Cochran had the looks to be a film star, and right there offered him a part in a film that was being made under the working title Do-Re-Mi. Quite how Petroff had the ability to give Cochran a part in a film he wasn’t working on, I don’t know, but he did, and the offer was a genuine one, as Cochran confirmed the next day. There were many, many, rock and roll films made in the 1950s, and most of them were utterly terrible. It says something about the genre as a whole when I tell you that Elvis’ early films, which are not widely regarded as cinematic masterpieces, are among the very best rock and roll films of the decade. The 1950s were the tipping point for television ownership in both the US and the UK, but while TV was quickly becoming a mass medium, cinema-going was still at levels that would stagger people today — *everyone* went to the cinema. And when you went to the cinema, you didn’t go just to see one film. There’d be a main film, a shorter film called a B-movie that lasted maybe an hour, and short features like cartoons and newsreels. That meant that there was a much greater appetite for cheap films that could be used to fill out a programme, despite their total lack of quality. This is where, for example, all the films that appear in Mystery Science Theater 3000 come from, or many of them. And these B-movies would be made in a matter of weeks, or even days, and so would quickly be turned round to cash in on whatever trend was happening right at that minute. And so between 1956 and 1958 there were several dozen films, with titles like “Rock! Rock! Rock!”, “Don’t Knock The Rock” and so on. [Excerpt: Bill Haley and the Comets, “Don’t Knock the Rock”] In every case, these films were sold entirely on the basis of the musical performances therein, with little or no effort to sell them as narratives, even though they all had plots of sorts. They were just excuses to get footage of as many different hit acts as possible into the cinemas, ideally before their songs dropped off the charts. (Many of them also contained non-hit acts, like Teddy Randazzo, who seemed to appear in all of them despite never having a single make the top fifty. Randazzo did, though, go on to write a number of classic hits for other artists). Very few of the rock and roll films of the fifties were even watchable at all. We talked in the episode on “Brown-Eyed Handsome Man” about the film “Rock! Rock! Rock!” which Chuck Berry appeared in — that was actually towards the more watchable end of these films, terrible as it was. The film that Cochran was signed to appear in, which was soon renamed The Girl Can’t Help It, is different. There are plenty of points at which the action stops for a musical performance, but there is an actual plot, and actual dialogue and acting. While the film isn’t a masterpiece or anything like that, it is a proper film. And it’s made by a proper studio. While, for example, Rock! Rock! Rock! was made by a fly-by-night company called Vanguard Productions, The Girl Can’t Help It was made by Twentieth Century Fox. And it was made in both colour and Cinemascope. The budget for Rock! Rock! Rock! was seventy-five thousand dollars compared to the 1.3 million dollars spent on The Girl Can’t Help It. [Excerpt: Little Richard, “The Girl Can’t Help It”] Indeed, it seems to be as much an attempt to cash in on a Billy Wilder film as it is an attempt to cash in on rock and roll. The previous year, The Seven-Year Itch had been a big hit, with Tom Ewell playing an unassuming middle-aged man who becomes worryingly attracted to a much younger woman, played by Marilyn Monroe. The film had been a massive success (and it’s responsible for the famous scene with Monroe on the air grate, which is still homaged and parodied to this day) and so the decision was taken to cast Tom Ewell as an unassuming middle-aged man who becomes worryingly attracted to a much younger woman, played by Jayne Mansfield doing her usual act of being a Marilyn Monroe impersonator. Just as the film was attempting to sell itself on the back of a more successful hit film, the story also bears a certain amount of resemblance to one by someone else. The playwright Garson Kanin had been inspired in 1955 by the tales of the jukebox wars — he’d discovered that most of the jukeboxes in the country were being run by the Mafia, and that which records got stocked and played depended very much on who would do favours for the various gangsters involved. Gangsters would often destroy rivals’ jukeboxes, and threaten bar owners if they were getting their jukeboxes from the wrong set of mobsters. Kanin took this idea and turned it into a novella, Do-Re-Mi, about a helpless schlub who teams up with a gangster named “Fatso” to enter the record business, and on the way more or less accidentally makes a young woman into a singing star. Do-Re-Mi later became a moderately successful stage musical, which introduced the song “Make Someone Happy”. [Excerpt: Doris Day, “Make Someone Happy”] Meanwhile the plot of The Girl Can’t Help It has a helpless schlub team up with a mobster named “Fats”, and the two of them working together to make the mobster’s young girlfriend into a singing star. I’ve seen varying accounts as to why The Girl Can’t Help It was renamed from Do-Re-Mi and wasn’t credited as being based on Kanin’s novella. Some say that the film was made without the rights having been acquired, and changed to the point that Kanin wouldn’t sue. Others say that Twentieth Century Fox acquired the rights perfectly legally, but that the director, Frank Tashlin changed the script around so much that Kanin asked that his credit be removed, because it was now so different from his novella that he could probably resell the rights at some future point. The latter seems fairly likely to me, given that Tashlin’s next film, Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?, which also starred Jayne Mansfield, contained almost nothing from the play on which it was based. Indeed, the original play Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? was by the author of the original play on which The Seven-Year Itch was based. The playwright had been so annoyed at the way in which his vision had been messed with for the screen that he wrote Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? as a satire about the way the film industry changes writers’ work, and Mansfield was cast in the play. When Tashlin wanted Mansfield to star in The Girl Can’t Help It but she was contractually obliged to appear in the play, Fox decided the easiest thing to do was just to buy up the rights to the play and relieve Mansfield of her obligation so she could star in The Girl Can’t Help It. They then, once The Girl Can’t Help It finished, got Frank Tashlin to write a totally new film with the title Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?, keeping only the title and Mansfield’s character. While The Girl Can’t Help It has a reputation for satirising rock and roll, it actually pulls its punches to a surprising extent. For example, there’s a pivotal scene where the main mobster character, Fats, calls our hero after seeing Eddie Cochran on TV: [excerpt: dialogue from “The Girl Can’t Help It”] Note the wording there, and what he doesn’t say. He doesn’t say that Cochran can’t sing, merely that he “ain’t got a trained voice”. The whole point of this scene is to set up that Jerry Jordan, Mansfield’s character, could become a rock and roll star even though she can’t sing at all, and yet when dealing with a real rock and roll star they are careful to be more ambiguous. Because, of course, the main thing that sold the film was the appearance of multiple rock and roll stars — although “stars” is possibly overstating it for many of those present in the film. One thing it shared with most of the exploitation films was a rather slapdash attitude to which musicians the film would actually feature. And so it has the genuinely big rock and roll stars of the time Little Richard, the Platters, and Fats Domino, the one-hit wonder Gene Vincent (but what a one hit to have), and a bunch of… less well-known people, like the Treniers — a jump band who’d been around since the forties and never really made a major impact, or Eddie Fontaine (about whom the less said the better), or the ubiquitous Teddy Randazzo, performing here with an accordion accompaniment. [Excerpt: Teddy Randazzo and the Three Chuckles, “Cinnamon Sinner”] And Cochran was to be one of those lesser-known acts, so he and Capehart had to find a song that might be suitable for him to perform in the film. Very quickly they decided on a song called “Twenty Flight Rock”, written by a songwriter called Nelda Fairchild. There has been a lot of controversy as to who actually contributed what to the song, which is copyrighted in the names of both Fairchild and Cochran. Fairchild always claimed that she wrote the whole thing entirely by herself, and that Cochran got his co-writing credit for performing the demo, while Cochran’s surviving relatives are equally emphatic in their claims that he was an equal contributor as a songwriter. We will almost certainly never know the truth. Cochran is credited as the co-writer of several other hit songs, usually with Capehart, but never as the sole writer of a hit. Fairchild, meanwhile, was a professional songwriter, but pieces like “Freddie the Little Fir Tree” don’t especially sound like the work of the same person who wrote “Twenty Flight Rock”. As both credited writers are now dead, the best we can do is use our own judgment, and my personal judgment is that Cochran probably contributed at least something to the song’s writing. The original version of “Twenty Flight Rock”, as featured in the film, was little more than a demo — it featured Cochran on guitar, Guybo Smith on double bass, and Capehart slapping a cardboard box to add percussion. Cochran later recorded a more fully-arranged version of the song, which came out after the film, but the extra elements, notably the backing vocals, added little to the simplistic original: [Excerpt: Eddie Cochran, “Twenty Flight Rock”] It was that simpler version that appeared in the film, and which took its place alongside several other classic tracks in the film’s soundtrack. The film was originally intended to have a theme tune recorded by Fats Domino, who appeared in the film performing his hit “Blue Monday”, but when Bobby Troup mentioned this to Art Rupe, Rupe suggested that Little Richard would be a more energetic star to perform the song (and I’m sure this was entirely because of his belief that Richard would be the better talent, and nothing to do with Rupe owning Richard’s label, but not Domino’s). As a result, Domino’s role in the film was cut down to a single song, while Richard ended up doing three — the title song, written by Troup, “Ready Teddy” by John Marascalco and Bumps Blackwell, and “She’s Got It”. We’ve mentioned before that John Marascalco’s writing credits sometimes seem to be slightly exaggerated, and “She’s Got It” is one record that tends to bear that out. Listen to “She’s Got It”, which has Marascalco as the sole credited writer: [Excerpt: Little Richard, “She’s Got It”] And now listen to “I Got It”, an earlier record by Richard, which has Little Richard credited as the sole writer: [Excerpt: Little Richard, “I Got It”] Hmm… The Girl Can’t Help It was rather poorly reviewed in America. In France it was a different story. There’s a pervasive legend that the people of France revere Jerry Lewis as a genius. This is nonsense. But the grain of truth in it is that Cahiers du Cinema, the most important film magazine in France by a long way — the magazine for which Godard, Truffaut, and others wrote, and which popularised the concept of auteur theory, absolutely loved Frank Tashlin. In 1957, Tashlin was the only director to get two films on their top ten films of the year list — The Girl Can’t Help It at number eight, and Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter at number two. The other eight films on the list were directed by Chaplin, Fellini, Hitchcock, Bunuel, Ingmar Bergman, Nicholas Ray, Fritz Lang and Sidney Lumet. Tashlin directed several films starring Jerry Lewis, and those films, like Tashlin’s other work, got a significant amount of praise in the magazine. And that’s where that legend actually comes from, though Cahiers did also give some more guarded praise to some of the films Lewis directed himself later. Tashlin wasn’t actually that good a director, but what he did have is a visual style that came from a different area of filmmaking than most of his competitors. Tashlin had started out as a cartoon director, working on Warner Brothers cartoons. He wasn’t one of the better directors for Warners, and didn’t direct any of the classics people remember from the studio — he mostly made forgettable Porky Pig shorts. But this meant he had an animator’s sense for a visual gag, and thus gave his films a unique look. For advocates of auteur theory, that was enough to push him into the top ranks. And so The Girl Can’t Help It became a classic film, and Cochran got a great deal of attention, and a record deal. According to Si Waronker, the head of Liberty Records, Eddie Cochran getting signed to the label had nothing to do with him being cast in The Girl Can’t Help It, and Waronker had no idea the film was being made when Cochran got signed. This seems implausible, to say the least. Johnny Olenn, Abbey Lincoln and Julie London, three other Liberty Records artists, appeared in the film — and London was by some way Liberty’s biggest star. Not only that, but London’s husband, Bobby Troup, wrote the theme song and was musical director for the film. But whether or not Cochran was signed on account of his film appearance, “Twenty Flight Rock” wasn’t immediately released as a single. Indeed, by the time it came out Cochran had already appeared in another film, in which he had backed Mamie Van Doren — another Marilyn Monroe imitator in the same vein as Mansfield — on several songs, as well as having a small role and a featured song himself. Oddly, when that film, Untamed Youth, came out, Cochran’s backing on Van Doren’s recordings had been replaced by different instrumentalists. But he still appears on the EP that was released of the songs, including this one, which Cochran co-wrote with Capehart: [Excerpt: Mamie Van Doren, “Ooh Ba La Baby”] It had originally been planned to release “Twenty Flight Rock” as Cochran’s first single on Liberty, to coincide with the film’s release but then it was put back for several months, as Si Waronker wanted Cochran to release “Sitting in the Balcony” instead. That song had been written and originally recorded by John D Loudermilk: [Excerpt: John D Loudermilk, “Sitting in the Balcony”] Waronker had wanted to release Loudermilk’s record, but he hadn’t been able to get the rights, so he decided to get Cochran to record a note-for-note cover version and release that instead: [Excerpt: Eddie Cochran, “Sitting in the Balcony”] Cochran was not particularly happy with that record, though he was happy enough once the record started selling in comparatively vast quantities, spurred by his appearance in The Girl Can’t Help It, and reached number eighteen in the charts. The problem was that Cochran and Waronker had fundamentally different ideas about what Cochran actually was as an artist. Cochran thought of himself primarily as a guitarist — and the guitar solo on “Sittin’ in the Balcony” was the one thing about Cochran’s record which distinguished it from Loudermilk’s original — and also as a rock and roller. Waronker, on the other hand, was convinced that someone with Cochran’s good looks and masculine voice could easily be another Pat Boone. Liberty was fundamentally not geared towards making rock and roll records. Its other artists included the Hollywood composer Lionel Newman, the torch singer Julie London, and a little later novelty acts like the Chipmunks — the three Chipmunks, Alvin, Simon, and Theodore, being named after Al Bennett, Si Waronker, and Theodore Keep, the three men in charge of the label. And their attempts to force Cochran into the mould of a light-entertainment crooner produced a completely forgettable debut album, Singin’ to My Baby, which has little of the rock and roll excitement that would characterise Cochran’s better work. (And a warning for anyone who decides to go out and listen to that album anyway — one of the few tracks on there that *is* in Cochran’s rock and roll style is a song called “Mean When I’m Mad”, which is one of the most misogynist things I have heard, and I’ve heard quite a lot — it’s basically an outright rape threat. So if that’s something that will upset you, please steer clear of Cochran’s first album, while knowing you’re missing little artistically.) “Twenty Flight Rock” was eventually released as a single, in its remade version, in November 1957, almost a year after The Girl Can’t Help It came out. Unsurprisingly, coming out so late after the film, it didn’t chart, and it would be a while yet before Cochran would have his biggest hit. But just because it didn’t chart, doesn’t mean it didn’t make an impression. There’s one story, more than any other, that sums up the impact both of “The Girl Can’t Help It” and of “Twenty Flight Rock” itself. In July 1957, a skiffle group called the Quarrymen, led by a teenager called John Lennon, played a village fete in Woolton, a suburb of Liverpool. After the show, they were introduced to a young boy named Paul McCartney by a mutual friend. Lennon and McCartney hit it off, but the thing that persuaded Lennon to offer McCartney a place in the group was when McCartney demonstrated that he knew all the words to “Twenty Flight Rock”. Lennon wasn’t great at remembering lyrics, and was impressed enough by this that he decided that this new kid needed to be in the group. [Excerpt: Paul McCartney, “Twenty Flight Rock”] That’s the impact that The Girl Can’t Help It had, and the impact that “Twenty Flight Rock” had. But Eddie Cochran’s career was just starting, and we’ll see more of him in future episodes…
Episode fifty-two of A History of Rock Music in Five Hundred Songs looks at “Twenty Flight Rock” by Eddie Cochran, and at the first great rock and roll film Click the full post to read liner notes, links to more information, and a transcript of the episode. Patreon backers also have a ten-minute bonus episode available, on “Teen-Age Crush” by Tommy Sands. —-more—- Resources There are several books available on Cochran, but for this episode I mostly relied on Gene Vincent and Eddie Cochran: Rock and Roll Revolutionaries by John Collis. I’ll be using others as well in forthcoming episodes. While there are dozens of compilations of Cochran’s music available, many of them are flawed in one way or another (including the Real Gone Music four-CD set, which is what I would normally recommend). This one is probably the best you can get for Cochran novices. And as always there’s a Mixcloud with the full versions of all the songs featured in today’s episode. Patreon This podcast is brought to you by the generosity of my backers on Patreon. Why not join them? Transcript To tell the story of rock music, it’s important to tell the story of the music’s impact on other media. Rock and roll was a cultural phenomenon that affected almost everything, and it affected TV, film, clothing and more. So today, we’re going to look at how a film made the career of one of the greats of rock and roll music: [Excerpt: Eddie Cochran, “Twenty Flight Rock”] Eddie Cochran was born in Albert Lea, Minnesota, though in later life he would always claim to be an Okie rather than from Albert Lea. His parents were from Oklahoma, they moved to Minnesota shortly before Eddie was born, and they moved back to Oklahoma City when he was small, moved back again to Minnesota, and then moved off to California with the rest of the Okies. Cochran was a staggeringly precocious guitarist. On the road trip to California from Albert Lea, he had held his guitar on his lap for the entire journey, referring to it as his best friend. And once he hit California he quickly struck up a musical relationship with two friends — Guybo Smith, who played bass, and Chuck Foreman, who played steel guitar. The three of them got hold of a couple of tape recorders, which allowed them not only to record themselves, but to experiment with overdubbing in the style of Les Paul. Some of those recordings have seen release in recent years, and they’re quite astonishing: [Excerpt: Eddie Cochran and Chuck Foreman, “Rockin’ It”] Cochran plays all the guitars on that (except the steel guitar, which is Foreman) and he was only fourteen years old at the time. He played with several groups who were playing the Okie Western Swing and proto-rockabilly that was popular in California at the time, and eventually hooked up with a singer from Mississippi who was born Garland Perry, but who changed his name to Hank Cochran, allowing the duo to perform under the name “the Cochran Brothers”. The Cochran Brothers soon got a record deal. When they started out, they were doing pure country music, and their first single was a Louvin Brothers style close harmony song, about Jimmie Rodgers and Hank Williams: [Excerpt: The Cochran Brothers, “Two Blue Singing Stars”] But while Hank was perfectly happy making this kind of music, Eddie was getting more and more interested in the new rock and roll music that was starting to become popular, and the two of them eventually split up over actual musical differences. Hank Cochran would go on to have a long and successful career in the country industry, but Eddie was floundering. He knew that this new music was what he should be playing, and he was one of the best guitarists around, but he wasn’t sure how to become a rock and roller, or even if he wanted to be a singer at all, rather than just a guitar player. He hooked up with Jerry Capehart, a singer and songwriter who the Cochran Brothers had earlier backed on a single: [Excerpt: Jerry Capehart and the Cochran Brothers, “Walkin’ Stick Boogie”] The two of them started writing songs together, and Eddie also started playing as a session musician. He played on dozens of sessions in the mid-fifties, mostly uncredited, and scholars are still trying to establish a full list of the records he played on. But while he was doing this, he still hadn’t got himself a record contract, other than for a single record on an independent label: [Excerpt: Eddie Cochran, “Skinny Jim”] Cochran was in the studio recording demos for consideration by record labels when Boris Petroff, a B-movie director who was a friend of Cochran’s collaborator Jerry Capehart, dropped in. Petroff decided that Cochran had the looks to be a film star, and right there offered him a part in a film that was being made under the working title Do-Re-Mi. Quite how Petroff had the ability to give Cochran a part in a film he wasn’t working on, I don’t know, but he did, and the offer was a genuine one, as Cochran confirmed the next day. There were many, many, rock and roll films made in the 1950s, and most of them were utterly terrible. It says something about the genre as a whole when I tell you that Elvis’ early films, which are not widely regarded as cinematic masterpieces, are among the very best rock and roll films of the decade. The 1950s were the tipping point for television ownership in both the US and the UK, but while TV was quickly becoming a mass medium, cinema-going was still at levels that would stagger people today — *everyone* went to the cinema. And when you went to the cinema, you didn’t go just to see one film. There’d be a main film, a shorter film called a B-movie that lasted maybe an hour, and short features like cartoons and newsreels. That meant that there was a much greater appetite for cheap films that could be used to fill out a programme, despite their total lack of quality. This is where, for example, all the films that appear in Mystery Science Theater 3000 come from, or many of them. And these B-movies would be made in a matter of weeks, or even days, and so would quickly be turned round to cash in on whatever trend was happening right at that minute. And so between 1956 and 1958 there were several dozen films, with titles like “Rock! Rock! Rock!”, “Don’t Knock The Rock” and so on. [Excerpt: Bill Haley and the Comets, “Don’t Knock the Rock”] In every case, these films were sold entirely on the basis of the musical performances therein, with little or no effort to sell them as narratives, even though they all had plots of sorts. They were just excuses to get footage of as many different hit acts as possible into the cinemas, ideally before their songs dropped off the charts. (Many of them also contained non-hit acts, like Teddy Randazzo, who seemed to appear in all of them despite never having a single make the top fifty. Randazzo did, though, go on to write a number of classic hits for other artists). Very few of the rock and roll films of the fifties were even watchable at all. We talked in the episode on “Brown-Eyed Handsome Man” about the film “Rock! Rock! Rock!” which Chuck Berry appeared in — that was actually towards the more watchable end of these films, terrible as it was. The film that Cochran was signed to appear in, which was soon renamed The Girl Can’t Help It, is different. There are plenty of points at which the action stops for a musical performance, but there is an actual plot, and actual dialogue and acting. While the film isn’t a masterpiece or anything like that, it is a proper film. And it’s made by a proper studio. While, for example, Rock! Rock! Rock! was made by a fly-by-night company called Vanguard Productions, The Girl Can’t Help It was made by Twentieth Century Fox. And it was made in both colour and Cinemascope. The budget for Rock! Rock! Rock! was seventy-five thousand dollars compared to the 1.3 million dollars spent on The Girl Can’t Help It. [Excerpt: Little Richard, “The Girl Can’t Help It”] Indeed, it seems to be as much an attempt to cash in on a Billy Wilder film as it is an attempt to cash in on rock and roll. The previous year, The Seven-Year Itch had been a big hit, with Tom Ewell playing an unassuming middle-aged man who becomes worryingly attracted to a much younger woman, played by Marilyn Monroe. The film had been a massive success (and it’s responsible for the famous scene with Monroe on the air grate, which is still homaged and parodied to this day) and so the decision was taken to cast Tom Ewell as an unassuming middle-aged man who becomes worryingly attracted to a much younger woman, played by Jayne Mansfield doing her usual act of being a Marilyn Monroe impersonator. Just as the film was attempting to sell itself on the back of a more successful hit film, the story also bears a certain amount of resemblance to one by someone else. The playwright Garson Kanin had been inspired in 1955 by the tales of the jukebox wars — he’d discovered that most of the jukeboxes in the country were being run by the Mafia, and that which records got stocked and played depended very much on who would do favours for the various gangsters involved. Gangsters would often destroy rivals’ jukeboxes, and threaten bar owners if they were getting their jukeboxes from the wrong set of mobsters. Kanin took this idea and turned it into a novella, Do-Re-Mi, about a helpless schlub who teams up with a gangster named “Fatso” to enter the record business, and on the way more or less accidentally makes a young woman into a singing star. Do-Re-Mi later became a moderately successful stage musical, which introduced the song “Make Someone Happy”. [Excerpt: Doris Day, “Make Someone Happy”] Meanwhile the plot of The Girl Can’t Help It has a helpless schlub team up with a mobster named “Fats”, and the two of them working together to make the mobster’s young girlfriend into a singing star. I’ve seen varying accounts as to why The Girl Can’t Help It was renamed from Do-Re-Mi and wasn’t credited as being based on Kanin’s novella. Some say that the film was made without the rights having been acquired, and changed to the point that Kanin wouldn’t sue. Others say that Twentieth Century Fox acquired the rights perfectly legally, but that the director, Frank Tashlin changed the script around so much that Kanin asked that his credit be removed, because it was now so different from his novella that he could probably resell the rights at some future point. The latter seems fairly likely to me, given that Tashlin’s next film, Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?, which also starred Jayne Mansfield, contained almost nothing from the play on which it was based. Indeed, the original play Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? was by the author of the original play on which The Seven-Year Itch was based. The playwright had been so annoyed at the way in which his vision had been messed with for the screen that he wrote Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter? as a satire about the way the film industry changes writers’ work, and Mansfield was cast in the play. When Tashlin wanted Mansfield to star in The Girl Can’t Help It but she was contractually obliged to appear in the play, Fox decided the easiest thing to do was just to buy up the rights to the play and relieve Mansfield of her obligation so she could star in The Girl Can’t Help It. They then, once The Girl Can’t Help It finished, got Frank Tashlin to write a totally new film with the title Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter?, keeping only the title and Mansfield’s character. While The Girl Can’t Help It has a reputation for satirising rock and roll, it actually pulls its punches to a surprising extent. For example, there’s a pivotal scene where the main mobster character, Fats, calls our hero after seeing Eddie Cochran on TV: [excerpt: dialogue from “The Girl Can’t Help It”] Note the wording there, and what he doesn’t say. He doesn’t say that Cochran can’t sing, merely that he “ain’t got a trained voice”. The whole point of this scene is to set up that Jerry Jordan, Mansfield’s character, could become a rock and roll star even though she can’t sing at all, and yet when dealing with a real rock and roll star they are careful to be more ambiguous. Because, of course, the main thing that sold the film was the appearance of multiple rock and roll stars — although “stars” is possibly overstating it for many of those present in the film. One thing it shared with most of the exploitation films was a rather slapdash attitude to which musicians the film would actually feature. And so it has the genuinely big rock and roll stars of the time Little Richard, the Platters, and Fats Domino, the one-hit wonder Gene Vincent (but what a one hit to have), and a bunch of… less well-known people, like the Treniers — a jump band who’d been around since the forties and never really made a major impact, or Eddie Fontaine (about whom the less said the better), or the ubiquitous Teddy Randazzo, performing here with an accordion accompaniment. [Excerpt: Teddy Randazzo and the Three Chuckles, “Cinnamon Sinner”] And Cochran was to be one of those lesser-known acts, so he and Capehart had to find a song that might be suitable for him to perform in the film. Very quickly they decided on a song called “Twenty Flight Rock”, written by a songwriter called Nelda Fairchild. There has been a lot of controversy as to who actually contributed what to the song, which is copyrighted in the names of both Fairchild and Cochran. Fairchild always claimed that she wrote the whole thing entirely by herself, and that Cochran got his co-writing credit for performing the demo, while Cochran’s surviving relatives are equally emphatic in their claims that he was an equal contributor as a songwriter. We will almost certainly never know the truth. Cochran is credited as the co-writer of several other hit songs, usually with Capehart, but never as the sole writer of a hit. Fairchild, meanwhile, was a professional songwriter, but pieces like “Freddie the Little Fir Tree” don’t especially sound like the work of the same person who wrote “Twenty Flight Rock”. As both credited writers are now dead, the best we can do is use our own judgment, and my personal judgment is that Cochran probably contributed at least something to the song’s writing. The original version of “Twenty Flight Rock”, as featured in the film, was little more than a demo — it featured Cochran on guitar, Guybo Smith on double bass, and Capehart slapping a cardboard box to add percussion. Cochran later recorded a more fully-arranged version of the song, which came out after the film, but the extra elements, notably the backing vocals, added little to the simplistic original: [Excerpt: Eddie Cochran, “Twenty Flight Rock”] It was that simpler version that appeared in the film, and which took its place alongside several other classic tracks in the film’s soundtrack. The film was originally intended to have a theme tune recorded by Fats Domino, who appeared in the film performing his hit “Blue Monday”, but when Bobby Troup mentioned this to Art Rupe, Rupe suggested that Little Richard would be a more energetic star to perform the song (and I’m sure this was entirely because of his belief that Richard would be the better talent, and nothing to do with Rupe owning Richard’s label, but not Domino’s). As a result, Domino’s role in the film was cut down to a single song, while Richard ended up doing three — the title song, written by Troup, “Ready Teddy” by John Marascalco and Bumps Blackwell, and “She’s Got It”. We’ve mentioned before that John Marascalco’s writing credits sometimes seem to be slightly exaggerated, and “She’s Got It” is one record that tends to bear that out. Listen to “She’s Got It”, which has Marascalco as the sole credited writer: [Excerpt: Little Richard, “She’s Got It”] And now listen to “I Got It”, an earlier record by Richard, which has Little Richard credited as the sole writer: [Excerpt: Little Richard, “I Got It”] Hmm… The Girl Can’t Help It was rather poorly reviewed in America. In France it was a different story. There’s a pervasive legend that the people of France revere Jerry Lewis as a genius. This is nonsense. But the grain of truth in it is that Cahiers du Cinema, the most important film magazine in France by a long way — the magazine for which Godard, Truffaut, and others wrote, and which popularised the concept of auteur theory, absolutely loved Frank Tashlin. In 1957, Tashlin was the only director to get two films on their top ten films of the year list — The Girl Can’t Help It at number eight, and Will Success Spoil Rock Hunter at number two. The other eight films on the list were directed by Chaplin, Fellini, Hitchcock, Bunuel, Ingmar Bergman, Nicholas Ray, Fritz Lang and Sidney Lumet. Tashlin directed several films starring Jerry Lewis, and those films, like Tashlin’s other work, got a significant amount of praise in the magazine. And that’s where that legend actually comes from, though Cahiers did also give some more guarded praise to some of the films Lewis directed himself later. Tashlin wasn’t actually that good a director, but what he did have is a visual style that came from a different area of filmmaking than most of his competitors. Tashlin had started out as a cartoon director, working on Warner Brothers cartoons. He wasn’t one of the better directors for Warners, and didn’t direct any of the classics people remember from the studio — he mostly made forgettable Porky Pig shorts. But this meant he had an animator’s sense for a visual gag, and thus gave his films a unique look. For advocates of auteur theory, that was enough to push him into the top ranks. And so The Girl Can’t Help It became a classic film, and Cochran got a great deal of attention, and a record deal. According to Si Waronker, the head of Liberty Records, Eddie Cochran getting signed to the label had nothing to do with him being cast in The Girl Can’t Help It, and Waronker had no idea the film was being made when Cochran got signed. This seems implausible, to say the least. Johnny Olenn, Abbey Lincoln and Julie London, three other Liberty Records artists, appeared in the film — and London was by some way Liberty’s biggest star. Not only that, but London’s husband, Bobby Troup, wrote the theme song and was musical director for the film. But whether or not Cochran was signed on account of his film appearance, “Twenty Flight Rock” wasn’t immediately released as a single. Indeed, by the time it came out Cochran had already appeared in another film, in which he had backed Mamie Van Doren — another Marilyn Monroe imitator in the same vein as Mansfield — on several songs, as well as having a small role and a featured song himself. Oddly, when that film, Untamed Youth, came out, Cochran’s backing on Van Doren’s recordings had been replaced by different instrumentalists. But he still appears on the EP that was released of the songs, including this one, which Cochran co-wrote with Capehart: [Excerpt: Mamie Van Doren, “Ooh Ba La Baby”] It had originally been planned to release “Twenty Flight Rock” as Cochran’s first single on Liberty, to coincide with the film’s release but then it was put back for several months, as Si Waronker wanted Cochran to release “Sitting in the Balcony” instead. That song had been written and originally recorded by John D Loudermilk: [Excerpt: John D Loudermilk, “Sitting in the Balcony”] Waronker had wanted to release Loudermilk’s record, but he hadn’t been able to get the rights, so he decided to get Cochran to record a note-for-note cover version and release that instead: [Excerpt: Eddie Cochran, “Sitting in the Balcony”] Cochran was not particularly happy with that record, though he was happy enough once the record started selling in comparatively vast quantities, spurred by his appearance in The Girl Can’t Help It, and reached number eighteen in the charts. The problem was that Cochran and Waronker had fundamentally different ideas about what Cochran actually was as an artist. Cochran thought of himself primarily as a guitarist — and the guitar solo on “Sittin’ in the Balcony” was the one thing about Cochran’s record which distinguished it from Loudermilk’s original — and also as a rock and roller. Waronker, on the other hand, was convinced that someone with Cochran’s good looks and masculine voice could easily be another Pat Boone. Liberty was fundamentally not geared towards making rock and roll records. Its other artists included the Hollywood composer Lionel Newman, the torch singer Julie London, and a little later novelty acts like the Chipmunks — the three Chipmunks, Alvin, Simon, and Theodore, being named after Al Bennett, Si Waronker, and Theodore Keep, the three men in charge of the label. And their attempts to force Cochran into the mould of a light-entertainment crooner produced a completely forgettable debut album, Singin’ to My Baby, which has little of the rock and roll excitement that would characterise Cochran’s better work. (And a warning for anyone who decides to go out and listen to that album anyway — one of the few tracks on there that *is* in Cochran’s rock and roll style is a song called “Mean When I’m Mad”, which is one of the most misogynist things I have heard, and I’ve heard quite a lot — it’s basically an outright rape threat. So if that’s something that will upset you, please steer clear of Cochran’s first album, while knowing you’re missing little artistically.) “Twenty Flight Rock” was eventually released as a single, in its remade version, in November 1957, almost a year after The Girl Can’t Help It came out. Unsurprisingly, coming out so late after the film, it didn’t chart, and it would be a while yet before Cochran would have his biggest hit. But just because it didn’t chart, doesn’t mean it didn’t make an impression. There’s one story, more than any other, that sums up the impact both of “The Girl Can’t Help It” and of “Twenty Flight Rock” itself. In July 1957, a skiffle group called the Quarrymen, led by a teenager called John Lennon, played a village fete in Woolton, a suburb of Liverpool. After the show, they were introduced to a young boy named Paul McCartney by a mutual friend. Lennon and McCartney hit it off, but the thing that persuaded Lennon to offer McCartney a place in the group was when McCartney demonstrated that he knew all the words to “Twenty Flight Rock”. Lennon wasn’t great at remembering lyrics, and was impressed enough by this that he decided that this new kid needed to be in the group. [Excerpt: Paul McCartney, “Twenty Flight Rock”] That’s the impact that The Girl Can’t Help It had, and the impact that “Twenty Flight Rock” had. But Eddie Cochran’s career was just starting, and we’ll see more of him in future episodes…
There are certain Beatles photographs that stick in the mind - from the chance snap of The Quarrymen playing together on the day John Lennon met Paul McCartney to Astrid Kirchherr’s carefully posed art images of the band in Hamburg.In this week’s episode presenters Laura Davis and Ellen Kirwin are joined by the man who took that first picture as a boy in Woolton - as well as Astrid Kirchherr’s archivist, Vladislav Ginzburg. For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy
Habíamos dejado al grupo saboreando las mieles del éxito de su Sgt. Pepper’s pero… éste éxito abrió la caja de los truenos y ya nada fue igual. John andaba con su nueva pareja, la artista conceptual Yoko Ono, y Paul pronto rompería lazos con el pasado y se enamoraría de la fotógrafa Linda Eastman. En 1968, tras el lanzamiento de su discográfica Appel, se habían convertido en un monstruo y antes de que este monstruo les devorara, quisieron recuperar sus propias identidades. Se reunieron para grabar, pero John y Paul ya no trabajaron juntos. Cada uno aportaba sus propias canciones (George hacía lo mismo) y las grababan como grupo, nada más. En este caldo de cultivo, nada propicio, se cocieron los últimos álbumes de la banda. El primero, Magical Mystery Tour, que era la banda sonora de su próxima película, apareció como un doble EP de seis temas a principios de diciembre de 1967. En los Estados Unidos las seis canciones aparecieron en un LP titulado de la misma manera, en el que se incluyeron también los temas de sus últimos sencillos. Allmusic, que es una guía de referencia para los aficionados, decía que las canciones contenidas en el Magical Mystery Tour americano eran: « «enormes, gloriosas e innovadoras». Pero amigos, no siempre se acierta y, aunque el álbum estableció un nuevo récord en sus primeras tres semanas de venta inicial en los Estados Unidos, la película, Magical Mystery Tour, dirigida básicamente por McCartney, les trajo la primera crítica negativa por parte de la prensa del Reino Unido, con artículos bastante duros. El Daily Express la calificó de «una indudable basura» y la describió como «una sucesión de imágenes sin editar mostrando a un grupo de gente subiendo y bajando de un autobús y viajando todo el tiempo». El Daily Mail la calificó como «un proyecto vanidoso», mientras que The Guardian la calificó como «una especie de juego de fantasía moral sobre la grosería, la calidez y la estupidez de la audiencia». Les fue tan rotundamente mal que fue cancelada en Estados Unidos. Hay en este disco, en la edición americana, una canción editada también en sencillo sobre la que merece la pena detenerse, es Strawberry Field. Strawberry Field era el nombre de un orfanato del Ejército de Salvación, muy cerca de la casa de John Lennon en Woolton, un suburbio de Liverpool. Lennon y sus amigos de la infancia solían jugar en el jardín arbolado que se encontraba detrás de la casa. Allí, en ese jardín, todos los veranos se celebraba un fiesta donde el niño Lennon se lo pasaba en grande escuchando la música de la banda del Ejercito de Salvación. Él mismo dijo que esta canción refleja la nostalgia y el recuerdo de aquellos primeros años vividos en Liverpool. A pesar de que se está refiriendo a lugares reales, también se detectan fuertes connotaciones surrealistas y psicodélicas. El productor George Martin dijo que cuando escuchó por primera vez la canción, pensó en un «mundo de sueños brumoso e impresionista». Para Lennon el periodo de tiempo en el que compuso la canción fue, por decirlo de alguna manera, complicado. A la controvertida frase «somos más populares que Jesucristo» y el desaire a Imelda Marcos, tenemos que añadir que el matrimonio de Lennon con Cynthia Powell estaba fallando y que había comenzado a consumir LSD de forma habitual. Con todo, la canción es preciosa. Entre tanto, apareció lo que sería el álbum The Beatles, un doble LP popularmente conocido como el White Album —Álbum Blanco— debido a su funda totalmente blanca. En contraposición a las anteriores fundas o cubiertas, el Álbum Blanco —publicado con el plus del diseño minimalista de Richard Hamilton— contrastaba con anteriores diseños de las cubiertas de estilo pop-art como los que realizaba Peter Blake. La inspiración creativa para este álbum llegó de la mano de su nuevo gurú Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. El caso es que el grupo participó en un «curso-guía» de tres meses de meditación transcendental que se convirtió en uno de sus períodos más creativos, produciendo allí un gran número de canciones, incluyendo la mayor parte de las treinta grabadas para el álbum. Pero pronto se cayeron del guindo: Ringo se marchó después de diez días de estancia allí, comparando aquel lugar con un campamento familiar de verano, y McCartney finalmente se aburrió con el comportamiento de sus compañeros en aquel lugar y se fue un mes después. A Lennon y Harrison les tuvieron que abrir los ojos gente de su entorno. Al constatar la manipulación a la que estaban siendo sometidos, Lennon quedó convencido y se fue abruptamente, llevándose a Harrison y al resto de la comitiva consigo. McCartney dijo: «Hemos cometido un error. Pensábamos que había algo más en el Maharishi de lo que realmente había». Durante las sesiones de grabación para el álbum, que se extendieron desde fines de mayo hasta mediados de octubre de 1968, las diferencias y los desacuerdos comenzaron a dividirlos. Ringo los dejó por un tiempo, lo que hizo que siguiesen adelante con McCartney tocando la batería en varios temas. El romance de Lennon con la artista vanguardista Yoko Ono contribuyó a crearles tensiones, haciendo que Lennon perdiese el interés en escribir canciones con McCartney. Desobedeciendo el acuerdo que ellos mismos establecieron de no llevar parejas al estudio, Lennon insistió en llevar a Ono a todas las sesiones de grabación, situación que no le agradaba a Harrison. También era cada vez más despectivo con los aportes creativos de McCartney, al que empezó a identificar como «autor de música para abuelitas», calificando la canción «Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da» como «música-basura para abuelitas». Recordando las sesiones del White Album, Lennon ofreció un abreviado resumen de la historia que había vivido con sus compañeros a partir de ese momento, diciendo: «Es como si sacaras cada tema de ahí y lo convirtieras en todo mío y todo de Paul [...] solamente yo con músicos de acompañamiento por un lado y Paul igualmente por otro; y me lo pasé bien. Entonces fue cuando nos disolvimos». McCartney también recordó que las sesiones marcaron los comienzos de la ruptura, diciendo: «Hasta ese momento, el mundo era un problema, pero nosotros no lo éramos», lo cual siempre había sido «la mejor cosa de The Beatles». Publicado en noviembre, el White Album fue el primer álbum de The Beatles editado por Apple Records. El sello discográfico era una de las divisiones de la empresa Apple Corps, formada por el grupo a su regreso de la India. El álbum tuvo más de dos millones de pedidos anticipados, vendiendo casi cuatro millones de copias en los Estados Unidos en poco más de un mes, y sus temas dominaron las listas de las emisoras de radio estadounidenses. A pesar de su popularidad, el doble álbum no tuvo, en los primeros días, una buena acogida. La crítica osciló entre la confusión y el desencanto. Finalmente, la opinión general de la crítica se decantó a favor del White Album, y en 2003 la revista Rolling Stone lo consideró el décimo mejor álbum de todos los tiempos. Esta es una de las mejores aportaciones de Harrison al album. Para ese entonces, el interés por las letras de The Beatles estaba tomando un aspecto más serio. Cuando la canción de Lennon «Revolution» se había publicado en un sencillo, como anticipo del White Album, su mensaje parecía claro: «libera tu mente» y «no cuentes conmigo» para cualquier conversación sobre la destrucción como medio para alcanzar un fin. En un año caracterizado por protestas estudiantiles que se extendían desde Varsovia hasta París y Chicago, la respuesta de la izquierda radical fue mordaz. Sin embargo, la versión de la canción en el White Album, «Revolution 1», añadía una palabra extra: «count me out... in» (traducible por: «no cuentes conmigo..., cuenta conmigo»), lo que implicaba un cambio de ideas desde la publicación del sencillo. De hecho, la cronología se había invertido: la ambigua versión del álbum se había grabado antes, pero algunos creyeron que The Beatles ahora decían que la violencia política podía ser, a pesar de todo, justificable. El LP Yellow Submarine apareció finalmente en enero de 1969. Contenía sólo cuatro de sus canciones inéditas, junto a la pista del título, ya aparecida en Revolver; una canción editada en sencillo en 1967; y siete piezas instrumentales compuestas por George Martin e interpretadas con su orquestada. Debido a la escasez de música nueva que la agrupación proporcionaba, Allmusic sugirió que quizás el álbum «no fuese esencial», salvo por el tema «It's All Too Much» de Harrison, «la joya de las nuevas canciones [...] resplandecida por un mellotron envolvente, una percusión increíble, y un feedback de guitarra fastuoso [...] una excursión virtuosa en la por otra parte confusa psicodelia reinante». Aunque Let It Be fue el último álbum que lanzaron, la mayor parte de su contenido fue grabado antes de Abbey Road. Inicialmente llamado Get Back, Let It Be se originó de una idea que Martin atribuye a McCartney: preparar nuevo material e interpretarlo por primera vez en un concierto, grabarlo para un nuevo álbum y filmar sus sesiones de grabación. En este caso, mucho del contenido del disco vino del trabajo en estudio, muchas horas de las cuales fueron capturadas en película por el director Michael Lindsay-Hogg. Martin dijo que los ensayos y la grabación para el proyecto, que ocuparon gran parte de enero de 1969, «no fue en absoluto una experiencia feliz. Fue una época en la que las relaciones entre los miembros de The Beatles estaban en su punto más bajo». Agravado por las relaciones entre McCartney y Lennon, Harrison abandonó los ensayos durante una semana. Regresó con el teclista Billy Preston, que participó en los últimos diez días de las sesiones del álbum y que fue acreditado en el sencillo «Get Back», el único músico en recibir tal reconocimiento en una grabación oficial de The Beatles. Pensando en la localización para realizar el concierto, a los miembros de la banda se les agotaron todas las ideas, rechazando, entre otros escenarios, un barco en el río Támesis, el desierto de Túnez y el Coliseo de Roma. Finalmente, acompañados por Preston, llevaron a cabo y filmaron la actuación en la azotea del edificio de Apple Corps en el 3 de Savile Row, Londres, el 30 de enero de 1969. Pero había que hacer el disco. Martin se sorprendió cuando McCartney se puso en contacto con él y le pidió que produjera un nuevo álbum, ya que las sesiones de Get Back habían sido —según el productor— «una experiencia desagradable» y que había «pensado que era el final del camino para todos nosotros [...] se habían convertido en personas desagradables - para ellos mismos como para las demás personas.» Las sesiones de grabación de Abbey Road se iniciaron a finales de febrero de 1969. El 4 de julio, mientras iba progresando el trabajo en el álbum, apareció el primer sencillo de un miembro de The Beatles en solitario: «Give Peace a Chance» de Lennon, acompañado por la Plastic Ono Band. El día que terminaron de grabar «I Want You (She's So Heavy)», de Abbey Road, el 20 de agosto, fue la última vez que los cuatro Beatles estuvieron juntos en el mismo estudio. Lennon anunció su retirada de la formación el 20 de septiembre de 1969, pero se llegó a un acuerdo por el cual no se haría ningún anuncio público hasta que no se resolvieran algunos asuntos legales aún pendientes. Lanzado seis días después de la declaración de Lennon, Abbey Road vendió cuatro millones de copias en dos meses y encabezó las listas del Reino Unido durante once semanas. Su segundo corte, la balada «Something», se publicó también como sencillo, la primera y única composición de Harrison en aparecer como un lado A en los sencillos de The Beatles. Abbey Road recibió críticas muy variadas: Allmusic considera que es «un oportuno canto de cisne para el grupo» con «algunas de las mejores armonías que pueden ser oídas en cualquier disco de rock». Por otro lado, MacDonald, un importante crítico de la época, lo resaltó como «errático y, a menudo hueco»: «Si no hubiera sido por la aportación de McCartney, Abbey Road carecería de la semblanza de unidad y coherencia que hace que parezca mejor de lo que es». Martin lo colocó como su favorito entre todos los álbumes de The Beatles y Lennon dijo que era «competente», pero «no tenía vida en él», tildando a las aportaciones de Paul como más música de abuelas. El 3 de enero de 1970 se grabó la última nueva canción de The Beatles, «I Me Mine», de Harrison, para el aún incompleto álbum Get Back. No había participado Lennon, que se encontraba entonces en Dinamarca. Para completar el álbum, ahora retitulado Let It Be, dieron las cintas de grabación de Get Back al productor estadounidense Phil Spector. Conocido por su característico muro de sonido, Spector había producido recientemente el sencillo en solitario de Lennon «Instant Karma!». Además de remezclar el material de Get Back, Spector editó, empalmó y sobregrabó varias de las pistas que The Beatles habían concebido como grabaciones «en vivo». McCartney estaba insatisfecho con el tratamiento que Spector le dio al material, y particularmente con la orquestación en «The Long and Winding Road», que involucró a un un coro y una orquesta de treinta y cuatro músicos. Por ello, intentó sin éxito detener el lanzamiento del álbum en la versión de Phil Spector. Finalmente, McCartney anunció públicamente la separación del grupo el 10 de abril de 1970, una semana antes de la publicación de su primer álbum en solitario. El 8 de mayo se lanzó el álbum Let It Be, y la película documental del mismo título le siguió más tarde. En la ceremonia de los Premios Óscar del siguiente año ganaría el Óscar a la mejor banda sonora. Pero los Beatles ya no eran un éxito seguro. The Sunday Telegraph la calificó como «una película muy mala, pero tierna al mismo tiempo, sobre la ruptura de esta tranquila, perfecta, y a veces atemporal familia de compañeros». Let It Be es el único álbum de The Beatles que ha recibido reseñas negativas, incluso hostiles. Paul McCartney presentó una demanda para la disolución de The Beatles el 31 de diciembre de 1970. Las disputas legales continuaron mucho tiempo después de la ruptura, y la disolución de la asociación no surtiría efecto hasta 1975. Esta versión de Don’t let me down es la del concierto en la terraza. Al final, cada uno de ellos recuperó su individualidad, y por primera vez en su vida, pudieron ser ellos mismos en lugar de ser un Beatle. Y entonces, como si el manto mágico que siempre les había protegido se esfumase de golpe, descubrimos que John era un grosero que se compadecía de si mismo, que Paul era malicioso y transmitia tensión por donde pasaba, que George, con sus barbas y su postura de loto era un pedante redomado y un roñoso y que Ringo, que se bebía el Nilo, cantaba country sensiblero acodado en la barra. Pero es que siempre habían intentado decírnoslo y, al final, no tuvimos más remedio que aceptarlo: solo eran cuatro seres humanos que hacían muy buena música. Y esto, queridos oyentes, es el fin. The End, The Beatles. Hasta aquí llegaron los Beatles y hasta aquí hemos llegado nosotros en el día de hoy. El final del mito dio paso a otros muchos músicos que, con el mismo genio, con el mismo talento, nos han proporcionado momentos musicales memorables y de los que nos ocuparemos. Eso si, ellos fueron los primeros. Amigos oyentes, disfrutad de la semana lo máximo posible y el próximo día os espero a todos aquí, en vuestra casa, en Radio La Granja. Hasta entonces… Buenas vibraciones!!!
Habíamos dejado al grupo saboreando las mieles del éxito de su Sgt. Pepper’s pero… éste éxito abrió la caja de los truenos y ya nada fue igual. John andaba con su nueva pareja, la artista conceptual Yoko Ono, y Paul pronto rompería lazos con el pasado y se enamoraría de la fotógrafa Linda Eastman. En 1968, tras el lanzamiento de su discográfica Appel, se habían convertido en un monstruo y antes de que este monstruo les devorara, quisieron recuperar sus propias identidades. Se reunieron para grabar, pero John y Paul ya no trabajaron juntos. Cada uno aportaba sus propias canciones (George hacía lo mismo) y las grababan como grupo, nada más. En este caldo de cultivo, nada propicio, se cocieron los últimos álbumes de la banda. El primero, Magical Mystery Tour, que era la banda sonora de su próxima película, apareció como un doble EP de seis temas a principios de diciembre de 1967. En los Estados Unidos las seis canciones aparecieron en un LP titulado de la misma manera, en el que se incluyeron también los temas de sus últimos sencillos. Allmusic, que es una guía de referencia para los aficionados, decía que las canciones contenidas en el Magical Mystery Tour americano eran: « «enormes, gloriosas e innovadoras». Pero amigos, no siempre se acierta y, aunque el álbum estableció un nuevo récord en sus primeras tres semanas de venta inicial en los Estados Unidos, la película, Magical Mystery Tour, dirigida básicamente por McCartney, les trajo la primera crítica negativa por parte de la prensa del Reino Unido, con artículos bastante duros. El Daily Express la calificó de «una indudable basura» y la describió como «una sucesión de imágenes sin editar mostrando a un grupo de gente subiendo y bajando de un autobús y viajando todo el tiempo». El Daily Mail la calificó como «un proyecto vanidoso», mientras que The Guardian la calificó como «una especie de juego de fantasía moral sobre la grosería, la calidez y la estupidez de la audiencia». Les fue tan rotundamente mal que fue cancelada en Estados Unidos. Hay en este disco, en la edición americana, una canción editada también en sencillo sobre la que merece la pena detenerse, es Strawberry Field. Strawberry Field era el nombre de un orfanato del Ejército de Salvación, muy cerca de la casa de John Lennon en Woolton, un suburbio de Liverpool. Lennon y sus amigos de la infancia solían jugar en el jardín arbolado que se encontraba detrás de la casa. Allí, en ese jardín, todos los veranos se celebraba un fiesta donde el niño Lennon se lo pasaba en grande escuchando la música de la banda del Ejercito de Salvación. Él mismo dijo que esta canción refleja la nostalgia y el recuerdo de aquellos primeros años vividos en Liverpool. A pesar de que se está refiriendo a lugares reales, también se detectan fuertes connotaciones surrealistas y psicodélicas. El productor George Martin dijo que cuando escuchó por primera vez la canción, pensó en un «mundo de sueños brumoso e impresionista». Para Lennon el periodo de tiempo en el que compuso la canción fue, por decirlo de alguna manera, complicado. A la controvertida frase «somos más populares que Jesucristo» y el desaire a Imelda Marcos, tenemos que añadir que el matrimonio de Lennon con Cynthia Powell estaba fallando y que había comenzado a consumir LSD de forma habitual. Con todo, la canción es preciosa. Entre tanto, apareció lo que sería el álbum The Beatles, un doble LP popularmente conocido como el White Album —Álbum Blanco— debido a su funda totalmente blanca. En contraposición a las anteriores fundas o cubiertas, el Álbum Blanco —publicado con el plus del diseño minimalista de Richard Hamilton— contrastaba con anteriores diseños de las cubiertas de estilo pop-art como los que realizaba Peter Blake. La inspiración creativa para este álbum llegó de la mano de su nuevo gurú Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. El caso es que el grupo participó en un «curso-guía» de tres meses de meditación transcendental que se convirtió en uno de sus períodos más creativos, produciendo allí un gran número de canciones, incluyendo la mayor parte de las treinta grabadas para el álbum. Pero pronto se cayeron del guindo: Ringo se marchó después de diez días de estancia allí, comparando aquel lugar con un campamento familiar de verano, y McCartney finalmente se aburrió con el comportamiento de sus compañeros en aquel lugar y se fue un mes después. A Lennon y Harrison les tuvieron que abrir los ojos gente de su entorno. Al constatar la manipulación a la que estaban siendo sometidos, Lennon quedó convencido y se fue abruptamente, llevándose a Harrison y al resto de la comitiva consigo. McCartney dijo: «Hemos cometido un error. Pensábamos que había algo más en el Maharishi de lo que realmente había». Durante las sesiones de grabación para el álbum, que se extendieron desde fines de mayo hasta mediados de octubre de 1968, las diferencias y los desacuerdos comenzaron a dividirlos. Ringo los dejó por un tiempo, lo que hizo que siguiesen adelante con McCartney tocando la batería en varios temas. El romance de Lennon con la artista vanguardista Yoko Ono contribuyó a crearles tensiones, haciendo que Lennon perdiese el interés en escribir canciones con McCartney. Desobedeciendo el acuerdo que ellos mismos establecieron de no llevar parejas al estudio, Lennon insistió en llevar a Ono a todas las sesiones de grabación, situación que no le agradaba a Harrison. También era cada vez más despectivo con los aportes creativos de McCartney, al que empezó a identificar como «autor de música para abuelitas», calificando la canción «Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da» como «música-basura para abuelitas». Recordando las sesiones del White Album, Lennon ofreció un abreviado resumen de la historia que había vivido con sus compañeros a partir de ese momento, diciendo: «Es como si sacaras cada tema de ahí y lo convirtieras en todo mío y todo de Paul [...] solamente yo con músicos de acompañamiento por un lado y Paul igualmente por otro; y me lo pasé bien. Entonces fue cuando nos disolvimos». McCartney también recordó que las sesiones marcaron los comienzos de la ruptura, diciendo: «Hasta ese momento, el mundo era un problema, pero nosotros no lo éramos», lo cual siempre había sido «la mejor cosa de The Beatles». Publicado en noviembre, el White Album fue el primer álbum de The Beatles editado por Apple Records. El sello discográfico era una de las divisiones de la empresa Apple Corps, formada por el grupo a su regreso de la India. El álbum tuvo más de dos millones de pedidos anticipados, vendiendo casi cuatro millones de copias en los Estados Unidos en poco más de un mes, y sus temas dominaron las listas de las emisoras de radio estadounidenses. A pesar de su popularidad, el doble álbum no tuvo, en los primeros días, una buena acogida. La crítica osciló entre la confusión y el desencanto. Finalmente, la opinión general de la crítica se decantó a favor del White Album, y en 2003 la revista Rolling Stone lo consideró el décimo mejor álbum de todos los tiempos. Esta es una de las mejores aportaciones de Harrison al album. Para ese entonces, el interés por las letras de The Beatles estaba tomando un aspecto más serio. Cuando la canción de Lennon «Revolution» se había publicado en un sencillo, como anticipo del White Album, su mensaje parecía claro: «libera tu mente» y «no cuentes conmigo» para cualquier conversación sobre la destrucción como medio para alcanzar un fin. En un año caracterizado por protestas estudiantiles que se extendían desde Varsovia hasta París y Chicago, la respuesta de la izquierda radical fue mordaz. Sin embargo, la versión de la canción en el White Album, «Revolution 1», añadía una palabra extra: «count me out... in» (traducible por: «no cuentes conmigo..., cuenta conmigo»), lo que implicaba un cambio de ideas desde la publicación del sencillo. De hecho, la cronología se había invertido: la ambigua versión del álbum se había grabado antes, pero algunos creyeron que The Beatles ahora decían que la violencia política podía ser, a pesar de todo, justificable. El LP Yellow Submarine apareció finalmente en enero de 1969. Contenía sólo cuatro de sus canciones inéditas, junto a la pista del título, ya aparecida en Revolver; una canción editada en sencillo en 1967; y siete piezas instrumentales compuestas por George Martin e interpretadas con su orquestada. Debido a la escasez de música nueva que la agrupación proporcionaba, Allmusic sugirió que quizás el álbum «no fuese esencial», salvo por el tema «It's All Too Much» de Harrison, «la joya de las nuevas canciones [...] resplandecida por un mellotron envolvente, una percusión increíble, y un feedback de guitarra fastuoso [...] una excursión virtuosa en la por otra parte confusa psicodelia reinante». Aunque Let It Be fue el último álbum que lanzaron, la mayor parte de su contenido fue grabado antes de Abbey Road. Inicialmente llamado Get Back, Let It Be se originó de una idea que Martin atribuye a McCartney: preparar nuevo material e interpretarlo por primera vez en un concierto, grabarlo para un nuevo álbum y filmar sus sesiones de grabación. En este caso, mucho del contenido del disco vino del trabajo en estudio, muchas horas de las cuales fueron capturadas en película por el director Michael Lindsay-Hogg. Martin dijo que los ensayos y la grabación para el proyecto, que ocuparon gran parte de enero de 1969, «no fue en absoluto una experiencia feliz. Fue una época en la que las relaciones entre los miembros de The Beatles estaban en su punto más bajo». Agravado por las relaciones entre McCartney y Lennon, Harrison abandonó los ensayos durante una semana. Regresó con el teclista Billy Preston, que participó en los últimos diez días de las sesiones del álbum y que fue acreditado en el sencillo «Get Back», el único músico en recibir tal reconocimiento en una grabación oficial de The Beatles. Pensando en la localización para realizar el concierto, a los miembros de la banda se les agotaron todas las ideas, rechazando, entre otros escenarios, un barco en el río Támesis, el desierto de Túnez y el Coliseo de Roma. Finalmente, acompañados por Preston, llevaron a cabo y filmaron la actuación en la azotea del edificio de Apple Corps en el 3 de Savile Row, Londres, el 30 de enero de 1969. Pero había que hacer el disco. Martin se sorprendió cuando McCartney se puso en contacto con él y le pidió que produjera un nuevo álbum, ya que las sesiones de Get Back habían sido —según el productor— «una experiencia desagradable» y que había «pensado que era el final del camino para todos nosotros [...] se habían convertido en personas desagradables - para ellos mismos como para las demás personas.» Las sesiones de grabación de Abbey Road se iniciaron a finales de febrero de 1969. El 4 de julio, mientras iba progresando el trabajo en el álbum, apareció el primer sencillo de un miembro de The Beatles en solitario: «Give Peace a Chance» de Lennon, acompañado por la Plastic Ono Band. El día que terminaron de grabar «I Want You (She's So Heavy)», de Abbey Road, el 20 de agosto, fue la última vez que los cuatro Beatles estuvieron juntos en el mismo estudio. Lennon anunció su retirada de la formación el 20 de septiembre de 1969, pero se llegó a un acuerdo por el cual no se haría ningún anuncio público hasta que no se resolvieran algunos asuntos legales aún pendientes. Lanzado seis días después de la declaración de Lennon, Abbey Road vendió cuatro millones de copias en dos meses y encabezó las listas del Reino Unido durante once semanas. Su segundo corte, la balada «Something», se publicó también como sencillo, la primera y única composición de Harrison en aparecer como un lado A en los sencillos de The Beatles. Abbey Road recibió críticas muy variadas: Allmusic considera que es «un oportuno canto de cisne para el grupo» con «algunas de las mejores armonías que pueden ser oídas en cualquier disco de rock». Por otro lado, MacDonald, un importante crítico de la época, lo resaltó como «errático y, a menudo hueco»: «Si no hubiera sido por la aportación de McCartney, Abbey Road carecería de la semblanza de unidad y coherencia que hace que parezca mejor de lo que es». Martin lo colocó como su favorito entre todos los álbumes de The Beatles y Lennon dijo que era «competente», pero «no tenía vida en él», tildando a las aportaciones de Paul como más música de abuelas. El 3 de enero de 1970 se grabó la última nueva canción de The Beatles, «I Me Mine», de Harrison, para el aún incompleto álbum Get Back. No había participado Lennon, que se encontraba entonces en Dinamarca. Para completar el álbum, ahora retitulado Let It Be, dieron las cintas de grabación de Get Back al productor estadounidense Phil Spector. Conocido por su característico muro de sonido, Spector había producido recientemente el sencillo en solitario de Lennon «Instant Karma!». Además de remezclar el material de Get Back, Spector editó, empalmó y sobregrabó varias de las pistas que The Beatles habían concebido como grabaciones «en vivo». McCartney estaba insatisfecho con el tratamiento que Spector le dio al material, y particularmente con la orquestación en «The Long and Winding Road», que involucró a un un coro y una orquesta de treinta y cuatro músicos. Por ello, intentó sin éxito detener el lanzamiento del álbum en la versión de Phil Spector. Finalmente, McCartney anunció públicamente la separación del grupo el 10 de abril de 1970, una semana antes de la publicación de su primer álbum en solitario. El 8 de mayo se lanzó el álbum Let It Be, y la película documental del mismo título le siguió más tarde. En la ceremonia de los Premios Óscar del siguiente año ganaría el Óscar a la mejor banda sonora. Pero los Beatles ya no eran un éxito seguro. The Sunday Telegraph la calificó como «una película muy mala, pero tierna al mismo tiempo, sobre la ruptura de esta tranquila, perfecta, y a veces atemporal familia de compañeros». Let It Be es el único álbum de The Beatles que ha recibido reseñas negativas, incluso hostiles. Paul McCartney presentó una demanda para la disolución de The Beatles el 31 de diciembre de 1970. Las disputas legales continuaron mucho tiempo después de la ruptura, y la disolución de la asociación no surtiría efecto hasta 1975. Esta versión de Don’t let me down es la del concierto en la terraza. Al final, cada uno de ellos recuperó su individualidad, y por primera vez en su vida, pudieron ser ellos mismos en lugar de ser un Beatle. Y entonces, como si el manto mágico que siempre les había protegido se esfumase de golpe, descubrimos que John era un grosero que se compadecía de si mismo, que Paul era malicioso y transmitia tensión por donde pasaba, que George, con sus barbas y su postura de loto era un pedante redomado y un roñoso y que Ringo, que se bebía el Nilo, cantaba country sensiblero acodado en la barra. Pero es que siempre habían intentado decírnoslo y, al final, no tuvimos más remedio que aceptarlo: solo eran cuatro seres humanos que hacían muy buena música. Y esto, queridos oyentes, es el fin. The End, The Beatles. Hasta aquí llegaron los Beatles y hasta aquí hemos llegado nosotros en el día de hoy. El final del mito dio paso a otros muchos músicos que, con el mismo genio, con el mismo talento, nos han proporcionado momentos musicales memorables y de los que nos ocuparemos. Eso si, ellos fueron los primeros. Amigos oyentes, disfrutad de la semana lo máximo posible y el próximo día os espero a todos aquí, en vuestra casa, en Radio La Granja. Hasta entonces… Buenas vibraciones!!!
This week's episode follows on from our trip to Woolton with the Quarrymen and we look back to July 12, 1958, the day John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and John Lowe cut their first record.We speak to Peter Phillips, the grandson of Percy Phillips, the man who owned the Kensington house turned recording studio where history was made in one living room.He also talks about how he continues his family's legacy today and making sure the recording studio lives on. Find out the more here. For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy
Original Quarrymen member Rod Davis takes us to the place where Paul McCartney and John Lennon first met - St Peter's Church in Woolton.He's joined with his brother Bernie Davis and the pair exclusively paint a detailed picture of what life was like in the village of Woolton when John and Paul met.Rod also debunks some widely-speculated myths about the Beatles and how the band came to be including a very interesting story about how there's a mistake on the plaque outside St Peter's Church Hall where the pair famously met.Rod played banjo with the Quarrymen from 1956 to mid 1957, he was replaced in the band by Paul. Since 1997 he has been playing guitar for the revived Quarrymen and sharing vocals with Len Garry. For Rod’s story see Hunter Davies’ biography of the Quarrymen. For information regarding your data privacy, visit acast.com/privacy
Sandra Ford used to live in The Dingle and in Woolton but now lives in Florida. Listen as she chats to Pete Price
Every week we have a 'School of the Week' and this week it was the turn of Bishop Martin Primary School in Woolton! Deputy head Jill joined Mick and our education expert Les Stewart on the line to talk about their Enterprise Week.
On Start the Week Andrew Marr explores food and politics. Churchill charged Lord Woolton with the daunting task of feeding Britain during WW2. The food writer William Sitwell looks at the black markets and shop raids Woolton had to battle as the country teetered on the edge of anarchy. Economist Jane Harrigan argues that it was rising food prices that sowed the seeds for the Arab Spring Uprisings, and food historian Bee Wilson asks what governments can do now to control what we eat. Producer: Hannah Sander.
Rob Clarke, the guitarist and frontman and CEO .from Liverpool Legends ...Rob Clarke and the Wooltones joins Muffin Junkee Podhost Jay Daniels for a series of interviews about the Music of Rob Clarke and the Wooltones and everything Wooltone ! and remember their not just a Band but a Brand ! ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------> You will hear many magnificient tunes Rob Clarke and the Wootlones album The World of the Wooltones and from their Brown Single ! ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------> But kiddos that's not all you will hear an exclusive live version of their brand new Wooltone Single " Iron Eyes Cody " performed Live in the Muffin Junkee studio by Rob ! and also during this Podcast you will hear the bside of this excellent new single release : "Iron Eyes Cody Horse Opera " ! --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------> Rob Clarke and the Wooltones Podcast Set List : (all songs by Rob Clarke and the Wooltones ) 1 Pancake Cupcake 2.Colours of the Sun 3.Monkey Mind 4. Butter .5 Are We Here ****6 Iron Eyes Cody ( Exclusive Live Acoustic Version ) 7.Peas .8 .Iron Eyes Cody Horse Opera (Brand new Bside from the Iron Eyes Cody single ! ) Outro : Mystic Room -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------> Additional Songs by Rob Clarke and Performed by Rob Clarke during this Podcast ..on his Acoustic Guitar and the Piano : 1 Tea (There's No Guarantee ) 2 Another Tea Song and 3 A Minute and Five --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------> Additional Audio by Rob Clarke and the Wooltones that appears in this Podcast : 1 Wooltone Yes ! 2. Wooltone Smile 3.Lennon Butter 4.Voltone VI Fi Get On It ! 5.Our Raving Reporter : The World of the Wooltones 6.Wooltone Brown Sketch 7 .A Case of Wooltone ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------> Additional Music that Appears in this Podcast : 1 .Woolton Man - Wild Willie and the Washboards ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------> Check out all of Rob Clarke and the Wooltones Music at : www.robclarkeandthewooltones.co.uk Special thanks to Rob Clarke for all the fab interviews and acoustic performances ! Ace ! and thanks of course to Pepe Hoonose and GP Chesters and Producer Fran Ashcroft and also to Sam Rogerson ! and of course Staff Only Records and Jeff Baxter ! -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------> Be sure to check their brand new single "Iron Eyes Cody " and indeed all their albums and eps at :www.robclarkeandthewooltones.co.uk -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------> and check out Rob Clarke and the Brown Bears Music at : http://www.robclarkemusic.com/ ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Muffin Junkee Theme by Paul Worsley
Tonight our host, Jude Southerland Kessler, author of http://www.johnlennonseries.com will have the joy of talking to John Lennon's boyhood friend, Michael Hill. Michael attended Dovedale Primary in Woolton with John, and later, QuarryBank Grammar with both John and Pete Shotton! His stories are incredible... and not the same tired tales you've heard a dozen times! Michael is the author of a brand new book: John Lennon, The Boy Who Became a Legend, and it is fascinating! In fact, Michael proposes a new story about the event that "hooked" John on rock'n'roll. Don't miss this exciting new info for Beatles fans!
On the afternoon of 6 July 1957 the Quarrymen skiffle group played at the garden fete of St Peter's Church, Woolton, Liverpool. In the band were John Lennon (vocals, guitar), Eric Griffiths (guitar), Colin Hanton (drums), Rod Davies (banjo), Pete Shotton (washboard) and Len Garry (tea chest bass). Their repertoire consisted mainly of Skiffle songs; skiffle blossomed in England, just before Rock &R oll replaced it from 1958 onwards. They played various Lonnie Donnegan songs,interspersed with songs by Gene Vincent, Elvis Presley, Eddie Cochran and Jerry Lee Lewis.This Quarrymen's set, remarkably, was recorded by an audience member, Bob Molyneux, on his portable Grundig reel-to-reel tape recorder. In 1994 Molyneux, then a retired policeman, rediscovered the tape. The tape was sold on 15 September 1994 at Sotheby's for £78,500. The winning bidder was EMI Records, who considered if for release as part of the Anthology project: performencas of Lonnie Donegan's Puttin' On The Style and Elvis Presley's Baby, Let's Play House were released, but EMI chose not to release more than half a minute or so, as the sound quality was deemed substandard.The BDJ engineers carefully reconstructed the tape using state-of-the-art digital techniques and so 10 minutes of the set were reproduced. The sound quality is as poor as the Anthology release, but true Beatles fans will appreciate these 10 minutes for their historic value.Setlist: Puttin on the Style, My Baby Left Me, Be-Bop-A-Lula, Maggie Mae, Baby Let's Play House, Blue Suede Shoes.
In the summer of 1966, the Beatles scored a No 1 with a double A-side single. On one side was "Yellow Submarine", and on the other there was "Eleanor Rigby", a sombre song with string backing about lonely people. It featured Eleanor Rigby, who sat by the window, and Father McKenzie, who may or may not have been the priest who officiated at her funeral, to which nobody came. Paul claimed that he had originally considered calling her Daisy Hawkins, although it is difficult to see how "Daisy" could have been made to fit the song's meticulous scansion, in which two unstressed syllables follow each stressed syllable, except at the end of a line. He then syas that hetook the name "Eleanor" from Eleanor Bron, who starred with the Beatles in the film Help!, and "Rigby" from the Bristol wine merchants, Rigby & Evens. But in the 1980s, a grave was discovered in St Peter's Church, Woolton, Liverpool, where McCartney and Lennon went sunbathing as teenagers, bearing the name Eleanor Rigby. nother gravestone had the word "McKenzie" sprawled on it. But who was the lonely person who picked up the rice in a church where a wedding had been really ? Paul stated on various occasions that the original lyrics featured a 'father McCartney'; he changed these to 'father McKenzie' since he did not want people to think it was about his father. But was it ? If the orginal lyrics were indeed about his father (McCartney), then whom would 'Eleanor Rigby' have referred to in the very first conception of the lyrics ? Could this have been 'mother McCartney', or - more likely - Mary McCartney (Paul's mother's name) ? Both fit the the rythm of the song much better than 'Daisy Hawkins' ! The lyrics were put together among The Beatles and friends (Pete Shotton), so we shouldn't expect to extract too much relevance concerning Paul in them. In later years, Lennon claimed that he suggested most of the words, but this appears unlikely, apart from the chorus. McCartney used a string octet of studio musicians, composed of four violins, two cellos, and two violas, all performing a score composed by George Martin.The octet was recorded on 28 April 1966, in Studio 2 at Abbey Road Studios and completed in Studio 3 on 29 April and on 6 June. Tantalisingly, the string quartet was recoreded (close - miked) on all four tracks of the EMI machine. Imagine if we had those ttracks to mix with ! The original stereo mix has Paul's voice only in the right channel during the verses, with the string octet mixed to one channel, while the mono single and mono LP featured a more balanced mix. In my ears, the stereo mix from June '66 was bungled: the stereo string quartet is further bounced into a mono track (in the middle of the stereo field), and lead vocals are on the extreme right, but sometimes seem to wander. The chorus features true stereo vocals on 2 occasions, but a 'fake' sounding stero in another case. Perhaps even George Martin was unhappy with the stereo version, when stereo became the norm instead of the mono versions. A complete remix was done for the Love release, boasting a stereo string quartet and centred vocals; unfortunately, the song fades in and out of other tracks in Love. Another remix ws made for the 1999 re-release of the Yellow Submarine movie. Again a decent stereo landscape, but here the vocals sound slightly out of sync.... So, there appears to be room for a definitive remix of Eleanor Rigby: fixing the stereo image, including a/o a stereo string quartet & true stereo vocals in the chorus throughout. George Martin, in his autobiography All You Need Is Ears, takes credit for combining two of the vocal parts, having noticed that they would work together contrapuntally. I didn't like it, so created a more suitable ending. Re-did the intro as well, while I was on it.......
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