Letters to the Editor
Zootsuiter
Published Letters: 13 Editor's Choice: 2
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Sgt. Pepper always aroused mixed reactions
[Read the article: The "Sgt. Pepper" discussion continues]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I vividly remember buying Sgt. Peppers the day it came out. I was in high school, a mad Beatles fan, and the album was hyped beforehand pretty well. The first listens -- some of it was surprising, some of it, well, odd, and then "A Day in the Life." At once the greatest rock song done to that moment and not really a rock song at all.
In 1967, the Beatles were not the most political band in the world (despite John's occasional nose-thumbing), they often did goofy music hall numbers (Paul clearly had a fondness for them), and they were wildly experimental for the time. Sgt. Pepper, to me, just picks up from Revolver, which would be arguably the second best rock album of the era (anyone for Rubber Soul as the third?). Tomorrow Never Knows shows up as a more compelling and mature Within You, Without You. Paul has his soulful ballad, She's Leaving Home. And so on.
I mostly agree with people who say it was radical for the time. On the politics, make no mistake that everyone got the message about She's Leaving Home being about a runaway from straight parents. Good Morning is a bit Dylanesque, again about people trapped in meaningless routine. Lovely Rita was a British thing -- in America in 1967, we had convinced ourselves that classes don't exist. A Little Help From My Friends was obviously a countercultural anthem, not so dissimilar in message from many Dylan songs, if more accessible and palatable (don't get me wrong, I love Dylan of that era).
The obvious things:
1. Albums were not such a big deal in rock music until the Beatles, period. And the idea of a thematically unified album had probably been only done for corny themes thought up by A&R men, like car songs or beach songs. Sgt. Pepper was the first album that was truly more than the sum of its parts. It was also one of the first to make good use of stereo, which unfortunately gave way to a lot of "headphone" albums with cheesy pans back and forth (Hendrix was a big offender there).
2. A Day in the Life was a stunner at the time, its use of recorded everyday sounds, tempo and mood changes, the ending and everything about it suggesting that rock could be used for big ideas and new things. It signaled the end of the Chuck Berry era of rock lyrics and music ("All Chuck's children playing his licks," as Bob Seeger intoned in the '70s). And don't forget the words -- Lennon's weary, alienated lyrics rank with the best of Dylan and others of the time as a poetic indictment of mainstream culture
As for influence, it amazes me that people think the Stones or Doors had more influence on what came later than the Beatles. The Stones were a great garage blues band and they did a lot to bring blues and later soul in to rock. But please, they had a lot of company, and just being the last ones standing doesn't qualify you as a prime influence.
Most of the time that you hear acoustic guitars in contemporary rock, you're hearing references back to Beatles 65 and all through the later Beatles. Close harmonies -- sure they stole it from the Everlys, but most future musicians heard it from them. Snide sarcastic cryptic remarks about the existing order -- Dylan and Lennon. Did other people do all of these things in the '60s? Sure, but many of them were aping the Beatles, too.
It's certainly true that Hendrix was more innovative than the Beatles. He was less influential during his day than them, and probably more afterwards. I find it difficult to believe, though, that his lyrics weren't influenced by the Beatles, among many others. The way he sometimes tells stories, like Dolly Dagger, or the Wind Cries Mary, that's a style that the Beatles really made work.
I get that many younger people relate no more to Sgt. Pepper than I do to Elvis' first album. Still, it's a rich collection of great music, and even if you don't buy the hype, it's always been worth a listen.
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Give me a break
[Read the article: "The Sopranos" goes dark]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]For all the reasons Heather lists as to why the Sopranos has been such a great show and so well written, the ending was cheesy and unworthy. It reduced The Sopranos to a reality TV show in which the audience gets to choose the winner. Maybe HBO should take a text message vote: 1 if Tony gets killed, 2 if the all get killed...
Maybe the DVD of Season 7 will have multiple endings and we can choose the one we like. Or maybe it will have some cool software that allows us to graft on YouTube endings to it. And so on.
To David Chase: own the end, dammit! If you wanted us to have a moral crisis, write something that does that. If you wanted us to feel satisfied that justice was done, write that. We didn't need your permission to argue about the woulda, shoulda, coulda stuff -- we'll do that anyway. But it would have been fun to argue about your end, not your non-end.
Upon the screen turning black, my wife immediately said "oh, there's going to be a movie and they don't want to ruin it." Hard not to feel manipulated like that.
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Apple didn't invent the GUI
[Read the article: Why the iPhone matters]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]While I generally agree with Farhad's piece, I'd like to make a couple of points in the interest of accuracy:
1. Apple didn't invent grapical desktops. Xerox did -- a system called STAR -- but never really made a go of it. Apple figured out how to do it in much lower cost, consumer products.
2. Apple has previously introduced game-changer devices that they failed at. I'm thinking of the Newton, which got the PDA off the ground. Palm did it cheaper and more or less as well and the Newton went away.
Apple's manaical proprietary approach will be a serious obstacle to the iPhone's success. In my opinion, that's their Achille's heel.
Mark Schlack