Recently I’ve been on a huge Beatles kick. It’s been great fun re-discovering some of the earlier stuff, the very songs that got me excited about music in the first place. Lizzy and I have been watching the Anthology series, which aired when I was in eighth grade, around the time I started my first rock band. Watching the series this time around has has not only reinvigorated my interest in the Beatles, it has made for a kind of strange flashback, as I lay awake in bed thinking about arrangements, bass lines, harmony lines, etc., just as I did when I was thirteen.
What’s more bizarre is that, as I was listening to “Paperback Writer” yesterday, I switched on my computer (my homepage is the New York Times), only to find a front page article on the Beatles. It seems that, after years of legal battles over trademark rights between Apple Corps. (the Beatles’ company) and Apple Computers, the Beatles have agreed to sell their music on iTunes. Even though, I’m sure, this has been in the media for weeks, I really had no idea it was coming. And yet this news seems to have coincided with my recent obsession with the Beatles. For the remainder of the night, I mulled over the news that the Beatles catalog was now available on iTunes.
Then, later last night, on Facebook, someone posted a link to a Gary Neuman video. I proceeded to geek out on Gary Neuman, searching for videos on YouTube, quickly gaining familiarity with his catalog. But here’s the thing: I would only watch 1/3 to 1/2 of each video (on my iPhone, by the way) before I became disinterested, and moved on. This is not to say that Neuman’s music is not engaging. On the contrary it’s quite engaging (and seemingly ahead of it’s time). After about seven Gary Neuman videos, I was struck with a thought: that the Beatles catalog is now available on iTunes is a sign of the end times.
OK, not really. But it does make a substantial statement about how music is consumed these days. The Beatles, after all, have sold upwards of 177 million records in the U.S. alone. That is a staggering figure. Not only that, but the Beatles continue to sell large numbers of albums some 40 plus years after they broke up! If there is any one band that does not need to succumb to the digital era, it is the Beatles!
I remember discovering the Beatles. I’m not sure what initially sparked my interest in them, but I do remember how excited I was to get ahold of every Beatles-related item I could. I dusted off my parents’ old vinyl records, I asked for CDs for Christmas and birthdays, and I spent my allowance on Beatles CDs. There was a certain “thrill of the hunt” in every new Beatles discovery I made. Watching the Anthology series, as of late, has stirred-up in me that “thrill of the hunt.”
But in discovering Gary Neuman last night, the thrill was gone, as it were. I could quickly consume one song, be done with it halfway through, and move on. And the next song was (literally) at my fingertips. There was no real commitment on my part. I consumed Neuman’s music as if it were a Twinky. It’s not surprising that the whole experience left a bad taste in my mouth. And, really, it was unfair to Gary Neuman, an artist with a long, influential, and respected career.
The author of the New York Times article (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/16/business/media/16apple.html?_r=1&scp=2&sq=beatles&st=cse) quotes commentator John Perry Barlow, saying ‘It’s probably some of the most remarkable songwriting created by humans and there are new generations coming along that don’t already know these songs,’ as if making the Beatles’ catalog available on iTunes can be justified by the idea that it can only lead to young people discovering the Beatles. But I wonder whether these new generations are going to experience the same fervor in their Beatles discoveries? There is something mysteriously satisfying about going through the motions of the “Beatles right of passage,” motions my parents went through. As I watch old Beatles footage, I am amazed by the crazy, screaming crowds, with hoards of teenage girls in tears over the Fab Four. I simply cannot imagine the ironic teens of today unanimously going crazy over a band. Nor can I imagine those same teens being singularly “into” one band. There are so many choices at their fingertips, how could the teens of today possibly devote so much of their attention to one band, no matter how truly great that band is? It’s a depressing question I pose. For musicians, it's a deflating question I pose.
There was a whole-hearted infatuation with the Beatles in the teenagers of the early 1960s. This infatuation bespeaks a certain commitment on the part of the fan. The fans were committed to tuning into the Ed Sullivan Show, or the local Saturday morning radio show. The fans were committed to buying the singles just as soon as they came out. The fans lined up outside of the record store the day before Sgt. Pepper’s dropped. There was an active engagement on the part of the fan, a willingness to devote real time, money, and energy to a band. To my mind, casually perusing YouTube does not constitute real time or energy, and it certainly doesn’t cost anything. This business of having anything you want, any time you want is troubling. Great music (great art) deserves our time and attention!
As I write this, I have to wonder whether the fact that I have recently renewed my interest in the Beatles is a coincidence? It is likely that, in the lead-up to Apple’s big announcement, there was a lot of press, which in turn permeated the general consciousness. But, regardless of whether I have Apple/iTunes to thank for my recently renewed interest in the Beatles, it is likely that I would have gone down the same path at some point, just as I have before, and probably will again.
While writing this blog, I got a phone call from Pete Droge (I work with Pete at his Puzzle Tree Studio). Pete mentioned that he recently attended an old-fashioned listening party, where everyone shared a recording that he or she liked, and then they simply listened. Often I lament that we never simply listen anymore, and I make a point to do it from time to time. Call me old-fashioned, but I sincerely hope that the upcoming generations of new Beatles fans just sit and listen to the Beatles, regardless of how they obtained the music.
Over the past few years there has been a lot of talk and speculation over the state of the music industry. We often refer to how music is consumed. No one seems to question the very idea of whether music should be consumed, however. This is no minor matter of linguistics! If I were to decode my own little blog, I suppose that this is the issue at the heart of this piece. The thought of merely consuming the Beatles’ music makes me sad.
I hear you. It seems a shame to think of any music as a consumable like that, but that is more true for the Beatles than for almost anyone else. Part of what we have lost in the digital era, too, is the concept of an album. Think of 'Sergeant Pepper,' both for the music in album form and for the album cover.
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