The Beatles have been a part of my life for as long as I can remember, thanks to my dad being a huge Beatles fan. He still has his copy of Yesterday and Today and I remember him playing it a lot when I was young. I was also very fascinated by the cover the first time I saw it. The story is pretty notorious by now - the Beatles did a photo shoot of themselves in butcher jackets with meat and baby doll parts surrounding them.
The photo was
deemed too offensive, and the album was pulled off the shelves to be
repackaged. But they didn't print out
whole new sleeves; that would be too expensive.
They simply covered up the offensive cover with a new one, one that
would ironically be later called one of the early clues for the "Paul is Dead"
controversy, thanks to Paul sitting in that case.
Because it's like a coffin! Yeah, right.
My dad got one of the re-covered versions,
but when he heard the original was worth a lot of money he thought he'd be slick and steam the re-print cover off
it. The end result is that you can now
see the butcher cover, but it's not very pretty. I mean that it's wrinkled and worn even beyond the actual ugliness of the cover itself.
So I grew up singing Beatles songs and being what I guess you could call a casual fan. I was apparently dedicated enough that in third grade, when we were asked to draw our favorite band in music class, I chose them. I did make a mistake, I drew five members instead of four, but my heart was in the right place. It was also a pretty big sign in my youth that I was destined to not be like the other kids - most of the other girls in my class were drawing New Kids on the Block, and one of them chose to make fun of me for my choice. Which is I guess why while loving the Beatles wouldn't normally be regarded as a geeky interest, I still feel like it's the perfect fit for me to talk about on this blog. Well, that and the level of devotion I gained the moment I saw The Beatles Anthology on television.
There are so many more Beatles related topics I could cover, from their music and their movies to the numerous parodies and tributes that have been created since. But I'm just going to have to save those for another time.
+JMJ+
ReplyDeleteI finally had some free time to watch this tonight. =)
This is a really great review! You make me wish I had some extra cash on hand. =)
Length, aye? I get what you mean, but this is something I'd totally pull an all-nighter for. Now if I could only find some like-minded friends to do it with me . . . Friends geeky enough to listen to all the extra music as well. (See? I do get what you mean. LOL!)
For the most part, I listened to this like a Podcast rather than watched it like a video, which is how I almost missed that picture of Imelda Marcos in the book! Oh, that was a bizarre point in Beatles history! Does the book report it and then drop the story, or does it have more closure, such as what Paul, George and Ringo thought when the Marcoses were deposed?
PS -- I drew The Beatles a lot during the fourth grade. =) I got the suits and instruments right but messed up the hair so often that I ended up drawing them without hair. =P When I think that a clever artist could draw only those unmistakeable mop tops and have a good portrait of them, I cringe at myself.
That would be a very long night! I usually get through it in about three or four days when I watch it, with obvious breaks in between. :)
DeleteI haven't read through that part of the book yet (I originally had a hardback copy that got ruined in Katrina, and I've only recently purchased the paperback version) but they talk about it in the documentary as well. I remember Paul says something to the effect that once they found out later on what the Marcoses had been doing, they were glad to have accidentally snubbed them.
+JMJ+
DeleteWell, okay, probably not just one night! LOL! Especially not if we take impromptu sing-song breaks. (Oh, I'm so embarrassing . . .) Maybe a nice weekend. =)
Thanks for sharing that tidbit! I hope to hear/read it for myself some time soon, too!