5.1 WORKSHEET 5

Compleat Beatles 1982 Part 3 Links to an external site.

Link Links to an external site. BEATLES

We are now at a crucial time in the history of rock music. The British Invasion occurred in 1964, and was spearheaded by the Beatles.

First off download and print Worksheet 5:

HIS:ROCK WORKSHEET 5 -1.pdf Download HIS:ROCK WORKSHEET 5 -1.pdf

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You know all those other great British bands we have enjoyed over the years, like the Rolling Stones, The Who, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, etc.? They would not have happened had not the Beatles broken through. Before that, it was rare for a foreign act to break through to the American charts. We invented R&R, and it was our domain. The Beatles broke through in such a way that was stunning, like a spaceship landing on our soil. It was also totally unexpected. Think about it. What if you were told that the greatest think musically was going to come from, say, Ramona, California? You would laugh it off for sure.  Well, the Beatles came from literally nowhere, the seaport town of Liverpool, 200 miles northwest from London.

They changed the music business from a singles (45 rpm) market to a album market (33 rpm), and completely changed the concept of what pop music could be.

The Beatles not only shocked the world, they surprised even England, where not much was expected from the outlying towns. The action, the entertainment, the center of it all was in London, not in Liverpool.

When I think of the Beatles story, I think of a maze, where you try to get from one point to another, by taking various turns. The Beatles could have missed their chance at various points, but they were at the right places at the right times. Their story has been documented dozens of times, and there are hundreds of books written about them and their music.  First let's look at what others have said about them:

QUOTES ABOUT THE BEATLES

“The greatest rock band of all time. Nobody even comes into the same planetary system in terms of songwriting and presentation. They never repeated themselves. They kept going from strength to strength.”
● –Lemmy Kilmister, Motörhead

“If it hadn’t been for The Beatles, there wouldn’t be anyone like us around.”
● –Jimmy Page, Led Zeppelin

“It was just magic – it was like being hit by a bolt of lightning. I even remember where I was and what I was doing. I was walking down the road in Aston one day, with my light blue transistor radio, and this song came on. I thought, ‘What the f**k is that?’
“It changed my life forever, and at that point I knew what I wanted to do with my life. I never knew it would turn out the way it did – it turned out way bigger than my wildest expectations – but I knew that I wanted to be the singer in a band.”
“The Greatest Band To Ever Walk The Earth!”
● –Ozzy Osbourne, Black Sabbath

“They were always original, and that’s thing that comes across from the beginning to the end. These people thought differently from everybody else, and that’s why they made it to the very top.”
● –Mark Lewisohn, author

“This was different, shifted the lay of the land. Four guys, playing and singing, writing their own material … Rock ‘n’ roll came to my house where there seemed to be no way out … and opened up a whole world of possibilities.”
● –Bruce Springsteen

“We were driving through Colorado, we had the radio on, and eight of the Top 10 songs were Beatles songs…’I Wanna Hold Your Hand,’ all those early ones. They were doing things nobody was doing. Their chords were outrageous, just outrageous, and their harmonies made it all valid… I knew they were pointing the direction of where music had to go.”
● –Bob Dylan

“There’s no outdoing The Beatles.”
“Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band is probably the greatest single album I ever heard.”
“the Beatles ultimately “eclipsed a lot [of what] we’d worked for … [they] eclipsed the whole music world.”
● –Brian Wilson, the Beach Boys

“This was the main event of my life. It was certainly the major event for many others, whether or not they knew it at the time. For me, it was no less dramatic than aliens landing on the planet. … There’s no equivalent of that today, TV shows that literally everybody watched. All ages, all ethnic groups, all in black and white on a 14-inch screen. … It was their sound, their looks, their attitudes. It was so many things. A time to look at things differently, question things a little bit. All kinds of things were new.”

● –Steven Van Zandt, Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band

“I love the Beatles. What more can I say? I’m not gonna lie to you. I love ’em. They make me happy. And I think they were the best, and still are.”
● –Liam Gallagher, Oasis

“From one generation to the next, The Beatles will remain the most important rock band of all time.”
“The Beatles are the foundation of everything we do.”
“If it weren’t for The Beatles, I would not be a musician.”
● –Dave Grohl, Foo Fighters

“The Beatles were the ON switch to my life. I can’t even put into words the impact they had on my seven year-old soul. It is almost 50 years ago I saw them on Ed Sullivan and this was the music that changed my life. I got a copy of Meet the Beatles and a guitar for my seventh birthday, and the guitar has been welded to me ever since. I was drawn to the sound of the guitars and the songs and the vocals, the way they looked and how they acted…well really everything about them! It was pure magic to me. I learned to play to those records, and like all the people my age that play music , we all wanted to be the Beatles. I think the Beatles are my generation’s classical music, and as time has shown, they still are our musical gold standard. John, Paul, George, and Ringo changed the entire planet like no one ever will again! They are and always will be the greatest band of all time.”
● –Steve Luthaker, Toto

“The British Invasion changed everything musically and culturally. Like a “big bang” there was a before and an after. Ideas changed, music changed, society changed, and the impact of The Beatles alone will keep fans and historians busy forever. A defining moment in the 20th Century that continues to resonate, and will continue strongly for all time.”
● –Todd Sucherman, Styx

“My favorite artists have always been Elvis and The Beatles and they still are!”
● –Johnny Ramone, the Ramones

“John Lennon has been my idol all my life.”
● –Kurt Cobain, Nirvana

“The Beatles were formative in my upbringing, my education. They came from a very similar background: the industrial towns in England, working class; they wrote their own songs, conquered the world. That was the blueprint for lots of other British kids to try to do the same.”
“I think The Beatles are the reason I’m a musician.”
● –Sting, the Police

“The minute I saw The Beatles on The Ed Sullivan Show — and it’s true of thousands of guys — there was the way out. There was the way to do it. You get your friends and you’re a self-contained unit. And you make the music. And it looked like so much fun. It was something I identified with. I had never been hugely into sports. … I had been a big fan of Elvis. But I really saw in The Beatles that here’s something I could do. I knew I could do it. It wasn’t long before there were groups springing up in garages all over the place. ”
● –Tom Petty

“The Beatles were in a different stratosphere, a different planet to the rest of us. All I know is when I heard ‘Love Me Do’ on the radio, I remember walking down the street and knowing my life was going to be completely different now the Beatles were in it.”
● –Justin Hayward, The Moody Blues

“From a standing start, knowing only a handful of chords between them, John Lennon and Paul McCartney turned themselves into the most influential composers of the late twentieth century. Their music wasn’t just immensely popular. It also proved that traditional western harmony – the main building block of European music – still had plenty to offer. (Even though avant-garde composers had turned their back on it.) By mixing pop and classical techniques, and cross-fertilising them with Indian, and electronic music, The Beatles refreshed and revitalised western harmony. They also transformed the recording studio from a dull box where you recaptured your live sound, into a musical laboratory, of exciting and completely new sounds. This was one of the most crucial advances in the way popular music was to be produced. But Lennon & McCartney didn’t just influence all popular music that followed them. They influenced classical music too. The leading classical composers of our own era have turned back to traditional harmony. More than anyone, Lennon & McCartney prefigured this trend. They showed that the old musical forms could be refashioned and refreshed, to make music that was both exciting and popular, and sophisticated and new. They, more than anyone, saved the western musical tradition from extinction, and gave it a new purpose and a direction. Not bad going for two boys who met at a local church fete and taught themselves their instruments.”
● –Howard Goodall, music composer named “Composer of the Year” at the 2009 Classical BRIT Awards

“The impact of the Beatles – not only on rock & roll but on all of Western culture – is simply incalculable … [A]s personalities, they defined and incarnated ’60s style: smart, idealistic, playful, irreverent, eclectic…. [N]o group has so radically transformed the sound and significance of rock & roll. … [they] proved that rock & roll could embrace a limitless variety of harmonies, structures, and sounds; virtually every rock experiment has some precedent on Beatles record.”

● –Rolling Stone

Watch this short history of the group:

HISTORY OF THE BEATLES Links to an external site.

Now for this assignment, watch part 1 of the documentary, The Compleat Beatles, and answer the questions on Worksheet 5.

COMPLEAT BEATLES PART 1 Links to an external site.

Links to an external site.