Re: They got it covered

I should've included this in the post I wrote yesterday about recent Beatles/solo-Fab covers. It's the Flaming Lips' thoroughly spaced-out stab at "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds." On the whole, Wayne Coyne and his merry band of psychedelic indie-rock pranksters stay true to the 1967 blueprint, but there is one notable deviation: when the chorus goes vertical, it's like a controlled explosion that slowly ascends rather than the original's sudden leap to the stars. It's a very Flaming Lips kind of touch for a very Flaming Lips kind of song.

While we're on the topic, here's the Lips' cover of "Revolution", and here's their interpretation of "I Am the Walrus."

They got it covered

Need a fix of recent Beatles/solo-Fab covers?

- Here's Arctic Monkeys' take on "All My Loving." It's a slowed down, less anxious version. Only several steps removed from a Roy Orbison-style torch song (though not so hopeless, and with a fuzzy-squeal solo lodged in the middle). The Monkeys played this cover at MSG almost 50 years to the day after The Beatles appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show for the first time.

- Here's the War on Drugs, an indie rock act from Philadelphia, revealing something that perhaps should've been obvious long ago: John's "Mind Games" was always a jammy Southern-rock anthem waiting to happen.

- Finally, here's Broken Bells (that is, the duo of Danger Mouse and Shins leadman/professional Kevin Spacey-lookalike, James Mercer) with a starry electro-pop revamp of "And I Love Her." Kudos for the clever "guest spot" by Ringo and the expertly placed sample of "I Am the Walrus." In my view, this is a perfect Beatles cover: an homage that artfully tinkers with the original but retains the core intentions and core emotions.

"Roll up for the mystery tour"

I was lucky enough to catch a showing of Magical Mystery Tour on PBS the other day. It was my first time. Verdict? I'm confident in saying I enjoyed it more than the average viewer did in December of 1967 when the film premiered on BBC1. Unlike the British public, who was blindsided and then thrown into a state of bewilderment by The Beatles' unscripted gonzo surrealism, I knew what was coming. All told, I found the movie amusingly antic, funny (or maybe funny enough is more accurate) and, in terms of its use of The Beatles' music, delectable. Any project that incorporates ten-plus songs by the Fabs is off to a formidable start. The scenes with "I Am the Walrus" and "Your Mother Should Know" stand out in particular. Then throw in Ringo's always winning charm, an inscrutable character named Buster Bloodvessel, an unsettling dream sequence in which John, as a pencil-mustached waiter, shovels heaps of spaghetti onto a plate, and a general spirit of anything-is-possible, we're-having-a-blast anarchy, and what results is a very memorable film. Not a great film, not a work of art, just a memorable hour-long romp.

What's it about? The plot is both beside the point and important, as the movie is part-spectacle and part-sendup. It follows Ringo, his Aunt Jessie and a colorful collection of folks as they travel on a mystery tour bus to some curious destinations. For The Beatles, these trips, which were common in Britain at the time, symbolize their past - a past that was steeped in notions about proper behavior and tradition. This is what the film is lampooning. Thus, the operative line comes when Buster Bloodvessel says he hopes the tour participants will enjoy themselves "within the limits of British decency." Hardly. With its madcap comic aesthetic, Magical Mystery Tour represents a total subversion of "British decency." All the flights-of-fancy, non-sequiturs and tangents served notice that the old rules of the game didn't apply anymore. It was a different world. To be sure, The Beatles still had deep affection for their past, but their new identities were simply so far removed from it. They would have been strangers to their former selves. As one commentator noted on the Arena documentary about the film, the band's message seemed to be "That's who we were, and this is who we are."

Not long after critics and viewers delivered their harsh judgement of the film, Paul essentially apologized for it. In his words: "If we goofed, then we goofed. It was a challenge, and it didn't come off. We'll know better next time." Since then, Paul has changed his tune, saying the film's style was ahead of its time. Its legacy has also benefited from the support of Hollywood heavyweights like Martin Scorsese. But I think it's more interesting to consider what The Beatles' pre-release mindset was. What were their expectations going in? How did they think the public would react to this very different kind of project? It's possible they were puffed up on hubris and just assumed that anything they put out, however avant-garde or uncommercial, would be well received. Or maybe they didn't care. Maybe they made the film for their own amusement. Whatever the case, Magical Mystery Tour was The Beatles' first critical black eye. With Brian Epstein dead, touring a thing of the past and uncertainty in the air, it set the stage for a bumpy final stretch.

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"Magical Mystery Tour Revisited"

The Beatles' psychedelic nostalgia-trip pic of 1967 remains (indeed) a mystery to many people. Below is a documentary that sheds some light on the origins, production and legacy of what was almost certainly the band's oddest creative endeavor.

Watch Magical Mystery Tour Revisited on PBS. See more from Great Performances.

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Weekend reading

- "The best books on the Beatles"

Excerpt:

Such is the remarkable pace of a story that has been told by scores of writers, a story about four young musicians but no end of other things: the cities of Liverpool, Hamburg and London; class, and the shaking of English hierarchies; pop's transmutation into a global culture; and the western world's passage from a world still defined by the second world war and its aftermath, to the accelerated modernity we know today. Everything in the tale pulses with significance and drama. It seems barely believable, and in the best Beatles books, it still burns.

. . .

- "Fab furore: Is it time to re-evaluate the Beatles' Magical Mystery Tour?"

Excerpt:

Moreover, its key element is an apparent drive to send up an England of decaying authority, bad food and anti-climactic entertainment: the country in which the Beatles had grown up, embodied by the hollering sergeant played by their actor friend Victor Spinetti; the dream sequence in which Lennon serves bucketfuls of vomit-like spaghetti; and the very idea of a mystery tour on a coach. Not for nothing, perhaps, did Harrison claim that the one group who later developed the Beatles' essential sensibility was Monty Python.

"Roll up for the mystery tour"

Big news announced yesterday: Magical Mystery Tour, The Beatles' long out-of-print film from 1967, has been restored and will be available on DVD and Blu-ray in early October. A little backstory... MMT came in the wake of both The Beatles' decision to stop touring and the tragedy of Brian Epstein's death. It was an unfocused period for the band. With Paul as the driving force, the Fabs themselves directed the film, a druggy, surrealist, madcap vision of a weekend bus trip around the English countryside. Production was sloppy and haphazard, as there was no script and the Four had little idea what they were doing. Upon release, MMT took a beating from the British press. It was a rare creative black-eye for The Beatles (though the soundtrack did deliver the goods). Since then, opinion has shifted a bit, and it seems the various Beatles estates have determined that the film is finally ready for another look. It's one missing piece of the puzzle that we won't have to complain about any longer. Now bring on the Let It Be doc!

Go here for the Magical Mystery Tour trailer.

A minor classic from the Quiet Beatle

On this, the 10th anniversary of George's death, I want to highlight my appreciation for a song of his that I find to be woefully undervalued: "Blue Jay Way." The standard line of criticism goes that "Blue Jay Way" is boring, tedious, monotonous, and the like. It's drone-pop that never comes to life, leaving listeners to share in the chief concern that George expresses in the song's lyric: wanting to go to sleep. I'm of a separate mind. I don't hear boring and tedious; I hear eerie and mysterious. In my view, this moody psychedelic gem from Magical Mystery Tour is among the most richly atmospheric and even cinematic songs in The Beatles' catalog.

The sound matches the subject: "Blue Jay Way" is about a confused and foggy night in LA. In August of 1967, George was staying at a rented house on the aforementioned street in the Hollywood Hills. He was tired after the flight in, but wanted to remain awake until The Beatles' former press officer, Derek Taylor, and his wife arrived. Blue Jay Way is apparently difficult to locate as it is, and the fog certainly didn't help. In the interim, George began writing:

"There's a fog upon LA / And my friends have lost their way / We'll be over soon they say / Now they've lost themselves instead."

He then respectfully pleads: "Please don't be long/ Please don't you be very long / Please don't be long / For I may be asleep."

It's all very uncertain and unsettled. Though the back-story belies this, I often get the impression that more is going on than George allows us to know, perhaps even something sinister. The sonics are just too creepy for the fairly mundane scenario presented in the lyric. There's the pounding rhythm, George's woozy, warped vocal, the atmospherics of the Hammond organ and cello, and the spectral backing vocals. Complementing all of this is the pace of the song, which builds and builds, escalating the urgency of George's words. By the end, he even stops saying "please," chanting simply, "Don't be long." Is that "be long" or "belong"? And what does the climax signify, anyway? Narratively speaking, what has the song been moving toward? Still more mysteries.

It is indeed this sense of mystery that draws me to "Blue Jay Way." It's like film-noir: inscrutable but absorbing.

George's most underrated Beatles song

"Blue Jay Way" cast a thick spell on me the first time I listened to it. It's the most richly atmospheric and eerie entry in The Beatles' catalogue. I would even say it ranks among my 25 favorite songs by the Fabs.



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Today in Beatles history

Here's another look-back involving George, but this time the day was one for grief and tears: On November 29, 2001, the "quiet Beatle" passed away at the too-young age of 58 after a bout with lung cancer.

Excerpt:
But tragedy crept into his world in 1997 with the discovery that a lump in his neck was malignant. Though he successfully battled the disease with radiotherapy, it was merely the beginning of a series of calamitous events. In 1999, Harrison was attacked in his home by a man later deemed insane by the courts. Harrison was stabbed seven times in the attack, having only been saved by Olivia jumping into the fray with a fireplace poker. Even as he healed from those wounds, Harrison received the devastating news that his cancer had returned, and this time there would be no reprieve. Harrison died of lung cancer in a Hollywood mansion once owned by Paul McCartney. His body was cremated and, according to his wishes, his ashes were spread across the Ganges River in India.

I never fail to be moved by the all-star performance of "My Sweet Lord" at the Concert for George. Billy Preston just nails his vocal.


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And below is what I consider George's most underrated entry in The Beatles' catalogue. It's the enticingly eerie and atmospheric "Blue Jay Way."


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"Magical Mystery Tour" ...

... in haiku form.

1) "Magical Mystery Tour"
2) "The Fool on the Hill"
3) "Flying"
4) "Blue Jay Way"
5) "Your Mother Should Know"
6) "I Am the Walrus"
7) "Hello, Goodbye"
8) "Strawberry Fields Forever"
9) "Penny Lane"
10) "Baby, You're a Rich Man"
11) "All You Need Is Love"

Saturday haiku - "All You Need Is Love"

Performed on Our World,
"Love" is a simple anthem
with a lofty aim.

Friday haiku - "Baby, You're a Rich Man"

The subject of "Man"?
Some have said Brian Epstein,
the Fabs' manager.

Wednesday haiku - "Penny Lane"

Filled with odd details,
"Penny" is Paul's playful ode
to dear Liverpool.

Tuesday haiku - "Strawberry Fields Forever"

Dreamy and wistful,
and brimming with cryptic thoughts,
"Fields" channels John's mind.

Sunday haiku - "Hello, Goodbye"

It's a feel-good tune
that saves its best for the end:
the outro dazzles.

Saturday haiku - "I Am the Walrus"

It's a feast of sounds;
a burst of daft imagery;
and one of John's best.

Sunday haiku - "Your Mother Should Know"

Rooted in the past,
in the sound of music-hall,
"Your" shows Paul's quaint tastes.

Saturday haiku - "Blue Jay Way"

George wrote "Blue Jay Way",
The Beatles' most eerie song,
in Los Angeles.

Wednesday haiku - "Flying"

An instrumental,
"Flying" has a daydream feel:
airy and relaxed.

Tuesday haiku - "The Fool on the Hill"

Earnest yet quirky,
"Fool" is Paul's take on wise men
who come off as nuts.