I DON'T GIVE A SHIT ABOUT THE BEATLES

I know it's shitty of me but I don't like The Beatles. I don't find much merit in their music and this opinion has yielded "violent reactions" (a common response to an unpopular stance as another has had a similar experience).



I'm interested in musical history obviously (though making history does not equivalate to breaking musical ground). If The Beatles broke any ground it's because they did it safely enough for the large majority of SOCIETY to be cool with it. My good friend, a Beatles enthusiast, tries to remind me that the TRUE Beatles wore leather jackets and boots and would spit and curse - THEY WERE BAD BOYS AT HEART - but they were convinced by the manager to do the suits and bowl cut thing for the public... that's cool, I guess?? Either way they were down with this public representation, both in music and in style, and that's what I and the rest of the world know them to be. It doesn't really matter if they CHOOSE to hide any of their badassery to appease the prudish public.


Think about the "boy band" argument we hear so much. THEY WERE! THEY WERE NOT! Whatever they were, The Beatles were loved by the world. They are the most commercially successful "rock" group, popular enough to take their version of rock'n'roll into the creation of a "pop rock" genre. Bands don't become popular simply because they are "the best". I don't trust humanity's intelligence enough for popularity alone to claim what is "best". Accessibility and simplicity have more to do with popularity than anything subjective.
The Beatles just happened to be at the right place at the right time with a musical formula easy for the public to swallow and a huge amount of press. Given a shit ton of money to make records by record labels who knew they'd make even more money off said musical production, the higher ups supported their transitions/reinventions with the times... they probably even found it necessary. The Beatles helped ease some preexisting counterculture relics into popular culture perhaps (psychedelic era!)... I guess we can give them credit for putting LSD into goofy pop music, right?


I don't hate The Beatles exactly. I've enjoyed them at moments in my life, though mostly the "I Wanna Hold Your Hand" era. Maybe my preference of that era in itself should prove how much I don't REALLY like The Beatles because that time frame was just covers or new versions of songs that had already existed (except in a different more white and British package). My personal experiences with The Beatles is simple:  they were a gateway drug to better psychedelic music when I was 12 and I used to sing "If I Fell" to my boyfriend when we first started dating (a cutesy expression of my uncertainty in allowing myself to be in love again, sugar coated with a pop song of course). The Beatles are good at sweet and cute - their primary lyrical subject (the most palatable in the world) is love. They were way more lovey dovey than singing about heavy hot fucking and they definitely weren't on the political or alienation tip. 


Even with my acceptance of cute lovey early rock'n'roll Beatles, I wouldn't be flattered if my boyfriend sang a Beatles song to me. It'd be cheesy and contrived in my eyes even though I really love cheesy things. And even though my boyfriend loves cookie cutter Beatles, he knows me better regardless of the many arguments we've had about the stupid money-music Brits. My boyfriend made me a cover of The Ramones' "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend"... similar pop formula but with a fierceness and respect for the love subject in the song. Bad ass expressions of love with humility and tenderness and all heart, no chilled out goofy love song shit... that's what I want. The Beatles have so many love songs, it's like their love wasn't even real. Gooey date rape music. Gooey goofy ingenuity. 


Granted John Lennon's love for Yoko Ono was BEAUTIFUL. The world gives Yoko so much shit for breaking up The Beatles when it really wasn't like that. Lennon left The Beatles because he wanted to experiment as a free agent, no more of this music biz pawn shit. And, yes, he was in love with a woman full of interesting ideas and beautiful thoughts, an artist in her own right, and she was supportive of his own creative desires. John didn't want to forever be locked into making "popular" music with Paul who he was having a shit time with. Why doesn't the world trust or respect Lennon's own DESIRES to get the fuck out of corporate rock when we all know that sometimes happiness means more than a job? Which I'm sure after a SHORT while The Beatles started to feel like a job.


Think about the beginning. The UK must have craved their own white boy rock'n'roll. The US had Buddy Holly and Elvis and the UK needed a little something for themselves. So they got The Beatles who did something similar to the dudes in the US, birth place of rock'n'roll, and they became huge in their country and took over the world. Unlike Elvis (and obviously Buddy Holly - RIP), The Beatles were able to go from suits and ties into those hilarious colorful get-ups that the Flower Power tweens could stand beside. Bob Dylan smoked them out and they figured out what was gonna happen next. The rest is history.


Elvis was super bummed to be dethroned from the highest point in rock'n'roll (esp. because John Lennon sort of dressed like him in the early years). Elvis wrote President Nixon a letter warning about the rise of Drug Culture and when the two met Elvis told him all about how The Beatles were anti-American and they were the prime encouragement of drug use in the United States. This was also during the time frame when Elvis popped pills pretty frequently.


Even though The Beatles were doing "illegal substances", I still favor the days when they were emulating the rock'n'roll before them (that was probably their rowdiest era, too). The in between is so goofy I can't even take them seriously. Cartoonish versions of psychedelic pop, more silly than scandalous? No, thanks.

Please don't hate me because I don't like The Beatles. Maybe you understand, maybe you don't. They represent a turning point in the commercialization of music, sitting on top of a mountain of money built by the widespread exploitation of culture, blowing up the charade that is musical hit making. Who knows? Maybe it's the money makers to blame but The Beatles were the face and for that reason alone, I have been unable to absorb them. Sorry.

And with that, I part with Nation of Ulysses lyrics, via friend and inspiration Ian Svenonius:

"I ain't talkin' bout a Beatles song written a hundred years before I was born. Yeah, we're talking about the round and round, but whose got the real anti-parent-culture sound?"