The Beatles, Popular Music and Society: A Thousand VoicesMore has been written about the Beatles than any other performing artists of the twentieth century. Accounts of their lives and times have been retold, reproduced and reinvented to the extent that their achievements have passed into contemporary folklore and popular mythology. What has been surprisingly absent, however, is any sustained critical investigation of the numerous debates and issues the group provoked. This book provides that long overdue analysis, by seeking to present the academic study of the Beatles in its appropriate contexts - historical, political, musical and sociological. Consisting entirely of newly commissioned articles and written by an international group of scholars, its contents challenge many of the traditional assumptions about the Beatles and offer fresh and provocative insights into the nature of their success and its continuing influence. It is essential reading for those wishing to understand not only the phenomenon of the Beatles but also the cultural environment within which popular music continues to be practised and studied. |
Contents
1 Men of Ideas? Popular Music Antiintellectualism and the Beatles | 1 |
Conversations with Joe Flannery | 23 |
3 The Beatles and the Spectacle of Youth | 35 |
4 LennonMcCartney and the Early British Invasion 196466 | 53 |
Austerity to Profligacy in the Language of the Beatles | 86 |
6 The Postmodern White Album | 105 |
the Beatles Artistic Freedom and Censorship | 126 |
Common terms and phrases
appear artistic freedom audience Beatlemania Beatles bird blues Brian Epstein Britain British Invasion Britpop Capitol career celebrity censorship chord Cloonan contemporary dance Davies discourse drugs early example fans film genre girl guitar Hard Day's Night Hearts Club Band Ibid identity intellectual involved Jagger–Richards Joe Flannery John Lennon later Lennon & Paul Liverpool London Lonely Hearts Club MacDonald 1995 Magical Mystery Tour Martin and Segrave meaning melody Merseybeat Music by John musicians parody Paul McCartney Paul McCartney Copyright Pepper's Lonely Hearts performance play political pop music popular culture popular music postmodern art production Real Love recording reference release Revolution riffs Ringo rock and roll role Rolling Stones sexual Sgt Pepper's Lonely social songwriters sound studio subculture success teenage television tion Top 40 hits traditional vocal Want Wenner White Album Words & Music working-class Yellow Submarine Yoko Ono York youth