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| From | "Andrew Hickey" <stealthmunchkin@gmail.com> |
| Subject | Re: Revolution in the head |
| Date | Sun, 14 Oct 2007 19:01:39 +0100 |
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On 10/14/07, Scott Shaw <brynneandscott@cox.net> wrote:
> I didn't know of the book, but it sounds like yet another I should own that
> I hope to one day have time to read.
>
> One Amazon reader didn't agree with everyone else.
>
> Does anyone feel like he does?
Frankly, this person hasn't got the reading comprehension of a four year old...
> If you want
> to read an entire volume consisting of a snob putting down Beatles songs,
> this is the book for you.
MacDonald does dislike some Beatles songs - and some of them I
disagree with him on - but he's mostly effusive in his praise. He just
doesn't think they're infallible...
> and a
> constant suggestion of where the Beatles "might have" gotten song ideas in
> many cases, relying on pure speculation to give the impression that Lennon
> and McCartney were incapable of coming up with any material of their own.
It doesn't give that impression at all. MacDonald does point out
places where Lennon & McCartney were influenced by other people (for
example Dylan on I'm A Loser, Del Shannon on I'll Be Back) but he
never says they didn't come up with things themselves. The Beatles
were musical magpies, and part of what made them great was the breadth
of their influences. To write a book analysing the Beatles' music and
*not* acknowledge their influences would be dishonest...
> He often falls back on musical terminology that even the Beatles
> didn't know. One doesn't want to read about which weird scale or mode a song
> has incidentally been written in,
"Incidentally" ? If you're going to look at how a song works in any
detail, you *need* to say if it's written in an unusual mode. Whether
the band themselves knew the name of the mixolydian mode, they clearly
knew 'if you sing it this way, it sounds better'. It *means* something
that John Lennon was mostly a 'horizontal' composer, with melodies
within a small range but rapidly-changing chords, while McCartney was
more 'vertical', with rangy melodies over more conventional chord
sequences, and it's still a useful observation whether or not they
ever consciously noticed that themselves.
That reader obviously wanted a book with no analysis beyond 'this bit
sounds really *cool*!' and with no criticism of his idols. If that's
what you want, then Revolution In The Head will be useless to you. But
if you want something that takes the songs apart, shows how and why
they work, what their influences were - a proper critical work that
actually leaves you with a deeper appreciation of the music - then
there's really nothing else out there that does the job as well.
--
The National Pep on myspace - http://myspace.com/thenationalpep
National Pep CDs - http://cdbaby.com/cd/nationalpep
The National Pep - Pop Music to hurt you forever - http://thenationalpep.co.uk
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