Post 22 ... Glass Onion

I was researching some of the stories behind the songs, and I kept stumbling across “Paul is Dead” information.  I knew of the rumor that Paul actually died and then they found a look-alike to replace him, but I had no idea how it all started. So I did some research. 

I knew about the whole Abbey Road cover thing: Paul is dead because he is in a blue suit with no shoes and has his opposite leg foward compared to the rest of The Beatles; John is god or an angel because he is dressed in white; Ringo is the pallbearer because he is in a black suit; and George is a grave digger because he is dressed in blue jeans. 

The things I didn’t know, however, could fill a book.

For example, the Magical Mystery Tour cover has three beetles in white animal costumes and one in black--read three alive, one dead. The black one happens to be a walrus, and according to the John-penned song “Glass Onion,” the walrus was Paul. Also there was a whole back story built around this myth that he died in a car wreck, while staring at Lovely Rita.  It seems like absolute nonsense to me, all of the “proof” that the conspiracy nuts use could be anything; the group couldn’t write a song with death or injury or sleep or cars or teeth or the number three without it being used as a message from The Beatles about Paul’s demise and cover-up. It is an interesting read though, if just to see how crazy some people really are.

Post 21 ... I Wanna Be Your Man

I was watching Anthology 3 today, and although it is hard to feel sorry for multi-millionaires that get to do every fun thing in the world, sometimes I do feel bad for Ringo. You just have to wonder whether The Beatles would have went to the Far East and left one of them behind sick if that one had been Paul or John--I think they might have left George, too--like they did with Ringo. It must be hard at times to be "The Other Beatle" and have everyone know you are "The Other Beatle."

Another note ... when I started this journey I thought I would fail because I would feel the need to listen to some new music, but the hardest part for me has been coming up with things to say on this blog. I just have trouble coming up with topics that I--let alone anyone else--would be interested in reading about. So I am going to keep this one short ... because ... I have ... nothing ...

Post 20 ... Helter Skelter

I was thinking about the "white album" today, and I think one of the most amazing things about it is that there are so many songs on that double album that could be released today and could sound like it belongs coming out today.  Two examples: "Helter Skelter" could be released now by plenty of different groups and still sound hard and noisy, I know thats what Paul was going for- hard and noisy, but there are tons of bands out there that would kill for that sound today.  "Everybody's got Something to Hide Except for Me and My Monkey" could be like electro-pop if you really break it down to its core, the beginning could be from a ton of CD's coming out today.

Maybe this is due to the way the album was recorded, almost completely separated in different studios with the freedom to do whatever they wanted, or maybe it was the long time off before it, where they had time to let their mind wander to do more exceptional things.  Either way the made some great songs and some revolutionary sounds on The Beatles. Not all of them worked --"Wild Honey Pie"-- but sometimes working without fear and trying is the important thing; and without the fear of failure, we are free to do anything.

Post 19 ... She's a Woman

Well my busy week at work continues, and I have been at my desk for two lunches and twenty-five other minutes this week.  Oh well, it makes the days go fast, but really limits my listening time (as well as my Internet surfing about the Beatles, but let's keep that between you and me).

One good thing about all this Beatles listening and researching is that it spreads. I spent an hour talking about all things Beatles the other night with a friend of mine at a crowded bar, and he is not that big of a Beatles fan in the first place. I also got a group of my friends to listen to the "white album" in its entirety at a party the week before. This is a hugely different sort of thing than we usually listen to at these events.  However, it appears that the biggest effect this Beatles phase I am in right now is that my wife too is obsessed; she just asked me for all of the Beatles songs so that she could put them on her iPod. It's not like she wasn't a fan of the Beatles or anything before--in fact, she can sing along with most of their obscure tracks--I just think that sometimes it is easy to forget how good something that you have had seemingly forever is, until someone else points it out to you--like love, luck, or family. This is one of the points that I try to get across [read: hammer home] to people about music: It is not just entertainment, digital information, or a possession; it becomes you as though it is dancing with the fibers of your very being. Music is one of man's primal urges, from banging sticks and bones on stones, to auto-tune and synthesizer--no matter the  implements available to the artist, it becomes part of our collective consciousness, a  constantly changing ether in which we all share real estate. 

Post 18 ... Every Little Thing

I have been exceptionally busy at work this week and not in my office, so my listening has been greatly hindered so far this week. But I have been reading Anthology and it truly is wonderfully put together, there is just so much information in that book that it is hard to absorb at times.  Also I have found a bunch of mp3s of Beatles interviews, which are very interesting.

I am starting to paint a picture, probably a very poor one, of each of the Beatles and a bit of their personalities. It is weird maybe for people who grew up withThe Beatles, but they aren't celebrities to me, they were just amazing musicians and songwriters. So it is very interesting to piece together what they were like years later. For me, it seems as though John could be very generous and nice, but at the same time very demanding and aggressive. Paul seems to have had a bit of the little brother complex when it came to John; he seemed to have great reverence for him, but was also fraught with jealously. George seems like he was a calm person, but also seemed as though he felt like the third wheel of the songwriting duo. And Ringo comes off as a very kind person who was sometimes frustrated by his exclusion from some of the decision-making processes.

But then again, I am no psychologist. I'm just a wicked dentist.

Post 17 ... I'm a Loser

I did a very poor job this weekend of posting. Between football, a new bicycle, The Beatles: Rock Band, band practice, beautiful weather, and catching up on movies before TV comes back, it just slipped my mind. I need to a better job at it this week; I am falling behind on my reading and Beatles movie watching as well. So look forward to some more posts this week.

Post 16 ... You Really Got a Hold on Me

Well a third of the way done, and I can say I am not tired of it yet. I thought this would be one of those things that would wear on me until I was so tired of it that I would want to quit; but actually I am excited every day to learn--and especially to listen to--more.  It truly was a fascinating adventure the four lads had. I am starting to understand why there are so many people completely obsessed with them. 

I am building a list of all of their songs and who wrote which, as I mentioned in earlier posts; in doing so, I am reading some of the back stories behind the songs, and some of them are fascinating.  Take, for example, "Eleanor Rigby." I heard somewhere a long time ago that Paul read an obituary in the paper for an old woman who had no "survived by" people, and he then wrote the song about her late life and death.  But it turns out there is no story like that, and in fact the song was all just made up piecemeal like most songs are: they started with a melody and then figured out some lyrics that filled it. According to Paul, anyway.  But then there are some other weird aspects to the story, such as there are actually old graves found in Liverpool with the names Eleanor Rigby and McKenzie (as in Father McKenzie) on them in a cemetery wear Paul and John used to hang out. Paul maintains he just made the names up, but that is a very interesting coincidence. You can read more about that here.

On another note, we got through all of the songs on The Beatles: Rock Band, and it is a really good game, very well put together and they have added many modes and goals to keep it interesting. I am pumped for when the full albums start coming out on it, they will definitely be purchased.  Very interested to see what they do with some of the songs that are not guitar driven.  

Post 15 … One After 909 [09]

Well, sorry for not posting yesterday. I broke one of my commandments, I know, but there was a lot going on yesterday. As I told you I would, I spent a lot of time last night playing The Beatles: Rock Band with my beautiful wife; the game is fantastic, by the way. I believe we played it in its entirety except for 5 songs. I like how they made it true to The Beatles and not just a fun music game with good songs. Also I spent a lot of time yesterday and today reading a very large quantity of Beatles-related information floating around out there; here are two great links I found: a serious in-depth review of all of The Beatles albums and a not-so-serious one.

I hope to do better in the future about holding to my tenant of at least once daily posts on here, but at the same time I also hope to get through all of the Rock Band songs tonight too. So we'll see!

Post 14 ... The Night Before

Ahhhh... The Beatles: Rock Band comes out tomorrow, as well as the reissues.  The box set of the reissues may be a must-buy for me at some point, but I NEED Rock Band tomorrow, so the box set may have to get relegated to a birthday request--October 12th.  I am very excited about this game for a couple of reasons: 

1. I have been a huge Rock Band fan since it came out, and I have been faithful to it (not buying Guitar Hero World Tour, for example).
2. This is the first Rock Band edition that will be sure to have only fantastic songs on it. 
3. Singing back-ups!!! Heck yea!!! 
4. I have heard that they will be releasing all of the albums as extra packs for download. Starting with Abbey Road!!! 

So if I don't have a post after about 4:30 PM tomorrow you will know why.

On another note I got through all of the extra songs that were not released on proper albums today (Anthology, Past Masters, etc.), for a total of 604 songs; obviously there are duplicates between the US releases and the UK releases, but I can assure you, duplicate or not, over the past 8 days I have listened to each song at least once. This totals 1 day, 2 hours, 13 minutes, and 41 seconds of music (and talking in some cases) according to my iTunes playlist. Since I have evaluated all of the songs in the context of the records they are on, I have decided to make a playlist with no duplicate tracks so that I can evaluate all of the songs independently of the songs they are sandwiched in between--barring the first and last tracks of each album I guess; this will definitely help in building my best of the Beatles list.

I have also decided that while doing this best-of list that I will determine scientifically and once and for all if I am a Paul or a John guy. (I have unscientifically considered myself a Paul guy for a long time... but so far my research may be pointing toward the fact that I may have been living a lie my whole life).  All of this to come ... in the "End."  (Which then leads into "Her Majesty." Oops, that's only in my head--I have been listening to a lot of The Beatles.)

Post 13 ... In Spite of All the Danger

Well, I am back from Cleveland and in my home once again.  I was able to finish all of the Anthology disks on the trip which was nice, and since my lovely wife was willing to drive, I also was able to read a lot of my newly acquired Beatles Anthology book. Once we got home, I also got a chance to watch the first episode of the Anthology documentaries, which pretty much goes right along with the part of the book I have read so far; the video did give some real insight into some of the older songs that I didn't know that the guys considered influential or that they covered at the time.  

The Anthology packages are all great and for someone trying to get some insight and back story into a band, you could not ask for a better package.  It is very interesting to hear how some of the songs evolved into what they are on the final releases.  I sent a message from my phone regarding the version of "While My Guitar Gently Weeps"; this is a great example of this.  I love the album track, but the version on Anthology is amazing; it sheds a completely different light on the song.  This just goes to show that a song is not just poetry set to music, but a whole package in which the the lyrics are just one element.  This kind of reminds me of the way a filter can change a scene in movies.  For example, a shot of a horse could take place anywhere, but put a sepia tone on it and poof! You're in at the OK Corral at high noon. These packages are giving me plenty of different filters to re-experience these fabulous songs.

At a wedding with a live band playing songs from the 50's and 60's and no Beatles... This is slightly depressing.

This acoustic demo of while my guitar gently weeps is gorgeous. Far more mournful and introspective almost... I nearly like this one beter.

I love the tracks on Anthologies where The Beatles make mistakes. It is refreshing to see that side of The Beatles.

Post 12 ... She Loves You

Almost done with the Anthologies, but I got a little slowed down Yesterday buy my other love, college football. There was so many good games and it had been so long. I also am going to a wedding today in Cleveland so I will have plenty of time to listen and read The Anthology during the ride up there. However I am going to not be near a computer so am going to be doing my posts form my phone so they will be short and sweet and hopefully plentiful (and probably without titles ... unless I figure out how to do that from my phone.)

Post 11 ... It Won't Be Long

Well, I was super busy at work yesterday and spent most of my time conducting experiments in our engineering lab, which sadly has no iPod hook-up, so I couldn't listen today at work. But like I briefly stated in a post from my cell phone this afternoon, I did finish the US Beatles albums, and out of all of The Beatles albums, US and UK, Yellow Submarine is still easily my least favorite and Abby Road is still my favorite. But I am warming up to some others ... Please, Please Me, for example, is a really solid record that I wouldn't have given much of a chance if I wasn't on this Beatles fast; so for this I am thankful. Also I did really enjoy the two CDs of UK singles released in the US, Yesterday ... and Today and Magical Mystery Tour--tons of classic songs on both albums. Magical Mystery Tour has some of my favorite Beatles songs on it; how can you go wrong with "Fool on the Hill" and "Strawberry Fields"?

On another note, I saw a list from EW on the best and worst Beatles songs, and this has inspired me to make a comprehensive list ranking all of the songs from top to bottom, so look for that toward the end of the month.

Post 10 ... Money (That's What I Want)

US releases complete through anthology coming up. Busy at work, but I hope to post later today.

Post 9 … Everybody’s Got Something to...

Well, since I have been babbling on this blog, I thought itmight be a good idea to let you know who I am.

My name is Matt. I was born on October 12, 1982, in Youngstown, Ohio, and lived in its suburb, Austintown, until 2002. My father worked (still does) in a steel mill, my mom has MS and was a stay-at-home mother to my older brother and me. My maternal grandparents lived nearby and were a huge part of my early life. My mother goes to church most Sundays; my father went on
Easter and Christmas when he wasn’t working, and I stopped altogether when I was about fourteen, because it never made sense to me.

I am and have always been overweight. I like sports but was never any good at them; I may be the slowest runner you will ever meet because I am duck-footed. I have been wearing glasses since I was fourteen due to a slight case of myopia. I was a bit of a pyromaniac as a child; however, I always made sure to have water in the vicinity so that my fires wouldn’t spread where I had not intended. I was smart, the school wanted me to skip the 3rd grade, I was in gifted classes, took AP courses in high school. I had enough friends so that I wasn’t bored as a youngster and enough that I never was home as a teen.

Music has always been the number one love of my life. It started with oldies and pop for me, but then my brother got into metal, which made me get into metal. At eight and older I was a huge fan of Ozzy and Maiden to start off, then moved onto Megadeth and Pantera. I saved my allowance for months so I could buy a CD player, amplifier and Speakers at the age of nine.

When I was in my early teens, it was Nirvana, Snoop Dogg, Soundgarden, Smashing Pumpkins, Alice in Chains, STP, etc. Then I got OK Computer for my 15th birthday and everything changed. Although I was still into metal and hard rock, it changed my outlook on what I was looking for in music. No longer was I looking for someone to identify with, I was looking for something I hadn’t heard before or for something to be done better than I had ever heard it being done before.

I played bass in a band for four years in high school that sounded sometimes like Tool and sometimes like The Deftones. It was fun, but by the end we were worn out and our musical tastes changed in different ways, as teen tastes often do, and it seemed like time to call it quits. At the end of this I was very much into bands that were all over the map, like Glassjaw, Radiohead, Rival Schools, UNKLE, Weezer, Tori Amos, Dillinger Escape Plan, and At the Drive In.

I went to college for a year at a branch of Kent State while living at home, trying to figure out what I was going to do with my life. I decided I wanted to be an engineer and also to move out of Youngstown, so I moved to Columbus to go to OSU. Throughout college, my musical tastes moved more indie, to bands like Cursive and Mars Volta, …Trail of Dead, BRMC, etc.

Currently I have been out of school and in the work force for 3+ years. I am happily married with two furry-canine children: Penny and Lucy. This is a list of bands of which I have 20 songs or more by on my iPod, so you can get an idea of what I like (there will be some abbreviation): Alice in Chains, AYWKUBTTOD, Arcade Fire, At the Drive In, Bat for Lashes, The Beastie Boys, The Beatles (obviously), Between the Burried and Me, Black Keys, Bjork, BRMC, Blur, Bob Dylan, Springsteen, Cave in, Chiodos, The Cure, Cursive, CSS, Curtis Mayfield, Deathcab, Deftones, Dillinger Escape Plan, Drowning Man, Dolly Parton, Elbow, Elliot Smith, Faith No More, Failure, Flaming Lips, Fleet Foxes, FOTC, GlassJaw, Godspeed, Grizzly Bear, Head Automatica, Iron Maiden, Jenny Lewis, John Vanderslice, Johny Cash, Lil Wyne, Led Zep, M83, Mars Volta, Michael Jackson, Minus the Bear, Mogwai, NERD, NIN, Nirvana, Notorious BIG, Outkast, Pink Floyd, Portishead, Primus, QOTSA, RATM, RHCP, The Roots, Sigur Ros, Smashing Pumpkins, Streets, Sufjan Stevens, Sunny Day Real estate, Supper Furry Animials, Tegan & Sara, Thursday, Tool, Tori Amos, TVOTR, UNKLE, Weezer.

If there is anything else you would like to know … ask.

Post 8 … Hello, Goodbye

In doing my research and diving deep into the fine details of all things Beatle--reading background stories behind albums, tracks, recording sessions, life stories, ect.--I found myself in a “not seeing the forest for the trees moment." There is so much music and so much information that it is hard to imagine that The Beatles got all of this done in a period of about just over seven years (longer in reality, but from the world's perspective this is pretty close as it is the period of time between the first and last UK album releases). Not to mention the touring, the making of movies, the spiritual quests to India, and simply living their lives. It astonishes really, the effect they had on the world in such a short period. It might be a stretch, but the four of them probably will have had the biggest influence on the human race after Mohammed, Jesus, Shakespeare, and thr Buddha. Maybe this is what John meant when he said The Beatles were bigger than Jesus.

It made me wonder what in the hell have I been doing with my life up until now.

Post 7 ... A Hard Days Night.

Man, US audiences really got screwed on the Hard Days' Night and Help! albums. On the US version, five tracks from the UK version of Hard Days' Night were replaced by four George Martin remakes of other tracks on the album, and the US version of Help! has half the original tracks swapped with five instrumentals composed for the movie and a weird detracting intro to "Help!" added. I know there are lots of differences in the track listings of their early works, but these seem like the most egregious offenses. US audiences also had to wait a year after the UK to get their hands on an album with "Yesterday" on it. It is obvious that Capitol Records was out on some crazy money-grab: this way they could turn one album into two with the addition of some instrumentals.

I guess this could be seen as the difference between rock music today and rock music then--the song seemed to be the big thing. Now the album seems to be the emphasis. I mean, singles still sell albums today, but no one buys CD singles. Now iTunes and previously Napster may have brought back the single culture, but I don't see a US distributer getting away with chopping up an album of say U2's to make more cash off of it. That said, I do thank the US for putting together full albums of non-album singles and b-sides later in the Beatles career--for example, Magical Mystery Tour.

As for me, I am doing fine and am more than enjoying this so far.

Post 6 … End

Even though I have been very busy and not at my desk this morning at work, I have found the time to finish the Beatles' UK records.  So now I am going to listen to all of the US releases in the order of their release. To try to experience the Beatles the way that America did starting with Beatle-mania. The only difference is I do not have Introducing … The Beatles and will be replacing it with The Early Beatles. All of the tracks included on The Early Beatles are on Introducing anyway.  Its missing a song or two depending on which version of Introducing you have, and it’s a little different order--but if you don’t tell, then I won’t either.

Post 5 ... Golden Slumbers

Well one day down and although I had plenty of interruptions at work and had to watch Mad Men and the new No Reservations, which both recorded last night, I made it nearly through all of the UK Beatles albums.  I am listening to Yellow Submarine now and that just leaves Abbey Road and Let it be left to be listened to.  It was an interesting trip today, it was fun to get a chance to take a look at how The Beatles evolved in how they put songs together.  And i know what some of you will say that some of the songs on later albums actualy were written much earlier--for example "When I'm Sixty-Four"-- but what I noticed more than song structure and more complex chord structures was their expanded use of emerging recording technologies.  Anyone could have made some songs with a cacophony of samples and sound effects (which they did from time to time) but what is more interesting to me is how the experimented with these technologies in their proper songs to give them more layers and depth.  This is the knid of thing that I find interesting.  

Although I knew my knowledge of older Beatles was poor at best, something that kind of surprised me was the number of the songs on the White Album (not one of may favorites but obviously a good record, of which I have still listened to may times), in which during this listen provided small surprises to me.  I don't know if I am explaining this very well but sometimes when I listen to a song a number of times and then don't for a while something that I never heard before in it stands out to me.  Whether this is more a causation of forgetting in the time apart from the song, or if its a that in the time of that my brain has changed in very gradually and very subtly I am not sure.  I hope that its the latter and not the former, because if we extrapolate this idea out towards infinity maybe this means that it is possible to completely change the way we think about more important things in our lives. Moreover, if this is happening gradually and without our knowledge maybe if we are open to it and given enough time we can be rid of current prejudices and old thoughts that is holding us back.  Or maybe i should slow down on the drinking.  Either way I am off to bed...

Post 4 … I Call Your Name.

You may be wondering why this blog is called "The Wicked Dentist."  It comes from a quote from George Harrison concerning the first time he, John Lennon, and their wives ever dropped acid.  They were dosed by a dentist friend of theirs who believed that LSD was some sort of aphrodisiac, hoping there would be an orgy if he did this to them.  What happened, though, was that they experienced their world in a completely different way.  I thought that this blog could be my wicked dentist into the world of music.
 
(Also “Fixing a Hole” was taken.)

Post 3 … A Beginning.

I started my journey this morning at 6:35 AM eastern time. I decided to try to experience The Beatles the way the world did, chronologically following their UK releases. So far I have listened to Please, Please Me, With the Beatles, and I am currently listening to A Hard Day’s Night. Please, Please Me, is excellent by the way. As I said before I am not a huge fan of their early stuff, but I am definitely warming up to it.

I guess some of you might ask why don’t I like care for early Beatles, and I guess that I can’t say I don’t like it, it is more that I grew up on them. My father used to listening to Oldies 93 in Youngstown, Ohio, when I was a kid, any and every time we got into the car. With the early Beatles and a lot of music from the 50s and early 60s, I heard it constantly and it muddled together in my young ears. I believe it is this muddling that leads to me not being very excited about these early songs. (However, I just finished A Hard Day’s Night, and its closer, “I’ll Be Back,” is gorgeous.)

But that is one of the points ofdoing this in the first place, to shatter my own perceptions, prejudices, and to expand my mind. So far it looks like it is starting to work.