I thought about this a bit today. Use the Ramones as an example. I love the Ramones, and I believe their musicianship, primitive and raw as it so often was, was very influential. But if I asked you the question, “Was the Ramones’ repertoire limited by their musical abilities?,” the answer would have to be, yes. There were musical directions that even if they could conceive them, they simply didn’t have the chops to play.
Now, of course that’s true of anyone in a sort of “duh” way–nobody can play everything or anything they’d like. But think about the Beatles absolutely stunning body of work. Did you ever think to your self, “These songs might have been improved, their creativity might have stretched even further–if only they were better musicians”?
The Beatles were good enough musicians to provide the foundation for an astonishingly great body of creative work. Now, I believe their musicianship was great unto itself, even examined separate from the value of their songs–if that contemplation is even truly possible, given how inextricably their tunes, their singing, their musicianship are intertwined. But even if that’s not your cup of tea, the bottom line is this: The Beatles musicianship was up to the challenge of giving form to their songs. The Beatles’ songs. I don’t know what could be a better compliment.
You make this sound like an impressive thing. But the Ramones isn’t a very meaningful basis for comparison. Lots of bands can play a variety of musical styles at a functional level. I’d venture to guess that it’s a tiny majority of professional musicians who can’t.
The Beatles were able to compose music in a wide variety of styles, but then again, so were a lot of the big bands of the 60s and 70s. It was an experimental era and people were trying all sorts of things. The Beatles were among, and potentially leading, that group, but they weren’t special in their capability for accomplishing it. And while I am willing to believe that they may have started the practice of experimenting in different styles, among popular music, I’m not as convinced that they originated any or a majority of them.
The Beatles were able to create or adopt a wide variety of musical styles and adapt them to popular tastes. At that, I would say that there is no argument. Other bands also accomplished this - Led Zeppelin, Jimi Hendrix, Pink Floyd, The Who, etc. - though none so popular as the Beatles.
As far as the technical musicianship goes, Hendrix, David Gilmour, etc. are clearly regarded as exceptional. The Beatles not so much. They were able to play the music which they had written for themselves, but I don’t know whether they could have held a candle to a Jimi Hendrix jam session, riffing on country western music. I somewhat doubt it.
Again, they were able to write some very popular, well-loved music. The choices they made, in incorporating other genres into their music, likely influenced what ended up becoming pop music. And that all is exceptional and noteworthy. But I think you have to be satisfied there. In other respects, they were matched or outstripped by others, without even having to get into obscure bands.
I think Paul, in particular, was more gifted as an instrumentalist, and as one who could pick up whatever instrument and learn to play it. But as solo performers and writers, I’ve always liked George Harrison’s writing and playing much better than any of the others’.
I devoted my day today to listening to The Beatles and I had a very happy and satisfying day.
At first, I listened to their earlier work and found a whole lot of their early work to make me happy.
Then, I listened to their middle years and their later years and I was likewise very happy with their music from that time.
I always loved their music. Right from the very first time I heard, “She Loves You” … right up to the time I would listen to the The White Album continuously for 24 hours at a stretch. I had a very advanced tape recorder (at least it was advanced at that time) that would accept some magnetic tape strips on the reel-to-reel type tapes and I could place that type at the beginning and end of a reel-to-reel type tape and listen to that album over and over again while I smoked some Mary Jane and never had to get up to touch that machine. I could just lie in bed and smoke and listen and I was in Seventh Heaven for at least a 24 hour stretch at a time. The only time I had to get up was to go to the washroom to take care of nature calls or to get something to drink.
It was a glorious time in my youth. Absolutely Glorious! Glorious! Glorious!
I cannot recall any other period in my life that was as wonderful as my Seventeenth year when I should have been studying Calculus but instead, I was studying The Beatles and I was in Seventh Heaven.
How could I ever find anything bad to say about those boys when they brought me such intense joy and bliss during those years in my tender youth? Thanks to the four of them, I enjoyed several days during which I was a happy camper and I will never forget those fun-filled days and I could never ever say a bad word about them. Not one word. Not even half a word!
I was going down the Youtube rabbit hole earlier tonight, and I found this rather wonderful deconstruction of the vocal harmonies on I Saw Her Standing There. Pretty amazing hearing this guy deconstruct and explain Paul and John’s vocal parts there, and point out subtleties I’ve always heard, but never quite noticed. Really gorgeous and interesting how the vocal harmonies worked in their music.
I love Galeazzo! I have spent many an afternoon watching his videos, and you’re right, he is able to deconstruct the songs in a way that is very illuminating. The nuances he points out are ones we tried to copy when we performed them, but often didn’t quite nail. Very subtle and clever vocals, very entertaining and educational analysis!
Fascinating. Thanks for finding that. These guys were so intuitively brilliant. I listened to a few others and am amazed at the different harmonies that build the final song.
I had seen him in a straight vocal training video, but hadn’t seen do a Beatles breakdown. Thanks pulykamell! Love hearing how the vocals wrestled with each other - I can totally hear Paul and John each pulling out their bags of vocal tricks and egging each other on, so there is an element of energy and immediacy that adds an essential something.
…Don’t forget that Paul was nothing but a pop idol who cared only about writing shallow, silly love songs.
I didn’t even have to click that link, because I knew exactly who you meant. His video series is amazing and insightful–not even just for the Beatles but also Queen and “Bohemian Rhapsody.” What a talent he has for making his voice sound like… well, almost every singer whose part he’s singing, from Freddie Mercury to George Harrison.
The phrase “rabbit hole” is apt. The videos are quite addictive and you can spend ages listening to his analyses and deconstructions.
He has such a great ear. His breakdowns of instruments are equally helpful. For example, his tutorial of “Lady Madonna” shows the little roll from C to C# with his right hand in the verse, when other guys often miss such nuances or miss the roll part. He also doesn’t confuse the bass guitar part with the piano left-hand part, which some guys do, throwing in extraneous notes. And he is equally adept at surgically slicing out multiple guitar parts, which as you know can be a challenge–who is playing what notes and clusters on a two accoustic guitar arrangement? But those are differences between half-assing the song and getting it like the record. And his guidance on how to hit notes (don’t just sing the note, sing it this way) are great. I always listen to his tutorials, vocals, guitar, piano, and end up reacting, “Yes! That’s it!”
Yeah, I came across the “Lady Madonna” tutorial eventually. Looks like I had the main verse right (grace notes and A-C# -D bass and all, no C natural in the piano part) but I was most curious about the bridge chords (the Dm-G-C-Am part). Couldn’t figure out exactly how those chords where voiced on the record. I didn’t catch all that internal harmonic movement. Now that I know it’s there, I could hear it, but before I just knew something didn’t quite sound right.
Dude has an incredible ear. How he teases apart the vocal lines in his other tutorials so finely, catching every nuance, ever little gliss and bend and warble, shifts in tone, etc., is just astonishing. How have I never found his videos before?
I mostly have stayed out of this, because worrying about who’s a good musician is usually a topic that’s not really provable. However, I don’t think that Gilmour is all that outstanding in terms of skill on the fretboard, and he describes himself as, “a person who’s stuck within certain limitations, and I have to work within them”. He’s very good at manipulating the sound of the guitar with effects, but I can’t think of anything he does on the fretboard that I couldn’t do as an 18 year old kid.
That’s not to say he’s bad by any means, but he’s a different type of guitarist than Hendrix or Harrison. He’s focusing on something other than the manual dexterity involved. Now, this gets into the question of what point does excessive manual dexterity cease being helpful in making good music and musicians, which is a question I doubt a satisfactory answer exists for.
I know. That progression is very interesting, just gorgeous, every note (every note left out, for that matter).
Not only does he tease out the parts I can’t quite get down, there were several tutorials where he sang a part I didn’t even know was in there (“Wait, there’s 5 parts?” or “Huh! I never heard that bass part.”) But he hears 'em, and then when he shows us, then I do too!
This has made me fall in love with them all over again.
I can still remember trying to figure out (with my garage band) how to play and sing early Beatles songs, and it was frustrating, they were at a level so far beyond most pop tunes. (complete side track, the Stones could be just a bad, with that crazy 5 string open tuning stuff)
