All Songs +1: The Beatles Are Live And Sounding Better Than Ever

What kind of crazy fucked up world do we live in where a fifty year old recording of a defunct band trumps the work of the modern masters?

One in which most acts play to track in search of perfection and have lived their entire life in the spotlight, one in which talent is secondary to image and you fake it to make it.

Imagine being able to sing to qualify.

I constantly get e-mail from lame singers pointing me to their lyrics, and when I tell them the vocal is substandard and the words don’t carry the track, they point me to Bob Dylan…and I respond yes, Dylan had a less than perfect voice, but he was THE BEST LYRICIST OF ALL TIME!

And Dylan was famous for being one and done, doing very few takes, he wanted to catch the essence and then move on. Comping vocals back in ’65? Give me a break. Not only was live about energy, but recordings too, it was about capturing the magic, evidencing humanity.

I’m shocked how good this live version of “A Hard Day’s Night” is. My modern cynicism tells me it was overdubbed, fixed in the studio after the fact, like most live albums, but then I remember John Lennon’s been gone for decades and George has departed this mortal coil too.

But they left us this magical cut, a window into what once was, that will drop your jaw.

It was the rehearsal, all those gigs in Hamburg, all that work when no one was paying attention, experimenting, honing their chops. Whereas today everybody’s playing in plain sight, putting videos up on YouTube before puberty, believing they deserve attention, wondering why they haven’t already gone to the top of the chart.

“Meet The Beatles” blew it up in America. “The Beatles’ Second Album” came shortly thereafter. Diehard fans went back and bought the VeeJay LP, “Introducing The Beatles,” and by the summer of ’64, we were all on the same page, Beatlemania reigned, and “A Hard Day’s Night” was released.

First came the album. A truncated version on United Artists in the States. There were too many instrumental interludes. But the Beatle originals, they were devastating. Even sans the magical “Things We Said Today” and the outright tear of “Any Time At All” which were included in the UK LP but were absent from the American iteration.

And it all started with the title track, “A Hard Day’s Night.”

There was that opening chord…

All baby boomers hear it and immediately think of the movie, the four lads running down the street, the excitement, that bubbling adrenaline, which overtakes your body and excites you, drowning out all intellectualism, you’re running on feeling.

And you couldn’t get enough of that, so you went to see the act live. Assuming you could get a ticket.

But this was when PA’s were laughable, before we expected you to be able to play, never mind sing. Remember CSNY’s vocals in the “Woodstock” movie? Our expectations were lowered in person, although we were thrilled to be there.

And then we find the progenitor, before Peter Grant flipped the remuneration, before Showco and the Clair Brothers built infrastructure, blowing the roof off a joint that had no roof to begin with!

There’s that CHORD! There’s no way they should be able to recreate that live. And then John starts to sing…LIKE HE BELIEVES IT! He’s not punching the clock, he’s trying to CONVINCE YOU! Reveling in his expertise, knowing he’s blowing minds. And the harmonies… Really? How can they do this?

And then we have Paul’s soulful middle eight, whew!

And then the band is locked into it once again. Just four guys, no support, yet it’s enough.

Greatness is always enough.

George is not missing notes in the break, Ringo is propulsively keeping it all on track, a band without a solid drummer is no band at all.

It’s like being jetted back in a time machine to an era with no cell phones, no social media, when if you weren’t at the show you completely missed it. Talk about FOMO? It was much worse back then.

And the girls are screaming, the band throws in bits of improvisation, and you’re listening believing you missed something, something incredible.

And then you remember you were there, when Beatlemania took the country by storm, when optimism ruled, when the youth stole the country from the establishment and ran with it.

And it was all powered by music.

And the Beatles were there first.

P.S. If you haven’t already, pick up Malcolm Gladwell’s “Outliers” and read the section on the Beatles, wherein the writer posits the Fab Four played more gigs before they were famous than most bands today play in their entire career. There’s your 10,000 hour rule right there. You become world class by putting your time in via hard practice, winning over audiences who don’t care. That’s what the Beatles had to do, play endlessly, converting those who didn’t care. That’s your job.

CREATIVE TRUMPS FINANCIAL

Tom Freston is one of the best managers of all time. Not only did he oversee the spectacular growth at MTV Networks, he left his charges alone, they made the decisions, he was the cheerleader, the advisor, but they were empowered. MTV ruled the music business, its programmer was the most powerful person in the industry, threw off boatloads of cash and was the cultural denominator for not only the nation, but the world. Furthermore, Freston was ahead of his viewers. Despite watchers clamoring for more clips, Tom said MTV was never gonna air videos 24/7 anymore, since they’d become an on demand item on the web, which they most certainly have, wait for a video on cable while it’s available on demand on YouTube? And in a world where there’s almost never a second act, where Walter Yetnikoff and Tommy Mottola and Donnie Ienner lose their jobs and disappear, Freston has been the enabler of Vice, which is not only cool, but burgeoning, about to take over youth news by being edgy and accurate, delivering what you really want to see, as opposed to providing bland talking heads no one believes in. If Freston was still CEO, Viacom would not be in this snit, he would have pivoted, he would have changed, because in media he not busy being born is busy dying. This is the guy who thought MySpace was overpriced and passed and lost his job because he didn’t get on the bandwagon and didn’t lie about corporate projections. Then a manager, Philippe Dauman, came in and the whole thing went to pot, as Dauman was overpaid in the process. We’ve seen this movie many times before. Doug Morris was forced out at Warner and then built Universal. Few bands survive the loss of their front man. Don’t focus on the bottom line, focus on the TALENT!

SEX TRUMPS EVERYTHING

Sumner Redstone was thinking with the little head. All these execs do, and so do the athletes. The most powerful people are oftentimes the spouses and girlfriends. Sex is biology, everybody is vulnerable, the person on the pedestal is driven by the same things you and me are.

EVERYONE DIES

I don’t know whether Sumner Redstone is capable or not, but I do know he thought he’d live forever, famously said so, and really didn’t have a proper succession plan in place. Your time will be done, no matter how powerful you are today. Train your successors, who might do a better job than you. That’s right, Lucian Grainge runs Universal better than Doug Morris did. Because not only does he know the creative side, he’s aware of tech and the changing landscape and he is leveraging his power at Universal for change, like trying to bring Japan into the twenty first century in terms of music formats. Sure, Doug Morris survives at Sony, he’s a great music executive, don’t get me wrong. But Morris was replaceable and Sony is just a record company with hits, Universal is so much more.

YOU DON’T SELL THE CORPORATE JEWELS

Paramount, Dauman wanted to sell half to make the stock jump. But once you start selling that which got you to the prom that still has asset value, you’re in terminal decline. Sure, Paramount is presently moribund, but that’s fixable with a few hits. Shuffle the deck, change the systems, nothing is preventing Paramount from succeeding, it is not an institutional problem. It’d be like selling your car to make rent and then being unable to get to work. Think to the future, not the past.

STOCK PRICE IS NOT EVERYTHING

Sumner split Viacom in two, creating CBS and Viacom. Turns out that Les Moonves is not only a programming whiz, but a financial one too, he rides herd over Wall Street. But today it would be better if the two were together, and because of gross differences in stock price they may not be able to be reunited. So the loss is palpable. Never mind that Moonves would be a better manager of Viacom’s assets than Dauman. Building an enterprise is one thing, keeping it running is another. I give Sumner credit for sticking by his people, it’s just that with Dauman he picked the wrong person.

THE SECOND GENERATION IS CLUELESS

Sumner legendarily promoted from within, but the fact that Tom Dooley was given the reins shows that Shari Redstone and her handlers are clueless. This is repeating the formula. They need a creative guy, not someone who can make the trains run on time. You don’t need to calm the waters, you need a great leap forward. At least Steve Jobs gave Tim Cook responsibilities before his death, Cook was experienced. But Cook is everything that’s wrong with Apple, he can make the trains run on time but he can’t lay new track, everybody’s going where he is now, but will they in the future, of course not!

HUBRIS KNOWS NO BOUNDS

There’s a fiction that if we expose the heinous activities of the rich, they’ll be shamed into doing the right thing. But not only was Dauman one of America’s highest paid execs before the turmoil, he insisted on costing the company money to fight for his failed vision before he settled and walked away with a stratospheric payment. You and me would be embarrassed, but not this prick. Enough is never enough. And if you think this guy is gonna resurface, you’re a fan of Mickey Schulhof and Michael Fuchs.

COURT IS LEVERAGE

No one wants an extended legal fight. You just shoot your arrows and wait for a few decisions to go your way and then settle. The amazing thing is how those with a losing hand take so long to realize this, like Dauman, like Kesha. If you’re gonna fight in court, you’d better be able to win, rulings have to go your way or don’t even start. And never forget, when it comes to high profile cases, you’ll always find an attorney to take them on, lawyers like the glory too, everything’s show business today.

NOTHING IS FOREVER

Not MTV or Nickelodeon. The past is paved with enterprises that have gone under, you’ve got to constantly adjust and prepare for the future.

WE’RE GETTING OLDER EVERY DAY

MTV fired its audience, not its employees. Yup, the beloved veejays, they were all canned, they were too old, MTV had a young demo it wanted to maintain. “Rolling Stone” was the bible of the baby boomers, it’s irrelevant to their children. He who grays with his audience is destined for irrelevancy.

DISTRIBUTION RULES

On a limited cable system, Viacom was a giant. When distribution moved online, not only did Viacom miss the boat, no one goes to mtv.com, it lost its monopoly.

Lucian Grainge sent out an email to Universal executives today ending all future exclusives with Universal artists.

So this is what it’s come to. A recorded music industry battered for 16 years, which has seen 60% of its revenue evaporate, has learned nothing, circled the wagons and left the customer out.

That’s right, Napster was a consumer revolution. At this late date, only Shawn Fanning and Sean Parker are demonized, but if you think back you’ll remember, all those acts and execs complaining that fans just did not know how to do the right thing. Which in this case was to give up piracy and consume overpriced CDs for one good track.

They didn’t. They don’t even buy CDs anymore. But these same people are complaining that the audience doesn’t purchase files, complaining that they stream. Proving, once again, if you want to find people behind the curve, just look to the music industry.

But the truth is the music industry is the most advanced of the media enterprises. It’s come through the digital wars scathed, but it’s well-prepared for the future. Streaming has won and it’s been fan-friendly.

Until now.

The movie business isn’t fan-friendly. Read about a flick and you won’t find it on Netflix, never mind Amazon Prime or Hulu. They want you to subscribe to everything and still be left out, which is why the movie business is still battered by piracy. But movies are different from music, despite sequel-mania, the truth is every flick is a one time event, oftentimes seen one time. But musical careers are long term. People want to listen to their favorite tracks over and over, and they hope that their favorite acts deliver new music that will entice them, fans are invested in careers.

As for television… Cord-cutting is real, and although HBO and Showtime have standalone products, ESPN refuses to budge meaningfully. It just announced an app that won’t feature its core events, who’s waiting for that?

But in music, you can find everything you want to hear, right at your fingertips.

Until now.

Because there’s a conspiracy between Apple Music and the industry to change the game, to get everybody to pay for a subscription by putting hit content behind a paywall.

Apple should be investigated by the government for antitrust. How do you compete with the world’s richest company that’s got endless cash on hand? You can’t. It’d be like expecting hillbillies to get into Harvard if slots went to the highest bidder. The rich get richer and the rest of us…we’re left out, just like in America at large, which is why Bernie and Trump got traction, the usual suspects doing it for themselves have rigged the game in their favor, and now the music industry is trying to do this too.

But the truth is few care.

That’s right, I said it, most people don’t give a crap about the new Frank Ocean album. We’ve got an industry that promotes marginal products that appeal to few and makes them unavailable to most people? That’s hysterical!

The biggest act in the business is Adele, and her music sounds like no one else’s. She can sing, the songs are well-constructed, and they appeal to almost everybody. This is the music industry that used to triumph, it’s one being left behind, as insiders pursue a pop game wherein the youth are everything and if you can’t get it on the radio they don’t care.

Is this really helping Frank Ocean’s career?

OF COURSE NOT!

But he can’t turn down the cash. And sure, his songs will be available elsewhere eventually, after all the publicity dies down. And it could work for him, although I doubt it, he’s leaving the looky-loos alone, and this business has always thrived on the casual listener who drives by and gets hooked, but there are few acts of Ocean’s stature.

But there’s all this press!

Funny how the press wasn’t interested in Major Lazer’s “Lean On,” which ended up being the biggest track of the year on Spotify.

We need a free tier. We need a place where casual fans can experience new music. We’re in the business of building lifelong fans, but how do you do this when you can’t hear the music first, when you’ve got to overpay to experience it, that’s a twentieth century model but we’re deep in the twenty first!

For a while there, about ten years ago, the music industry paid fealty to its fans, saying they were the most important element in the food chain.

Every act still does. After thanking Jesus, they lavish praise on their fans.

But it’s dishonest, it’s bait and switch, it’s no different from Republicans appealing to rank and file workers by cutting taxes on the rich, no different from Democrats letting unions wither on the vine, expecting laborers to still go blue.

This is what happens when you neglect your constituency.

But it’s not hard to believe this is happening when Jimmy Iovine at Apple Music used to be a label executive, when Apple used to have monopolies via breakthrough products. Apple Music is a me-too product that works badly that’s locked behind a paywall and the music industry wants it to be the dominant platform so the fan is squeezed and indie acts are pushed down to the bottom where they belong.

And it’s all happening now.

And Frank Ocean is complicit.

Shame on you Frank, and shame on everybody else who takes money from Apple and screws fans. There’s enough money in music without taking every last buck, and the joke is on you, for thinking so short term, you want your music available to everybody, because in these days of information overload we need nobody, everybody is superfluous, you don’t want to enter the marketplace with one hand tied behind your back.