Golden Beatles<\/a>", the songbook covering all the early hits, but I could never figure out the tempo, the groove, on my guitar.\u00c2\u00a0 Oh, I nailed "What You’re Doing", which also appeared on "Beatles VI", which I’d also never heard previously (imagine discovering a new Beatle song!), but "Every Little Thing" escaped my grasp.\u00c2\u00a0 But then I heard it on the debut Yes album.<\/p>\nNot that I knew it was a Beatle song.\u00c2\u00a0 That was only after I purchased the LP and read the credits.\u00c2\u00a0 My dentist took me to Mad River Glen, to ski the tough stuff.\u00c2\u00a0 But we never made it there, the cover was too thin.\u00c2\u00a0 But on the long way back to Connecticut, in his Dodge Coronet station wagon that shook like a mixer when we hit seventy, the tires badly in need of balancing, he played me a home made 8-track tape of the English group’s debut.<\/p>\n
He asked me if I’d heard of Yes.\u00c2\u00a0 I had to admit not, however much it pained me.\u00c2\u00a0 And figuring that no band with such a stupid name could be any good, I girded myself for crap, but I was enthralled.\u00c2\u00a0 And went to Korvette’s the very next day to buy it.\u00c2\u00a0 I had to hear "Every Little Thing" more.\u00c2\u00a0 This great prog rock number with the magnetic chorus.\u00c2\u00a0 That turned out to be a Beatle song!\u00c2\u00a0 But what album?<\/p>\n
There was no Internet.\u00c2\u00a0 I asked everybody I knew.\u00c2\u00a0 All the musos in Andrew Warde High School.\u00c2\u00a0 And discovered the track was on "Beatles VI".\u00c2\u00a0 But who owned "Beatles VI"?<\/p>\n
It was weeks before I stumbled on the album, after searching the records at every house I entered thereafter.\u00c2\u00a0 And I was instantly enraptured.<\/p>\n
There’s the jangly intro.<\/p>\n
And then John Lennon’s voice.\u00c2\u00a0 You can see him!\u00c2\u00a0 On "Ed Sullivan"!\u00c2\u00a0 You know, with his feet spread, his guitar high on his chest, bouncing up and down.<\/p>\n
And then, what are those, piano notes?\u00c2\u00a0 That sound like a drum?\u00c2\u00a0 That accent and emphasize?<\/p>\n
And there’s that one part…<\/p>\n
There is one thing I’m sure of
I will love her forever<\/em><\/p>\nThe way John goes down at the end of the line, it’s so intimate!\u00c2\u00a0 The song immediately sets your mind free, you think of your best self, it makes life worth living, you feel your magic moment is out there, and if not, the pure joy in hearing this track is enough.<\/p>\n
And then I told Felice "Every Little Thing" was on my favorite Beatle album, "Beatles For Sale".<\/p>\n
Oh, it didn’t used to be my favorite.\u00c2\u00a0 That used to be "Sgt. Pepper".\u00c2\u00a0 But that album seems dated, a curio.\u00c2\u00a0 Whereas "Beatles For Sale" is like a time capsule.\u00c2\u00a0 Listening takes you back.\u00c2\u00a0 You’re immediately in Christmas ’64.\u00c2\u00a0 You can smell it!<\/p>\n
And "Beatles For Sale" starts just like "Beatles ’65", with "No Reply".\u00c2\u00a0 You remember "No Reply", don’t you?<\/p>\n
Actually, Felice didn’t.\u00c2\u00a0 I’m waxing rhapsodic about "Beatles ’65", but it’s not registering.\u00c2\u00a0 Then I start to sing the opening cut.<\/p>\n
This happened once before
When I came to your door
No reply<\/em><\/p>\nOH YES!\u00c2\u00a0 THAT’S MY FAVORITE!<\/p>\n
Suddenly, Felice was back in ’64 too.\u00c2\u00a0 She started singing "No Reply".<\/p>\n
And now I was all excited.\u00c2\u00a0 Because the follow-up was just as entrancing.<\/p>\n
It started off a cappella.<\/p>\n
I’m a loooser!<\/em><\/p>\nOh, it was jaunty, akin to a country song.\u00c2\u00a0 But so intimate.\u00c2\u00a0 It was like running away with the circus.<\/p>\n
Then I’m singing "I’ll Follow The Sun".\u00c2\u00a0 And then replicating every note of the intro of "I Feel Fine".\u00c2\u00a0 It’s Beatlemania all over again!<\/p>\n
We both know every lick, every word.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s been forty years, but there’s been no act like this since.\u00c2\u00a0 Oh, there have been good songs, but that’s all they were, songs.\u00c2\u00a0 The Beatle numbers were exquisite jewels, they weren’t throwaways, they had harmonies, changes, they were works of genius.<\/p>\n
And now we’re running through contemporaneous albums.<\/p>\n
I focus in on "Help".\u00c2\u00a0 With all its overlooked tracks.\u00c2\u00a0 Like "I Need You" and "The Night Before".\u00c2\u00a0 And, of course, "You’ve Got To Hide Your Love Away".\u00c2\u00a0 Don’t you remember playing that one on the guitar?\u00c2\u00a0 Singing along at parties?\u00c2\u00a0 HEY!<\/p>\n
And Felice wondered about the lyrics of "Run For Your Life".\u00c2\u00a0 What were they thinking?\u00c2\u00a0 Then again, there are men who do that every day, kill their spouses when they find them with somebody else.<\/p>\n
I’m thinking of going to see "A Hard Day’s Night" during the afternoon, in Lititz, Pennsylvania, on vacation in Pennsylvania Dutch country.\u00c2\u00a0 And suddenly I realize, I’m still a believer.<\/p>\n
<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Felice asked me why "Every Little Thing" was my favorite Beatle song. I told her it had to do with "Beatles VI".\u00c2\u00a0 How I didn’t buy it. It started with "Something New", that’s when I broke my streak.\u00c2\u00a0 I felt it was a rip-off.\u00c2\u00a0 I already had all the songs on the second side on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-656","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-music"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/s96vPs-656","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/656","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=656"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/656\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=656"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=656"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=656"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}