Beatlemania
By Jennifer HaymoreBeatlemania hits again on 9/9/09! All of the Beatles albums have been re-released digitally re-mastered, and if you’re video game junkie or just curious about the Beatles, you can now pick up The Beatles: Rock Band at your local retailer. My husband bought the video game yesterday, and we’ve been having a blast playing it.
I wasn’t even born when the Beatles broke up, but I grew up listening to their music. Many of their songs are classics now, but I’m wondering if they’d be as successful if they were a new band today. Would their early mop-head hairstyles fly with today’s teenagers? Would they need to learn to dance around the stage more and flirt with the camera? Would their looks be more critical in becoming a success than their a
ctual music?
If you think about the evolution of the Beatles, they tended to change with the times—in their music as well as in their individual styles. I wonder...if the Beatles were young right now, would their talent and individual personalities make them superstars in this day and age?
Has the public become more superficial in terms of how they choose their music? Would the Beatles need to change anything to be as successful today?
What do you think?
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Jennifer Haymore
Wickedly Seductive Historical Romance
It's funny because the Beatles style and music have influenced so many artists today that if they were a new band today they'd be pretty revolutionary wouldn't they? What would have come before them? Twilight Zone time. I think they would have been just as popular. But I don't think it's possible for any one band or artist to attain iconic status anymore - I think there would have to be a big shake up in pop culture for that to happen because there is so much homogeneity today. I think now - the only way an performer stands out is by doing something really outrageous in the style of Britney. But then it's not exactly the kind of attention that warrants icon status.
ReplyDeleteI think the Beatles are only as iconic as they were because of the audience they were interacting with and performing for. They were great and I love the Beatles now a days everything is so technologically enhanced that more simplistic or rather more musically talented bands are something that is uniquely from the past. Not to say that there aren't talented bands today, just less main stream and have less impression on the youth today.
ReplyDeleteI loved the Beetles and have all their records and tapes. I just took a liking to them and really can't explain why. Ringo was my favorite . susan L.
ReplyDeleteAh, the Beatles. My first loves! At the time, we just thought they were cute and lovable moptops (ok, I was only six). But they truly broke ground with their music - they were the first to break the two-minute song barrier, add sound effects, and bend the genre. Their songs inspired countless other artists, musicians, poets, writers, you name it.
ReplyDeleteToday's musicians rely on so much more, such as videos (though the Beatles also broke ground with A Hard Day's Night and Help). Geniuses that they are (and were), I bet they'd still stand out in the glut of today's music.
Thanks for your comments everyone. Your point is interesting about the homogeneity, Joanna, and about how different the audiences are today, Murissa.
ReplyDeleteHmm. Given those points, I'm really not sure. But I'd definitely like to think the Beatles still be stand-out artists today...
I'm positive The Beatles would be groundbreakers again today if they only hit the world now. They had a special vibe as a group of four, and their charisma, musical talent, technological risk-taking and innate sense for the pulse of the times would work the identical magic now. It would just be in ways we couldn't predict. Because when they came out, no one could have predicted where they would take popular music.
ReplyDeleteI think you're right, Julia. ;-)
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