Michael Gerber • Hey Dullblog, the Beatles fan blog

Off to the Fest for Beatles Fans

By Michael Gerber|2015-08-14T11:08:07-07:00October 10, 2014|Beatles in LA|

The mothership. Can somebody die from too much Beatles? We're about to find out! Any readers going to the LA Fest who want to meet a Dullblogger in the flesh — and God, wouldn't that be something to tell your grandkids? — send an email to the site. I'll be checking it over the weekend. I'm usually somewhat shy and prefer to swim the seas of Fabdom incognito, but if there are a few of us, maybe we'll do a meetup. "Try these Riñgo Jalapeño Poppers, they're super-spicy." "Ahh, I don't think they're any different than regular jalapeño poppers." "I disagree. [...]

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Who should I interview at The Fest?

By Michael Gerber|2015-08-14T11:11:41-07:00October 7, 2014|Beatles in LA, The Fest for Beatles Fans|

I just booked my hotel for LA's edition of The Fest For Beatles Fans, and am incredibly psyched. I plan to spend this coming weekend immersed in sun-drenched SoCal Beatledom, writing down things to share with you. I also hope to interview as many people as I can, but I want to know who you'd like most, so I've embedded a poll below. Vote for the guests you'd like me to try to corner, and I'll make a special effort to chat with your favorites. Put suggestions for questions in the Comments! [polldaddy poll=8358662]

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Interview with Man on the Run author Tom Doyle

By Michael Gerber|2014-09-24T11:02:26-07:00September 23, 2014|1970s, books, Interviews, Paul McCartney|

At this late date, it's a rare book that fundamentally redefines what I think of a Beatle and his work. But after reading Tom Doyle's Man on the Run, I'm hearing Paul McCartney's Seventies music in a whole new way -- not as tuneful, inoffensive AOR, or bargain-bin Beatles, but as a legitimate second act -- a bit like Dylan after the motorcycle crash. Doyle is just the right man for this job; a longtime contributor to the Beatles-crazy UK music mags MOJO and Q, the spine of Man on the Run was formed by a series of interviews he did with [...]

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Deconstructing The Beatles: The End

By Michael Gerber|2016-01-18T11:04:00-08:00September 18, 2014|1969, Abbey Road|

Yukking it up in Studio Two. Thanks to a timely Tweet from The Fest for Beatles Fans -- LA Fest is coming and I will be there! -- I stumbled on this wonderful video, which lays out Abbey Road's climactic track in all its glorious pieces. Too juicy not to pass along. I have to say, as a non-musician, this is both very encouraging (I can hear how they made the finished song) and also demonstrates a way of thinking that I've never done myself, which makes music even more mysterious than before. http://youtu.be/P68IF-90WWU And here's the track in toto [...]

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The Beatles in Pittsburgh, 1964

By Michael Gerber|2014-09-15T11:59:05-07:00September 15, 2014|1964, Beatlemania|

The Beatles one and only visit to Pittsburgh came in 1964, at the height of Beatlemania. The Post-Gazette commemmorates both the concert and the phenomenon here. This is my favorite part. Three fans, holding a cake they hope to present to the group, are outside the arena waiting for the concert to begin: Speaking “British” was something the three teens who’d never ventured far from Weirton [West Virginia] had done quite often. Just a few weeks earlier, Sharon and Beverly had launched into the accents while attending the premiere of the Beatles’ new movie, “A Hard Day’s Night,” in nearby Steubenville, Ohio. [...]

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Joshua Wolf Shenk on Lennon and McCartney (Take 2)

By Michael Gerber|2015-04-11T11:43:35-07:00August 14, 2014|Breakup, John and Paul, Joshua Wolf Shenk, Reviews|

Hello there Nancy (and everybody)— Mike here. Nice post, Nancy; thanks. Here are some more thoughts spurred by The Atlantic's Joshua Wolf Shenk on Lennon and McCartney, perhaps too many. "I read The Atlantic, mmkay?" First of all, Shenk’s piece struck me as typical magazine journalism in the post-Gladwell age — well-written and not factually wrong, but persistently unambitious, only revelatory to somebody who hasn’t really thought about anything but TPS reports since the late 1990s. You know the drill: writer declares something to be conventional wisdom — Shenk even goes to Wikipedia for it — then demolishes it via a catchphrased [...]

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Charles Taylor on A Hard Day’s Night

By Michael Gerber|2014-08-12T09:54:34-07:00August 10, 2014|1964, AHDN, Beatles Criticism, Swinging London|

Some boys have trouble expressing affection. Charles Taylor has written a marvelous appreciation of "A Hard Day's Night" for the Los Angeles Review of Books. He just gets so much right here, and it's stuff that I've felt myself but never read anywhere else. Here's the opener to get you started: HOW WOULD YOU REACT if there appeared in front of you a flesh-and-blood vision of everything you ever dreamed life could be? What if you could, at the same time, be your distinctive self and an irreplaceable part of a greater whole? What if that greater whole showed you [...]

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Thoughts on the Python Reunion (and the Beatles)

By Michael Gerber|2014-08-08T09:56:33-07:00August 7, 2014|Breakup, comedy, Monty Python|

Just got back from watching Monty Python Live (Mostly), the filmed record of the Python reunion concerts performed at London’s O2 Theatre last month. It was — and I say this as someone who bought the expensive tickets primarily out of affection — a ball, a delight; if you can see it, go see it. The two and a half hours flew by; I laughed a lot, and even got a little choked up there at the end. I’m so glad I’ve lived at the same time as Monty Python. (A shaky fan video of their farewell — "Always Look on the [...]

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1967 Brian Epstein Interview with Murray the K

By Michael Gerber|2014-07-27T18:57:57-07:00July 27, 2014|1967, Brian Epstein|

http://youtu.be/_0kHAqfGnfQ Taking a moment on this lazy Sunday to pass along a mildly interesting recording I found last night: the infamous 1967 Brian Epstein interview with WOR-FM's Murray Kaufman ("Murray the K") from March 1967. Brian was in the US announcing the addition of Robert Stigwood (and Stigwood's acts The Cream and The Who) to his company NEMS. The coolest bit comes at the 15:00 mark, where Brian mentions turning "Sgt. Pepper" into a TV show. Is this what became "Magical Mystery Tour"? Could be -- according to this page, MMT began in April, shortly after this interview. Of course we know [...]

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The Black Album: Solo Beatles According to Ethan Hawke

By Michael Gerber|2014-07-21T21:18:24-07:00July 21, 2014|Beatles lists, solo|

Filmed over the course of 12 years, Richard Linklater's movie "Boyhood" is getting raves. Beatlefans will take particular note of the scene where a father (Ethan Hawke) gives his son (Ellar Coltrane) a mix of solo Beatles tracks, which he dubs "The Black Album." (Please note: this is not the stupendously lo-fi Let It Be-era bootleg, which managed to bring me down within seconds of loading the video.) The fictional collection's fictional liner notes begin, "I wanted to give you something for your birthday that money couldn’t buy, something that only a father could give a son, like a family heirloom. This [...]

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