Michael Gerber • Hey Dullblog, the Beatles fan blog

Eight Days A Week trailer

By Michael Gerber|2016-06-20T12:53:16-07:00June 20, 2016|Documentaries|

Am I excited for Ron Howard's upcoming documentary, Eight Days A Week? Hell yes, I am. The story of the Beatles' touring years is the great untold portion of their career, and it deserves more attention. In part because the touring experience was what made them who they were; in part because we think we know what it was like; and in part because no one but them could ever truly know what it was like. In my generation, Touring Beatles (1962-66) were often dismissed as pop lightweights turned into artists by exposure to drugs and Bob Dylan. And that viewpoint has [...]

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Lewisohn with Conan O’Brien on Serious Jibber-Jabber

By Michael Gerber|2016-05-19T11:48:25-07:00May 19, 2016|Mark Lewisohn|

Geekin' out with Conan and Lewisohn. Comedy legend (and serious Beatle fan) Conan O'Brien has just interviewed Beatle legend (and serious Beatle fan) Mark Lewisohn on his chat show "Serious Jibber-Jabber." It's well worth a listen. "Most of the books you have read, upon which you base your knowledge," Lewisohn begins, "in terms of biography they only skim the surface. The writers will take a year or two. And in that time, they'll do six to nine months of research, six to nine months of interviews, and then they'll write. I always felt this was a subject that would merit [...]

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Tony Barrow 1936-2016

By Michael Gerber|2016-05-16T12:53:46-07:00May 15, 2016|Obituaries|

The Beatles and Tony Barrow, 1963 Former Beatles press agent Tony Barrow has died at age 80. A member of the group's original Liverpool gang, Barrow was part of the Beatles' story from 1961-1968. Record reviewer for the Liverpool Echo from the age of 17, Barrow was working for Decca when Brian Epstein called for some advice regarding a pop group he'd just agreed to manage. Using his connections, Barrow was able to finagle the Beatles an audition. Not forgetting the favor, Brian Epstein later hired him away from Decca to handle press for all the NEMS groups. As every [...]

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Our media policy

By Michael Gerber|2016-05-11T18:34:55-07:00May 11, 2016|Housekeeping|

"You sold me oregano!" Folks, just a quick check-in here -- earlier a commenter put up a link to a downloadable .epub of Philip Norman's new biography of Paul McCartney. This file is almost certainly an infringement on several entities' copyright, and I removed it as soon as I was made aware of its existence. As someone who has lost thousands (millions?) of dollars in royalties because of exactly this kind of piracy, I take a very dim view of this type of behavior. You want a book, go buy the book. Or get it from the library. Piracy hurts [...]

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The Joshua Liquid Light Show

By Michael Gerber|2016-05-04T09:50:38-07:00May 4, 2016|1969|

The Joshua Liquid Light Show, invented by artist Joshua White, was a psychedelic staple at New York's iconic Fillmore East in the late Sixties. White and his colleagues would project their work on 30-40 foot screens behind bands like Jimi Hendrix and The Who, improvising in time with the music. I've found one of their Shows on YouTube, which I'm pasting below. This work is now part of the permanent collection at The Museum of Modern Art in New York. https://youtu.be/TW733Ut5zE0 It is a real shame that the Beatles didn't return to touring; their post-Pepper music, plus proper mic-ing and amplification, plus [...]

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Sgt Pepper and Psychedelic Utopianism

By Michael Gerber|2016-05-03T11:04:41-07:00May 3, 2016|Sgt. Pepper|

"Did you hear that, lads? It's...HISTORY" In a comment on Starostin's latest review of Sgt. Pepper, Dullblogger Karen wrote the following: Part of the charm of this album, as it relates to the construction of an alternate reality, is that it was borne of out a felt need. It wasn’t just conceptual; it was an “only if” type of reaction to the group’s growing disenchantment with their own fame. No other group had ever done that, and with the exception of Prince (who changed his name a few times for the same reason) no-one else has done it since. This [...]

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The Turtles and Managers

By Michael Gerber|2016-05-02T14:01:50-07:00May 2, 2016|music business|

"Then he went to Mexico, with $40K and the bass player's wife." Since we've been talking a lot lately about managers and agents and their role in the story of the Beatles, I thought I'd post this so-sad-it's-funny video done in 1990 by Flo and Eddie, the founders of The Turtles. https://youtu.be/5JHN5HaUg28 As the Fabs discovered, this kind of thing makes it much, much harder to create, and no band -- no matter how touched with genius -- survives for long under these conditions. This is why I endlessly sing the praises of Mister Brian Epstein. This from Flo and [...]

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All Things Must Pass

By Michael Gerber|2016-05-01T12:24:19-07:00May 1, 2016|Documentaries|

Cool car, too Dullblog readers will likely enjoy All Things Must Pass, a recent documentary on the rise and demise of Tower Records. Directed by Colin Hanks, All Things Must Pass probes all the nooks and crannies of the legendary record store chain, which via the magic of contemporary American capitalism, only exists in Japan anymore. Turns out that the biggest threat to our way of life isn't "handtruck fuel" (store slang for cocaine), but bankers. The doc is a fascinating glimpse into Sixties, and particularly Seventies, rock culture, which generated oodles of cash and spawned a million mini-ecologies, from [...]

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Beatle humor in your daily life

By Michael Gerber|2016-05-01T12:35:47-07:00May 1, 2016|comedy|

"Pencil, Mal -- " I was recently in the hospital with my first kidney stone (not recommended). I left the experience knowing two new things about myself. One, I can survive the most intense pain the male body can dish out. And two, no matter how bad it gets, I still keep a sense of humor. After eight hours of agony, the nurse decided to "get on top of this pain" by giving me a bunch of morphine. My wife Kate was standing next to me as he put a port into my right hand, loaded the ampule, and pressed [...]

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Gopnik on Norman on McCartney

By Michael Gerber|2016-04-26T21:37:24-07:00April 26, 2016|biography|

Paul, looking over his shoulder Adam Gopnik has contributed a peculiar review of Philip Norman's new bio, Paul McCartney: The Life. The TL;DR is "A reader familiar with the past twenty years of Beatles biography will have a pretty hard time finding a single new fact or revelation within [Norman's biography]." Pretty damning, right? Apparently not; Gopnik hastens to add that we shouldn't blame Norman. "After Lewisohn; after Barry Miles’s strange Many Years from Now, a semi-official biography; after Albert Goldman’s The Lives of John Lennon and the Beatles Anthology series, there just isn’t much left to say. Even if [...]

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