Uncategorized Archives | Page 5 of 12 | Hey Dullblog, the Beatles fan blog

Happy Birthday Paul McCartney, Friend of the Jews

By Michael Gerber|2019-06-18T12:08:30-07:00June 18, 2019|Uncategorized|

In honor of Macca's 77th, The Forward posted this little squib detailing Paul McCartney's various Jewish spouses, friends, business associates, et cetera. (This from Heeb aside, there is no evidence that McCartney has converted—though of course all his children would be considered Jewish under Hebraic law, because Linda was Jewish.)With all the Jews in and around the music biz, I actually think it's more remarkable that fully 50% of the group married alumnae of Sarah Lawrence. :-) Nevertheless—as far as The Beatles is concerned—the answer to the eternal question "Is it good for the Jews?" has got to be yes.

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Paul McCartney Makes Mashed Potatoes

By Michael Gerber|2019-05-25T14:50:00-07:00May 25, 2019|Uncategorized|

This man loved his wife. (I'm guessing he was promoting her cookbook.) https://youtu.be/WyyEc-GNDfQ Adding this after I posted it: GodDAMN but Paul McCartney is charming. I don't care if it's all just a big hustle, I just love the guy. Let us take a moment to, once again, be thankful for the brilliant stroke of luck that was The Beatles: what are the odds that these four guys would all be from the same town, all be great musicians, and all be incredibly charismatic people?

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Critic Amanda Marcotte: Sgt. Pepper’s made rock “music for men”

By Nancy Carr|2019-10-19T21:58:41-07:00June 1, 2017|1967, Beatles Criticism, Beatles on the Web, critics, Sgt. Pepper, Uncategorized|

Amanda Marcotte, critic and politics writer for Salon. Yeah, no surprise that the 50th anniversary of Sgt. Pepper's has everybody out there opining. But I find Amanda Marcotte's take in Salon worth calling out, if only to say that as someone who considers herself a feminist I'm thoroughly tired of this kind of facile, oversimplified finger-pointing. Her claim that Sgt. Pepper's "was the point when rock stopped being the music of girls and started being the music of men" is potentially defensible. Certainly the critical reception the album received made it clear that popular music could be considered serious art. If Marcotte stuck to analyzing what critics at the time said about the [...]

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What John Lennon Thinks of Donald Trump

By Devin McKinney|2016-12-03T07:52:05-08:00November 14, 2016|Uncategorized|

In the last few days, two people close to me have said they’ve found John’s “Gimme Some Truth” to be a tonic right now, even a cathartic. But this is the Lennon song that came to my mind, a day or two after the worst cataclysm to befall America since 9/11, and I’ve been listening to it several times a day. Coming from 1974, it’s a demo of the song from John’s Walls and Bridges album. As we know, it was written about ex-Beatles manager Allen Klein. But as far as I’m concerned, it’s a hot curse from the grave, a shot [...]

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McCartney Opens Sacramento Stadium with a Bang

By Nancy Carr|2016-10-11T17:31:36-07:00October 11, 2016|"New" album, concert, Live, McCartney: Man of the People, Paul McCartney, Uncategorized|

My view from the cheap(ish) seats. Paul McCartney opened Sacramento’s Golden 1 Center on October 4 the same way he closed down Candlestick Park two years ago – with a nonstop volley of songs. The opening chord of “A Hard Day’s Night” sounded, and tens of thousands of fans started screaming. The overall mood, though decidedly more decorous than the heyday of Beatlemania, was reminiscent of it. And as has become usual during the past few years, McCartney basked in it, drew energy from it, and played a nearly 3-hour set that included 38 songs. Most of the songs and anecdotes [...]

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Eight Days A Week: 5 Great Things About Ron Howard’s Documentary

By Nancy Carr|2016-09-26T16:05:36-07:00September 26, 2016|1963, 1964, 1965, Beatle History, Beatlemania, concert, Live, Movies, Uncategorized|

Getting ready to perform, during the suit-and-tie era. Ron Howard's Eight Days A Week documentary of the Beatles' touring years is excellent. Not perfect, not a definitive look at the totality of the Beatles' career, but very good at doing what it sets out to do. Howard does shy away from the unseemly elements of the Beatles' life on the road, most obviously the rampant sex. And he doesn't delve into the disenchantment that Lennon and Harrison later expressed about the experience of being Beatles. But Howard is aiming to show us what being on public display felt like for the band, and [...]

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Beatles mystery: “She’s Leaving Home”

By Nancy Carr|2016-09-22T07:33:20-07:00September 20, 2016|1968, Beatle-inspired, Beatles fiction, books, fans, Uncategorized|

William Shaw's She's Leaving Home is a Beatles-linked police procedural mystery. It's also a deep dive into the turmoil of late-60's London. And an examination of two detectives struggling with their identities and social roles. If that makes the book sound overstuffed, it's because it is. But overall it's an enjoyable read for Beatles or mystery fans who are prepared to skim a bit. Beatles novels are as various as the songs on the White Album, ranging from the simply parodic (Alan Goldsher's Paul is Undead) to the thriller (Phil Rickman's December) to the realistic slice-of-life (Philip Gillam's Here Comes the Sun). But alternative history leads the field, with [...]

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McCartney and Starr on Orlando attack

By Nancy Carr|2016-06-16T07:33:19-07:00June 16, 2016|concert, Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, Uncategorized|

McCartney on stage in Berlin After the June 11 mass shooting attack at Orlando's Pulse nightclub, both Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr have publicly expressed their solidarity with the victims. This isn't a surprise, but it's a welcome reminder that in this time when so many seem driven by fear and hatred of those who are different, there are still prominent voices speaking of the power of love and connection. At his June 14 show in Berlin, McCartney emerged for an encore wearing a large rainbow flag and declared "We stand together with Orlando." And in an interview on June [...]

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Ringo Starr says Give Peace A Chance

By Karen Hooper|2016-04-13T18:21:27-07:00April 13, 2016|Uncategorized|

Ringo Starr has joined the growing list of musicians who are cancelling performances in North Carolina/Mississippi in protest of new laws which, in an attempt to protect the masses from the transgender menace in public bathrooms (note sarcasm) removes legal protections for LGBT persons. Peace and Love, Ringo, we love yah. (If you’re not up on the goings on, here’s a video to bring you up to speed.)

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Dr. Jenny Boyd On Creativity

By Karen Hooper|2016-04-01T19:10:26-07:00March 31, 2016|Apple/Inner Circle, books, Uncategorized, Wives and girlfriends|

Jenny Boyd with George Harrison I was surfing the internet yesterday and came across an interesting story about Patti Boyd’s sister and ex-wife of Mick Fleetwood, Jenny Boyd. After leaving her modelling career, Boyd attended UCLA and obtained her Ph.D in psychology in the late `80’s. Her Ph.D dissertation about the origins of creativity was published in 1992 as Musicians in Tune and again in 2014 as an expanded version entitled It’s Not Only Rock ’N’ Roll: Iconic Musicians Reveal The Source of Their Creativity. Here’s the description from Amazon. Psychologist Jenny Boyd has probed the minds and souls of these artists [...]

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