Four In Hand by John Lennon
This musical was brought to you by Purell. With all this talk of certain male sexual practices, I couldn't help but remember Four In Hand by John Lennon, the sketch he wrote for Kenneth Tynan's erotic revue "Oh! Calcutta!" First mounted (so to speak) in 1969, "Oh! Calcutta!" was a massive success — long runs on both sides of the Atlantic, [...]
Comments and the spam filter
Fished around in the spam filter today and retrieved two actual comments, one by ChelseaQW and one by Virginia Abreau de Paula –they’re now showing up in the appropriate threads. Everyone, if you submit a comment and it’s not posted within a few hours, please resend it. (Like George in "Blue Jay Way," we may be asleep—but there's also a chance the [...]
Why Those Screaming Beatlemania Girls Matter
Those videos of Beatlemania girls screaming have have always made me squirm. All that howling, weeping, and writhing bug me for multiple reasons. As a woman, they make me cringe because rock criticism defined itself against them: screeching gals over there, analytical guys over here. As a Beatles fan they make me wince because they (superficially) reinforce the argument made by many non-fans [...]
The Beatles Forever?
I read this book until it fell apart. I still have the pieces on my bookshelf. Commenter @ChelseaQW said something in our gargantuan thread today that really resonated with me. I wanted to surface it in a post, on the off-chance it resonated with some of you. "Traditional Beatles fandom (and 'journalism') is SO dominated by straight white male baby [...]
ELO is back
Since we're talking about Jeff Lynne, I wanted to pause for a moment and take Dullblog's temperature on Electric Light Orchestra. Because ELO is back with their first album in 14 years, and I just listened to this catchy little tune. https://youtu.be/uy0oWuhTzh8 Commercially -- for the moment -- ELO is back, but for a lot of Beatles fans, they've never left. Their [...]
Free As A Bird: Pro or Con?
The act you haven't known... I awoke this morning to begin my American Thanksgiving, and the first song I heard on KCRW was "Free As A Bird." (Droll, young hip DJ, very droll.) FAAB is that rarest of B's: a Beatles song you don't hear very often. And rightly so? I remember being delighted by "Free As A Bird" when [...]
Beatlebone review by Karen
One of the few perks of Hey Dullblog (in addition to being able to converse with all of you, which is pleasure enough) is receiving the occasional Beatle-related item in the mail. Earlier in the fall, a nice man at Doubleday reached out and asked if we'd review the Irish novelist Kevin Barry's Beatlebone, a fantasy starring a late-Seventies John Lennon. Of [...]
Beatles Halloween Costumes? Sure there are
Mr Lennon, before he made my candy bag all sticky Just a quick post before I go out trick or treating -- okay, okay, I'm not quite that immature, my bank account to the contrary. I am going simply as moral support. But I do plan on plucking some winners out of the obscene haul my young friend Henry is [...]
Beatles Drum Chronology
A candidate we can believe in A friend (thank you Joey Green!) forwarded this amazing film of Australian Kye Smith going through the drum parts of the Beatles' catalogue in one wonderful five-minute spurt. ("Control yourself, you'll spurt.") Bonus points to Kye for putting "Strawberry Fields" and "Penny Lane" before the Sgt. Pepper tracks in his Beatles drum chronology; demerits [...]