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Did Paul “Save The Beatles”? Comment by Michael Gerber on Apr 20, 20:30 @Tony, how it seems to have worked is this: Klein would agree to purchase the band’s interest in all their music — like, say, the songwriting royalties due to Jagger/Richards in exchange for some flat fee. Then that money would be held in escrow and doled out to the band in pieces, so that (according to Klein) they would pay less in taxes). Basically ABKCO would be interposed between the label and the artist under management. This was a TERRIBLE idea, because 1) Allen Klein was better at squirreling away money than you were at finding it; 2) you’d have to PAY someone to find it, sue Klein, or both — which made it all a considerable gamble, likely more than the royalties themselves; 3) how could you finance a fight with Klein if all your royalties were going to him?; you had to trust Klein to pay your taxes on time and in full, which he didn’t; and 4) the moment any legal fight would commence, all the major activity of a band would become either impossible (who would fund a tour? who would pay for studio time?) or extremely risky — anybody getting involved with the Stones when they were fighting Allen Klein would likely become a part of that lawsuit. Klein not only arranged for royalties to be paid into companies he controlled, he also was the publisher of the Stones’ music, and he arranged their tours. I’m not plugged in enough to the music business to know how different this was from what Prince Rupert Loewenstein did for the Stones after 1970, but I suspect the main difference is that the entities formed to collect and disburse the Stones’ money were owned by them, not by Loewenstein. That to me is the big red flag with Klein. As I said in an earlier comment, London/NY/LA was full of businesspeople who could’ve done what The Beatles needed doing; Prince Rupert Loewenstein shows that. But Lennon especially would’ve never worked with someone like that, a merchant banker, “a fat-cat sitting on his arse in the City.” So that made him, and his group, susceptible. Since Jagger was disenchanted with Klein in 1968–before Lennon had his meeting–I think it’s rather likely that his disenchantment was known by the Fabs, and among the other members of that set. But a cursory perusal suggests that Jagger, preparing his own group’s departure, did not want to tip his hand by warning The Beatles off. I personally don’t buy that. I personally think that the Stones and Beatles had been friends long enough that Jagger could’ve said, “There are better options” instead of what he was reputed to have said, “Klein’s all right, if you like that sort of thing.” I think Jagger felt that Klein having The Beatles would satisfy him enough to go easier on The Stones. But that’s not the psychology of someone like Allen Klein. Whom I am being very hard on but, c’mon, the guy left a fucking trail of destruction. With Sam Cooke, The Stones, and The Beatles, the common denominator is Klein.
Did Paul “Save The Beatles”? Comment by Michael Gerber on Apr 20, 19:21 “But Mother, I left the packet of FALSE heroin under the issue of Red Mole. But when I came back, it was gone!” “Which means—“ “That someone let themselves in, searched the living room, and…IS STILL HERE!!!!” “..:or you’re hallucinating.” “Yes, well, obviously. But what if I’m not?”
Did Paul “Save The Beatles”? Comment by Jennifer L. Schillig on Apr 20, 12:08 Hey there…I know it’s off-topic for this thread, but did you see where there’s a new mystery novel with John and Yoko in the detective roles? It’s called Imagine Murder and it’s by Dean Thompson, who was a member of John and Yoko’s staff. It takes place in 1972 and depicts John and Yoko investigating the murder of a staff member of their film company. I haven’t gotten around to reading it yet, but it’s on the library app Hoopla if you have access to it. You might be interested in reading it/reviewing it for the blog.
Did Paul “Save The Beatles”? Comment by Tony Collins on Apr 20, 00:47 Glad to see your thoughts Can you or anyone give an explainer, or a link to an explainer, about how Klein ended up owning the Stones’ publishing? I’ve never quite understood it Also you mention the possibility they Paul wouldn’t sign with Klein cos of what was happening with the Stones. Was it known at the time by people outside the Stones, or is that an educated guess? Thanks!
The Artist as a Dissipated Man: Fred Seaman’s “The Last Days of John Lennon” Comment by Michael Gerber on Apr 16, 14:27 One rumor, at least by the time of Goldman, was that Lennon might’ve had AIDS. We have no reason to think that he did, save for the alarming weight loss after 1977. But the story is given legs by Lennon’s rambling around the drug- and sexual demimondes of 1970s New York. Researchers now believe that AIDS first hit the US in New York around 1970, and if you believe (as I do) that Lennon injected heroin as well as sniffed it, okay, maybe possible. Another rumor around fans in the early 80s was that Yoko had proposed that they both be murdered together, and then had second thoughts/chickened out. But neither of these are necessary for your suggestion to have happened. Lennon was famously obsessed with assassinations — like many who’d lived through the Sixties — and seemed to think he would meet a violent end. Might he have dismissed MacDougal so that “it” would happen? Impossible to know. IIRC correctly, according to Goldman Yoko convinced John that having a bodyguard was unmanly — but I may be remembering that from another source. But for the events of 12/8/80, the actions of the limo driver are more central. Was he ever questioned? Probably not, given the unfolding of the case. It could be a series of sad, sad coincidences, or something more nefarious. We will never know.
The Artist as a Dissipated Man: Fred Seaman’s “The Last Days of John Lennon” Comment by PlasticSpirit on Apr 16, 05:56 Could it be at least somewhat possible that Lennon had been receiving threats and fired the bodyguards thinking that just making it easy for “it” to happen could actually make “it” happen? This could also include the theory that he was terminally ill then. What do you think?
The Artist as a Dissipated Man: Fred Seaman’s “The Last Days of John Lennon” Comment by Michael Gerber on Apr 16, 00:15 Forty years on, I think that’s a pretty fair assessment. The reaction to Goldman can’t be separated from the international grief over Lennon’s death, and a weird kind of fan guilt over his murder. So people were not interested in “the real story” in 1987.
The Artist as a Dissipated Man: Fred Seaman’s “The Last Days of John Lennon” Comment by Ben on Apr 15, 11:03 So did Albert Goldman tell some uncomfortable truths about Lennon after all few people wanted to hear ?
Did Paul “Save The Beatles”? Comment by Michael Gerber on Apr 12, 21:27 @Craig, Happy to be back! There were probably a hundred, certainly fifty, business people in NY/LA/London who could’ve untangled Apple, set the Beatles’ affairs on their feet, and negotiated the SHIT out of a new contract with EMI. Everyone and their mother would’ve wanted that gig, and not groovy people, but serious experienced, square businessmen; Paul was right when he said that there was no need to pay Klein 25%. I believe in the Playboy interview, Klein himself said there were people who’d do it for nothing. The important point was that there were so many more options than obvious shyster Allen Klein, and Paul’s new in-laws. Think about it this way: the kind of expertise The Beatles needed was so thick on the ground that the rock photographer Paul married happened to have a father and brother who could do it. So why didn’t they look around? Partly because it was more fun being a Beatle, partly because of the times. I doubt The Beatles would’ve been bankrupt in six months — but even if Apple had crashed and burned in that fashion, the real money was in future earnings, which was Klein’s leverage on EMI. Following his return from India, Lennon particularly began parroting the countercultural line that all businessmen were bastards. For example, in the May 11th, 1968, press conference announcing Apple, he says, “It’s a business concerning records, films, and electronics. And as a sideline, whatever it’s called… manufacturing, or whatever. But we want to set up a system whereby people who just want to make a film about (pause) anything, don’t have to go on their knees in somebody’s office. Probably yours.” This last swipe makes no sense; the people who’d asked him the question were journalists, and neither journalists nor the readers of their publication would be having begging artists on their knees in somebody’s office. Lennon’s comment was one of the first media appearances of Everybody’s Always Fucking Me Lennon, a persona he would wear off-and-on for the rest of his life. With the exception of merchandising, John Lennon in 1968 had not been ill-treated by businesspeople; I’m sure he wished he’d made more money, and we all agree he probably deserved a lot more money, but by the standards of the time, the Fabs hadn’t been screwed. This is so important to remember when discussing Brian Epstein: Bad management, bad record deals, these things DESTROY people. The way the publishing business treated me from 2005-2010 nearly destroyed me; I got out alive, barely, but stopped writing books, my life’s dream. Read about Badfinger, for a bad time. Jimi Hendrix’s manager was so awful one of his roadies thinks he actually killed Jimi for the insurance. No, what we are hearing here is Lennon spouting off-the-rack Angry Hippie Bullshit. Certainly by mid-68, there’s a lot of this floating around the counterculture, causing a lot of bad decisions. It’s why the Stones hired the Hell’s Angels to provide security at Altamont, instead of…literally anyone else. So, one, Lennon’s paranoid about businessmen because of fashion. Then, after Apple had introduced legions of leeches into The Beatles’ circle, in January ’69 Lennon said this to the press: ““We started off with loads of ideas of what we wanted to do — an umbrella for different activities. But like one or two Beatles things it didn’t work because we weren’t quick enough to realise we need a businessman’s brain to run the whole thing. If it carries on like this all of us will be broke in six months.” Lennon may have hated businesspeople, but the moment he thought he might have to live like a prole again, the cold sweat came. Klein smelled his fear, and made a meeting, wherein Lennon straight-up told Klein he was afraid of ending up like Mickey Rooney, a broke show-biz has-been. Klein played on that fear. Lennon felt desperate, which was one source of his bad judgment regarding Klein. But to use him, John (and Yoko) had to convince themselves that Klein was some sort of countercultural ally. John’s fear, and Klein’s sucking up to Yoko, made that easy. But I also think Lennon picked Klein because he knew it would drive Paul crazy. Because by the time they’d met Klein, Lennon was well into the spiral that caused him to break up the group by mistake. I’ve long held a theory—maybe first put forth in comments on Dullblog, though Mikal Gilmore was working similar territory as of 2009, that John Lennon broke up the Beatles in an escalating series of emotional outbursts designed to get a reaction, but that he didn’t expect to really break up the group for good. Hiring Klein should be viewed as part of this series of actions, which began with his flipping out on the Air India flight, and didn’t simmer down for years. Sadly, Klein turned out to be the one thing that really did break up the group. Saying “I want a divorce” is a hot-headed thing to say by the group’s beloved hothead, a guy who once announced he was Jesus. But introducing Allen Klein into the mix couldn’t be taken back, and unless Paul was willing to be in business with ABKCO for the rest of his life (and would you be?), he had to sever the partnership agreement, thus ending the group.
Did Paul “Save The Beatles”? Comment by Craig on Apr 12, 17:01 Here here Michael. Klein is without a doubt the biggest villain in the Beatles story. Or am I forgetting someone? Interesting to hear your quick take on Jagger. While I don’t discount it, I seem to recall that Mick/Stones were still attempting to disentangle themselves from Klein and he (Mick) was thus wary of angering Klein by being the person who dissuaded the Beatles from signing with Klein. Now, I still think a mate should forewarn another mate about a lecherous parasite such as Klein so I think I do fault Mick somewhat for this. Re: the Eastman’s. I do sympathize with J/G/R being a tad bit concerned signing over their business to Paul’s in-laws. I totally get that. I also think the Eastman’s would’ve been perfectly adequate as stewards/managers of the Beatles but it’s a shame nobody could find a third party who wasn’t Klein or a family member to helm the most important act in show-biz. So happy this blog is back!
Will the Beatles Last? Comment by Unfabbed on Apr 11, 23:41 “Bill Maher Asks Why #MeToo Didn’t Hit Music Industry, Fran Lebowitz Says It’s “’Much More Lucrative’” https://deadline.com/2024/09/bill-maher-why-me-too-didnt-hit-music-industry-fran-lebowitz-says-much-more-lucrative-1236102419/?fbclid=IwY2xjawRIHQxleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBicmlkETE2ZkswMFpkSlBqeXNoTXdoc3J0YwZhcHBfaWQQMjIyMDM5MTc4ODIwMDg5MgABHk2-FMS4isyKpW_NI46IefxytaBUQ2V7fg2EqzUHeP18WvCMj-UOixctz_P-_aem_2nc-PyAKpUgNn0WZ5uIYqg “I’ve been asking this question for seven years, since 2017 when the #MeToo thing happened,” he said. “Why… why not the music industry?” Comment by Jenny Lens on September 28, 2024 11:35 am “I photographed rock n roll from August 1976-80. IF we were to investigate #MeToo in rock, there would be NO rock n roll. Most are unaware of rock bands beyond Stones tours. But many rock bands are still out there performing and recording. If we want to hold people accountable for heinous sexual activity, say goodbye to ALL rock n roll and ALL of the music industry, right now.”
Memories of Nicholas Schaffner and The Beatles Forever Comment by Michael Gerber on Apr 6, 15:54 Chris, just sent you my email. Happy to field questions and answer them privately.
Will the Beatles Last? Comment by jimjamflimflam on Apr 5, 10:47 The music industry was absolutely not exempt from the me too movement lmao
Memories of Nicholas Schaffner and The Beatles Forever Comment by Chris Country on Apr 4, 17:42 Apologies for the delayed response. I agree entirely about Prisoner of Love. If it was purely a matter of behaviour on John’s part and the public already knows about domestic abuse and heroin, then it must be unimaginably depressing stuff. If you give me an email address (apologies if it’s public here somewhere and I’m just not seeing it), and you have the time, I’ll send some questions. I’m not trying to make you go into horrible detail about stuff that was evidently very distressing to even think about, but it seems like my amateur notions are mirrored by a real scholar here so I’m definitely interested in anything you’re willing to go into without causing yourself any pain.
Old Draft: Beatles Folk Memory 1970-1995 Comment by Michael Gerber on Apr 2, 14:06 @Marie, your comment joggled loose a post I did in 2021 about these issues: https://www.heydullblog.com/uncategorized/let-it-be-get-back-and-history-as-art/ Poke around the site near that date and I think you’ll find more of interest. As people age, they tend to say/think, “Why dwell on the bad?” I think there’s a lot of that in Get Back; as well as the commercial imperatives. I think it is about as accurate as A Hard Day’s Night, which is less of a slap than it might seem. Both movies embody certain really fundamental truths about the band’s public personae AND private interactions.
Old Draft: Beatles Folk Memory 1970-1995 Comment by Marie on Apr 2, 11:06 Michael, All of the Beatles seemed very disenchanted and disgruntled about the “Let It Be” sessions in the press and accounts that I read in the in the late 70s and 80s that dated from that time ( I was too young to remember much about the Beatles except “Yellow Submarine” and the Blue Meanies until the resurgence with the Red and Blue albums and “Got to Get You into Life’ on AM radio). I think I trust their impressions more than the cheery vibe of “Get Back”, though I enjoyed watching it. Clearly, they had more good times than they remembered and those were caught on film, but I think the ship was going down and they all had the same feeling of malaise by then. As you posit, drugs played a part as well as fatigue from being trapped in a silo together. And Yoko, the new and omnipresent studio presence!
Will the Beatles Last? Comment by Michael Gerber on Apr 1, 15:41 As I said, I think the larger picture is so filled with dire circumstances, Susy’s age being only one of many disheartening factors. I suspect a not-small percentage of groupies in 1970-80 were under 18; American society seems to produce a steady supply of young women and men who find themselves out on the streets, and those kids usually use sex for fun, profit or both. “Sleeping with every Beatle” seems like a very groupie (baby- or otherwise) goal to have, and if someone young and pretty was actively soliciting that kind of attention back in the mid-70s, they’d get that kind of attention. Boys as well as girls. I know for sure that fake IDs were as common as dirt back in the 70s — the legal drinking age in CA was 21. So even if J/P/G/R asked her age (which they didn’t), Susy had “proof,” and could continue on her quest. (BTW, I highly doubt “only three women slept with all four Beatles.” My guess is that there was a lot of swapping from Hamburg to Candlestick Park.) Then there are the drugs: Was she high when it happened? Likely. Was everybody high? Likely. Is giving an underage girl cocaine or pot better or worse than sleeping with her? Is accepting drugs from an underage girl in exchange for sex better or worse than doing it sober? These are questions for Solomon! When someone is hanging out with rockstars at the age of 15-16, she has been failed by the entire society AND her parents. Should we scold her for using what she had (sex appeal) to obtain proximity to fame and money? I don’t think so. But if we don’t scold her for offering — and almost certainly having “proof” of legal age — and everybody is drunk and/or high — and laud her for “being one of only three women etc”– I don’t think we can come down too hard on any of the ex-Beatles for accepting Susy’s advances. If she’d gotten pregnant, and they’d denied the baby, or if they were any suggestion of trauma from that encounter, my feelings would be different. But sex qua sex? Don’t think I personally can untangle the moral nuances of that situation. Also, being Gen X, I don’t think the age gap is as determinative as it might seem; a 16-year-old offering sex is acting like an adult with the legal right to consent, and if she had ID saying she was 18…While in a perfect world we might expect a person to try to verify her age beforehand, that’s not how things work. In general, should 30-35-year-olds be sleeping with teenagers? Nah. But I think we have to key on harm, not on age, and Susy didn’t say she was harmed by the experience — sorta the opposite, right? She sought it out, connived to achieve it (a staged photoshoot to get rid of Linda? Respect!) and was proud of it.
Will the Beatles Last? Comment by Unfabbed on Apr 1, 09:03 Susy was also a teenager who was born in 1959 and California’s age of consent is 18 (which is higher than most US states). She did have a relationship with Beatle buddy Keith Moon that has been confirmed by other sources and a 1975 photo of Keith with Susy (when she was 16) has been posted in Facebook and Instagram. There were other well-known underage “baby groupies” in LA at the time, such as Sable Starr, Lori Lightning and Queenie Glam who have been linked to other big name rock stars. The fact that John, Paul, George and Ringo have now been linked to a baby groupie when they were in their mid to late 30s is pretty scandalous.
Will the Beatles Last? Comment by Michael Gerber on Apr 1, 02:02 @Paul, you’re very nice. God knows if I’ll be able to keep it up — my workload these days is truly crushing. But I’ll try!
Will the Beatles Last? Comment by Michael Gerber on Apr 1, 01:27 @Unfabbed, your comment tickled something deep in the recesses of my brain and it turns out I DID write a post that touches on your point, at least tangentially: https://www.heydullblog.com/uncategorized/why-the-beatles-never-had-a-mudshark-story/ I think Lennon basically has been cancelled, because of his own, and especially Yoko’s, accounts of spousal abuse. The problem isn’t what he did with his penis, but his fists, and there’s something I find a little hopeful about that. In general the under-30 online fandom is very judgmental about Beatle sexual behavior (George particularly comes in for a lot of stick: “He SLEPT with RINGO’S WIFE!!!!!”) which I find exceedingly tiresome, for the reasons I enumerate in that earlier post. The Beatles are not guys you go to school with, they were old-for-their-age heterosexual men in an extraordinary situation, sexually speaking; getting too twisted up about their bedtime behavior is like tsk-tsking the Emperor Nero. I mean, do it if you want, but it seems kinda dopey to me. The least interesting way to address the information. The Beatles’ sexual behavior was concealed for the same reasons that JFK’s sexual behavior was concealed — the mores of the time were so fiercely patriarchal that exposure much less punishment was pushed back upon from every direction. In 1964, it seems that the society around The Beatles and any reporter who might expose them was largely inhospitable to that story. Fast-forward ten years, and the society had changed so that stories of Zep and The Who and Alice Cooper getting up to every kind of mischief on tour were not only publishable, they were sought-after, and there was a flourishing rock press and alt-weekly ecosystem where they could be published. But these post-’68 exposes were not damaging to either the group or the industry, and that’s interesting. The young “Sprout of a New Generation” fans of 1964 turned into the Plaster Casters, and that really says it all. I can only report as someone alive and aware in the Seventies that…if you were young, sex wasn’t a thing. And it was recognized as a contact sport; if you were pretty enough to hang out with rock stars, and presented yourself at the stage door, you were going to get propositioned — that’s WHY you were there. And if you were going to sleep with rock stars, there might be consequences to that — from marrying one to having your heart broken, getting an STD, getting pregnant, et cetera. See “Almost Famous” for details. I have a friend who saw all this up close back in the 70s, and though she suffered a bit, she looks back on it all very fondly. (And that’s ALL I can say about that. 🙂 There was a refreshing honesty about sex in the Seventies, an acceptance of it as a normal human thing, that I very much miss today. Today the internet has created a society that is both endlessly performatively outraged, but also apparently unable to muster up the political courage to prosecute famous pedophiles. Say what you will about 1965 or 1975 or 1985, a lot of men did a lot of shady shit in the name of sex, but if there’d be credible proof of the President having sex with underage girls, they wouldn’t have lasted a week. (JFK included.) My guess is that the vast number of Beatle bedmates (on tour or not) were either professionals, or very willing. And in a society where overt female sexuality was still to be hidden, a non-pro sleeping with a Beatle encouraged silence on both parts. Mutually-assured destruction. My guess is also that because The Beatles invented touring, the groupie-industrial complex hadn’t quite been invented in the years 1962-66. (In the UK, the Pill wasn’t available to unmarried women until 1967.) But if they’d kept touring, we’d have detailed casts of their “rigs,” and lots of juicy stories. I liked the Susy Thunder piece (and especially the design! Gosh, wouldn’t it have been wonderful if the web had given us lots of magazines doing that kind of old-fashioned thing?), but within it is precisely why there’s been no Beatle #metoo — it seems that around her 70s groupie days, Susy was a “worker,” a dominatrix even, and so the sexual politics involved in her “having sex with all four Beatles” are morally complex. “Groupie has sex with rock star” or “Rock star has sex with prostitute” is strictly dog-bites-man stuff. So much of #metoo is the casting couch, or co-workers, stuff like that, powerful men ambushing women — or guys like Bill Cosby straight-up drugging and raping people. And even in that clearly abhorrent situation, Cosby’s behavior remained an open secret for 60 years. Such is the power of patriarchy, money, and a likable image…and the Beatles had all those things in spades.
Will the Beatles Last? Comment by Unfabbed on Mar 31, 21:19 I wonder if the Beatles (as well as the Stones and almost every other classic rock artist) will get canceled since underage groupie stories have been gaining traction in social media. In the case of the Beatles, the Verge’s “Searching for Susy Thunder” article four years ago (which Paramount bought the film rights to) was the first crack in the facade. Some commentators have wondered why the music industry is the only industry that escaped post-metoo scrutiny so far.
Will the Beatles Last? Comment by Paul Guay on Mar 30, 21:42 I am so glad you’re back.
I’d Love to Turn You On Comment by Joel Jambon on Mar 26, 15:07 Excellent, thought-provoking analysis! “Beatles as alcoholic children” is going to stick in my head forever.
Memories of Nicholas Schaffner and The Beatles Forever Comment by Michael Gerber on Mar 25, 11:05 Lemme post about the addiction/mental health issues in the Beatles story, and why they are so essential. I always give Goldman a lot of slack, because I really do believe that he came to the project admiring John (as most people did then) and what he found shocked him. So he over-corrected. And besides, what will endure about Lennon is his music and his cultural impact, neither of which can be changed by a muckraker. The “Lennon-as-abuser” line of argument has turned him into a non-entity to the terminally online under 35s, but eventually he will be seen by future-folk for the amazing unique genius he was, warts and all. He’s just too important within pop cultural history. The last-minute cancellation of Prisoner of Love makes me 99% sure that there were real bad things going on 1975-80 — not just junkie behavior, either, but stuff that would fundamentally change how the public views several powerful people. They really don’t want that story to be told in full, and given what we already know, how much more damning can it be? Quite a bit more damning, I guess! It might even be possible that the public would read it and shrug, but someone(s) with a guilty conscience or a corporate-type obsession with narrative control would see it differently. It even could’ve been Apple, worried that PoL would depress future sales of things like “Get Back.” The Beatles are now elemental, the movement of vast sums into some wallets and not others. All this is pure speculation on my part, but the question must be asked: what’s important enough to suppress, after 45 years? On the other hand, the suppression could’ve been reflexive: “…because I/we can.” If you have specific questions about the book, email them, I will read them and answer them if I feel comfortable. I’m sorry to be uncharacteristically cagey, but it really was an awful psychological experience and I so I treat it all with a great deal of wariness. As a sort of general statement, I will say that over the years I was writing I began to see the outlines of a very plausible plot, shockingly cynical and truly upsetting if you cared about John Lennon. I am fully willing to admit that this was probably my own story-making brain, which by that point was quite paranoid. This didn’t merely come from my Beatles-knowledge, but also my deep reading about the intelligence community — both of these interests are decades-long. So I found myself in a truly terrible spot: I could write the book that these data-points were suggesting to me, which might cause a stir but felt thoroughly awful and was nothing any Beatles/Lennon fan would want to read, or I could veer totally comic, which had been done excellently by Mark Shipper and The Rutles. To finish the project I charted a middle way, which was very unsatisfying to me, and why when third parties have attempted to embiggen the project via republishing or TV, I have gone limp.
Memories of Nicholas Schaffner and The Beatles Forever Comment by Chris Country on Mar 25, 08:17 Thank you for the detailed response. As someone with both a personal and professional life deeply enmeshed in mental health issues and addictions, I definitely think that’s an extremely interesting way to view The Beatles story, but only if done with empathy. It makes me wonder what kind of book Goldman could have written if he’d been more empathetic and less hell bent as portraying John as Bond villain level evil. The cancellation of Prisoner of Love was massively disappointing, as I suspect it was exactly the kind of unflinching yet empathetic view of John that has been sorely lacking since before the man died. I certainly wasn’t writing for SNL, but my background in academia makes me absurdly perfectionist and I’m always surprised when ideas that are rawer and more persona resonant far more with people than those that I’ve redrafted and edited for months on end. Truth be told, my main questions for you pertain to the “real” story you brushed up against while writing Life After Death for Beginners, but based on your posts I imagine you’d rather do that privately, if at all.
Memories of Nicholas Schaffner and The Beatles Forever Comment by Michael Gerber on Mar 23, 12:09 @Chris, I thank you — I am such a creaking, choking, grasping perfectionist about my writing, and the thinking behind it; comedy writers are like that! Because my Beatles-related writing is so emotive — personal essay with historical fillips — I tend to discount it. I’m an exceptionally poor critic — my own self is too present at all times to allow for the necessary analytical distance; and my adult life has been so circumscribed by illness that I don’t have much journalism to contribute. I’ve always felt Devin’s post on Dizz Gillespie to be the Platonic ideal of Dullbloggery, and that’s just not something I accumulate much of in my life. I can tell you what a bunch of Simpsons and SNL people are like, though! 🙂 I’m obsessed with the era 1959-1980, and so bring an ever-enhanced (though definitely idiosyncratic) knowledge base to this topic; I am pretty profoundly UN-interested in Bob Wooler’s shoe size, which is where most internet fandom seems to be going, but very interested in John’s beating him up and what that might’ve said about both men in their era. I think the one place I really do shine is in empathy; I’m uncommonly good at imagining what life must have been like for the guys, and applying whatever experiences I’ve had (for example growing up in an alcoholic family, or having a Kundalini Emergency) to the Beatles story. That type of writing is pretty useless if one wants to become a Beatles Authority, but it does seem to enrich others’ enjoyment of the band, and I’m happy to contribute it here when I can. My goal with the site seems to have become to increase empathy for the band and surrounding characters — to humanize them, to get into their nooks and crannies in a way that someone like Lewisohn, using the tools that Lewisohn uses so well, simply cannot. Lots of fans don’t want that, they want their icons; but I think this human comparison is essential to engage with them and their work as an adult. Especially Lennon. Lennon is so often dismissed by people under 30, and it’s really a shame, because so much of how they consume media and artists comes directly from John Lennon. My entire purpose with Life After Death for Beginners was to empathize, and it took a mighty, mighty bite out of me, because not everybody in and around The Beatles is safe to interact with; Lennon himself was so damaged. As a result that book is really two books — the jokey story I wrote, and the perhaps true story underneath that story, which was much too dark and grim to tell. And as I wrote that book over a period of years, and the real story revealed itself to me, I became very conflicted; it was not anything I wanted to write, or people wanted to hear. But out of respect I finished it. Having finished it, though, I turned down an agent who thought he could sell it. I sometimes consider rewriting it, telling the real story in there, but just as often consider pulling it off the shelf as a souffle that didn’t rise. Perfectionism again. 🙂 Other commenters: can you answer @Chris’ question about logging in? I’ve never commented as an outsider, only as blog owner.
“Paperback” Trail; or, The Hunt for Mark Shipper Comment by Michael Gerber on Mar 23, 11:50 I’ll reach out to a friend who is a journalist. He’ll have some tools with which to solve this mystery.
“Paperback” Trail; or, The Hunt for Mark Shipper Comment by Robert Nafius on Mar 23, 07:16 What the hell, one more Mark Shipper story, this one with a Beatles twist (and shout). Mark told me once that the two best “screamers” in rock and roll — as a tool in their vocal repertoires — were John Lennon and the Gerry Roslie of the Sonics. Like so many of his observations, this is true to a point, and that point is the boundary of what Mark had actually heard or experienced or — frankly — given any thought to. Still, I know exactly what he meant…
“Paperback” Trail; or, The Hunt for Mark Shipper Comment by Robert Nafius on Mar 23, 06:59 How about that? I wrote what amounts to an obituary and your question has made me realize I actually have no idea if Mark is alive or dead. See, I stumbled on your website and this thread, and all of these memories came flooding out and…well, you get it. The answer to your query: I don’t know and I have no way of finding out. The Mark myth/mystery lives on, it seems…
Memories of Nicholas Schaffner and The Beatles Forever Comment by Chris Country on Mar 23, 02:20 I suspect you mightily underestimate your contributions here, much as you rightly heap praise upon your peers. Due to absurd level sleep deprivation, I have very little to say at present besides thank you for reactivating the site, and (however odd it doubtlessly sounds to you), I am genuinely proud to be part of this community. Is there a way to register or do we all just have to manually write our names and email addresses with every comment?
Memories of Nicholas Schaffner and The Beatles Forever Comment by Michael Gerber on Mar 22, 21:22 @Chris, you certainly sound like that person! Your esteem for the site played a not-small role in my revivifying it. Thank you, and I look forward to fielding your questions. To the degree we have been civilized, nuanced and deep, it is our commenters that have allowed this to happen. Dullblog was begun as a way for me to keep writing when I was too sick to do my actual career, kept me company as I deteriorated, and then continued as I fought my way back to some semblance of health; I have always been pleased that it also amused Devin, Ed, Nancy, and the others — the idea that it could be “a great resource” is even better. As someone who has been fortunate enough to engage with audiences on a massive scale — at SNL and The New Yorker, then Barry Trotter — it’s amusing to me that people might well be interacting with my posts here years after I have joined the big skiffle combo in the sky. I will try to remember to set aside money for hosting fees in my will. 🙂
Old Draft: Beatles Folk Memory 1970-1995 Comment by Michael Gerber on Mar 22, 21:13 @Jarrett, I’m delighted that my (over)thinking on those topics has been interesting to you, and perhaps spurred some insights of your own, which I hope you’ll share. “Magic Circles” is what Dullblog wants to be when it grows up, and I encourage every serious Beatlefan to read it. Agreed that ’84 was rough; I soothed myself by going to Chicago Beatlefest. But that era was a weird interregnum — so many of the people were still alive (I’m sure I saw/heard Harry Nilsson), but everything happened in the shadow of the one man who wasn’t. I’m so torn about “Get Back.” On the one hand I’m delighted at the content, it looks and sounds so good, but on the other, it has triggered my Spidey Sense from the beginning. There is a tendency among people who made mischief in the Sixties to downplay their activities — to sanitize the whole affair. But the messiness was the WHOLE POINT. “Get Back” strikes me as the version of the Get Back sessions that Disney (and the partners) wanted to sell the world fifty years later, not what happened or how they were. The only thing that could possibly kill The Beatles for future generations is making them safe and inoffensive, bloated and optimized. Unfortunately that is precisely the instinct of the corporate owners of culture.
Reader question: “Thoughts on Prisoner of Love?” Comment by Michael Gerber on Mar 22, 21:02 Thank you, @Joe — I’ll check it out!
“Paperback” Trail; or, The Hunt for Mark Shipper Comment by Michael Gerber on Mar 22, 20:59 Thank you so much for this, @Robert — is Mark still alive? I’d love to take him out to lunch (and get Paperback Writer back in print).
The Artist as a Dissipated Man: Fred Seaman’s “The Last Days of John Lennon” Comment by Michael Gerber on Mar 22, 20:48 Re: Lennon — he was a surprising fellow; whenever anyone counted him out, he persevered. I think if he’d divorced Yoko and engaged with some kind of authentic spirituality (meaning, something tried tested and true, not a cult or a fad or something that advertised in the back of a comic book) he would’ve had a reasonable chance of living long enough to grow up, lay some of his demons, and reconnect with his (imho absolutely authentic) genius. As for the site: you’re welcome, @Celine. Dullblog’s a weird experience, at once totally personal and also having nothing to do with me. The closest thing I can compare it to is a novel; you write something over the course of years, it fills your head and strips you bare for all to see, and maybe wrecks your life. Then you send it out into the world and there it exists with no further input from you, and people interact with it as they will — interpreting and misinterpreting it, liking it or hating it, maybe even developing some idea about who you are from it. (Flattering but always incorrect, in my experience.) As a creative person, once something of yours has “a public” it’s not really yours anymore. That’s why I kept it up. I’ve largely said all I have to say on the group and its times, and the kind of Beatlysis that Dullblog pioneered is now terribly common. I think we did it a bit better, because we all have pre-internet brains, and there’s a seriousness to words that conversation and/or video simply can’t match. But even if it’s been supplanted, Dullblog’s really not mine to destroy. All the fans that have visited and commented mean that it now belongs to the fans, in some sense. I reserve the right to feel differently in the future, of course. 🙂 For me it is a long, long daydream about music and history and the nature of creativity and addiction, living as an artist under capitalism, the career as a Sixties historian that I never had…for the other Dullbloggers it is something else personal to each of them, and for fans something different yet again. Even though my magazine takes up all my time, I can afford the hosting, so Dullblog lives on.
Old Draft: Beatles Folk Memory 1970-1995 Comment by Michael Gerber on Mar 22, 20:27 Great comment, @Alejandra! Though I would have much rather have lived through the original mania (and the years that followed). I like modern immersive sound systems, but mono on a transistor radio (or car radio) is pretty goddamn satisfying too.
Memories of Nicholas Schaffner and The Beatles Forever Comment by Michael Gerber on Mar 22, 20:23 Glad to be back, Paul! What are some of your other favorites?
Memories of Nicholas Schaffner and The Beatles Forever Comment by Chris Country on Mar 22, 09:51 Michael, I believe I may be the “smart” (debatable) Redditor you mentioned in the “turning the lights back on” post, and I’m fantastically glad you didn’t just nuke this site. I’m sure the maintenance and moderation is at times a nightmare, but this is the home of the most civilised, nuanced and deep Beatles discourse I’ve ever encountered. And I’ve read just about all the books, trawled the forums since I was ten or so in the 90s, and seen everything Reddit has to offer. As either you or somebody else on here once posted, “The Beatles lead everywhere”, and it’s entirely true. Shifts in culture, gender norms, media,” and politics, before we even get down to the music itself. I’m afraid it seems impossible to comment on the post I’m referencing, so apologies for doing it here. But this is a great resource and even in its inactive state, my number one recommendation to fans wanting to delve beneath the surface.
Old Draft: Beatles Folk Memory 1970-1995 Comment by Jarret Cooper on Mar 21, 21:54 @Michael, SO glad to see you’re back — I had the misfortune to discover HD just when the lights were going out, and I’ve been kicking myself (and reading the ENTIRE blog straight through) for the last two years. Your take(s) on John & heroin and “what happened in India” changed the way I thought about the whole history of the group after 40+ years of fandom, and among so many other gifts I (SO belatedly) discovered “Magic Circles” thanks to this blog. In the 70s I was a little nerd who liked to read ABOUT the Beatles (even though we didn’t have the records), but didn’t really have my born-again moment till 1984 — completely random timing, the proximate cause only being that a friendly art teacher loaned me the later albums. In hindsight it wasn’t such a great time to be a Beatles fan, unless you really dug “Spies Like Us”… I’d agree that 1987 was a turning point with the CD catalog release, and to me 1988 seems pretty huge by itself: Goldman’s book and the “official response” of the “Imagine” film, Lewisohn’s “Recording Sessions”, and “Ultra Rare Trax” on CD — those to me are before/after events. for good and ill. Probably the next big “marker” in the timeline would be the Anthology, and it does get a little fuzzy after that. But whatever “eras” have happened in-between (already), I’ll put this out there: “Get Back” has had the biggest impact of anything released by or about the Beatles in the last thirty years, both within the fandom and with the normies.
Reader question: “Thoughts on Prisoner of Love?” Comment by Joe Wisbey on Mar 20, 03:05 https://www.podbean.com/ew/pb-927ai-193f30d Peter gave a short answer to my question about his book on my podcast last year
“Paperback” Trail; or, The Hunt for Mark Shipper Comment by Robert Nafius on Mar 19, 15:31 I just ran across this discussion, a few years too late. I went to high school with Mark — we both wrote for the school newspaper — and he and I shared a lifetime friend, the superb L. A. Times reporter, Bob Baker. Bob and Mark had a berserk two-man sorta garage band in high school called Ron and the Gauchos. Bob told me that Shipper played him a Phil Ochs album back then and he was so impressed it he hung a hard left politically and never looked back, Most of the times I saw Shipper over the years were with Bob. The note about Flash being “Bangs and Meltzer influenced” doesn’t go far enough: Mark was a friend of Lester Bangs and I believe Meltzer actually wrote for it. Of all the madness and brilliance that went into Flash, I think my favorite piece — and it may have been Mark’s, too — was a deeply felt and absolutely unhinged rant by Ronnie Weiser, rockabilly maniac and the man behind Rollin’ Rock Records. Weiser’s righteous hatred of everything about rock and roll after, say, Eddie Cochran’s death was a pure flame of indignation, and hilarious, to boot. Flash also permitted Mark to do a mock ad in the mag which situated two of his fave bands — who shared a numeral — the MC5 and the Dave Clark 5; the tagline on this, as I recall, was: “One band wants to tour America. Thew other wants to DESTROY America.” If you’re a fan of unrepentant rock and roll, you’ll know who was who.) Thinking back over the years, I recall when Mark lived in an apartment over a garage in Laurel Canyon (I think) and when Bob and I visited, he played us the first Elvis Costello album, which hadn’t been released in the U. S. He was dazzled by it, I recall. “Doesn’t he just sound like someone who has been shat upon his entire life,” Mark offered as context. For the record, Paperback Writer was originally self-published, but it was too good and crazy and funny not to land a real publisher eventually. One thing that those coming to this later on seem to miss is that the rave blurbs from Robert Hilburn and Greil Marcus were fictional and satirical. Mark thought Marcus — a great writer, to me — was far too pompous and was utterly dismissive of Hilburn (here I agree). That night in Laurel Canyon, he had hundreds of the self-published version stacked all over the apartment, doomed now by the new edition I remember he, Bob and I went to the Long Beach Blues Festival sometime in the mid-1990s (Bobby Blue Bland and Buddy Guy both in fine form) In the intervening years, I would get the odd email from Mark, completely out of the blue, commenting on some rocker he thought I’d like. But he was reclusive, living alone in the same apartment in Marina del Rey for many years. The radio gig made him plenty of money — he never lost his edge, his wit or his eye for the telling cultural detail — but he seems to have found precious little to spend it on. Once he emailed me a clip from Conan O’brien’s late night show; the talk show host had slicked back his hair, strapped on a guitar and shake, rattled and rolled himself through a full-tilt rockabilly number. Mark thought it was great, and, as was often the case, he was right. I seem to recall we exchanged message when Bob died a few years ago. I suspect his final years were sad but couldn’t say for sure. And that’s what I know about Mark Shipper. The years may have dulled my memories a bit, so forgive any missteps. But I think I got it right. I remember, over a period of almost half a century, a very smart, very clever, very perceptive, very funny guy. And beyond that, who cares?
The Artist as a Dissipated Man: Fred Seaman’s “The Last Days of John Lennon” Comment by Celine on Mar 17, 20:19 God Bless you for not nuking this site. This was a hell of a read to stumble upon—as I’ve always been fascinated by John and his later life. I remember stumbling upon his demo tapes like “Mirror (On The Wall)” and the (now ruined imo) “Now and Then,” and the 12 year old me would just listen over and over trying to figure how on EARTH he could’ve been such a ghost of a man, yet depict himself in lyrics and haunting piano progressions. Now, at 22 and being just as perceptive, I find myself once more laying on the floor listening to the demos (that I can find—why are they so hard to locate now??) and wondering what could’ve helped him out of it. Looking forward to reading the book. Thank you again for keeping this insight around.
Memories of Nicholas Schaffner and The Beatles Forever Comment by Baboomska McGeesk on Mar 15, 09:58 I remember reading it in 1970 and then believing somehow that Paul took the bus every day to the sessions. There’s a quote somewhere in it “I get the horrors every morning on the bus” (I’m paraphrasing). Kids believe the darndest things. I’m looking at it now. First thing I notice is how minimalist it is. Completely black front & back cover. No text anywhere on the front or back, just pure black with the famous 4 “Let It Be” photos on the front, but small. The book is a transcription of some of the movie’s dialogue. It reads like a stage play. Along with the text are photos, many photos from the sessions. Some group shots, some extreme close-up photos. I see “text by Jonathan Cott and David Dalton, photos by Ethan A. Russell”. This is very much a classy coffee table book, circa 1969. It’s a lovely layout, actually, a nice mix of photos and dialogue. Back it goes with the other Beatles books on my shelf. I’ll leave them to my heirs to either cherish or discard, however they see fit.
Old Draft: Beatles Folk Memory 1970-1995 Comment by Alejandra Castro on Mar 14, 22:58 Well, the thrill of watching the live game is incomparable to watching it on the replays… The Beatles phenomenon hasn’t died out, but it has mutated, and each new generation experiences a different Beatles phenomenon than in the past. For example, even though the music is the same as it was sixty years ago, the way we consume it has changed, so while many of us would love to have lived during the sixties and been part of the mania, few would trade the privilege of listening to their music on a modern, immersive sound system. I discovered them in 1994, so I knew The Beatles through The Threetles, when bootlegs became official merchandise and musical rarities ceased to be rarities, becoming more mainstream and expensive products. As a fan, I feel less special than the baby boomers and for some selfish reason I wish the Fab Four to be a niche group and less global cause I believe that the intensity of a fandom is inversely proportional to its size, although Them proved otherwise
Memories of Nicholas Schaffner and The Beatles Forever Comment by Paul Guay on Mar 11, 19:10 So happy you’re back, Michael! Of the 143 Beatle books I’ve read so far (he tosses off casually), The Beatles Forever is one of my favorites.
Memories of Nicholas Schaffner and The Beatles Forever Comment by Michael Gerber on Mar 5, 10:35 Do you remember anything in particular from that book, @Baboomska?
Memories of Nicholas Schaffner and The Beatles Forever Comment by Michael Gerber on Mar 5, 10:34 @Paul, I’m very sorry to hear that you also have some health issues. But I am VERY gratified to learn that this labor of love was helpful to you during COVID. As I’ve said, I came within a couple of clicks of nuking the site entirely, but my hand was stayed by a sense that perhaps someone somewhere who was ill and could not function as they wish to in life — a reasonable description of my adult life — would be given entertainment or comfort by the writing, images and thinking here. May your health improve!
Why Those Screaming Beatlemania Girls Matter Comment by Michael Gerber on Mar 5, 09:06 Glad you found it insightful, @beatlemaniac64.
The Artist as a Dissipated Man: Fred Seaman’s “The Last Days of John Lennon” Comment by Kim on Feb 28, 08:36 Yoko’s fault.
Why Those Screaming Beatlemania Girls Matter Comment by beatlemaniac64 on Feb 10, 10:34 Looking at this 11 years from now, and wow. I’m a student researching The Beatles and their Impact on Female Youth, and I’m wondering if I can use this as a credible source. It’s well researched and the analysis is quite nice.