The Cricket of Abbey Road A Micro Memoir Regarding the Beatles Album

 

Early October 1969

        The Beatles Abbey Road album was released on September 26, 1969.

With my saved cash from various entrepreneurial ventures I rode my green stingray, with white banana seat, from my mobile home at the Cable Line Meat Market trailer park to Kmart which rested along US33 in Dunlap, Indiana. Dunlap, as was known by the more mature generations, was more commonly known as Concord by the younger generations of which I, at age fourteen, inhabited.

    A frequent visitor of the record section at Kmart, I knew the route to the section of 45 RPMs and 33 and 1/3rds. I don’t remember the sticker price of the album. But I know that it was less than five dollars. The sticker on the “shrink wrap” surrounding the album had a sticker which read “suggested retail price”. Kmart’s price was less than the “suggested” price. That was an early lesson in marketing…give people the impression that you are giving them a break on the price, and you will sell more. As if the Beatles needed any such gimmicks!

   Purchasing the album, of which I had been looking forward most of the summer, riding my bike back to the trailer park, I immediately set the vinyl record on the spindle, flipped the switch and watched as the mechanical workings of the phonograph player drop the album, the needle-arm moved over and gently sat the needle into the groove. Yes, it was very much a ritual for me.

    I played the album daily. My favorite song being “She Came in Through the Bathroom Window”*. My least favorite being “Come Together”. Oh, for sure, the instrumentation on the song is great. But the Lennon-esque lyric, a la “I Am the Walrus”, discouraged my intellect. Well, enough French for this writing. Anyway and overall, the album was, and continues to be, great.

   It was, perhaps, during the first week in October, as I was playing the album, I noticed that my grandmother, with whom I lived, was searching around the home with a broom and small carboard box. At first, I thought she was looking for cobb webs lurking in corners or under furniture. But no, she was not brooming anything into the box. Curious, I asked “What are you doing? What are you looking for?

“Don’t you hear it?” she responded.

Perplexed, I asked “Hear what?”

“The cricket…there’s a cricket in here somewhere.”

I paid attention to the noises in the room. After a short bit, it occurred to me, and I said “The cricket is on the recording.”

“No, this is a real cricket. I hear it clearly” she insisted.

I went to the phonograph, I gently lifted the needle from the vinyl, the sound of a chirping cricket stopped.

My grandmother stopped, a baffled look upon her face. I sat the needle upon the vinyl. The chirping resumed. I removed the needle, the chirping stopped.

A bit of embarrassment upon her face, she stepped over to the phonograph and looked at the spinning record. I dropped the needle again, the chirping resumed.

“Well, I ain’t never heard nothin’ like that on a record!” she spoke in her Campbell County Tennessee accent pronouncing the preposition “on” such that it sounded like “own”.

My grandmother was impressed!

The recorded chirping sounded “live” to my grandmother!

This vinyl-captured chirping is found on the “b” side of the album as “You Never Give Me Your Money” segues into “Sun King”.

I report this incident as an accolade to George Martin and the Beatles for their precision and expert talent in making recordings. Fooling my grandmother took some talent!

 

*Yes, I acknowledge Paul could write some lyrics detached from decipherability, but at least they were recognizable words.

Micro-Memoir 1969 Concord Arrival

 

Present day view of  corn field looking north along County road 11

                                   This was the field in which I tasted corn.

Part I

It was July 20, 1969 (55 years ago) that I, along with grandparents, moved into Elkhart County. We lived in a mobile home beside the Cable Line Meat Market on county road 26 of Cable line monster legend.

   I set out upon bicycle to find Concord Junior High School as I knew that would be the school I would attend upon school start.

   While riding my bicycle eastward from the Meat Market and having run into other bicyclists of the area, in general introductory conversation, I was told the story of the Cable Line monster and shown the precise tree at the precise corner of legend, intersection of County roads 26 and11. My new conversationalists identified the tree, with the bark-absent image of a man, which one had to use abundant imagination so as to grasp. I did my best to appear convinced of this legend. In fact, I too would use the legend as a means of entertaining new arrivals at the trailer court in which I lived.

   But, my new conversationists, detecting my naivety, asked me to try some corn in the nearby field and tell them what I thought of the flavor. We rested our bikes off the road, stepped into a corn field and I proceeded to grasp an ear and remove the husks. Now, as  kid from  Detroit Michigan, having never been around farm culture, I knew some kind of prank was probably in play but I played along anyway. I was invited to bite into the corn cob and taste the kernels.

Asked what I thought of local farm product, I said, with my best spirit of congeniality, “Tastey.” To which they snickered and then explained that it was field corn grown for animals. Attempting to maintain my self-confident composure, I replied “ Animals around here must have well-developed tastes”.

That was my first experience with folk in Elkhart County.

I ventured on toward discovery of Concord Junior High. Arriving at county road 13, I rolled my bicycle left, as directed by afore mentioned conversationalists, and eventually rolled upon a campus of three buildings. There was the two-story building which I was told housed the principal’s office, the three-story building, closest to intersection of Mishawaka road and county road 13, and the gymnasium building. The windows all along the corridor of the gymnasium building seemed inviting and so I parked my bike on the sidewalk and entered the building. Custodial folk where busy refinishing floors. They allowed me to enter the gym. I was impressed at such a gymnasium. I still remember the thick aroma of a recently refinished wood floor. That wood floor glistened and reflected light from the large rows of windows on either side of the gym and set high adjacent to ceiling.

And then I rode my bike back home, stopping into the meat market to get a Pepsi from the top-load vending machine which sat close to the meat display refrigerators.

I considered it an adventurous day.

Part II

Later that summer, on the first day of school, waiting for the bus to stop and pick me up, another new experience occurred, the area was dense with fog. I waited beside the old Meat Market sign, which, as I remember, had an S and H Green Stamps logo suspended, I heard a quickly paced rhythm of “click-clock, click-clock” approaching. I knew it was not the sound of a bus. I waited, attentive to what might appear out of the thick fog. Emerging from the fog, traveling east, was first the head of a horse, followed by the full body. Then followed a black buggy driven by a fellow dressed in black. I watched as the buggy drove past me and then it vanished as ghostly as it had appeared, the rhythm of the hoofs of the horse fading audibly as well as visually.

Mr. Stickle, bus driver, welcomed me to his bus route, which traveled eastward on CR 26, then turned into Miller’s Rolling Acres, picking up, as best I can remember, Tom Sisk, Jeff Blackburn, Judy Weaver, and others. The bus then continued eastward until CR 13 at which it turned toward the junior high.

My two years, eighth and ninth grades, at that school before moving up to the high school, are very fondly remembered. Too many memories to go into…but for sure, adventurous!

Job: A Model of Intercessory Prayer

 

Job is my favorite book in the Bible. Like Revelation, there is an encouragement to remain faithful regardless of the difficulty, persecution and disappointment we experience. And, like Revelation, there is the promise and evidence of great restoration.

 

1 In the land of Uz there lived a man whose name was Job. This man was blameless and upright; he feared God and shunned evil. ² He had seven sons and three daughters, ³ and he owned seven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred yoke of oxen and five hundred donkeys, and had a large number of servants. He was the greatest man among all the people of the East.

⁴ His sons used to hold feasts in their homes on their birthdays, and they would invite their three sisters to eat and drink with them. ⁵ When a period of feasting had run its course, Job would make arrangements for them to be purified. Early in the morning he would sacrifice a burnt offering for each of them, thinking, “Perhaps my children have sinned and cursed God in their hearts.” This was Job’s regular custom.

Job was the greatest in all the land. Yet this did not cause him to be uppity or self-serving. He was blameless and upright. One thing we can acknowledge is that while we tend to think of humans as morally bankrupt, we should temper that assessment with the fact that Job and others in the Bible have been described as being blameless and upright.

Another point…Job is an excellent example of intercessory prayer. Job did not abdicate his moral obligation to his children saying, “their state of righteousness is up to them”. No, he made arrangements to purify them. He made sacrifice on their behalf. And there is every indication that God accepted his intercessory prayer.

Be like Job! Pray for all those stinkers out there that party all the time and even curse God. You will win God’s heart!

Peace, Mike

 

Reflection on Psalm 105

 

Psalm 105

Give praise to the Lord, proclaim his name;
    make known among the nations what he has done.
² Sing to him, sing praise to him;
    tell of all his wonderful acts.
³ Glory in his holy name;
    let the hearts of those who seek the Lord rejoice.
⁴ Look to the Lord and his strength;
    seek his face always.

Give, sing, glory, and look. The verses begin with action verbs.

Maybe a good understanding of the word “give” here would be to release, offer, acknowledge. There is the unstated idea that God is worthy of our released praise.

Sing and tell of his wonderful acts. This is the fundamental essence of witness or that uncomfortable word evangelize. Another way to say it would be to have something to tell people about. Something that might strike a chord with someone.

Glory…bask, sunbath, get tickled. Feel really great in His presence.

Look, seek, be active and intentional rather than passive about knowing God and his benefits.

May today and always our faith be active rather than passive. May others describe our faith with action verbs and impressive adjectives.

There you have the Psalmist’s grammar lesson for the day.

Peace, Mike

God, Baruch, and Splendor

 

image from cgg.org I claim fair use

A Jewish fellow by the name of Baruch was the scribe for prophet Jeremiah.

Baruch also wrote a book, though it did not make the cut for our Old Testament, still some of the readings are part of the schedule of Scriptural readings through the year.

This is one reading suggested for preaching…

Baruch 5:1-9
5:1 Take off the garment of your sorrow and affliction, O Jerusalem, and put on forever the beauty of the glory from God.

5:2 Put on the robe of the righteousness that comes from God; put on your head the diadem of the glory of the Everlasting;

5:3 for God will show your splendor everywhere under heaven.

5:4 For God will give you evermore the name, "Righteous Peace, Godly Glory."

5:5 Arise, O Jerusalem, stand upon the height; look toward the east, and see your children gathered from west and east at the word of the Holy One, rejoicing that God has remembered them.

5:6 For they went out from you on foot, led away by their enemies; but God will bring them back to you, carried in glory, as on a royal throne.

5:7 For God has ordered that every high mountain and the everlasting hills be made low and the valleys filled up, to make level ground, so that Israel may walk safely in the glory of God.

5:8 The woods and every fragrant tree have shaded Israel at God's command.

5:9 For God will lead Israel with joy, in the light of his glory, with the mercy and righteousness that come from him.

Please note how verse 7 here very closely resembles verse 5 of chapter three of Luke…

3:5 Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways made smooth;

And also chapter 40, verse 4 of Isaiah…

Every valley shall be raised up,
    every mountain and hill made low;
the rough ground shall become level,
    the rugged places a plain.

Be very assured that whatever obstacles may seem to be in the way, God is working on removing those obstacles and leveling our path toward him.

This idea of leveling the path seemed important enough for God to inspire Isaiah, Baruch, and Luke…perhaps it is an important enough of an idea that we should cast our faith upon it!

Rejoice this day for God will show your splendor everywhere under heaven.
Peace, Mike

 

Maintaining and Strengthening a Separation of Church and State

 

My thanks to Jerald Turner and Eric Settles for review and advice.

I write to advocate for the continuation of a well-defined separation of Church and State. This is in no way so that America will become absent of the Christian faith. It is to protect the integrity of the Church, and its divine mission, from political corruption.

It may seem among many Christians, and other faiths, that harnessing our government by religious faith would “set us right with God.” But I am convinced that erasing the line between state and Church would result in the Church becoming the lap dog of those in political power.

I strongly assert that the Church does not have the authority to abdicate Christ’s command for the church to make disciples.

Matthew 28:19-20 teaches, ^“Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to obey everything that I’ve commanded you. Look, I myself will be with you every day until the end of this present age.” (Common English Bible translation)

Christ never made any provision to outsource His Great Commission to any government or other authority. Nowhere in the New Testament does Jesus, the Apostle Paul, or Saint Peter instruct His followers to write letters to the Roman Senate or Roman Emperor, urging the establishment of Christianity as the State religion. It is clear from the New Testament writers that the work of evangelism is solely within the realm of the Church.

I have heard many people claim that “America was founded as a Christian nation.” I assert that the religious condition in colonial, revolutionary America was more complicated than “everybody shared the same Trinitarian ideas of Christianity.”

From our beginning, deism was an idea held by many people of the day, including Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and Thomas Paine, among others. Deism suggests a distant, detached God, without regard to Abraham, Moses, Jesus, or any of the writers of Biblical Gospels or Epistles. The terms “Creator” and “Nature’s God” used in the Declaration of Independence align closer to deism than Christianity.

Aside from those facts is the reality that on this continent, before Europeans arrived Original Peoples held their own religious faith, and continued to do so throughout the colonial period, thereby having a religious influence on arriving Europeans. More, when slave traders brought slaves from Africa, they brought with them many different religions that also continued throughout the colonial period, and even to this day.

So, in its infancy, and still today, America held numerous religious beliefs. But more to my point of maintaining a separation of Church and state is the fact that, whatever religious views the framers of our Constitution may have held, they did not incorporate any of them in the Constitution, even when they had ample opportunity to do so.

The Constitution was not a hastily thrown together document. From May 25 of 1787 to September 17, 1787, its text, ideas, and wording were carefully crafted. Yet, there is no language that indicates or establishes that we were to be a “Christian” nation.

Whatever sentiments of religion our framers communicated in their personal correspondence privately; as representatives of “The People,” they signed their names publicly to a document to be the Law of the Land, and that resides in the Constitution.

I point out a few areas of the Constitution where the framers had opportunities to set a religious baseline, yet chose not to do so: The Preamble, which serves to describe the scope and the intent of the Constitution, we encounter these three words: “We the People.” Not “God Almighty.”

This seems to me to be a direct accommodation of the clause found in the Declaration of Independence: “Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,” Furthermore, regarding that revolutionary concept, while it is noble  and one to which most people in America would subscribe, it is in jarring conflict with, and disobedience to the New Testament teaching that governments and rulers are established by God and therefore we are to obey them (Romans 13:1, 1 Peter 2:13).

Also in reference to the Preamble, there is no clause that has even a hint of any language or idea indicating the establishment of a “Christian” form of Government.

The framers of the Constitution could have easily inserted religious language, if they had chosen to do so. But, instead, the scope of the Constitution provided by the Preamble reads, in full, “We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”

So, it seems the framers missed several opportunities to address religious influence in the Preamble.

What’s more, within the body of the Constitution…

The last paragraph in Article II reads in full…Before he enter on the Execution of his Office, he shall take the following Oath or Affirmation:—"I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."

Please note that the phrase “So help me God” is not present here. While those elected President have chosen to speak those words while taking the oath of office, they have done so as a matter of personal choice and conscience. Neither those words, nor their sentiment, is required by the Constitution.

Clause 3, Article VI reads: “but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.” This is an explicit prohibition of religious favorability within government.

And of course, the First Amendment to the Constitution also has obvious and explicit language regarding religion…

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof;”

Returning to the religious convictions of Native Americans, and Africans brought over on slave ships, there is no language to prohibit their free exercise of religion. Indeed, the Constitution is absolutely neutral as to religious matters.

If the framers had intended a “Christian” form of government, I count at least six missed opportunities:

·         Two missed opportunities in the Preamble.

·         The lack of address to God in the President’s oath of office.

·         The prohibition of religious test to hold office.

·         The first amendment with its explicit language regarding religion.

·         The absence of prohibition on non-Christian religions known to actively exist at the time of the writing of the Constitution.

All of this is not to say that individual Christians, denominations, and/or other religious groups should not advocate governments to improve the conditions of those living in poverty, those who suffer violence, those who are trafficked, or those who are oppressed in any way. Indeed, as people of faith, be it Christian, Muslim, Jewish, or others, we should feel compelled by our faith to advocate for the “least of these.” (Matthew 25:46)

Nowhere even in the Declaration of Independence is there any compulsion for anyone to subscribe to any particular expression of religious faith. Government cannot instill sincere religious faith in anyone. Government can only indoctrinate a people, and thereby cause them to be absent any genuineness of faith.

My appeal to Christians is to apply our resources of time, money, and social capital according to models present in the New Testament; models of conversion that are effective. The Church best achieves Christ’s Great Commandment by making its argument in the free market of ideas, as Apostle Paul modeled for us in Acts 17:16-34. 

If we want America to be a Christian nation in fact, not just electoral rhetoric, then Christians must actively try to change hearts, rather than be obsessed with dictating what other people must believe. We must avoid the danger of becoming a lap dog of those who hold political power, which is as fickle as musical tastes across generations. Christianity, as well as other religions, is a faith of personal invitation, not political coercion.

For these reasons, among so many others, I believe that we must maintain and strengthen a separation of Church and State.

Concord High School Honors Night 1974: A memoir

 

 

That's me, front row. The "C" stands for Charles, my first name.

     My 24, 1974, yes, fifty years ago, Concord High School held our Honors Night program.

Thank goodness for there being a Library for me to work in otherwise I would not have had opportunity to accept an award, as pictured below, before assembled classmates, their parents, teachers, and administrators on that stage in that affectionally-remembered auditorium.

Having no musical talent, I was not in band or choir, nor did I participate in sporting events which call for physical duration and strength, nor did I have the projection of voice for theater.  I have no high school trophies or framed newspaper reports to adorn walls, shelves, or tables so as to impress visitors with stories of glory. But, by golly gee whiz did I know how to navigate the Dewey Decimal system! I know how to get you to the book you want! “Need Cliff’s Notes for that Shakespeare play? Gotcha covered, brother!”. ”Seeking a biography of King Edward VII? Follow me, sister!” I can even find that obscure recording of Gloriana by Benjamin Britten if that is your musical taste!

 And therefore, I am happy to claim, and exalt, and present this pictured charm as my award for Library Service.

 Yes, fifty years I have held on to this memento.

But seriously, I offer sincere accolades to all my classmates who achieved academic, athletic, artistic, or other school disciple success that year!

You can read about them in this Elkhart Truth article which James Clouse recently posted on Facebook.

And let’s all recommit to our class moto:

Saxon...Legendary in the Metal Community

 

    I had known of Saxon only by their name on the cover of albums in records stores during my visits in the late 1970s. Not being a fan of heavy metal, I never invested in purchase of album or tickets. Not that I have anything against Heavy Metal. I was much more the Beatles/Simon and Garfunkel kind of appreciant.

When my son suggested this concert featuring Saxon and Uriah Heep at the Lerner Theatre in Elkhart, of course I said “yes”. I love the gathering of music fans to just about any type of music and venue.

    Eric, my son, said, regarding Saxon…”These guys are legendary in the metal community.”

    I was impressed. This band is very precise in their instrumentation, timing, cadence, and more so than most performers I have encountered. Through the loudness, one can distinguish each guitar and vocal. The loudness is not merely for the aim of playing loud…the level of sound they create enables their music to ricochet from the walls in just the right directions for the listener to audibly consume each thrash-strum, slide-pick, and drum roll presented.

   I was impressed. Each song was acutely predictable. I don’t say that as a negative, contrary, this quality of predictability enabled the listener to know where the variations of the strums and drums was going and where the anticipated landing would be.

  At the beginning thrash-strum of one song my son leaned over to me and said “JFK”. Quickly, I Google-searched “Saxon JFK”. Well, that landed me where I did not want to go. Then I searched “Saxon song JFK”. Ah yes, that gave me the tilte of the song the band was playing (Dallas 1PM) and the lyric, which I present at bottom of this blog post.

Now, that fact made strong connection between baby-boomer me and this British new wave heavy metal band from South Yorkshire, England.

    I was impressed. The crowd that was there responded to each lyric sang as if the crowd knew the lyrics by heart. They were certainly well invested!

   I was convinced, as my son asserted, these guys are legendary in the metal community. They built upon that legend tonight at the Lerner Theater.

If you have never experienced a heavy metal band in concert and are interested in it as a “bucket list” item, for sure see Saxon.

I present the lyric Dallas 1PM in Fair Use as I do not monetize my blog…

[Verse 1]
A crowded main street, the scene was set
They check out the view, turn the radio on
Open the case, assemble the gun
Wait at the ready, for the president's run

[Chorus]
The world was shocked that fateful day
A young man's life was blown away, away, away-ay-ay
At Dallas 1 p.m

[Verse 2]
White hot lead, in the back of the head
Screaming confusion, shots rip the air
Cadillac racing, cops on the run
They couldn't believe the president's hit

*3 Shots*
[Radio Chatter]
"Something has happened here
We understand there has been a shooting
The presidential car coming up now, we know it's the presidential car, you can see Mrs. Kennedy in the pink suit
There's a secret serviceman spread eagle over the top of the car
We understand that governor and Mrs. Connally are in the car with president and Mrs. Kennedy
We can't see who is hit if anybody's been hit, but apparently something is wrong here, something is terribly wrong
[?] behind the motorcade [?] they're going to Parkland Hospital
[?]."

[Guitar Solo]

[Verse 3]
The shooting's done, assassin run
Is he dead? No-one will say
Around the world, the news was flashed
We sat and watched, your tragic history

[Chorus]
The world was shocked that fateful day
A young man's life was blown away, away, away-ay-ay
At Dallas 1 p.m
1 p.m

[Outro]
The world was shocked
In Dallas 1 p.m
We sat and watched
Tragic history

The world was shocked
In Dallas 1 p.m

 

 

 

Favoring the Spector Reproduction of "The Long and Winding Road"

 

Image from discogs.com I claim Fair Use

With a great deal of humility, I offer that my preferred version of “The Long and Winding Road”, released on May 11 in 1970, is the Phil Spector reproduction.

 I just sensed a disturbance in the gravitational field of all of Beatledom.

I was fourteen when I first heard the song on WLS radio station of Chicago. This was the formative version of the recording to which I was introduced. Other people may have had their first experience from the “Let It Be…Naked” album of 2003 which. I admit, had a simpler, more faithful to original recording production.

But the Spector reproduction to my fourteen-year-old self, having followed the Beatles since that first Ed Sullivan show, seemed like the Beatles at full maturity.

From the stage-performable “I Want to Hold Your Hand”, to the studio intense “Tomorrow Never Knows”, to trend-setting ‘Hey Jude”, this Spector reproduction of LWR, with his fullness of choir and orchestra, which seems to escort the listener from the end of one lyrical phrase to the beginning of the next, causes the group to rise above ordinary pop/rock music to unprecedented cultural apex.

Yes, those were my actual words that I wrote in my journal at the time of my first hearing the song. I was hoping to become a rock music critic.

As to McCartney’s lyric, I will say that the best phrase ever I have heard in a pop/rock song follows…

“The wild and windy night that the rain washed away has left a pool of tears, crying for the day. Why leave me standing here, let me know the way.”

Much respect to those who prefer the original recording done in January of 1969.

But to reinforce my argument, the Beatles pretty much shelved that music and left it somewhat abandoned. I see no transgression committed by Allen Klein or Phil Spector in making LWR an even better recording than the concurrent “Bridge Over Troubled Water”, which seems to have similar production value.

I mean no transgression in my preference for the Spector reproduction.

Peace, all.

 

The Beatles Success in Context of John F Kennedy

 

picture from jacobsmedia.com I claim Fair Use Doctrine
I do not monetize.

The Beatles success story began on Friday, November 22, 1963.

The assassination of John F Kennedy had thrust the adult population in America into an emotional preoccupation with fear, loss, grief. It was all over the news, whether radio, print, or television for months.

    America had to become accustomed to a new President, who resembled the older generation rather than the younger generation as had Kennedy.

   America had to calculate anew the place it held in the world relative to the Soviet Union.

    And we, the kids and teenagers, were witness to this cultural depression.

    Many of us kids felt emotionally abandoned by adults, even at school, who were busy trying to figure out their new worldview and how they fit within it.

    Cartoons didn’t make up for our loss.

    When we heard the buzz about this fresh talent from England, we decided to watch the Ed Sullivan show on that musically tectonic night in American history.

February 9, 1964.

    There we were, a huge population of young people watching the same television channel, reclining on couches, propping our heads up with the palms of our hands, tapping our feet to the beat of Ringo’s drums, following the fresh, excited vocals of Paul and John, and tingling with that glistening sound of George’s electric guitar!

    We felt emotionally unleashed!

After months of Samuel Barber’s Adagio for Strings (a magnificent and beautiful piece, though fixated in the depth of despair), we now had our own sound which provided us dispensation from grief and opportunity for celebration.

And we celebrated!

The very next day at school all the talk was the Beatles. Throughout that first week kids brought to school the 45RPM “I Want to Hold Your Hand”.

Within a month some kids had metal lunch boxes bearing the likeness of the Beatles.

By the end of the week, I had a ring from a “dime toy dispenser” at Woodson’s Grocery store in Lafollette Tennessee. This ring flashed the likeness of each of the Beatles as I moved it in the light.

I often wonder if that shot had missed John F Kennedy and landed harmlessly in the street or grass, had we kids and teens then not been subjected to a lengthy abdication of adult attention, perhaps the Beatles would have been on their way back to Liverpool, a mere ephemeral novelty from which we moved on to Rick Nelson.

Rooftop, Woodstock, and Altamont: a Less than Admirable Review of 1969

 

Nineteen Sixty-Nine was a very ripe year for the concert-goer of the legendary 1960s of which it is nostalgically said “If you remember the 60’s, you weren’t really there.”

Well, I was really there! And I remember reading the news reports, and the photos of three “free” yet troublesome major concerts. Though not in attendance at any of them, they nonetheless had much impact upon me.

Shea Stadium 1965 (I claim Fair Use)

Please note that my personal review of the history of 1960s concerts begins with the Beatles 1965 Shea Stadium event (I know, I leave out have of the decade). I was not present at this event, but it was this concert which first got my attention of the culture, sensation, and sense of ephemeral community attached to a large gathering of people for a “rock band” experience.

As well-planned as was this 1965 event, I consider it the debut of an emerging rock phenomena.

The year 1969 closed out the decade with some events that seemed quite ad hoc in execution.

Rooftop of Apple Records (Fair Use)

To begin, there on the rooftop of Apple Records, January 30, 1969, we have the Beatles performing, quite impromptu and free to the world, about forty minutes worth of yet to be released music, which caused traffic congestion, disruption of business, and involvement of police.

Oh, how I wish I could have been there atop that roof, looking down upon the commotion.

No longer were there teenage girls screaming until they faint into the arms of folk who will protectively attend to them. News video show the gathering crowd as comparatively subdued in response and interest as if to indicate a sense of “Now what are they up to?”

Though the rooftop shenanigan remains, probably, more legendary than even Shea Stadium, it also then served as harbinger of other ripe concert events with dubious consequences.

Such as was Woodstock.

Though well-planned, the Woodstock event also turned out to provide some very uncomfortable side effects. Many folk experienced health problems. Food and water had to be distributed by National Guard. Though there were ticket sales, at one point, because of the flood of people and no fencing to control them, it was announced that the concert was “now free”. Yes, like the Beatles roof top…free, yet troublesome.

I wonder how many divorces resulted as a consequence of this event.

Oh, how glad I am that I did not get a ride to that event, as I, at age 14,  was trying desperately to do.

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And of course, on December 6, 1969, sunsetting the year in rock and roll extravagance, we have the Altamont Concert which was designed as a free event yet also met with much problem. This event turned violent and even deadly for Meridith Hunter. I will leave it to you to read about it on Wikipedia or some other source.

Oh, how glad I am to not have even considered that one.

I don’t mean to dampen the excitement associated with these legendary concerts of 1969. But let us remember that they came at great cost to those who paid a price other than a ticket.

Yes, 1969 was a very ripe year for the concert experience.

It was also the inaugural year for what has become infamously known as the “27 Club”.

Yes, July 3, 1969, Brian Jones of the Stones died at age 27, followed by Jimi and Janis the following year, and Morrison in 1971.

But I bifurcate.

Think of a banana that has become mushy. That is how I think of the legendary year of 1969.

Thank goodness for Neil Armstrong and company to give the year a high point!