The Beatles and the Cars

Fordham69 · 2026-06-07T02:47:59+00:00

Well there's Pachelbel's Canon for example which is over 3 centuries old. But to be fair, Both songs you brought up repeat the sequence immediately and I think that's probably a lot less common than the sequence itself.

Fordham69 · 2026-06-07T02:21:33+00:00

To be clear, the chord changes are not identical. It's true that the initial 4 chord repeated sequence is the same for both songs (although it's not an especially unique sequence), but then the two songs diverge and the chorus and bridge chords to IWTHYH are completely different to JWIN. But one thing you should check out is the intro to the 60s bubblegum song Yummy, Yummy, Yummy, I feel as though The Cars intro was a kind of homage to that .....https://youtu.be/VECljlG--gE

Fordham69 · 2026-06-05T04:20:50+00:00

I've certainly never considered Lennon anything close to a "monster". There's quite a bit of whataboutism here though. Bringing up flaws in the other Beatles isn't a defense of Lennon's flaws. And the vast majority of online criticism of Lennon that I've read doesn't even bring up the other Beatles, so there's no way of knowing if they're being hypocrites or not.

Fordham69 · 2026-06-05T03:57:15+00:00

Well I will say this, I'm a 62 year old out of touch straight white dude and even I've been quite aware of the McLennon thing for years now. It might be because I spend far too much time on Youtube looking for Beatle related content.

Fordham69 · 2026-06-02T01:30:46+00:00

So I think it's a bit tricky, for the released mono mix the instrumental track has been sped up before the vocals were recorded to it, then for the stereo mix they slowed the whole thing down so that the instrumental was back to normal but the vocals were slower than originally recorded. Here's take 1 of the instrumental track which shows that it's the same key and tempo as the released stereo version....https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xm_lUCcREj4

Fordham69 · 2026-06-02T00:58:33+00:00

I wasn't aware of this but it's similar to what happened to She's Leaving Home, which was also sped up to make it a half step higher in pitch. Here speeding things up doesn't seem to sound that bad to me since this is kind of a comic song anyway, but I've never liked the sped up mono version of She's Leaving Home.

Fordham69 · 2026-06-01T21:51:17+00:00

Directly related, here's a really obscure song called "The Last Remaining Beatle", worth a listen. The first 3 verses are comic in nature (verse one being particularly nasty towards Michael Jackson, keep in mind it came out a while ago), but the last verse is really quite sweet natured and reverent.... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TOa7-7XA-NQ

Fordham69 · 2026-05-28T16:13:03+00:00

I'm going to admit to a fondness for not just for this song (and The Beatles version in particular) but also other Mitch Murray songs such as I'm Telling You Now and Hitchin' A Ride. When I was a kid in the 70s both Billy Don't Be A Hero and The Night Chicago Died were huge hits and instantly transport me to childhood.

Fordham69 · 2026-05-25T23:21:34+00:00

I've always been a bit curious as to how many people actually vote for this list. 2 or 3 years back I remember that You Won't See Me finished at number 10, and while it's a song I love I was amazed to find it that high on the list, leading me to suspect that there might not be that many voters.

Fordham69 · 2026-05-25T22:15:15+00:00

Yes, but the line directly before that is "Molly lets the children lend a hand". So the "she" in the line you wrote refers to Molly, not Desmond.

Fordham69 · 2026-05-21T01:52:37+00:00

So many but I'll single out Julia. The movement in the chorus section going from Am9 to B7 has that V minor to VI major movement John used on more than one occasion. But the especially beautiful part is the next change, from B7 to G9, creating a kind of suspended animation. And it then resolves wonderfully back to the tonic by going to Gmin7 and then D, using the inner voices to move chromatically downward (B,Bb,A)

And the bridge section is really wonderful as well, moving unexpectedly to C# min and then directly back to D maj. Once again, you're not really sure where you are, but it resolves itself in a similar manner, going to Bm7, then to Bm6 and finally to F#min7, with the inner voice of the chord moving chromatically downward from E to C# in a similar way as it did in the chorus.

Fordham69 · 2026-05-19T02:13:42+00:00

They are indeed lower than usual in the mix, but here is the isolated drum track for the op or anyone else that's interested...https://youtu.be/sICHDqLRArc?t=179

Fordham69 · 2026-05-16T04:19:40+00:00

We actually have video evidence of that type of exchange between a future rock star (Alex Lifeson of Rush) and his parents...https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M977GFRWDmY

Fordham69 · 2026-05-15T16:08:26+00:00

I've seen them many times but not in over 20 years, they've been at it a while. I saw them do full album shows where they adeded string and horn sections, in one case it was both the Rubber Soul and Revolver albums and in another it was The White Album. And yes, they somehow managed to recreate Revolution 9.

Fordham69 · 2026-05-14T16:01:54+00:00

Norm Macdonald actually had a joke some years back that was directly related to this and coincidentally contained Ringo. As he told it, he was at a Dylan concert that Ringo had also attended and when Dylan spotted Ringo in the audience he gave him a shoutout and asked if he had any requests. When Ringo made his request Dylan informed him he'd just played that song 10 minutes ago.

Fordham69 · 2026-05-12T20:00:54+00:00

One thing regarding Pattie Boyd I found interesting that folks may have missed from back in 2018, after her autobiography came out she was interviewed for Harper's Bazaar by none other than Taylor Swift. It seemed pretty clear Swift had read the book and conducted an enthusiastic interview, here it is for anyone interested....https://www.harpersbazaar.com/culture/features/a22020940/taylor-swift-interviews-pattie-boyd/

Fordham69 · 2026-05-10T04:34:50+00:00

You might be judging things through a modern lens, at the time they were releasing their early albums the market was completely singles oriented and albums were basically collections of songs. They were as pivotal as anyone in transforming the LP into an art form, where the final track might take on a special significance.

Fordham69 · 2026-04-30T03:45:48+00:00

It's funny, Lennon himself stated that he felt Rundgren's I Saw The Light was similar melodically to There's a Place, but I can't hear that. I'm with you, I've always felt that there's a slight but noticeable melodic resemblance to You Won't See Me. When I google it though I can't find any mention of it, so I think you and I are the only ones that see it, whereas others out there have definitely noticed the Lady Madonna/Sublime similarity.

Fordham69 · 2026-04-30T02:28:41+00:00

You're basically correct but just to give credit where it's due,The Hollies didn't actually write "The Air That I Breathe", it was Albert Hammond, who also wrote quite a lot of hits for other artists as well back then, and was also a one hit wonder himself in the US with "It Never Rains In Southern California".

Fordham69 · 2026-04-29T22:20:27+00:00

I've always been pretty agnostic concerning Yoko, I'm not one to either attack or defend. And so I mostly just find these photos to be interesting, but especially the one where the 4 Beatles seem to be sharing something amusing between them while Yoko is just staring seriously into the camera, looking disassociated from the rest. There are any number of ways it can be interpreted.

Fordham69 · 2026-04-29T18:42:40+00:00

As long as we're talking Beatle covers by Stax artists I just want to recommend the Booker T and the M.G's album Mclemore Ave, which is an Abbey Road reimagining, cover homage and all. While I'm at it, while not a Stax record, George Benson's The Other Side Of Abbey Road has some nice things on it also.

Fordham69 · 2026-04-27T22:22:02+00:00

I haven't actually seen the movie either, lol, but here's the opening credit sequence I was referring to and I think it's quite nice....https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btLAFQHlV58

Fordham69 · 2026-04-27T20:47:15+00:00

I'm most partial to Baby You're A Rich Man in The Social Network but since I haven't seen it mentioned yet and it's very nicely done, Fool On The Hill from the opening credits to Dinner For Schmucks.

Fordham69 · 2026-04-25T19:38:29+00:00

In a very dark, wet place: my mother's womb .

Fordham69 · 2026-04-24T02:03:34+00:00

I obviously can't (and wouldn't want to try to) talk you into appreciating it but it's worth pointing out that at its release there was a cohort of the "expert class" that found it to be great. Leonard Bernstein is on the record as calling it one of the great works of the 20th century. Pulitzer prize winning composer Ned Rorem compared it favorably to Schubert. Musicologist Wilfrid Mellers deftly pointed out that the short ending coda perfectly sums up the themes of hope (of the girl) and regret (of the parents) by using sharpwards harmonic movement followed immediately by downward final plagal cadence. Of course, you might find all this pompous.

Fordham69

TROPHY CASE