Christmas Music Video Of the Week - December 27, 2024

"Ding Dong, Ding Dong" by George Harrison  (Go to the link in the upper-right-hand corner.)

Music Video Of the Week - September 29, 2023

"Give Me Love (Give Me Peace On Earth)" by George Harrison  (Go to the link in the upper-right-hand corner.)

Music Video Of the Week - February 24, 2023

"This Is Love" by George Harrison  (Go to the link in the upper-right-hand corner.)

Christmas Music Video Of the Week - December 30, 2022

"Ding Dong Ding Dong" by George Harrison  (Go to the link in the upper-right-hand corner.)

The Concerts For Bangla Desh - Fifty Years

It was fifty years ago today, Sunday, August 1, 1971, that George Harrison staged rock's first major benefit concert.

When the non-contiguous Pakistani region of East Pakistan, also known as Bangladesh, began a war of liberation from the rest of Pakistan with the support of India, the Pakistani military responded brutally, creating a humanitarian disaster that was compounded by a tropical cyclone that hit the region.  Sitar player Ravi Shankar, whose family came from East Pakistan, went to George Harrison and asked him if there was anything he could do.  Harrison did the only thing he, as a musician, knew how to do - stage a benefit concert to raise money for the people of East Pakistan as they strove to overcome the odds of poverty, oppression, and natural disaster and create a new Bangladeshi nation. He was able to get the top musicians of the time to participate, including Billy Preston, Leon Russell, and Shankar himself.  But the biggest coup Harrison pulled off was getting his buddy Bob Dylan - who had only played once concert in the previous five years (the second Isle of Wight festival in 1969) - to take part.

The twin concerts at New York's Madison Square Garden - an afternoon show followed by an evening show - were nothing short of magic.  Backed by a band that included Eric Clapton, bassist Klaus Voormann, drummer Jim Keltner, Pete Ham of Badfinger, and Taj Mahal guitarist Jesse Ed Davis, Harrison performed his biggest Beatles hits and choice cuts from his All Things Must Pass solo album, along with his charity single "Bangla Desh."  Preston also shone when he performed a rousing rendition of his song "That's The Way God Planned It."  Leon Russell - then the hottest singer-songwriter in rock and roll - did an astonishing medley of the Rolling Stones' "Jumpin' Jack Flash" and the Coasters' "Young Blood," bringing rock down to the core of its rhythm and blues roots.  There was great applause when George Harrison brought out a special guest - Ringo Starr, who sang his new song "It Don't Come Easy," providing the closest anyone ever got to a Beatles reunion in the seventies.  (John Lennon had been invited to take part and agreed to do so without his wife Yoko Ono, per Harrison's insistence, but Yoko's objections led to his withdrawal; Paul McCartney agreed to participate provided Harrison agree to the dissolution of the Beatles' legal partnership, to which Harrison said no can do.)    Dylan's sets of each concert were the highlights, though, with Harrison and Russell joining him for one of them.

Ravi Shankar opened each show with his orchestra, performing Indian classical music, at at one show, as seen in the movie, the audience committed a faux pas after several minutes of music when they applauded Shankar and his musicians.  Shankar thanked them for appreciating the tune-up and promised that they'd appreciate the performance even more. 😄

On a negative note, Stephen Stills, who was on tour promoting his second solo album and had performed at the Garden two days earlier, donated his stage and sound equipment to the Bangla Desh concerts but Harrison inexplicably didn't think to invite him to play in them. 

The proceeds from the concert and the subsequent album and movie got held up in all sorts of legal difficulties, but once those problems were all resolved, the money started flowing to Bangladesh - in 2021 marking a half century of independence - totaling $45 million by the 1990s.  Harrison has since been recognized as a farther to the modern Bangladeshi state. Shankar, for the record, was pleased with the results.  "In one day, the whole world knew the name of Bangladesh," he later said. "It was a fantastic occasion."

The Concerts for Bangla Desh is too monumental to do justice to in my Music Video Of the Week feature.  Instead, here's an audio-only video of the concert for your listening pleasure.  (Sound quality may be spotty.) 

Music Video Of the Week - February 5, 2021

"What Is Life" by George Harrison (Go to the link in the upper-right-hand corner.)

Music Video Of the Week - October 11, 2019

"Faster" by George Harrison  (Go to the link in the upper-right-hand corner.)

Music Video Of the Week - March 2, 2018

"Blow Away" by George Harrison  (Go to the link in the upper-right-hand corner.)

Review - 'The Beatles: Eight Days a Week: The Touring Years'

It has been said - I'm sure - that the last thing we need is another Beatles documentary.  Ron Howard's new movie looking at the concert-tour era of the Beatles' career blows that nonsense out of the water.

Eight Days a Week isn't just one of the best movie about the Beatles ever made - it's the first and only movie to focus on their years as a live band and how the excitement they generated was key to spreading Beatlemania from Britain to America and the world beyond.  New insights from Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr and archival reminiscences from John Lennon and George Harrison  illustrate how thrilling it was for the band to play live in their early days and invigorating it was to take the world by storm.

As Eight Days a Week progresses into 1965 and 1966, the ennui of touring shows as the Beatles were continuing to advance musically in the recording studio.  Their concerts - rare footage of which offers some astonishing samples of how pervasive and engrossing Beatlemania was - evolved from exciting musical performances to what Lennon called "tribal rituals"; indeed, some of the live music included here is ragged and sloppy.  Eight Days a Week also puts the viewer in the center of the action, with photos and dizzying footage of the group taking the stage, traveling long distances on planes, and dealing with the press.  There are some eye-opening anecdotes, too, like when the Beatles forced racial integration of the Gator Bowl in Jacksonville as a condition for performing there.   Philadelphia TV newsman Larry Kane, one of the many figures interviewed for the movie, traveled with the Beatles and covered them on their 1964 North American tour for the Miami radio station he was working for at the time; his specific memories and documentation of his time with the group are especially revealing.  Even the familiar stories of the Beatles' time on the road, particularly the controversy over John Lennon's statement of the Beatles becoming more popular than Jesus, are seen from a fresh perspective and give a picture of how grueling the road was for the group.  (Also worthy are comments from fans and observers such as Elvis Costello, Whoopi Goldberg, and Malcolm Gladwell.)

Fifty years after their last stadium concert at San Francisco, Eight Days a Week makes clear why the Beatles had to end their concert career, and how rock and roll benefited from their decision to do so; Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band and Abbey Road couldn't have existed had they continued touring.  Howard's documentary, which ends with a clip of the Beatles in their last public performance from January 1969 on the Apple rooftop for Let It Be, ultimately succeeds in its main purpose; it brings Beatlemania as it played out in the mid-sixties back to life.  You had to be there, but if you weren't, this is the best (and only) way to experience it. 

(Note: During its theatrical run, Eight Days a Week is followed by a remastered, re-edited version of the film of Beatles' 1965 Shea Stadium concert.  It's an astonishing document, showing a confident foursome playing in perfect sync and giving one of their best live shows ever, despite the primitive sound system and the screaming fans. It is more than worth the price of admission.)         

The Concert For Bangla Desh - Forty Years Later

I saw today, for the first time ever, the documentary film of the Concert For Bangla Desh documentary film forty years to the day after the original concert in New York's Madison Square Garden. It's probably one of the finest concerts - and the greatest benefit concert - in rock and roll history. George Harrison organized it in response to a plea for help from his friend, Indian musician and sitar master Ravi Shankar, whose father was born in Bangladesh (now one word), when the country than known as East Pakistan was fighting for independence from Pakistan proper. The India-Pakistan war that resulted was an embarrassment for the Nixon administration, as I recall - they backed Pakistan, the ultimate loser - but Bangladesh lost a great deal even after winning its independence. The humanitarian crisis that resulted was beyond comprehension, and Shankar hoped that his Beatle buddy Harrison could help do something about it.

Harrison did not disappoint, bringing together some of the greatest rock and roll musicians of the time (and all time, in many instances) for a pair of concerts in which some mighty fine music was generated. Concertgoers supported a good cause with the price of admission to either the afternoon or evening show and got Leon Russell performing a medley of the Rolling Stones' "Jumpin' Jack Flash" and the Coasters' "Young Blood;" Billy Preston offering up his tune "That's the Way God Planned It;" Ringo Starr (the only other Beatle in the show) performing "It Don't Come Easy," his big hit at the time; and Harrison performing solo and Beatles tunes. And this all-star band included Eric Clapton, Klaus Voorman, and Taj Mahal guitarist Jesse Ed Davis.

But the biggest surprise for the audience was Bob Dylan, then making few public appearances - coming onstage to sing classics such as "Blowin' In the Wind" and "Just Like a Woman" with Harrison and Russell backing him on guitar and bass, respectively - and backing vocals. Magic!

The Concerts for Bangla Desh were far more focused, musically and philanthropically, than many other benefit concerts. It targeted a specific cause for relief in a specific place. And unlike Live Aid, which tried to be all things to all people by offering a sixteen-hour revue of popular performers that suggested quantity more than quality (what was Duran Duran doing at that show, anyway), the Bangla Desh shows had a small list of like-minded musicians for whom the music mattered as much as the cause. (After all, the shows started off with Ravi Shankar and his group Indian musicians playing a disciplined form of music that required attention and concentration to listen to as well as play.) George Harrison didn't try to draw more people by inviting the Osmonds to take part, did he?

Although it took more than a decade for the proceeds from the concert to make it to Bangladesh, it was still a success on balance. Money from record and video sales has continued to go to relief for what is still a very poor country. And they need it.

Learn more by going here.

The Beatles On CD . . . Again

When the Beatles' catalog was first issued on compact disc in 1987 - seems like a long time ago, huh? - EMI righted a wrong that had long gone uncorrected, restoring the Beatles's first seven albums to the way they had been issued in the United Kingdom (Capitol in the United States padded them out to ten titles). Paradoxically, the Beatles were among the last artistes from the vinyl age to be reissued on CD. And although posthumous releases of previously unreleased Beatles material in the nineties and two thousand zeroes made the most out of the format (especially the Anthology series), the original catalog was never remastered with the most advanced technology, making the audio quality of the 1987 issues seem stale.

Until now. Apple Corps has announced that on September 9, 2009, the entire Beatles catalog will finally be remastered for a new generation of fans. The CDs will be packaged with the artwork from the original U.K. releases (plus the Capitol-compiled Magical Mystery Tour album, which gathered all of the tracks from 1967 outside Sgt. Pepper), along with new liner notes to complement original album notes, rare photos (there are Beatles photos we haven't seen yet?), and, for a limited time, embedded documentary films about each of the original albums. The Past Masters CDs, which gathered the 33 nonalbum tracks the Beatles recorded, will be merged into one.

The albums were remastered by of engineers at EMI's Abbey Road Studios in London over four yeas, using the latest recording technology and 1960s vintage studio equipment to maintain the sound of the original releases to ensure the highest fidelity possible. All fourteen albums will be issued in stereo, hence the first four Beatles albums (Please Please Me, With the Beatles, A Hard Day's Night, Beatles for Sale) will be in stereophonic sound for the first time. The stereo releases will be gathered n a box set along with a DVD compiling the miniature documentaries. A second box set will compile the original Beatles mono releases as well, for those who prefer the mono sound of the earlier records (and truth be told, audiophiles prefer the monophonic versions of the first four albums and the earlier singles).

This is the most ambitious issue from Apple since the Anthology series, maybe even since the original Beatles CD issues. A splendid time will indeed be guaranteed for all. :-)

The release date - September 9, 2009 - is appropriate. It's the ninth day of the ninth month of the ninth year of the century.

John Lennon always considered nine a lucky number. :-)