STILL THE KING

[lincsyokel2]

Elvis Was the greatest Rock & roll artist EVER, his music is played all over the world every day.  The Beatles, what Beatles Mmm,  :P ;D.

No, clearly not. He was a first class vocalist, he was no musician. For example, B B King was clearly a better guitarist and Jerry lee Lewis was clearly a better Pianist.  Compare the Kinks version of Milk Cow Blues Boogie http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qwDBepAv4KU to Elvises http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hK8iwZUpz1o. Elvis has a far better vocalization, but the musical arrngement of the Kinks is superior

As I said, truly great musicians change the genre into the next phase. Chopin for example was the bridge between pure classical piano forms and creole. Some of Chopins later pieces have jazz figuring in them, he was so far ahead of his time, "So deep is the night" is such a piece   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lE4GhdSdi-Q

Elvis took the genre as far as it could be taken, vocally, but he was no paradigm shifter. It took the Beatles to transform rock and roll into rock and pop, thats self evident if you are intellectually honest about it.

The argument "xxxx is the greatest musician ever" is a banal claim because its not valid to compare different types of performers from totally different genres. You cant possibly decide who is better, for example between Pavarotti and Dave Brubeck, or Stefan Grossman (pioneering ragtime guitarist of the 1970's)  and Saburo Kitajima (japanese Enka maestro of the late 1940's). All four are brilliant in there own genre. How can you possibly compare Katherine Jenkins with Harry Carney (Duke Ellingtons Baritone Sax player in 1946)

Its clear Elvis was a first class vocalist, and few rock n Roll vocalists could match him, but he was no musical revolutionary. The Beatles changed Society, and took us, by there musical influence, from the austere fifties to the swinging Sixties and thence to Progressive Rock, and all those multitude of genres which exploded after 1970. The Beatles laid the foundation for the music of the next forty years. Whatever his brilliance, Elvis did not scale any such heights, although he did found an enduring industry of Elvis Impersonators.

[lincsyokel2]

[SamLouise]

Lincs, why so serious?  To some people he was the greatest rock n roll artist ever - what's the problem?

Personally, I've never understood the appeal of the Beatles, I've never liked their music or their vocals but if to others they are musical gods then sobeit.

It's not for anybody else to decide who a musical great should be!
 

[lincsyokel2]

Lincs, why so serious?  To some people he was the greatest rock n roll artist ever - what's the problem?

Personally, I've never understood the appeal of the Beatles, I've never liked their music or their vocals but if to others they are musical gods then sobeit.

It's not for anybody else to decide who a musical great should be!
 

thats right. thats why "xxxx is the greatest musician ever " is such  a banal statement, and demands to be demolished.

There was a vote just before the turn of the century, for the Greatest Musician of the 20th Century. It was won by Robbie Williams, because all the little teenage girlies jumped onto the internet and voted for him, because he was at the height of his fame at the time. Robbie Williams clearly isnt the greatest musician of the 20th century, or any other century, and in fact  i doubt he makes to top 50000. of the last 500 years. It demonstrates the perils of generalising like that and the perils of running internet polls.

And why not be serious? This is a debate forum isnt it?  AS long as its kept civil, debating this particular subject is very interesting. Social history is per se an interesting subject, and the 50's and 60's were profound in the way society changed. This was because of us, the baby boomers, the single most  influential demographic cohort that has ever existed.

One of the parallels between Elvis and the fifties and the Beatles and the 60's was that the 50's had Rebellion, people like Elvis and James Dean. Rebellion said ' im not going to obey, but im wrong', whereas the 60's, people like Dylan, and movements like Flower Power, invented Protest. Protest still said 'im not going to obey' but then pointed out it was society that was wrong.

I think its a huge subject , and massively interesting.

[cornykev]

Everyone is entitled to their opinion thats why I'm going for Boy George, a legend.   :P

[betula]

Loved Boy George   ;D

As for me.......back a bit,so many really

Terry and Julie walked by the river....................

[tonybloke]

elvis was good at what he did, no problem with that.
the beatles? britains first 'boy band'

Otis Reading, now he knew how to sing,and he wrote most of his own songs!
http://youtu.be/dael4sb42nI

[carbonel11]

I can remember clearly the day he died. My parents had parked me with an Aunt while they were on holiday. I was in the first throw of punkdom but seeing her so upset sat down and listened with her to her album collection. I was surprised by how good it was and still reckon to this day he deserves his title and has earned his credentials. Simarly I remember clearly the day Lennon died. It was again the collective grief of the women around me at the time, this time a couple of women who worked in the secretaries pool at work, that registered. Again it made me listen to his stuff and again although the Beatles have never been my cup of tea I recognised the genius.
And yes Betula and Cornykev good old Boy George ! My abiding memory is of my little sis swaying in the dark in the living room, dressed in black weeds, silly hat and dreads endlessly playing and crooning along over and over again " Do you really want to hurt me ". He must be recognised as the king of the eighties!:)

[BarriedaleNick]

Boy Gorge!  That someone we can all get behind... oh er misses...

The Beatles - I suppose they are OK if you were a screaming teenage girl in the 60s but all this hyperbole about them being the entire foundation of modern music strikes me as mere fanboyism..

[lincsyokel2]

Boy Gorge!  That someone we can all get behind... oh er misses...

The Beatles - I suppose they are OK if you were a screaming teenage girl in the 60s but all this hyperbole about them being the entire foundation of modern music strikes me as mere fanboyism..

They were more than that. They were the driving force, in the UK of the Swinging Sixties. They influenced everything and everyone. There isnt a famous musician from the 70's and 80's who wont admit the Beatles were a major influence on them, even John Lyndon (Johnny Rotten) has recently admitted as such.

The whole military uniform fashion of the mid 60's was rocket boosted when John Lennon started wearing one. Furthermore, they brought the whole Flower Power Movement in California to the attention of the UK.

Every musical genre influences the next one. The 60's was different only in the scale and extent. This can all be traced back to the fact the baby Boomers, ie our generation have had a more influential effect on society than any other.

Until the Baby Boomers came along, every generation did exactly the same as there parents did.  Boys left school at 14 or 15, got a suit and went to work in the same office as dad, or got a pick and went to work in the same factory or mine. Girls got a dress like mum  and waited for a lad to choose them and have babies.

We changed that. We redefined the teenager and invented Youth Culture. We said, "no, were going to have our own music and clothes, and idols". The baby Boomers have done this, this changing of the previous, for sixty years. We are now all retiring, and we are in the process of redefining the Pensioner.

And there you have the nub - Elvis wasnt a Baby Boomer, he was part of the War Baby cohort, his generation did not change anything, whereas the Baby Boomers, amongst which were the Beatles, were the vanguard of change.

Look at all the musical genres that rose in the next 25 years, all ultimately  influenced by 60's pop music and rock:

Electric Folk
Progressive rock
Glam Rock
Soft Rock
Reggae
Alternative Rock
Hip Hop
New Country
Post Punk
New Wave
New Romantic
Goth
Synth
House
Garage
Grunge
Indie
Britpop
Robotics
Pop Metal
Nu Metal

Every single one of these genres can trace its roots back to the music and social revolution the Beatles led.

They even rescued Classical Music - Classical had for years been stuck in a rut, descending into the blind alley the Modern classical was, the rubbish like 12 tone tone music and Schoenberg. When the Times music critic wrote of the 'Aeolian cadences' in Penny Lane, Classical musicians pulled themselves together and starting writing real music again instead of the pretentious rubbish of the previous 30 years.

The Beatles pioneered new techniques, including the most important one of all, multitracking, as well as the music video and the Concept Album -  'Sergeant Peppers' was one of those milestone albums, which embodied all the new inventions, and managed to encapsulate in one place the sixties and all it was about.  Look at the instrumental solo in 'Being For The Benefit of Mr Kite' - that was done by chopping up hundreds of sections of 1/4" tape of organ music and randomly splicing it back together, and then playing it all in reverse. Tubular Bells, another milestone album, took the Beatles invention of multitracking and took it to its limit.  Mike Oldfield was another musician influenced by The Beatles. Pink Floyds 'Dark Side of the Moon' was another seminal album that defined its genre, taking its linked track concept and  sonata forms from Sgt Peppers. Its certainly arguable that musically, Sgt Peppers was the single most important LP ever released.

Socially, morally,  and culturally, the influence of that cohort of individuals, and it also includes people such as Lulu, Vivienne Westwood, Malcolm Clarence, Twiggy, Cathy McGowan, (theres too many to list!) was profound and changed the direction of this country.

[shirlton]

At school my friend liked Elvis and I liked Cliff Richard.There was always a divide.I remember mornings before we went into class dancing to her singing an Elvis song and our partners were the poles at the end of the coat racks. i must admit I did like his early stuff.
The small faces and the stones and the yardbirds were my favourites and then later Boy George  and George Michael. I will always be a Matt Monro fan .
Today I am a huge Joe McElderry fan and so is Tony. ;D

[lincsyokel2]

At school my friend liked Elvis and I liked Cliff Richard.There was always a divide.I remember mornings before we went into class dancing to her singing an Elvis song and our partners were the poles at the end of the coat racks. i must admit I did like his early stuff.
The small faces and the stones and the yardbirds were my favourites and then later Boy George  and George Michael. I will always be a Matt Monro fan .
Today I am a huge Joe McElderry fan and so is Tony. ;D

Cliff tried to be the english Elvis, but soon realised there was no mileage in that. You have to hand it to Cliff, he's outlasted every one of his contempories bar a handfull (eg Lulu is still around)

[djbrenton]

Back in 1977 I worked at the Palais in Nottingham. I think it was around 3 weeks after Elvis died that we hosted the European Elvis Convention. Grown men in Elvis suits sobbing on the stairs all around the place. It was only the night before that the organisers realised the film they'd got was Love Me Tender ( the only film where Elvis dies on screen) and that the club would be full of people slitting their wrists if it were still shown. They ended up having to get a different film flown in from Germany that arrived an hour or so before it was due to be screened.

[BarriedaleNick]

Just because The Beatles came before it doesn't follow that there is any causal relationship between them and what came next.  Personally I think that the Beatles were highly over rated and just happened to be in the right place at the right time - Their influence is not as great as some people seem to think

Effectively what you seem to saying is that every style of modern music is influenced by the past, which is really saying nothing.  The Beatles were influenced by what came before them so you may as well say that all modern music is descended from Blues or R&B or what ever it was that came before that.  

Also the teenager and youth culture came about a decade before the Beatles - America in the 50s witnessed the rise of teenage culture and changing behaviour.  The Beatles themselves were a product of this change not an instigator of it.

I dint know if 'Sergeant Peppers' is as influential as you say but it is goddam awful!! ;)

Edit - Mr Lydon may have changed his mind since 2007

Sex Pistol frontman John "Johnny Rotten" Lydon has revealed that he is not a fan of the Beatles- insisting that they didn"t put their heart in what they did. While the whole world appreciated the quality of 'Beatles" in their glory days, Lydon believes that the 1960"s band"s work was a cultivated operation, and therefore manufactured.

"[The Beatles] started out as a rock "n" roll imitation and a covers band [a reference to their early days when they covered the hits of the day]," the Daily Express quoted him, as telling on an interview. "They spent a few years learning their craft before they decided they were original geniuses," he said. "There was no great heart in anything they did. It was all a cultivated operation, and therefore manufactured," he added.

[lincsyokel2]

Just because The Beatles came before it doesn't follow that there is any causal relationship between them and what came next.  Personally I think that the Beatles were highly over rated and just happened to be in the right place at the right time - Their influence is not as great as some people seem to think

You can make that argument for almost everyone who ever invented anything. Someone eventually woudl have invented the concept album and multitracking. The point was the Beatles did it first, and superbly. Thats all that matters

Effectively what you seem to saying is that every style of modern music is influenced by the past, which is really saying nothing.  The Beatles were influenced by what came before them so you may as well say that all modern music is descended from Blues or R&B or what ever it was that came before that.  

of course it is. but its a case of influence, and what you spawn. look at Rap Music, Stole influences from everywhere, contributed nothing to the future. Popular music made massive strides in the 60's because of an explosion of freedom of expression, technology, and the will to do what you wanted. Again, its probable that it woudl still have happened, but the bealtes were there and did it first.

You cant deny the fact that Lennon and McCartney were brilliant and prolific songwriters, and almost every song they wrote  was innovative - take the previously mentioned 'Penny Lane' single. Not only did it contain notable references to classical phraseology (the Aeolian Cadences so beloved of Mozart), it used an instrument that no one had every used on a pop song (the piccolo trumpet solo) and was multitracked .

The Beatles produced more songs and more top songs, the majority of which still endure and continue to be played today, than any other song writing duo of the time or since - unless you can give a counter  example?

Also the teenager and youth culture came about a decade before the Beatles - America in the 50s witnessed the rise of teenage culture and changing behaviour.  The Beatles themselves were a product of this change not an instigator of it.

The budding youth culture of the 50's was careefully controlled by the music industry, it was not an expression of the youth themselves, more an expression of how the men in suits wanted it to be. Preformers were  carefully groomed to be clean cut wholesome all american boys in suits, singing unoffensive rubbish manufactured in Tin Pan Alley, as it has been for 60 years.  No singer was allowed to write songs, it was unheard of.

The point of the sixties was that the youth of that decade rejected that carefully monitored, controlled, edited version, and invented there own version, which was free, uncontrolled and included protest and the criticism of the establishment, something else not allowed in the fifties.

I dint know if 'Sergeant Peppers' is as influential as you say but it is goddam awful!! ;)

Clearly it isnt. The general opinion amongst historians and musicians (and i speak as a musician of the time)  goes something like this:

The album is widely regarded as one of the greatest of all time, and has since been recognised as one of the most important albums in the history of popular music, including songs such as "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" and "A Day in the Life". Recorded over a 129-day period beginning in December 1966, Sgt. Pepper's saw the band developing the production techniques of their previous album, Revolver. Martin's innovative and lavish production included the orchestra usage and hired musicians ordered by the band. Genres such as music hall, jazz, rock and roll, western classical, and traditional Indian music are covered. The album cover art, by English pop artist Peter Blake, depicts the band posing in front of a collage of their favourite celebrities, and has been widely acclaimed and imitated.

Sgt. Pepper's was a worldwide critical and commercial success, spending a total of 27 weeks at the top of the UK Album Chart and 15 weeks at number one on the US Billboard 200. A defining album in the emerging psychedelic rock style, the album was critically acclaimed upon release and won four Grammy awards in 1968. It frequently ranks at or near the top of published lists of the greatest albums of all time. In 2003, the album was placed at number one on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the "500 Greatest Albums of All Time". Sgt. Pepper's is one of the world's best selling albums, having shipped 32 million copies.

Edit - Mr Lydon may have changed his mind since 2007

Sex Pistol frontman John "Johnny Rotten" Lydon has revealed that he is not a fan of the Beatles- insisting that they didn"t put their heart in what they did. While the whole world appreciated the quality of 'Beatles" in their glory days, Lydon believes that the 1960"s band"s work was a cultivated operation, and therefore manufactured.

"[The Beatles] started out as a rock "n" roll imitation and a covers band [a reference to their early days when they covered the hits of the day]," the Daily Express quoted him, as telling on an interview. "They spent a few years learning their craft before they decided they were original geniuses," he said. "There was no great heart in anything they did. It was all a cultivated operation, and therefore manufactured," he added.

He may well have done, he certainly praised them up in the TV interview I saw a couple of years ago.

The Beatles were most certainly NOT  manufactured band - the Monkees, for example,  were a manufactured band, Anyone on the X Factor is manufactured. Such bands are created by music industry professionals from minimal talented amateurs. The Beatles learned there trade the proper way, gigging, and sweating in the Kaiserkeller. They then simply got to the stage they could do what they liked. if it was cultivated, then breaking up at the end of 69 was hardly a brilliant deliberate move to create sales, was it ? I suggest My Lydon is playing to the crowd.

[GRACELAND]

looks like i have started something   :P

[GRACELAND]

There was alot of good rock n roll singers out there

But Elvis was not just a Rock n roll singer He was a singer of Music So talented   :)

[Bugloss2009]

funny how Sgt Pepper is The Greatest Album Of All Time, but the best Beatles album is Revolver

[BarriedaleNick]

@incsyokel2

I always knew that people who lived through the 60s had rose tinted spectacles but I hadn't realised how rosey they were!  If the 60s are so influential in todays culture maybe we should be blaming the likes of you for the state of society today  ;D

Lydon playing to the crowd? - maybe he was when he said he liked the Beatles - who knows but as he threw Glen Matlock out of the band for liking The Beatles too much I wouldn't put it beyond him!

One thing that you seem to forget is that not everyone cares about the opinons of musicians or historians when it comes to what they like and don't like.  Most people seem to have a fasination with the type of music they grew up listening to - maybe if I grew up in the 60s I would share your fascination with that age.
I don't like the Beatles much - and the pepper album, to me, is horrible.  Cut and paste what you will but it will never make it a better album for me.  Intellectually it may be concidered a great album by many people but music is a question of taste and mine doesn't extend to the Beatles.  
Elvis does even less for me so I will bow out of this thread to let you old uns discuss the heroes of yesteryear!!

[lincsyokel2]

@incsyokel2

I always knew that people who lived through the 60s had rose tinted spectacles but I hadn't realised how rosey they were!

But then if you wernt there you have no idea. What the 60's had which is totally lacking today, is personal freedom.  This society, compared to the 60's is a constantly monitored, watched, documented Big Brother Police NannyState.  But then that was exactly the point Orwell made in "1984" - if you've never had it, you dont miss it. Personal freedom is  something you need to experience, and you dont have it today.

Music was superior in those days, because you required talent to produce it. Today, its possible to produce music with absolutely no talent whatsoever, its all done by the computer and the electronic keyboard.

I know someone who just spent £300 on a new acoustic  guitar. I tried it, its crap. Thats because the golden age of guitar making has gone. The sales of acoustic guitars were vast in the 60's and 70's because everyone made music. I still own my guitars from that age - a Fender f5-12 12 string, an Eko 12 string, and Eros 6 string,  a Yamaha 6 string. These are far better guitars than what they make today. Todays guitars ar crap because they dont sell 1/10 the number they did 50 years ago, and the expertise to make them has gone.

Furthermore, todays society lacks the cohesion and morality of those days. People took personal responsibility for there own actions. If you did something stupid that injured you or lost you money, you just shrugged, put it down to experience and learned from it. Nowadays people go rushing to a solicitoir demanding there 'rights' and 'compensation'. This is the heart of the moral collapse brought down on us by 20 years of political correctness and looney left tree huggers.

[BarriedaleNick]

As I said in the another thread I don' take people who use tired old cliches like "looney left" very seriously.

"Music was superior in those days" - As I said rose tinted specs - I am surprised you can see through them..