1960s Archives - Hey Dullblog, the Beatles fan blog

Something Happened

By Michael Gerber|2023-03-12T23:27:51-07:00March 6, 2023|1960s|

After reading my post on LA's legendary radio station KHJ, commenter @Hieronymus wrote, This is fascinating, Michael. We are roughly the same age and while I’ve been obsessed with the Beatles and 60s culture since I hit double figures, I only really started digging DEEP into the 60s (aside from the Beatles) around 20 years (I know, ONLY 20 years ago, ha!) but what I soon became aware of was how necessary that deep digging was to really understand the world I grew up in. I think we came into this world at the start of the slowing down of whatever the [...]

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The Beatles and India documentary

By Michael Gerber|2021-10-25T11:32:01-07:00October 25, 2021|1968|

Folks, I just got a press release for something very interesting: The Beatles and India is a new documentary about, well, just what it says. Those of you in the UK (and India?) can stream it now; the rest of us will have to wait a bit. There is also an album of covers. Two things come immediately when the topic of the Beatles and India heaves into view. The first is how strange it was for something like this to happen. The world's most famous pop group decamping from the West—in the middle of the Cold War—to go sit at the [...]

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Peter Jackson’s “Get Back”: Now Thanksgiving on Disney Plus

By Nancy Carr|2021-06-21T07:11:00-07:00June 21, 2021|1968, 1969, Breakup, Documentaries, Get Back, Let It Be, Movies, Uncategorized|

Peter Jackson's "Get Back," which was expected to be released in theaters this September, is now going to be a six-hour documentary on Disney Plus, premiering during Thanksgiving weekend. Variety reports that "each episode is approximately two hours in length, rolling out over three days, November 25, 26 and 27, 2021, exclusively on Disney Plus." So, more footage, but to watch it you'll need a Disney Plus subscription. It will be interesting to see how all this plays out.

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Eddie Cochran Documentary on Arena

By Michael Gerber|2021-05-07T16:05:42-07:00May 7, 2021|1960, Documentaries|

The venerable BBC documentary series "Arena" is my television happy place. It's really an unparalleled trove for people interested in a certain era of American and European culture. Last night, as I recovered from Moderna shot #2, I happened upon this documentary about early rock and roller Eddie Cochran. Eddie was one of the early influences on the Fabs, as well as the man behind "Twenty Flight Rock," reputedly the song that convinced John to let Paul into the band. Well worth a watch, if you're into such stuff. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PNAA6kosegA

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Beatle Cars

By Nancy Carr|2022-04-11T09:46:06-07:00April 14, 2021|1964, 1965, 1966, 1967, 1968, Magical Mystery Tour, Psychedelia, Sgt. Pepper|

One of the perks of the mega-fame and fortune the Beatles enjoyed in the 1960s was buying cool automobiles. I think that a look at one of the cars owned by each Beatle in the mid-1960s reveals something about the personality of each. On to the cars: Ringo owned this 1964 Facel Vega Facel II, which autoblog.com describes as "a brutally powerful, but supremely comfortable four-place coupe that didn't skimp on style. Power came from a thumping 6.3-liter Chrysler Typhoon V8 that turned out up to 390 horsepower and could scoot the Facel II to a reported top speed of 150 miles [...]

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Beatles on Ed Sullivan, 57 years ago

By Nancy Carr|2022-06-02T04:25:10-07:00February 10, 2021|1964, 1965, Ed Sullivan, Television|

It's been almost six decades since The Beatles made their first appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show on February 9, 1964. As a Gen X-era fan, I found watching the four Ed Sullivan Beatles shows in their entirety (on a DVD) a revelation. [The other shows were on February 16 and 23, and September 12, 1965.] I highly, highly recommend watching the episodes in full; clips of the Beatles' performances don't give a sense of what was really happening on stage during these shows. The commercials add yet another dimension, underlining how much the Ed Sullivan show was family-friendly but pitched toward [...]

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Global Beatles Day 2020

By Nancy Carr|2020-06-24T07:30:04-07:00June 24, 2020|1967, Beatle History, Beatles on the Web, Psychedelia, Television|

Tomorrow–June 25–is Global Beatles Day. Begun in 2009, this is a day "honoring and celebrating the phenomenon and ideals of the Beatles, collectively and individually, for their gifts to the world including their promotion of peace and love, of truth and youth, and of the expansion of human consciousness." This specific day was chosen because it's the anniversary of the Beatles' performing "All You Need Is Love" live on the BBC program Our World, in 1967, using the first live satellite TV link. If we ever needed a time to promote peace, love, truth, youth, and the expansion of human consciousness, I'd [...]

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RIP Little Richard, Unique Trailblazer

By Nancy Carr|2020-09-10T11:02:03-07:00May 11, 2020|1960s, Beatle History, Obituaries, Other bands, Paul McCartney|

Richard Penniman, whose music and performance stylings reshaped rock 'n' roll, died on Saturday at the age of 87. His full-throated, emotion-packed singing, piano playing, and songwriting had a profound influence on the Beatles, as well as on a wide range of other musicians and performers through the decades. I wrote about seeing Paul McCartney perform "Long Tall Sally" at Candlestick Park back in 2014, and that performance was such a strong reminder of the many, many influences that go into creating a musical moment. There are a multitude of reasons to celebrate Little Richard's legacy; his impact on the Beatles [...]

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Swinging Through The Sixties Podcast

By Michael Gerber|2020-09-10T11:06:06-07:00January 13, 2020|1960, Podcasts|

The many faces (and bodies) of The Profumo Affair. Since everybody seemed to enjoy last week's post on Another Kind of Mind, a podcast offering some interesting new angles on Beatles analysis, I wanted to offer up another Beatle-related podcast I'd run across recently: Swinging Through The Sixties. Though the podcast is Beatle-tilted, it also has quite a bit of general Sixties topics and talk, so that's even more up my alley. I'm currently listening to Episode #25, "The Beatles' Unrealized Album." (Once again, a topic we've discussed endlessly.) This podcast is worth listening to from the first bit with George, which [...]

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Up Against It: BBC Radio Play from 1997

By Michael Gerber|2019-05-16T12:18:28-07:00May 16, 2019|1967|

Being a fan of both The Beat Brothers and doomed playwright Joe Orton, Up Against It has always been interesting to me. Brian Epstein rejected it, of course he did; Orton's outlaw sexuality was a total wrong fit for the Beatle-buying public circa 1967—but the mixing of two such strong, really important flavors from Swinging London is fascinating. In 1997, BBC Radio 3 presented a 90-minute adaptation of Up Against It. The cast included such luminaries as Leo McKern and Fawlty Towers' Prunella Scales. Having stayed up until 2am listening, I can attest that the finished product is grippingly strange. The segments [...]

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