McCartney/Nirvana Benefit Tonight

[Highlander]

I presume that's his sig model that has Gibson clones of them...

[gweimer]

Around 2:15 for Seinfeld's remarks about "I Saw Her Standing There."

I had always understood that McCartney started showing Lennon the song, but didn't have a second line for the verse.  Paul sang the first line, and Lennon just echoed the second because it rhymed and fit in meter.  It didn't mean anything.

[Hörnisse]

Memo to Paul McCartney, nobody wants to hear the new song that you wrote for your 3rd wife.....Stick with the classics!

[Dave W]

Paul was on SNL tonight with the Nirvana guys, then did a Christmas number with his Hofner, with a chorus of kids and what I suppose was the SNL band -- haven't watched it for so long I really don't know.

[Highlander]

Hmm... I didn't know Dave was masochistic...

[westen44]

I had always understood that McCartney started showing Lennon the song, but didn't have a second line for the verse.  Paul sang the first line, and Lennon just echoed the second because it rhymed and fit in meter.  It didn't mean anything.

I've also heard Paul took the bass line from a Chuck Berry song, but I've never bothered to check that out.  I can only assume that it is probably true, though.  As for the lyrics, I've never paid much attention to those.  I never bothered much with Beatles lyrics and mostly concentrated on their melodies.  In fact, I feel a lot of John's lyrics were nonsensical.  Some were meaningful, of course, and so were some of Paul's. 

[westen44]

Hmm... I didn't know Dave was masochistic...

From listening to a bass prone to intonation problems, watching contrived skits, or watching Paul and the Nirvana guys again? 

[Dave W]

I couldn't give it my full attention, at the time I was occupied taking care of my senior dog.

[westen44]

I couldn't give it my full attention, at the time I was occupied taking care of my senior dog.

Being a pet lover, I can totally identify with that. 

[Pilgrim]

Senior dogs need lotsa love and lotsa clean-up.  But it's worth it for having had their company.

[Dave W]

Yes, it is. Every day I have with her is a blessing.

[westen44]

Making their final moments on earth as pleasant as possible may be the greatest gift you can give them.  I regret that I wasn't able to do that with my last pet who suddenly vanished after 14 years.  Long story and I doubt if I could bear to hear all the details myself even if I could. 

[Pilgrim]

We had a cat who over a period of months began creating such a mess and peeing all over the house that I turned him into an outside cat.  He disappeared a bit more than a month later.  I will regret doing that forever.  It wasn't fair to him and I let him down.

I will never do that to a pet again.

[Highlander]

... Every day I have with her is a blessing.

+1

... and Mike... the answer was yes...

[Granny Gremlin]

I think guys like Swaggart who bully their followers and incite near-cult behavior are a lot closer to Satan than musicians are.

I am not suggesting he is a good man, merely using his vitrol to make an only somewhat and superficially related point; music is a powerful medium and as creators of such we have a responsibility.  My counter to 'just a song.'   

The quote was handy because it was sampled in a PWEI track which I posted an unofficial video for.

Obviously I'm not going as far as the alarmist parent's groups in the 80s with the whole "this record, played backwards, is subliminally telling people to kill themselves/others" thing,  but the general point, stripped of that hyperbole is valid and important to remember.

Oddly, my dad brought this up with me at dinner the other day and we argued about it quite a bit; he doesn't get how just because something is literally mentioned, that it doesn't actually mean that (that's how art works, allegory/code), and how the worst music is usually the most popular, seemingly harmless or banal stuff.  For example, this is actually some evil stuff (in addition to being horrible musically). The context here: this local boy band's target market was tween girls; note the "YTV" logo in the bottom right; that's the Youth Television channel - usually cartoons but also a weekly top 40 vid show:



vs this song (by an old band I was in), which sure, talks about Rape explicitly, but considering it's a) indie vs mainstream on TV b) the target market was local scene kids/students who were aware of the spat of ruffie rape cases around campus at the time the song was put out and therefore understand that it was calling out that sort of douchebag vs encouraging assault of any kind (which would be preposterous).



The thing that makes me laugh the most is that I've actually been flamed about that track online because music industry people thought it was pro-rape; these people should really know better, that lyrics aren't always literal and that the first clue to that (especially in a Post-Beastie Boys world) is the hyperbole and slapstick production treatment (intentional out of tune vocals and only acoustic /folky track on what is otherwise a rather heavy noise rock album... also the main vocal not sung by our vocalist.... so to bring this tangent all the way back to the original topic, we pulled a Yellow Submarine/made Ringo sing it... though we did later  finish a proper electric version sung by our actual vocalist, but it wasn't properly released though we did play it live a lot).