The Beatles singing "You Can't Do That" in 1969

You don't have to, that's right. But it's also irrelevant, because you have in fact already done so.

 

I guess he could have said that, but I seem to remember him using a word like "raw"--which they were, at least in terms of studio experience. And George Martin has often been quoted as saying they were talented, willing to try anything, open to new ideas and quick learners. He obviously respected them and had great affection for them. I could buy that George Martin helped shape The Beatles sound, encouraged them, pointed them in certain directions and guided their studio development, but they also had the talent and wrote the songs. And in meeting them, he was just as fortunate career-wise as they were in meeting him. Win-win on both sides. Just one of those happy accidents--rock and roll (and life itself) are full of them. Like Elvis hooking up with Sam Phillips because a receptionist thought he was handsome, Keith running into Mick on a train, Elton John being given Bernie Taupin's address by an engineer.....

The Beatles and George Martin both would have had careers if they never met, but it's not taking anything away from either of them to admit that -by bringing out the best in each other--they, at the very least, changed the course of pop music.

 

Well said.

No matter what Martin said or didn't say, The Beatles were an incredible and popular live band before they got signed, after all of their practice in Hamburg, as some of the recordings from that era attest. As Lennon said, their best live work was before they were even signed (although I personally feel that they remained a great live act after they were signed. This thread I started last year is full of their greatest performances after they were signed : http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threa...es-of-each-song-that-they-played-live.339166/ ).

 

They were probably a very good live band at the height of Beatlemania, but who could tell with all the screaming? I really wish they had decided to become a live band again after 1967, when developments in recreating live sound and amplification were coming to match what bands were doing.

 

I fully agree. It would have been great to have footage of them touring in late 1969, after the release of Abbey Road. The rooftop performance shows that they still had it, and that they could still perform live.

 

There are some very well recorded 1963 and 1964 shows that demonstrate they were a great live band.

The DC show in Feb of 1964 is a great start. The NME Poll Winners show (I think) from 64 is also fantastic.

 

Incredible. However and although the Beatles were definitely leading , it was the whole pop music scene changing so fast at the time.

Take records like Please Please Me or With the Beatles and compare them with the big hits in, say, 1956 or 1957. Then move in the opposite direction and compare them with all the things going on in 1969/70, and it's really hard to believe -- Led Zeppelin, The Doors, Emerson Lake & Palmer, etc.

There's a great Bob Dylan quote -- something like "the 60s did not start until 1965" -- which very much paints the whole picture.

 

You can tell in 1964 they were still quite tight and definitely rocking, see Australia or Washington DC 1964.

 

I think they got sloppier and sloppier as time progressed - and who can blame them? They were exhausted from the never-ending series of demands on them, and they performed show after show in front of crowds who couldn't hear them - and they couldn't hear themselves.

I won't say they didn't care by 1966, but I think they'd lost much incentive to try very hard to play well...

 

The video is primarily drawn from a January 9th session (the audio is from January 3rd). Part of the video is the improvised number "Commonwealth".

 

Pretty good in 1965 (Paris) too:

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xzpj2_the-beatles-live-at-paris-1965_music

Added Edit: I think 1966 was the only tour they did where they were less than stellar.

 

I like the Hollywood Bowl 65 stuff just fine.

 

I think that's a cool song that they play well during the Let It Be sessions (as well as they could play a half-remembered song at least). It would've made a pretty nice addition to the album, like 909.

 

Thanks! (I just ordered DDSI online, by the way.)

Here is at least part of the same video with (seemingly) correct audio:


So would there be no video currently available for "You Can't Do That"?

 

horrible version. Their legacy is tarnished forever!

 

You're welcome, thank you for supporting our book.

Not only is there no video currently available for "You Can't Do That", I'd venture that none exists. There are no sync beeps in its vicinity on the "A" sound roll, and it was not captured at all on the "B" sound roll (an indication that the B camera also went unused during the performance).

 

Amazingly, I was in my used records store today and he had a huge pile of old rock magazines there. I saw one with The Beatles from the PEPPER era, and there was an interview with George Martin in it. I had forgotten the name of the magazine you mentioned at the time, but I read the interview with GM pretty much saying what you did (and using the word "charisma" tipped me off). Now that I am returning to this thread, it turns out that it indeed was the MOJO issue -- from 2007. Turns out that Martin actually called The Beatles "crap" in that interview (which is more unflattering than "terrible", even). But I wonder what it is about magazine interviews like MOJO and ROLLING STONE, where the interviewees suddenly feel an urge to be completely and unsympathetically blatant?

 

I've not seen that - - thanks.
It looks like a copy of a copy of a copy. I would love to have the original footage released, but most likely it will not happen in my lifetime.

 

It's one of the biggest mysteries about the Beatles, that with their studio recordings "getting better all the time" their live performance went downhill until they couldn't "get no worse".
Lots of those "Twickenham sessions" leave any musician clueless. It's absolutely normal, that lyrics or chord changes get forgotten. But to hear them playing and singing "out of tune" and "off key" endlessly while they don't even seem to notice it - that remains a mystery.

 

Could Nilsson's cover made them want to revisit the song?
Well, it's a stupid question since no one here could know the answer. But I like to think so.

 

For anyone here criticizing that performance, when you are in a band that kind of loose performance happens all the time at rehearsals. I loved it, raw and good-humoured.

 

I think the rapid progression doesn't only apply to the Beatles, or any one group, but to the whole decade in general

Just look at the difference between pop songs in 1963 and stuff from 1967. A HUGE change in only four years. We went from Lesley Gore's "It's My Party" in '63 to The Doors "Break on Through (to the Other Side)" in only four years. From songs about teenage-heartbreak to songs about sex and drugs in only four years

The 1960s was truly an amazing decade for music...whether it'd be popular or art

 

of course , hence the liberty with the lyrics!

 

Playing in different keys for minutes is quite unusual for professional musicians. I'm not talking about the occasional wrong chord or breakdown.

 

Another newsflash...there was no audition for George Martin. He may have liked their charisma more than their music, but the band were already signed to EMI when George Martin met them for the first time at the June 6th, 1962 session.