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Were the Beatles just another 'boyband'?
johnythefox
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Before I get lynched.. I think the Beatles were the most creative, talented band ever to grace the planet, and almost single handedly created the template for modern pop music.
However, I ask the question because last night on BBC4 there was a documentary charting the history of light entertainment - a repeat from a couple of years ago I think - anyway, the theme was how pop music has been depicted on TV, and there was a short piece about boybands featuring that well known intelligent, articulate irishman Louis Walsh..he claimed that Take That, Westlife, Boyzone were just carbon copies of the Beatles.
Is it just me that thinks, with views like that he should be kept away from commenting on music? or is this a well held view?
However, I ask the question because last night on BBC4 there was a documentary charting the history of light entertainment - a repeat from a couple of years ago I think - anyway, the theme was how pop music has been depicted on TV, and there was a short piece about boybands featuring that well known intelligent, articulate irishman Louis Walsh..he claimed that Take That, Westlife, Boyzone were just carbon copies of the Beatles.
Is it just me that thinks, with views like that he should be kept away from commenting on music? or is this a well held view?
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Nothing remotely like Boyzone or Westlife (specifically created as boy bands via auditions). Walsh is talking bollocks.
The likes of The Rolling Stones and The Who were far more creative and talented.
The Beatles just came at the right time (and The Stones helped them to become 'acceptable').
And how many Beatles singles did the Stones write?
Agreed. And Ray Davies of The Kinks and Brian Wilson of The Beach Boys were, in my opinion, superior songwriters.
Apart from that, errrrrrrrr no!
Whilst I agree they were great songwriters, I don't believe they were better or more prolific than the combined songwriting talents of Lennon/McCartney/Harrison.
But as most already know Lennon did almost all the writing on the songs.
In fact without lennons writing skills there would have been no beatles.
The world's shortest book.... "Louis Walsh's Knowledge Of Popular Music".
Although I generally prefer Lennon's songs for the Beatles to McCartney's I have to take issue with the highlighted statement.
In the early days they actually did write as a team, while the songs they provided for the later Beatles albums were mainly written individually, with the majority coming from the pen of McCartney.
That is completely wrong. McCartney was always a more prolific writer.
In any other band, Harrison would have been a main songwriter too.
The fact that three local lads were that good, and got together at such a young age is quite remarkable.
There is no comparison to the modern boybands.
I think that's true certainly in the early days, and especially on albums like Hard Day's Night and Help. I've never seen a Beatle be so dominant as he is there. :eek: He kicks the other Beatles arses!!!
But in the later years I think he faded a bit, maybe due to drugs and then losing interest in the Beatles.
I feel like Lennon had to be in the mood to write a song while Macca would probably do it in his sleep.
Lennon also had this tendency to combine songs together to form one big super song. I think that's maybe why I find his songs the most interesting and exciting of all the Beatles.
I think I saw this when it was first aired, Louis Walsh is an idiot and shows himself up by saying such crap. :mad: He made my blood boil and yes you are right, He should be kept away from commenting on music and maybe keep to his crappy boy bands or something.
However, they then seemingly gained a completely different following.
He did most of the writing on the songs he sung but the songs that McCartney sung had little input from Lennon. In the last few years of the band the amount of times they wrote together you could count on the fingers of one hand.
I've heard this question before, elsewhere. The OP's tongue was firmly in her cheek though.
"Louis Walsh..he claimed that Take That, Westlife, Boyzone were just carbon copies of the Beatles."
Didn't see the prog. If Take That, Westlife, Boyzone were just carbon copies, to conclude that the Beatles were of the same genre is a logical fallacy.
The short answer is: the Beatles (not that they do much for me personally) could play things and write stuff. QED.
They quickly grew out of it though to become the most important band in history and thats not debatable.
Almost every band that followed has been influenced in some way by the Beatles.
The boy bands that have followed since are just straight off the shelf boy bands that are just there to make money and nothing else.
I'm more likely to want to lynch you for saying that than for suggesting they were just a boyband.
Had they emerged even as little as ten years later with little ditties like I Wanna Your Hold Hand, Please Please Me and I Wanna Hold Your Hand, they would have been considered lightweights.
(a) they didn't (b) you might as well say "if the ZX Specturm was released now it'd be laughed at". :rolleyes: