{"id":7951,"date":"2019-09-30T17:32:35","date_gmt":"2019-09-30T22:32:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thefest.com\/?p=7951"},"modified":"2019-09-30T17:32:36","modified_gmt":"2019-09-30T22:32:36","slug":"and-the-favorite-beatle-is","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thefest.com\/and-the-favorite-beatle-is\/","title":{"rendered":"And the Favorite Beatle is"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Jude Southerland Kessler<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Over the last nine months, Recipe\nRecords<\/em> author Lanea Stagg and I have been asking our guests on the She\nSaid She Said<\/em> podcast one \u201cbonus question\u201d at the end of each interview: \u201cTell\nus who your favorite Beatle is and why?\u201d And in posing this query, we\u2019ve\nstumbled onto a trend. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our female guests have all\ninstantly piped up with a specific choice \u2014 generally Paul or Ringo, although\nonce in a while, George, and even more infrequently, (the best Beatle!!) John. Our\nmale guests, however, have tended to respond with a pause and then a response\nsomething like this: \u201cWelllll, I don\u2019t really have a favorite.\u201d Or: \u201cHmmmm, it\u2019s\nhard to separate the group. I mean, it takes all of them<\/em> to make the\nmusic, right?\u201d This \u201cchoosing a Beatle\u201d question almost seemed foreign to them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A month ago, I wrote an article\nfor Culture-Sonar<\/em> discussing the disappointing number of times that John\nLennon\u2019s songs are being aired on many Beatles streaming and radio stations\u2026bemoaning\nthe current \u201cdisappearing act of John Winston Lennon.\u201d And the Facebook\nresponses to this article\u2019s observations were truly educational for me. Female\nreaders answered with, \u201cI\u2019ve observed the same thing, and it\u2019s aggravating!!\u201d\nOr: \u201cWell, Paul\u2019s catalogue is much larger, so of course, he\u2019s going to get\nmore air time!\u201d Or: \u201cWhat if you were a George fan?! George was rarely<\/em>\nheard from in the \u2018fab days,\u2019 much less now!!!!\u201d You get the drift.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But my male readers (though not\nall!) saw my observations as rather \u201cdivisive.\u201d One particularly well-written\nand insightful comment stated, \u201cInteresting article, but I hate to hear the\nsegregation of the songs through ’embryotic’ ownership. Beatles songs are\nBeatles songs. Start cutting them up and dishing them onto separate plates, and\nthat is not how I want to remember them.\u201d \n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This comment really set me on my\nheels. It made me stop and think. Because \u201cin my life,\u201d as it were, The Beatles\nhave always been very distinct individuals, openly competing with one another,\nand good-naturedly vying for the attention of their fans. (Think, for example,\nof John \u201chmphffing<\/em>\u201d disgustedly on Live at the BBC Vol. 1<\/em> when he\nreads aloud a piece of fan mail that says, \u201cLove to the boys\u2026especially Paul<\/em>!\u201d)\nFrom the very first day that I was introduced to The Beatles and was given, by\nmy elementary school friends, only two hours (\u201cuntil recess\u201d) to \u201cfall in love\u201d\nwith one of them, The Beatles have been quite separate and very individual. I\nhave never<\/em> thought of them as one indivisible unit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In August, as I drove cross-country\nto the Chicago Fest, I mulled over my lifelong devotion to one particular\nBeatle (clearly, John) and about that similar \u201csingular Beatle\u201d response from my\nfriends throughout junior high and high school. I smiled remembering that my\nfriends and I, back \u201cin the day,\u201d readily identified ourselves as \u201cJohn girls\u201d\nor \u201cGeorge girls,\u201d etc.  And even as\nadults, little has changed. In fact, not so long ago, Lanea Stagg and I aired a\nwell-researched \u201cJohn vs. George\u201d debate on our She Said She Said<\/em>\npodcast, discussing four of John\u2019s songs from the White Album<\/em> in contrast\nto four of George\u2019s.  And we saw nothing\namiss in the act of adamantly \u201cstanding by our man.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Terry Crain, author of NEMS\nand the Business of Selling The Beatles in the U.S., 1964-1966<\/em>, will tell\nyou that merchandisers realized this \u201cFavorite Beatle\u201d phenomenon from Day One.\nIndeed, the entire purpose of selling \u201cI LOVE PAUL\u201d or \u201cI LOVE RINGO\u201d buttons\nwas to make money off of female fans who quite definitely connected with one\nparticular Fab. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Going back now to re-watch\nYouTube videos of The Beatles landing at various locations throughout the 1964 North\nAmerican Tour, I see scads of female fans holding signs lauding one Beatle over\nanother. I see girls passionately screaming not <\/strong>the word \u201cBeatles!!!!!!!!!!!\u201d<\/em>\nbut weeping and shouting, \u201cGeorge!\u201d or \u201cRingooooo!\u201d or \u201cJohn!\u201d or \u201cPaul!\u201d And I\nsee those same girls wearing sweatshirts, T-shirts, buttons, and hair bands\nwith their favorite Beatle boldly emblazoned on the garment. From these earliest\ndays of Beatlemania, the great majority of female fans (though not all) were\nunashamedly choosing one Beatle and his songs over the others. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Once ensconced at the Chicago\nFest last August, I began asking those who visited my booth in the Marketplace\none question: \u201cDo you have a favorite Beatle?\u201d And just as I had begun to\nsurmise, less than 10% of male fans identified with any Fab in particular. In\nfact, they looked at me with befuddled expressions and said things such as,\n\u201cWell, I\u2019m a drummer, so I guess I\u2019d have to say, Ringo\u2026but uh, really, I like\nthem all.\u201d Or: \u201cWell, I like John\u2019s straightforward approach to life, but I\nmean, I don\u2019t have a favorite Beatle<\/em>, per se.\u201d The majority of them\nsimply stated, \u201cNope, I like them all.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Beatles historian, Sara Schmidt\n(author of Happiness is Seeing The Beatles: Beatlemania in St. Louis<\/em>),\nwho is currently writing a book on the Beatles Fan Clubs in America, recently\ntold me, \u201cAt the Fests and other places, I usually give those attending my\ntalks a free photo of one or all of The Beatles at the end of my presentations.\nAnd what I\u2019ve discovered is: women almost always select a photo of one\nparticular Beatle. They don\u2019t bat an eye when I give them a choice. They say,\n\u201cI\u2019ll take George.\u201d Or \u201cGive me Ringo.\u201d But men generally select a photo of the\nentire group.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Beatles knew this. In fact,\nin 1965 when 16 <\/em>Magazine\u2019s editor, Gloria Stavers, flew to the Bahamas\nto interview The Beatles on the set of \u201cHelp!\u201d, she asked John Lennon, \u201cTo what\ndo you attribute your incredible success with these scads and scads of female\nfans?\u201d And John\u2019s very direct response was, \u201cWell, I\u2019m a man, aren\u2019t I?\u201d Yes,\nindeed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Undeniably, a sociological,\nsexual connection does exist between the four handsome, charismatic, and often\nflirtatious young men known as The Beatles and their female fans, while a great\nmany male fans (though certainly not all) tend to be drawn to Beatles gear,\nBeatles discography, and that creative collective known as The Beatles who created\nBeatles music. That being said\u2026The Beatles World is varied and colorful in its\nmany textures, shades, and hues, and there are all sorts of variations in\nbetween the majorities. There are plenty of women who like the Fab Four for\ntheir music only and plenty of men who find The Beatles attractive. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

And all of us,<\/em> despite our\nunique vantage points, can agree on this: A song without Ringo\u2019s \u201cMatch 10\u201d\nforce and power would be lacking. A song without Paul\u2019s bass brilliance would\nmiss something wonderful. A song without George\u2019s magical lead would fall\nshort. A song without John\u2019s grit and extemporaneous genius would be ho-hum.\nThe Beatles are undeniably different but equal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And so are we. It takes the different\nbut equal<\/strong> outlooks of males and females to create the extensive, over-awing\nfan base that has kept The Beatles \u201cfront and center\u201d for nigh on 60 years now.\nWe may view them in slightly different ways, but our devotion is the same. And\nwhen I raise objections about the small quota of John\u2019s songs in the film Yesterday<\/em>,\nit doesn\u2019t negate my pride in the fact that a 2019 film is still lauding \u201cThe Boys\u201d\nas unparalleled. Whether you view The Beatles as an inseparable group or as a\nonce-in-a-lifetime gathering of unique, individual musicians, it matters not. In\nfact, what a \u201cblah\u201d world this would be if we all saw things identically. Like\nthe horrid, same-same world that Charles Wallace, Meg, and Calvin encountered\nin Madeline L\u2019Engle\u2019s Wrinkle In Time<\/em>, such an existence would be\nterrifying.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Let\u2019s celebrate our differences\nand enjoy The Beatles as we will. There is no right way to sing \u201cyeah, yeah,\nyeah.\u201d There is no one direction to Strawberry Fields or Blue Jay Way. There is\nno single ticket for the Magical Mystery Tour. And thank goodness, there is\nroom on the bus for everyone.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Jude Southerland Kessler Over the last nine months, Recipe Records author Lanea Stagg and I have been asking our guests on the She Said She Said podcast one \u201cbonus question\u201d at the end of each interview: \u201cTell us who […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":7952,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7951","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thefest.com\/?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7951","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thefest.com\/?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thefest.com\/?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thefest.com\/?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thefest.com\/?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7951"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.thefest.com\/?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7951\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7953,"href":"https:\/\/www.thefest.com\/?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7951\/revisions\/7953"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thefest.com\/?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7952"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thefest.com\/?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7951"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thefest.com\/?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7951"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thefest.com\/?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7951"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}