THE BEATLEWORKS LTD.
Mystery Artist
THE BEATLE WORKS LTD.
FROM THE BEATLE WORKS – A new kind of book about music...
When Music Holds the Moment
Angela Ballard ~ Kenneth Campbell ~ Melissa Davis
Biographies of songs that shaped their times and continue to hold their meaning today...
California Dreamin' (1965) For What It's Worth (1966)
The Mamas & The Papas Buffalo Springfield
All You Need Is Love (1967) Suite: Judy Blue Eyes (1969)
The Beatles Crosby Stills & Nash
TOUCHSONGS
The Mamas & The Papas' background vocals on Barry McGuire's California Dreamin' session were so good that producer Lou Adler decided to record and release their version instead, keeping their background work and adding Denny Doherty's lead.
For What It's Worth didn't start out as a protest song. It began as a nod to the young soldiers fighting in a faraway war they didn't understand. The song was nonetheless quickly adopted as an anthem and is used to this day in film, television, documentaries as a shorthand for protest movements.
The Beatles finalized All You Need Is Love on June 25, 1967 before 400 million viewers getting the first glimpse inside a Beatles recording session at EMI’s Abbey Road studio.
The world was watching the first simultaneous global satellite broadcast live as it happened.
Suite: Judy Blue Eyes was performed for only the second time at 3 a.m. in a farm field in upstate New York called Woodstock... but the real debut, the important one, the one that really mattered, had been in a California hotel room months before to an audience of only one...
The who, what, when, where, why and how behind the music, the lyrics, the songwriters, the artists and the meanings...
More than origin stories, Touchsongs explores how the songs came to be so completely associated with their moment that they are used as shorthand to summon up the past and what it means to the present.
Whether beckoning to the warmth of post-surf/pre-Manson California or sounding the clarion call to "STOP! And look around..."
... from offering LOVE as a mantra for the world to professing love and admiration for a woman following her need for independence... these were the songs of their times.
A touchsong is not necessarily a band's 'best' song.
It may not have reached #1.
It may not be everyone's 'Desert Island Disc'.
But there is something undeniable in each song that communicates beyond its time and speaks across the decades to the present.
They have been used in film, television, documentaries, samples, YouTube videos, reels, even commercials, becoming part of the lexicon to conjure up a moment in time and place.
Three authors – each expert in their area of popular music – dive deep with meticulous research, contextual as well as musical and lyrical analysis, and quotations from the creators, including sound engineers and producers.
Listener and Viewer Guides let the reader hear the songs again – or possibly for the first time – as they evolved from demos and outtakes to the finished product ready for release and in notable covers, as well as in performances that shared the music for the first time and decades later with audiences joining in mass sing-alongs.
Reserve your signed and numbered copy at a 10% pre-publication discount
available this autumn:
IMAGINING ALL THE PEOPLE
Poetry Inspired by the Characters in the Lyrics of The Beatles
Marcus Benjamin Ray Bradley
ALL THE PEOPLE poster
available at this site... $15 includes shipping and handling within the US.
IMAGINING ALL THE PEOPLE
Poetry Inspired by the Characters in the
Lyrics of The Beatles
ebook $2.99
Order the All The People poster today!
Limited printing... $15
includes shipping & handling in US
email: ImaginingPoems@gmail.com
TO BUY THE POETRY BOOK
YELLOW SUBMARINE
(Lennon & McCartney)
Revolver, 1966
A local man tells colorful stories of his younger years at sea
living in a submarine with his friends.
He says it was yellow.
It sounded wonderful!
Beneath the Waves
The Boys Who Heard The Stories
Normally submarines are black
To reflect the least amount of light
Or gray to blend in with the horizon
when it brings people up for air
You and your sardine companions
Are crammed inside at a density
Comparable to that of a white dwarf
Then sunk until the food runs out
There's no way to avoid others
And nowhere you can be alone
For these reasons I never thought
That way of life seemed utopian
But then I heard colorful stories
From a mariner reliving his days
In what sounded like a commune
Choosing to live beneath the waves
The scene he set was not at all drab
With no gray and black for camouflage
But the vivid blue sky and green sea
And the brilliant yellow of the vessel
All his friends were there with him
There was a band, there was harmony
They had each other, peace, and love
And everyone had all they needed
ABOUT THE POET
Marcus Benjamin Ray Bradley
In addition to working in the IT Department at the University of Kentucky, Marcus also makes use of the right side of his brain writing poetry.
After 'Take Your Daughter to Work' Day
at the university, his job was described
as "Daddy talks to people...and draws,"
which generally describes it quite well.
Marcus grew up in the small town of
Perryville and now lives in Versailles,
Kentucky with his wife, daughters, and
two dogs Eleanor and George – Rigby
and Harrison, of course.
Although his poetry has been widely published, this is his first book of poetry – and his first collection of poems about
The Beatles.
THE BEATLES BIBLIOGRAPHIES:
New Guides to the Literature
"The very definition of exhaustive. Well-written...
a staggering amount of research."
Record Collector Magazine
"Superb. Vibrant and compelling."
Spencer Leigh
"A must own. FOUR STARS”
GOLDMINE Magazine
"Congratulations to Brocken and Davis for a masterpiece of research."
Larry Kane, the only American journalist to accompany the Beatles
on their North American tours, author,
A Ticket to Ride: Inside the Beatles' 1964 Tour That Changed the World
The Beatles Bibliographies:
New Guides to the Literature
Volume 1 (2012) & Volume II (2014)
Dr. Michael Brocken
Melissa Davis
The books about the books about
The Beatles... originally $80
now available in ebook format!
$9.99
Mary-Lu Zahalan
We are heartbroken by the loss of our friend, Mary-Lu Zahalan, who was the first to earn a Master's degree from the first graduate program focusing on the musical and cultural impact of The Beatles – and she did it with Honors!
Her outstanding dissertation focused on the story of how The Beatles 'broke' in Canada first – before their more well-known debut on The Ed Sullivan Show on
9 February 1964.
It is a 'hidden history' that deserves to be told for a thorough understanding and context of the extraordinary months that took the group from national recognition in Britain to the international stage.
Mary-Lu and I met the day we were moving into student housing at Liverpool Hope University – the only 'mature' students in four floors of teenage freshman just off the leash from home. We rolled our eyes and laughed it off, becoming friends right away.
My favorite memory of ML was the morning we went to the childhood homes of John Lennon and Paul McCartney.
We were standing in the McCartney family's kitchen when she nudged me and pointed to the floor... she had slipped her foot out of its shoe and was rubbing it on the linoleum. This from a woman who said she hadn't been 'a crazy' fan.
I miss her.
The Masters class and James McCartney on a cold Merseyside night in 2009.
