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Good day, sunshine for the summer

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  • Originally published July 18, 2008 at 3:28 p.m., updated July 18, 2008 at 3:28 p.m.

I finished another school year without a single count of homicide. Anyone who has ever spent a single day in a public high school knows what an accomplishment that is. I decided to treat myself to a long-overdue reward, so I went to Amazon.com to order the two box sets of the Capitol recordings of the Beatles. The Fab Four. The Moptops.The Lads of Liverpool. This is going to be a Beatles summer!

Twenty years ago, my record player went to meet Alan Freed where radio waves go on forever. Theoretically. Since then, I’d been hoping for a vinyl revival so I wouldn’t have to replace everything I own with digital versions. But to be honest, a lot of my collection would be more suitable as coasters. Really big coasters. We're talking about albums, not CDs, after all. When I realized that my own students had more Beatles music at their disposal, I knew it was time to update.

I’d been saving my money for weeks for this, but I blew it on books. Then we received a nice check from the government. President Bush should be glad to know I helped pump the economy with a $100 worth of imported culture instead of imported fuel. My week-long wait was richly rewarded when “Please Mr. Postman” delivered eight CDs filled with memories and music. All in all, that comes to about 100 songs!

I can scarcely remember a year of my life in which the Beatles weren’t part of it. My older sister and brother started it all. The sister had their pictures posted in her bedroom. My brother, a poet at heart, tutored me on the deeper meaning behind Beatles lyrics. Even my own father liked some of their songs, such as “Yesterday” and “Michelle,” although he hated their hair. And when was the last time a rock group wore suits on stage and bowed to the audience?

I never got over the news of their breakup in sixth-grade, and I lit a candle in church for their reunion. Even in high school, the Beatles were in the background. My homecoming date was arranged by classmates who were also Beatles fanatics. “I’ve Just Seen a Face” brings her face back. At my wedding, “Here, There and Everywhere” was played before my beloved walked down the aisle.

Audiences fell in love with them since their first appearance on Ed Sullivan: The infectious harmonies, Ringo’s enthusiastic cymbal-thrashing, and George’s amateurish guitar solos. To his credit, the Quiet Beatle became quite an accomplished slide-guitar player.

They went from a better-than-average garage band to the gold standard in the music industry. Here in Victoria we can still hear them on three radio stations: classic rock, the oldies, and the really old oldies, right before Paul Harvey and The Ressst of the Story.

They were the greatest contribution to popular music since Rogers and Hammerstein. Together, they wrote and produced a tremendous variety of music. They employed rhythm and blues, country, Motown sound, string quartet, Eastern, and more. There was always a freshness to the sound. Nobody else comes close.

Do we still love them? ‘Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!’

 

Patrick Hubbell is a teacher and resident of Victoria.



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