The sound of a generation
Last night we watched "A Hard Day's Night" — the first movie that the Beatles made in 1964. Total silliness. But it made me feel so weird.
In 1964 I was a freshman in high school and Beatlemania was just picking up speed. My friend Mary Lee was the only true Beatlemaniac I knew in the summer of 1964, when we were taking Biology in summer school. They were so scandalous, with their long hair.
And then the Beatles became the background music I did my growing up to. Haven't given it that much thought.
But last night I had to ask myself... how did it happen... in 1964 the Beatles were mop-headed lads... and, then, zwooo-o-sh, fast forward to the serious artists they became when I sat in my college dorm room and listened to "Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" for hours on end? What had happened in between? What had happened between 1964 and 1968? Was it Vietnam? Drugs? Or was it simply my generation, growing up, morphing from teeny boppers to the young adults who were going to save the world?
2.7.07