Movies Yesterday

[SimpleG]

 

[SaysWho?]

I cannot wait for this movie. I just watched the trailer and I think the idea is hilarious but has so much potential.

[Greatoneshere]

Directed by Danny Boyle. I'm there.

[Guest]

This looks really great.

[sexy_shapiro]

8 hours ago, Greatoneshere said:

Directed by Danny Boyle. I'm there.

 

And written by the screenwriter of Love Actually. I’m... still there but with major reservations.

[Greatoneshere]

10 minutes ago, sexy_shapiro said:

 

And written by the screenwriter of Love Actually. I’m... still there but with major reservations.

 

Richard Curtis is more often a good screenwriter than a bad one but I grant he's not always on point. I'd argue almost all of his films are really good, just a bit too sentimental.

[sexy_shapiro]

This premise is great and feels like it should yield a more interesting looking movie than the one this trailer is selling us, but hey, it looks cute enough.

 

But yeah, you could raise a lot of interesting questions with this premise that it looks like this movie doesn’t have interest in dealing with. Wouldn’t the entire music industry look completely different if the Beatles never existed? Would there even be a Coldplay without the Beatles?

[SimpleG]

43 minutes ago, sexy_shapiro said:

Wouldn’t the entire music industry look completely different if the Beatles never existed? Would there even be a Coldplay without the Beatles?

Different yes but not so different that bands wouldn't exist. People make the The Beatles out to be a keystone of rock music but bands like The Kinks,The Who, or Rolling Stones would just have a larger influence on music as a whole then they do now.

[TheLeon]

I just watched this, and man, I’m having a hard time sorting out exactly how I feel about it. A lot of it was pure fun, but I had some fundamental problems with the premise that make me feel like a total buzzkill. 

[GeneticBlueprint]

1 hour ago, TheLeon said:

I just watched this, and man, I’m having a hard time sorting out exactly how I feel about it. A lot of it was pure fun, but I had some fundamental problems with the premise that make me feel like a total buzzkill. 

Same. A world where the Beatles never existed would not sound like the world he wakes up in. His friend mentions "Coldplay", who in no way or form would exist without the Beatles. Music is my "thing" so I can't suspend disbelief for this one.

[johnny]

This is doing nothing for me. I’ll watch it eventually because Danny Boyle is directing. 

[Guest]

Coldplay cribs early Radiohead more than The Beatles, and early Radiohead isn’t particularly strongly influenced by the Beatles.

[GeneticBlueprint]

4 hours ago, sblfilms said:

Coldplay cribs early Radiohead more than The Beatles, and early Radiohead isn’t particularly strongly influenced by the Beatles.

 

Yeah I'm not talking about cribbing. I'm saying what influenced Radiohead was influenced by something that can trace its origins back to the Beatles (thus so can Radiohead). The Beatles were the biggest nuclear bomb in pop music that ever was and likely ever will be. Their success and influence affected not only the sound of everybody around them but the business of music as well. Any band with a guitar, bass, and drums would not exist in the same form as they do today without the Beatles. And that's anything from popstars to indie bands to death metal bands. 

[Guest]

6 hours ago, GeneticBlueprint said:

 

Yeah I'm not talking about cribbing. I'm saying what influenced Radiohead was influenced by something that can trace its origins back to the Beatles (thus so can Radiohead). The Beatles were the biggest nuclear bomb in pop music that ever was and likely ever will be. Their success and influence affected not only the sound of everybody around them but the business of music as well. Any band with a guitar, bass, and drums would not exist in the same form as they do today without the Beatles. And that's anything from popstars to indie bands to death metal bands. 

This is such a questionable take  If it hadn’t been the Beatles, it would have been something else. Same way if it hadn’t been Napster, it would have been something else. If it hadn’t been the iPod, it would have been something else. 

 

It’s the same reason the “what if we killed baby Hitler” thing is silly. Would things in Germany be different? Sure. Would fascists still take control and seek similar ends? Most definitely.

[Chris-]

You can absolutely see the Beatles influence in Radiohead, Later-era Beatles experimentation is basically Radiohead decades before Radiohead actually existed.

[Mercury33]

And the Beatles were the coming together of influences that came before them. They, like most of music, are just part of the evolution of music. So to say that everything in music would be 100% different if not for a particular band is not a take I can buy in to. Like SBL said, if not them then someone else. 

[Spawn_of_Apathy]

20 minutes ago, Mercury33 said:

And the Beatles were the coming together of influences that came before them. They, like most of music, are just part of the evolution of music. So to say that everything in music would be 100% different if not for a particular band is not a take I can buy in to. Like SBL said, if not them then someone else. 

There would always be other music groups, but to say one of them would have the influence the Beatles had is doubtful. It wasn’t just their sound, but the cultural influence too. Music isn’t a zero sum thing. Not just any other band could come along and have the same impact. 

 

The industry would have kept moving forward, but the landscape would likely look a bit different. We may still have gotten the same genres over time, like Disco, punk, metal, alternative, but we may have seen a different timeline on their rise, and some groups may not even exist as their very involvement in the industry was due to the inspiration from Beatles songs. 

[Keyser_Soze]

 

[GeneticBlueprint]

5 hours ago, sblfilms said:

This is such a questionable take  If it hadn’t been the Beatles, it would have been something else. Same way if it hadn’t been Napster, it would have been something else. If it hadn’t been the iPod, it would have been something else. 

 

It’s the same reason the “what if we killed baby Hitler” thing is silly. Would things in Germany be different? Sure. Would fascists still take control and seek similar ends? Most definitely.

 

Didn't expect Godwin's Law to be relevant on page one of a discussion about the Beatles. Imagine a world where Star Wars doesn't exist. Are there still sci-fi movies? Yes. Do most of them have the same titles, directors, and storylines? No.

 

You are really understating the influence of the Beatles. While it's easy to say somebody would have taken their place, their specific sound paved the way for the sounds that exist today. Without them, rock would have died in the 70s, and pop music would sound very different than it does today.

 

3 hours ago, Mercury33 said:

And the Beatles were the coming together of influences that came before them. They, like most of music, are just part of the evolution of music. So to say that everything in music would be 100% different if not for a particular band is not a take I can buy in to. Like SBL said, if not them then someone else. 

 

Someone else would have sounded completely different. Someone else would have put a totally different mark on culture. Someone else probably wouldn't have been as big.

 

It's easy to say that a group is the sum of its influences. Nobody is questioning that. That's actually the point I'm trying to make. Remove an influence and you're changing music. But some groups' effect is larger than others. And there is literally no group in the 20th or 21st centuries whose effect would be as large and important as the Beatles. I mean that's why they're making this movie. Lol.

[Kal-El814]

24 minutes ago, GeneticBlueprint said:

You are really understating the influence of the Beatles. While it's easy to say somebody would have taken their place, their specific sound paved the way for the sounds that exist today. Without them, rock would have died in the 70s, and pop music would sound very different than it does today.

 

It's easy to say that a group is the some of its influences. Nobody is questioning that. That's actually the point I'm trying to make. Remove an influence and you're changing music. But some groups' effect is larger than others. And there is literally no group in the 20th or 21st centuries whose effect would be as large and important as the Beatles. I mean that's why they're making this movie. Lol.

 

I kinda have to quibble about some of this. We're at a weird point with Beatles takes and have been for time time, where I think the influence of the Beatles CAN be overstated. That's not to say that they weren't hugely influential and culturally significant, because of course they were. But saying no artist was as influential as the Beatles on 20th and 21st century music is... questionable? Even if we're just talking rock and roll, we're FOR SURE going to say they're more influential than Elvis? Or Chuck Berry? Or Jimi Hendrix? Or The Everly Brothers? It's worth a conversation at least, I think. And if we're talking about 20th - 21st century music in general outside of rock I don't know that we can say the Beatles were more influential than Frank Sinatra, Hank Williams, or NWA... they just play to different crowds.

[GeneticBlueprint]

2 minutes ago, Kal-El814 said:

 

I kinda have to quibble about some of this. We're at a weird point with Beatles takes and have been for time time, where I think the influence of the Beatles CAN be overstated. That's not to say that they weren't hugely influential and culturally significant, because of course they were. But saying no artist was as influential as the Beatles on 20th and 21st century music is... questionable? Even if we're just talking rock and roll, we're FOR SURE going to say they're more influential than Elvis? Or Chuck Berry? Or Jimi Hendrix? Or The Everly Brothers? It's worth a conversation at least, I think. And if we're talking about 20th - 21st century music in general outside of rock I don't know that we can say the Beatles were more influential than Frank Sinatra, Hank Williams, or NWA... they just play to different crowds.

 

The Beatles absolutely were bigger and more influential on today's soundscape than any of the examples you listed. I will say that Chuck Berry and Elvis paved the way for the Beatles for sure. But their specific sound's influence isn't heard in today's music as much as the Beatles. You can still hear a lot of Chuck Berry in modern metal music. But all of rock has abandoned the sound of Elvis and Berry for sounds that the Beatles influenced.

[Kal-El814]

1 minute ago, GeneticBlueprint said:

The Beatles absolutely were bigger and more influential on today's soundscape than any of the examples you listed. I will say that Chuck Berry and Elvis paved the way for the Beatles for sure. But their specific sound's influence isn't heard in today's music as much as the Beatles. You can still hear a lot of Chuck Berry in modern metal music. But all of rock has abandoned the sound of Elvis and Berry for sounds that the Beatles influenced.

If we're going by current trends, country music is unquestionably more popular than rock now, and you hear Hank Williams in almost all of it. Hip hop is unquestionably more popular than rock now, and you'll hear any prominent rapper talk about NWA, KRS, etc., and hear that influence in what they're doing.

 

I know it's difficult to quantify, but the only way I can see someone saying the Beatles are unquestionably the most influential artist in the 20th - 21st century is if you're ignoring entire genres of music that have been and are very popular currently, influential culturally, and musically.

[GeneticBlueprint]

Just now, Kal-El814 said:

If we're going by current trends, country music is unquestionably more popular than rock now, and you hear Hank Williams in almost all of it. Hip hop is unquestionably more popular than rock now, and you'll hear any prominent rapper talk about NWA, KRS, etc., and hear that influence in what they're doing.

 

I know it's difficult to quantify, but the only way I can see someone saying the Beatles are unquestionably the most influential artist in the 20th - 21st century is if you're ignoring entire genres of music that have been and are very popular currently, influential culturally, and musically.

 

All very good points. But my posts are specifically talking about rock and pop. And pop is bigger than hip hop. Also I don't live in the hip hop world so I can't speak to that. But I will disagree with your country point. Today's country doesn't have the same sound it does without the Beatles because it is heavily pop infused. But yeah it doesn't sound the same without Hank Williams either.

[Spawn_of_Apathy]

27 minutes ago, Kal-El814 said:

If we're going by current trends, country music is unquestionably more popular than rock now, and you hear Hank Williams in almost all of it. Hip hop is unquestionably more popular than rock now, and you'll hear any prominent rapper talk about NWA, KRS, etc., and hear that influence in what they're doing.

 

I know it's difficult to quantify, but the only way I can see someone saying the Beatles are unquestionably the most influential artist in the 20th - 21st century is if you're ignoring entire genres of music that have been and are very popular currently, influential culturally, and musically.

I won’t say they are the most influential. I’m sure such a thing could be quantified, but it would take polling every artist and essentially creating a family tree and seeing who has the most artists trace their inspiration back to. But that’s not really possible. 

 

And I don’t think you could say that without the Beatles we wouldn’t get Michael Jackson, or Garth Brooks. So there is plenty of the industry that musically the Beatles did not get influence directly and barely even indirectly.  But they were a huge influence in the industry. 

[TheLeon]

What's funny to me is that the movie doesn't even ask these questions, much less try to answer them. Mild spoilers, I guess...

 

When he first starts Googling and realizes that The Beatles never happened, he looks up some other artists. The Rolling Stones show up, Childish Gambino is there, but not Oasis. So, "without the Beatles there's no Oasis, ha ha" is the premise there, I guess. But shortly after that, he starts finding out that other things don't exist anymore, including things that could never be traced back to the Beatles, so the Oasis bit doesn't actually mean anything. 

[Guest]

The Oasis bit is just a joke at the expense of Oasis because the Gallaghers desperately wanted to be the new Beatles

[SaysWho?]

18 hours ago, Kal-El814 said:

Even if we're just talking rock and roll, we're FOR SURE going to say they're more influential than Elvis? Or Chuck Berry? Or Jimi Hendrix? Or The Everly Brothers? 

 

Yes. Yes. Yes. Very Yes.

 

All were influential (Elvis was actually more influential culturally than musically since he barely wrote anything he sang).

[brucoe]

Not to take away from a lot of great posts that have come before this one, but something came to mind today as I was playing Fallout 4 yesterday. ALL of the music in that game came from around the 1950s, which has absolutely no influence from the Beatles whatsoever. And it's all good music, which kind of  makes me wonder if that would be the kind of world we'd experience (musically) without the Beatles. It would be a kind of rock music with a huge big band type of sound, which I could so see continuing to evolve over time so that we'd probably see guitars and all that evolve, but probably see a lot more Elvis-style bands with huge orchestras involved as well.

 

And it would all be contingent on a possibility that someone or some group might come along that could seriously move entire nations and genres at any time. And it might cause the movement to go into all sorts of different directions that we can't even imagine because we're symptoms of our own time line and influences.

 

I do want to see this movie, although I will wait until it releases to streaming (I tend to buy on itunes, as long as it exists) but I rarely go to movie theaters any more because I just hate sitting in a theater to watch a movie (really don't like the atmosphere which has gotten a lot worse over the years).

[Keyser_Soze]

21 minutes ago, brucoe said:

Not to take away from a lot of great posts that have come before this one, but something came to mind today as I was playing Fallout 4 yesterday. ALL of the music in that game came from around the 1950s, which has absolutely no influence from the Beatles whatsoever. And it's all good music, which kind of  makes me wonder if that would be the kind of world we'd experience (musically) without the Beatles. It would be a kind of rock music with a huge big band type of sound, which I could so see continuing to evolve over time so that we'd probably see guitars and all that evolve, but probably see a lot more Elvis-style bands with huge orchestras involved as well.

 

 

It would be like this: