by welkin » 18 Oct 2017, 12:18
ah yes, i see what you're getting at now. no, i never knew about paul's interest in stockhausen myself until researching for the deck. the thing about psychedelic is it was around in nascent form, influenced obviously by cannabis and LSD use, but also indian music and some jazz like john coltrane. this seemed to affect guitars and lyrics and approach most, as with the yardbirds and 13th floor elevators. then there was pet sounds. this helped push the beatles to introduce weird sounds - things never heard on record before. the tape loop approach was used later, in being for the benefit of mr. kite (where it was undercut by the 19th century carnival atmosphere), the unreleased carnival of light, and revolution 9. so, in other words, it wasn't really used much again - on revolution 9 paul wasn't even there and its lennon's early solo albums that most feature tape loops.
the introduction of orchestration certainly continued on sgt. pepper, but it itself doesn't seem such an aspect of psychedelic music as the introduction of new or unusual instruments - the sitar, the theramin, the melatron for example. This was something the beatles had begun with rubber soul. this is what i was getting at when i suggested that, sure, the beatles influenced pop music, but they were also abreast of the wave which was a natural maturity of popular music at that time. the influential bands around were making the music themselves; they were young people in an era that was becoming socially conscious, global, searching spiritually; and they were working with a new technology - electric instruments, effects, and the recording studio. one of the key aspects of psychedelic is the unnaturalness of the basic sound - highly compressed drums, vocal through a leslie speaker, tape loops faded in and out, things played backwards or their speed altered, and effects such as fuzz. All the aforesaid factors suggest the way music had to move, away from the cliff richard or pat boone example of formulaic 3 minute pop songs written tin-pan alley style and recorded in a conventional manner, and all essentially manicured by the record company.
all this said, tomorrow never knows is an amazing song. do you know john's original idea - to have the background music the chanting of a thousand monks on a mountainside? or the plan to hang him upside-down in the studio and swing him like a pendulum while he sang the lyrics? good thing they came up with the revolving leslie speaker idea instead!
ah yes, i see what you're getting at now. no, i never knew about paul's interest in stockhausen myself until researching for the deck. the thing about psychedelic is it was around in nascent form, influenced obviously by cannabis and LSD use, but also indian music and some jazz like john coltrane. this seemed to affect guitars and lyrics and approach most, as with the yardbirds and 13th floor elevators. then there was pet sounds. this helped push the beatles to introduce weird sounds - things never heard on record before. the tape loop approach was used later, in being for the benefit of mr. kite (where it was undercut by the 19th century carnival atmosphere), the unreleased carnival of light, and revolution 9. so, in other words, it wasn't really used much again - on revolution 9 paul wasn't even there and its lennon's early solo albums that most feature tape loops.
the introduction of orchestration certainly continued on sgt. pepper, but it itself doesn't seem such an aspect of psychedelic music as the introduction of new or unusual instruments - the sitar, the theramin, the melatron for example. This was something the beatles had begun with rubber soul. this is what i was getting at when i suggested that, sure, the beatles influenced pop music, but they were also abreast of the wave which was a natural maturity of popular music at that time. the influential bands around were making the music themselves; they were young people in an era that was becoming socially conscious, global, searching spiritually; and they were working with a new technology - electric instruments, effects, and the recording studio. one of the key aspects of psychedelic is the unnaturalness of the basic sound - highly compressed drums, vocal through a leslie speaker, tape loops faded in and out, things played backwards or their speed altered, and effects such as fuzz. All the aforesaid factors suggest the way music had to move, away from the cliff richard or pat boone example of formulaic 3 minute pop songs written tin-pan alley style and recorded in a conventional manner, and all essentially manicured by the record company.
all this said, tomorrow never knows is an amazing song. do you know john's original idea - to have the background music the chanting of a thousand monks on a mountainside? or the plan to hang him upside-down in the studio and swing him like a pendulum while he sang the lyrics? good thing they came up with the revolving leslie speaker idea instead!