ACT NATURALLY, a Beatles book by STEVE MATTEO |  

One thing that stands out about the Beatles films (and their music for that matter) is how they could bring in artistic, revolutionary & avant-garde ideas and put them into a pop context. I like how Steve Matteo culturally contextualizes their films for even greater understanding & appreciation.

Good stuff. It's no accident I would think that my first memories as a child, revolve around The Beatles. From hearing I Wanna Hold Your Hand on the car radio of my dad's '56 Buick to seeing them on Sullivan, memories of a 3 year old that stuck with me like they happened yesterday. The Beatles cartoon was no different. My weekly fix of Beatleness. A very personal Beatlemania going on inside a child who knew how great they were even before I could understand the concept of greatness. And what makes it special is that a million or more people my age can say the same thing.

We still need the Shea Stadium show on DVD. It was a network television special in 1967 - two years late.

I loved the midnight rock movie shows back in the 70s. And yes, l knew 'how it goes'!

Inside Baseball is a great analogy. My first thought watching Get Back was 'this is not for the casual fan'. (I am not a casual fan.)

Nice job. Nice channel. We're always learning something new Thank you gentlemen

Excellent video. Thanks, Matt. Loved the discussion. Steve is a great guest, I’ve heard him on another program and enjoy his insights.

This was a great discussion, and I plan on getting this book. I always enjoy your extended conversations with Erin Weber, John Heaton, and all the others.

Wonderful content! Steve has some intriguing insights and I look forward now to reading his books.

So happy for this! I do fundmetally disagree with saying The Beatles are not in the running for one of the best live acts, they were great, have you seen them do dizzy lizzy at Shea, its a recording of legend.

I was anticipating a "Now And Then" review from you. Perhaps next video?

Anothet Great interview Matt and Steve Matteo is an Excellent Guest !!! As Always enjoyed very much this insightful interview and fascinating conversation of The Beatles 👍✌️

a wonderful interview/discussion Matt :)

I totally agree with Mr. Matteo's statement about the 1965-66 period in pop music, my favorite section of time in rock music history. Your discussion with Steve made for an interesting and enjoyable segment. Thank you for posting this, Matt.

Great discussion. I have Steve’s book and am currently reading it. A great read so far. It does provide some good insight within the context of the British film industry as a whole. Thanks for posting this Matt!

Great interview Matt . Love the long format. I agree with Dick Lester . I prefer Help over A Hard Day's Night. The first half esepcially, with their sharing the apartment, the songs, a great video of the band singing You're Gonna Lose that Girl!

Another excellent show , brother MATT!! I especially agree with your guess the great Steve Mateo at the end of the show where he talks about where is the authenticity? Where are the new bands? Where is the new seen? I was a guy who grew up with the Beatles the stones in the who, and Jefferson Airplane and the Grateful Dead, but the only scene I really got to see firsthand live was when I went to art school in New York at school, the visual arts, and my friends there drag me to CBGB‘s, and I saw Stiv Bators in the dead boys and the Talking Heads and people like Nick Niniko and a DAVIDJOhansson and that was the last hurrah of authentic music on the lower east side of Manhattan and I was so proud in my early 20s to experience that. Keep up the great work Matt I am also a Prog rock fan of yes genesis tall King Crimson who I have all seen in concerts and places like Madison Square Garden or Fillmore East but like I said at the beginning man, where is the authentic music thank God that Steve Mateo was writing about this and addressing it to us all us all Ted music lovers. Keep up the great work my friend I’m doing this through the microphone on my iPad so I’m sorry it’s such a long message but I don’t have to type anything. God bless you and keep up the great research. I also love what you did with the beach boys important stuff brother. God bless Jerry Potente out.

Matt, I finally worked through my virtual stack of books to listen to Steve's book. Which I thought was superb, but I confess that having lived through the sixties, I really appreciate reading a book that place each Beatles movie within the context of its time and culture. I ended up with a list of movies to watch (mostly b & w) which will hopefully remind of the times. I'd still aver that "A Hard Day's Night" was the most influential of the movies as it charted a new course for music and groups in movies. I like "Help," but it seems to reflect the times rather than redirect them. I sa "Yellow Submarine" at the Everyman Cinema in Hampstead in '69 with some English friends who dragged me to that theater to get an education in 60s realist cinema. Definitely more grim than cheery, but well worth seeing. Kudos to Steve for a great book, and to you for an absorbing interview!

Excellent interview (Steve is terrific)! As a mid Gen X'er I would argue rock is alive and well: from the Grammy winning Boygenius & Black Pumas (neo soul rock), to St. Vincent (post alt Prince), to Vampire Weekend (every rock genre?!), or even alt country legends Wilco are all producing world class music (Peter Garbriel's latest "i/o" is incredible). Yes, music is more diverse than ever but that can mean more opportunities to explore sounds we may have never knew we liked before. After all, the Beatles are the one's that taught everyone to never stay in one sub-genre...

Great interview Matt! Just remember their will always be a niche of us younger people that will appreciate the older music for what it is and tbh I never had a way of explaining why I never liked the newer music and that was because like you guys said because it was all computer music and nothing that seemed like it was coming from the heart and soul. But that’s just how I feel at least 🤷‍♂️ Keep it up with the great work 👍

Very nice. You graciously let him go on without interruptions. He's a little long winded but he definitely kept my interest. Lester said he didn't like all the music choices for HDN, especially a couple of Lennon songs. If you notice, Can't Buy Me Love gets played twice: the field and police station. I always thought I'll Cry Instead would have worked well in the latter scene. Fleming died in 64, so it's possible he saw the first two Bond films. Interesting point about being a niche band. The Beatle mainstream audience may be much smaller as you say. Maybe most performers are headed that way (those not named Swift) As has been said over and over again, audiences seem more disparate today than in the 1960's.

Excellent interview with two knowledgeable and thoughtful people. Three observations... 1) I appreciated the distinction between solo acts being more prominent now than music groups. However, I do note in our local live music scene that groups are the most prominent when reviewing who's performing in town. Also, in my gym which is patronized primarily by younger men in their 20's and 30's, the music being played (we hear the Kinks, the Stones, the Doors the Animals, CCR and new wave bands like the Knack etc alot!) is almost all by groups from the period from the mid-60's to the early 2000's ...so many music fans have a preference for groups. 2) Based on what I am observing around me, I do not see the Beatles and their music becoming a niche - it's like referring to the Grand Canyon as a river valley- quite the vast valley...so if the Beatles and their music are becoming a niche it's quite the vast niche with many many old and new fans. Attending a music tourism conference in Liverpool I was impressed with the many many folks who had made a pilgrimage to Liverpool - there were hourly bus tours of Beatle locations (Strawberry Fields, Penny Lane and the roundable, their homes, the venues they played), the resurrected Cavern was full of fans of all ages and enjoying life music by young musicians of Beatles and Mersey Music, A Beatles museum and a whole floor of images, history, outfits etc documenting the 12 years John and Yoko were together. 3) The book sounds excellent and as someone that studies film and social and musical cultures, I appreciate he wrote about the contexts from which their films emerged. I am thankful that many years ago I saw for the first time the Magical Mystery Tour in a packed theatre on the wide screen and it looked great....given the wide eyes of many in the audience...I assumed some had indulged in a psychedelic 'something' that enhanced their enjoyment of the film and a grasp of it's narative...no doubt the Beatles must have wished more of the 1967 Boxing Day TV viewing audience would have had their experience similarly 'enhanced' and in colour. But I guess in those days British families generally did not drop acid in preparation for their Boxing Day TV viewing. thanks for the interview...cheers

I also think the end of National Service in 1960, allowed The British youth to finally let their hair down.

One important British 60s cultural smash was FASHION. Twiggy, Jean Shrimpton...they were the IT girls. Not from Paris or Milan. LONDON. Shrimpton was named Model of the Year by Glamour in June of 1963. Same year the Beatles really took off.

Help! Is available on Apple +

Fascinating. So often these Beatles biographers can leave me cold. (Lewishon). Hard facts...dry...no emotion. I especially love the fact that he incorporated a bit of the outside world during this time. You have to consider the amount of cross-pollination that was going on, and the Beatles reaction to what was going on around them. This is an element that most music biographies always leave out. I was hoping Mr. Matteo would mention Richard Lester's pre-Hard Day's Night" movie called "It's Trad,Dad". It's pretty obscure, but it has that Dick Lester trademark all over it. Thanks Matt. 😻✌

Matt, I must be under stress because I keep repeating myself: this is probably the best (my favorite) video so far. Steve's comments seemed to come from a different sensibility, certainly a wider sensibility, than previous interviews. The last ten minutes had a lot of great ideas like culture versus technology. I have read a couple of books that point out that the omnipresence of TV (a technology) has flattened the various regional accents. Two books stated that the 'standard' accent was based on Salt Lake City pronunciation. Who Knew? The 60s were more open to artists than the 70s with the multi-platinum success of Fleetwood Mac and Billy Joel changing the corporate structure of record companies into, well, corporate structures, not nurseries fro developing artists. It is no coincidence that the punk movement coalesced at the same time that big record companies overtly cared more about money than artists. Pardon me while I ramble on about context. My context is/was living in the 60s, and thus closer to the moments of creation. But this is not to say that I am right and others are wrong, but to provide a little history. "A Hard Day's Night" is/was perceived by some as an art movie. American movies were color, not black and white, so b & w American movies were mostly 'artistic choices,' i.e. artier. while American 'pop' music movies were in color (Elvis Presley, Frankie Avalon & Annette Funicello), it would require a great stretch of the imagination to call them rock or pop. "A Hard Day's Night" was truly groundbreaking. and while the choice of b & w was due to cost, in America being b & w made the movie appear more arty. While young Americans lived in a culture loaded with goodies in the 50s and 60s, the Brits were rationed until the mid-fifties, and even after did not have the disposable income that American teens had. (It figures that it was Liverpool bands that crammed into a single small room in Hamburg, not Americans.) As one commenter pointed out, fashion became part of Swinging London - and that was as much about the lack of colour in everyday life as anything else. When American musicians (most famously the Byrds) saw "A Hard Day's Night," it changed their perception of the possible. When one watches the movie now, one really misses how different and liberating the movie was.And United Artists was too cheap to make it in colour as they perceived the Beatles as a one hit wonder. But oddly, the b & w only made "A Hard Day's Night" more a feather in the cap of the Beatles. No wonder that it changed Crosby's life.

man, i wish they'd gotten Alun Owen to write the screenplay for "Help!"

Pity FW Murnau wasn’t around to direct a psychedelic-expressionist Beatles movie. Luis Bunuel could have made some short music Beatles videos, which would have been exceptionally weird.

Yeah, Richie, a lot of us fogies took advantage of Disney’s $3 month to watch Get Back, and enjoyed watching all the old Boomer material like The Absent Minded Professor, plus that great Salvador Dali short, and a bunch of other classic animated features, and then cancelled. Great deal!

Steve, aside from the book that you're plugging, I think you made an excellent point that most Beatle fans want more of the Beatles because they don't want to come to grips that The Beatles broke up (maybe I misinterpreted, hopefully not). That's why the Now and then debacle is so hyped through the long waiting period, the video about the making of the song, the song, and then the Peter Jackson video. I only listened to the song once and have seen neither video because I do not consider it a Beatles song. I think it's okay that the Beatles become a niche. Letting go is difficult but there is a Sirius XM Beatles Channel. There is also Symphony Orchestra on Sirius XM. The Beatles music won't die. It's part of music history. Mozart died young, yet we have his music. And a lot European music back in earlier centuries didn't become well known until after the artists' deaths. Recording has allowed artists to become well known in their lifetimes. And now during the streaming age we have even more immediate fame through the apps, etc. This is off the topic of Beatle films but whatever.

I think the whole Beatles becoming niche is basically how a lot of pop culture has been since the real expansion in social media in everyday life. The growth of it really encourages things being contained into their own pockets, though some stuff gets popular enough to deep into the collective consciousness/zeitgeist. Stranger Things getting the great Kate Bush on the Hot 100 for almost an entire year being a recent music example. I think Apple and Disney potentially banking more on a wide audiences streaming Get Back isn’t necessarily the most wise move since not everyone is going to be into a documentary that long that goes THAT deep into the process, regardless of age. Among the friends in my age group (early/mid 20s) that are really big music fans, Get Back’s magnitude was a little too inside baseball for some.

PS to the singer that I saw in CBGB’s was name Nico who played with the velvet underground I also saw Lou read there, but it was not a guy name nick Nikita. Sorry about that brother OK man peace out love what you do man good work.

PS you’re right on brother we are seeing the decline of the digital Roman empire. Let’s try to keep the lights on as long as we can.

Matt do you know why the songs on the british Lp version of the Help and Hard Days films were different then the ones in the US. ours had songs on them there are not on the UK version and for some reason I never knew that the Beatles didn't lend their voices to the cartoons (loved them) and Yellow Submarine

Let's think about whether the Beatles have a niche fan base. I stream lots of music, but I almost never stream the Beatles because I own everything, in multiple versions. I also own most of the Elton John catalog, but no Queen. If I'm listening to Queen, I'm streaming it. With Elton John, I'm probably listening to what I own. And so forth. Like many baby boomers, the bands I listen to the most are the least likely to show up in my streaming stats - because I own the music, often on vinyl and CD, and in more than one release. Not only that, when I bought records, I created non-vinyl ways to listen before streaming existed. I made reel-to-reel tapes for serious home listening, and to keep my precious LPs from getting scratched. I made tapes when car cassette decks and the Walkman showed up. Over time, I bought CDs of probably 75% of my vinyl. I'm used to the ownership model, though I have never purchased a pre-recorded cassette tape. I didn't give up vinyl until I had to. (I bought a few 8-tracks at the markdown racks at truck stops, but it quickly became obvious that 8-tracks weren't durable. Better to buy vinyl and make a cassette tape.) I've never seen anyone take "listening to music I own" into account in considering listening stats. Maybe it's statistically insignificant, but I doubt it. It's just damn near impossible to quantize. Streaming stats can't include what people own, and we're more likely to own music a) we like the most and b) that was released before digital versions existed. I.e., the Beatles. This is a caution against assuming that streaming stats accurately represent listening habits and niches. Listening to stuff we own should have faded to near insignificance as old farts with big record and CD collections died off, but now we have vinyl again! 🤷‍♀️ (kinda unbelievable 😸😹😹) There must be popularity models that account for non-digital ownership and listening. I don't know where to find them, probably because I don't care. I listen to what I like. And it's not in the interests of Spotify and Apple Music to point out that their streaming stats aren't the final word in popularity. I'm done dancing with angels on the head of a pin for today. It was fun putting branches in the spokes of Steve Jobs' i-cycle. 🤡👹👻🥳😳😎😉🫡

I disagree with the Beatles having a niche fan base. If Get Back was streaming on Netflix, don't you think the audience would have been much larger? How did Disney get involved anyway? Also I read that Peter Jackson found hours of forgotten film footage from the Anthology project. Do you know anything about that?

HARD DAY'S NIGHT was poised on the cusp in '64, between British New Wave working class regionalism that was cutting edge in cinemas since 1958 (on the back of verite Free Cinema documentaries by the likes of Lindsay Anderson & John Schelsinger)... & incoming Swinging London films that called all those outdoor film units back to the capital by 1965. The Beatles had just moved to London, & though the London-bound script was supposed to start at Lime Street Station, the film never went there. HELP telegraphed the folly in cinema of throwing money at a project that would help wreck the British film industry with indulgences like CASINO ROYALE. The exact opposite of the British New Wave aesthetic. The British New Wave, on limited budgets, wasn't AS dependent on American funding as those frivolous extravagances of the late-60s, so when America pulled out of Wardour Street, the roof caved in. Ian Fleming saw the first 2 Bond films, but didn't live long enough to hear Connery find The Beatles intolerable without ear-muffs. GOLDFINGER was risking offending Beatlemania with that line to keep in spirit with Fleming's conservatism. Rock n roll passed him by, & Fleming despised transistor radios - - if there was ever a part for Fleming in HARD DAY'S NIGHT it would be the civil servant in The Beatles train compartment. Then again Fleming did joke, when the films boosted his popularity, that he was now "the 5th Beatle." Maybe Fleming was first to coin that phrase, I don;t know. Fleming was the oddest mix of a backward conservative ahead of his time.

What 2 Beatle records are none of them wearing the same clothes, but on both album covers they are wearing the same clothes?

As Steve so aptly put it, “James Bond and The Beatles. What’s cooler than that?” Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Oh yeah, we anxiously await your views on the song and video for “Now And Then”. I know you must be working on that right now Matt. Yours is one opinion I’d really like to hear.

The Rolling Stones never out did the Beatles. They did, however outlast them… There’s a big difference. The Stones copied everything the Beatles did.

Matt we desperately need you to critique this now and then nonsense. The overly sentimental music video with ghost John and George is too much and someone needs to check Paul and Ringo because they’re out of control haha. If this is the last thing the Beatles do it’s a lame note to go out on if you ask me.

Fascinating stuff, shame it degenerated into a Let's Bash Modern Music moan. Sure you don't like it, fine, but it's simply not true to say that the internet has destroyed the concept of regional music scenes.Where I live in South London it seems to have even amplified it! Grime was a music born of East london, self-consciously so for a while. UK Drill was almost exclusively South London, and even more self-consciously so. Atlanta Trap is universally recognised as a distinctive groove ,much since copied . Chicago Footwork, the recent music from the Rio Favelas, and don't even get me started on the crazy stuff coming out of multitudinal regions of Africa, all different from each other... Homogeniety? There's always been a homogenous commercial centre and more interesting peripheries, and with the Internet more of the latter than ever. I think you guys will always be frustrated because you want music to give you the same feeling as the stuff you like from the past which'll never happen, and even when people from now try to sound like the past it'll only ever be a pale imitation. I'm a 60 year old that sees great things in some contemporary music and loves The Beatles simultaneously. I believe in people's creative powers, particularly young people's, and I don't think any era's problems will diminish that spirit . Still love the channel though!

You wanna hear a really good new band? Listen to the lemon twigs, totally old school 60s 70s pop sound

Nice job. Nice channel. We're always learning something new Thank you gentlemen