Many of us have always considered "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" a milestone album in music history. It was definitely avant-garde and lead the way for a whole new generation of music and musicians. Released in 1967, it has gone down in history as one of the most influential albums of all time, reinventing popular music and is repeatedly listed by Rolling Stones Magazine as one of the “Best Albums of All Time”.
Justin Bieber a “wanabe” perhaps. US magazine Esquire, he went straight after Sgt. Pepper, an album that contains such
According to Keith Richards pop cultural judgment, a lot of people simply got it wrong. Now Richard has gotten it right many times in the past, Justin Bieber a “wanabe” perhaps. This time, however, he is likely to seriously stir the pot: In an interview with the US magazine Esquire, he went straight after Sgt. Pepper, an album that contains such pivotal tunes as "With a Little Help from My Friends" and "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.'' His words, paraphrased are: “A hodgepodge of garbage":
“No, I understand—the Beatles sounded great when they were the Beatles. But there's not a lot of roots in that music. I think they got carried away. Why not? If you're the Beatles in the '60s, you just get carried away—you forget what it is you wanted to do. You're starting to do Sgt. Pepper. Some people think (Sgt. Pepper) is a genius album, but I think it's a mishmash of rubbish.”
Now granted, Richards also displayed some self-criticism:
"(Sgt. Pepper was), kind of like Satanic Majesties—"Oh, if you can make a load of shit, so can we."
Well, I am sure the world is big enough for everybody to be wrong at the same time and while some will always consider Sgt. Pepper as a force of Nature that somehow happened to them, others will give credence to one of the greatest Rock n’ Roll musicians of all times instead. , As a 3rd century BC Chinese proverb would put it: An irresistable force just met an unmoveable object...
Arved Deecke is founder of the Danish / Mexican Loudspeaker company KVART & BØLGE that makes audiophile quarter wave loudspeakers and sound systems at a price anyone can afford. In his free time he blogs about all things related to sound, music and audio.
