http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25467676-5013575,00.html
Iain Shedden
May 16, 2009
SPIN Doctor noticed with mild interest this week that the Beatles are
getting back together for a series of shows in Australia in August to
mark the 40th anniversary of their White Album, or The Beatles, as it
was also known.
This is just another example of a band of old hacks sacrificing its
artistic credibility at the altar of crude commercial opportunism.
It's becoming an epidemic. Actually, the Beatles' White Album 40th
Anniversary Concert Series, to give it its full title, has neither of
the two remaining Beatles involved, but will feature a fab four of
sorts, namely our own Tim Rogers, Josh Pyke, the Living End's Chris
Cheney and Phil Jamieson of Grinspoon.
These four singers, accompanied by a large and star-studded
assortment of rock'n'roll ne'er-do-wells, will perform the White
Album in order, from the opening Back in the USSR to the closing Good
Night, with the exception of the 8.22 minutes of improvised
electronic doodling, Revolution 9, which, promoter Tim Woods says,
would need "a whole lot of people with tape recorders on stage".
Woods conceived the idea for the show because the White Album is his
favourite Beatles album and because he wanted to see it performed,
something the Fabs didn't get around to before they split up.
The tour opens at Melbourne's Hamer Hall on August 4 before
travelling to Brisbane's Queensland Performing Arts Centre and the
Sydney Opera House. Let's hope the "musical differences" that ensued
during the making of the album in 1968, when all four Beatles were
decidedly unhappy campers, will not repeat themselves when the Aussie
Beats hit the stage in a few months. Wives or girlfriends on backing
vocals may not be the way to go, guys.
* * *
SPEAKING of 40th anniversaries, just one day after the White Album
tour ends, on August 9, another celebration of an important rock
event will get under way on a farm near the town of Livermore in the
US state of Maine.
The Heroes of Woodstock Concert at the Barnyard All Terrain Park will
feature six of the artists who performed at the original Woodstock
Music and Art Fair at Bethel in New York 40years ago, including
Jefferson Starship (formerly Jefferson Airplane), Canned Heat, Ten
Years After, Big Brother and the Holding Co, and Tom Constanten,
former keyboardist with the Grateful Dead. The event is one of many
being held in the US to mark the anniversary of the country's most
famous rockfestival.
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