I'm sort of dragging along on this, so I'll go ahead and finish up with a couple more posts.
This is a timeline of album releases by The Beatles, Pink Floyd, and The Rolling Stones (3 bands related to Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album)
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(B)=Beatles (P)=Pink Floyd (R)=Rolling Stones Time Line of album releases
(from
groups.google.com/group/alt.music.pink-floyd/browse_thread/thread/946ce5e3bd92ea3c?tvc=2 )
(B)Sgt Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band-released June 1, 1967
(recorded over 129 day period)
SAMLKWCEFR hidden in photo...connection to U and I (sympathy for the devil)
reference to The Rolling Stones on the cover
"Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds" LSD anthem
pauL iS deaD (conspiracy theory) (P)The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn-released August 5, 1967
Lucifer Sam (song title)
Pow R Toc H (song title...see The Division Bell)
recorded at Abbey Road Studios next door to Beatles Sgt Pepper
Pink Floyd and Beatles officially meet (R)Their Satanic Majesties Request-released December 8, 1967
(John Winston Ono Lennon murdered exactly 13 years later) (B)Magical Mystery Tour-released (LP)November 27, 1967-(EP)December 8, 1967
(Lennon murdered exactly 13 years after EP release)
EP double album had 6 songs LP double album had 11 songs (see The Division
Bell) en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magical_Mystery_Tour_(album) (P) A Saucerful Of Secrets-released June 28, 1968
(Syd Barret's last PF album having become a casualty of LSD abuse)
Syd was replaced by a remorseful (to this day) David Gilmour (B)The Beatles (The White Album)-released November 22, 1968 (R)Beggar's Banquet-released December 6, 1968
Sympathy For The Devil-first track on album
(released 12 years and 2 days before John Lennon's murder)
"Who killed the Kennedys?" U and I
(:"Who killed John Lennon?") (B) Yellow Submarine-released January 17, 1969
Pepperland-song title (reference BACK to Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club
Band) CaveatAugust 8-9, 1969
Tate/LaBianca murders by the Manson "family"
* * * * * * * THE MIRROR (R) T........hrough The Past, Darkly (Big Hits Vol. 2)-released September
12, 1969
reference (indirectly) to 1Corinthians 13:12 which contains the word ENIGMA
in the original Greek (only occurrence in the bible of this word) (B) A.......bbey Road-released September 26, 1969
(John Ringo Paul George appear in reverse order from Sgt Pepper
cover---mirror image) (P) U........mmagumma-released October 25, 1969
Double studio/live album
Cover depicts the 4 band members in an "infinity mirror" (Through a glass,
darkly?) * * * * * * * TAU
As with Christianity, other ancient societies who used the "Tau" symbol also
expanded upon its symbolism to include life, resurrection, reincarnation,
and
BLOOD SACRIFICE The Tau Cross in Christianity dates back since the latter's beginnings.
Today, its most common use is in reference to Saint Francis, who proclaimed
to his fellow friars in his hometown of Assisi (Italy) that their monastic
habit was the Tau Cross.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tau_cross * * * * * * * The next album released in this progression was:
(R)Let It Bleed-released November 28, 1969 en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Let_It_Bleed ********************************************
Altamont and the death of the counterculture/1960'sThe
Altamont Speedway Free Festival was an infamous rock concert held on
December 6, 1969, at the then-disused Altamont Speedway in northern
California, between Tracy and Livermore. Headlined and organized by The
Rolling Stones, it also featured, in order of performance: Santana,
Jefferson Airplane, The Flying Burrito Brothers, and Crosby, Stills, Nash
and Young, with the Stones taking the stage as the final act.[1] The
Grateful Dead were also scheduled to perform between CSNY and the Stones,
but canceled shortly before their scheduled appearance owing to the
increasing violence at the venue
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altamont_Free_Concert Gimme Shelter
Directors: Albert Maysles, David Maysles, Charlotte Zwerin
Cast: as themselves, Mick Jagger, Keith Richards, Mick Taylor, Charlie
Watts, Bill Wyman, Melvin Belli, Grace Slick, Jerry Garcia
(Maysles Films/Cinema 5 Distributing, 1970 / re-release 2000) Rated: PG
by Norma Coates
Blame Woodstock
That Altamont happened isn't surprising. That it didn't happen earlier is.
The Maysles Brothers' Gimme Shelter, now rereleased in theaters on its 30th
anniversary, documents the Rolling Stones' 1969 tour of America and ends, as
the tour did, at the free concert at the Altamont Speedway in the hills west
of San Francisco. The concert degenerated into mayhem when booze and
acid-addled Hell's Angels, hired to keep order in front of the stage,
discharged their task by beating concertgoers over their heads with leaded
pool cues. Altamont's violence was capped by the murder of a young black
man, Meredith Hunter. Captured on film, Hunter's murder cemented the
festival's reputation as the official end of the 1960s counterculture. Even
worse, Gimme Shelter showed that the counterculture was not going to redeem
or change anything, especially the human impulse to violence.
That this free concert could result in destruction and death (three others
died that day) shocked the Woodstock Nation. After all, a scant three and a
half months earlier, 300,000 people coexisted peacefully for three days in a
muddy field in New York to listen to music. Woodstock only became free once
its gates were stormed by the ticketless, but its commercial origins are but
a footnote in its mythology. But perhaps Woodstock was the fluke, not
Altamont. Alice Echols, in Scars of Sweet Paradise: The Life and Times of
Janis Joplin, quotes a former assistant Attorney General of the State of New
York as saying, "Instead of the widespread notion of joy and an outpouring
of goodness, the people I met told tragic stories of lack of consideration,
nonexistent sanitation, . fear and pain." To paraphrase the oft-quoted
observation of Barry Melton of Country Joe and the Fish, if you think
Woodstock was great, then you weren't there. You saw the movie instead.
Ironically, Gimme Shelter, the film - as much as the actual events at
Altamont - secured that festival's bad reputation as marking the "end" of
the Sixties. On the film's original release, the New York Times, Variety,
and even Rolling Stone criticized the Stones and the Maysles Brothers for
exploiting the murder to their economic advantage. Arguably, these
accusations are as responsible for Altamont's notoriety as the murder
itself.
The Maysles Brothers and Charlotte Zwerin were proponents of Direct Cinema,
a documentary movement that applied techniques of fictional films to shape
the reporting of events. In Gimme Shelter, the filmmakers construct a
narrative to lead inexorably to the murder. Indeed, they give away the
ending at the beginning of the film, and don't adhere precisely to the
chronology of events. As one example of the film's reordering of what
happened, consider the following: Stanley Booth, in what could be the
greatest rock and roll book ever, Dance with the Devil (also known by the
exploitative title The True Story of the Rolling Stones) reports that the
Flying Burrito Brothers played after the Jefferson Airplane. But in order to
show the mounting tension and violence at the festival, the film situates
the Jefferson Airplane's set, in which singer Marty Balin was knocked out by
an Angel when he jumped into the crowd to stop a fight, after the Burritos.
Or again, the movie makes it appear that the Stones opened their set with
the prophetic "Sympathy for the Devil," which, according to Booth, they did
not. And the movie makes it appear that the show concluded after Hunter's
stabbing at the end of "Under My Thumb," which it did not. As Booth has it,
the Stones went on to give one of their greatest performances ever.
But taking note of these cinematic liberties does not have to lead to the
conclusion that the filmmakers manipulated the events, on film or by the act
of filming, in order to exploit them. The conclusion I wish to draw has less
to do with the film per se than with the historical moment it evokes:
Woodstock, or perhaps more accurately, the Woodstock mindset, may be
ultimate reason why the violence at Altamont was inevitable. In a letter to
the National Film Registry seeking to add new information to the public
record about Altamont, Stan Goldstein discusses Altamont as if it were a
train that never should have gone down the track, but that no one could
stop. Goldstein is listed in Gimme Shelter's credits as "Special Help," but
claims that he filled many roles, including "sound recordist, music mixer,
contract negotiator, consultant, and advisor." Tellingly, perhaps, Goldstein
is also the only person in the Maysles and Stones' entourage who recognized
the urgent need for a lawyer as the concert fast approached.
First planned for Golden Gate Park, the free concert was moved to the Sears
Point Raceway after its permit was withdrawn. The stage was all but ready at
Sears Point when that venue fell through. The deal to perform at Altamont
was struck at the last minute, via negotiations that the Maysles reveal to
the film audience. In these scenes, the air of desperation, of doing
something just because no one can stop it, is palpable. It's also clear that
the possibility of violence didn't enter into their thinking. Further,
according to Goldstein, logistics for the show, including getting equipment
to the right place in time, were in total disarray. Still, any attempt to
cancel the show was stopped by a general agreement amongst the people
involved that they'd show the authorities that they couldn't shut them down.
As he observes, "In the aftermath of 'Woodstock', there was a general
euphoria - more than a feeling - the sure knowledge that we, the rock &
roll, be-in, wear a flower in your hair community had triumphed and could,
in anarchy, find peace, and overcome with love any who had an interest in
violence. Some raised concerns about public safety, control, etc. Those
voices were overwhelmed." His recollection of their "Woodstock mentality"
demonstrates the danger - and violence - inherent in a naive understanding
of anarchy.
For me, the part of the film that best exemplifies where things went wrong
is a brief exchange between a few members of the Grateful Dead. In a scene
that could be straight out of a R. Crumb strip, Jerry Garcia is offstage
talking with another person about the violence transpiring in front of the
stage. Weir rushes over with a brief report. Garcia's response is a stoner
cliche: "Oh, bummer." To which Weir adds that Hell's Angel's beating up
musicians "doesn't seem right." Garcia, Weir, and other San Francisco
musicians and key figures like Janis Joplin and Ken Kesey lionized the
Angels, hanging out with them, granting them special areas near the stage at
concerts, and, as Echols observes, defending them as fellow outlaws. Garcia
and Weir's ingenuousness is understandable given the context, but
irresponsible and downright stupid in hindsight.
But if the presence of the Hell's Angels in the San Francisco scene and the
havoc they wreaked at Altamont are the specific elements that "caused"
Altamont, in fact Altamont, or something like it, would have been inevitable
in any case. Altamont issued from the Sixties, which were steeped in
violence, and there was nothing that could stop the violence from
encroaching upon the counterculture. Sixties rock and roll festivals - given
their large crowds of people, lack of sanitary facilities, bad drugs, and
shortages of food and water - were catastrophes waiting to happen. People
get angry when they're uncomfortable or feel ripped off. For proof, look at
what happened at the Woodstock 30th anniversary concert, when the lack of
decent facilities and affordable food sent the crowd into a destructive
frenzy.
It's very easy to blame the disorder of Woodstock 99 on our violent times or
on the sexism rampant in what's left of rock culture, exemplified by the
work of artists like Limp Bizkit or Kid Rock. We can point fingers at the
audience, saying that their feelings of entitlement led them to violence, or
chastise the bands for putting them in that mindset. But Gimme Shelter shows
that the Sixties weren't very different. The Stones may not have put on a
free concert if they didn't think their fans expected it of them after
Woodstock. They may not have hired the Hell's Angels if they weren't held in
such high esteem by the Haight-Ashbury rock and roll elite. What ultimately
may be most instructive about Gimme Shelter is its documentation of
similarities between then and now, perhaps especially concerning celebrity
culture, rock mythologies, and OUR COMPLICITY in EVENTS THAT VEER
DANGEROUSLY OUT OF CONTROL.
www.popmatters.com/film/reviews/g/gimme-shelter.shtml I shouted out "Who killed the Kennedy's?"
...when after all it was You and Me