The art of the album
Friday was the 40th anniversary of the release of The Beatles' "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band," and as I've discussed before, I do love the album, but I'm a little ambivalent about all the boomer nostalgia.
But in the latest installment of the All Songs Considered podcast Bob Boilen discusses his first discovery of the album in a lovely little snippet (that I cannot find online, sorry). He talks so lovingly of the first time he heard "Sgt. Pepper" that accusing him of navel-gazing would just be mean.
He also brings up an interesting point: At the time, the airwaves were dominated by 45s, and to hear the Beatles' magnum opus, you'd have to seek out the album and purchase it for yourself. You wouldn't hear it on the radio.
The album qua album has not always been the rock standard. And while it's a shame that in an age dominated by one-hit-MP3-wonders the art of crafting an entire album has been lost, it may not be gone for good. The way we interact with media is constantly changing (just think, in 1998, when you had your first AOL screen name, would you ever have imagined podcasts?), and surely some other artist will come along with a new, mind-blowing paradigm for how to experience their work.
(He also pointed out that albums were available in mono or stereo — mono was $1 cheaper — and I'm sure the rock snob audiophile is not a recent invention, but it seems that people are quite volubly picky about digital compression these days, when the gulf between mono and stereo is vast compared to the difference between AAC and MP3.)
It's incredibly dorky, but I wasn't alive then, and I appreciate knowing the history and context in which Sgt. P was released.
—eh, www.amny.com
Comments (1)
i dont know if you read your old comments, but on this topic i could write a book. Im a bit young to know what it was like back in the sixties (born in 1969!) but whenever i meet someone who remembers those days i pick their brains, like how it used to be back in the day, people who remember going to free shows in central park back in the 70s, people who went to woodstock, etc. that whole history really interests me.
btw- if you havent seen it you must check out summer of 1967 doc on pbs, its on their website, in the american experience section, you can watch on internet. as for albums on the radio, i remember i would stay ip till midnight and listen to the perfect album sides on wnew 102.7, that was something i looked forward to every night! that was in mid to late 1980s. i think by 90s they stopped doing that, and did get the led out or some other lameness. not that led zep is lame, but enough already...