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CNN Live Event/Special
The Sixties: The British Invasion
Aired February 02, 2014 - 21:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When the Beatles arrived, from then on, a thousand different things arose.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's is a desire to get power in order to use it for good.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Popular musicians in today's generation, they can rule the world.
ALEXANDER KENDRICK, CBS NEWS REPORT, LONDON: Yeah, yeah, yeah, this is Beatleland formerly known as Britain, where an epidemic called Beatlemania has seized the teenage population especially female.
DAVID WILD, WRITER: CBS, they do a story on what they probably think is a goofy band from England that's doing quite well.
KENDRICK: These four boys from Liverpool, with their dishmop hairstyles, are Britain's latest musical and in fact sociological phenomenon. They symbolize the twentieth century non-hero as they make non-music, wear non-haircuts, give non-"mersey". Meanwhile, yeah, yeah, yeah, this is Alexander Kendrick in Beatleland.
WILD: Some little girl heard just a hint of what the Beatles were about and starts calling her local DJ. The local DJ asks his friend to bring over a Beatles record from England and has the vision to put it on and hear that there's something happening.
CAROLL JAMES, DISC JOCKEY: So Marsha Albert of Dublin Drive of Silver Spring has the honor of introducing something brand new and exclusive here at WWDC. Marsha, the microphone here on the Caroll James Show is yours.
MARSHA ALBERT: Ladies and gentlemen, for the first time on the air in the United States, here are the Beatles singing "I Want to Hold Your Hand".
MIKAL GILMORE, AUTHOR/JOURNALIST: That's song when we start to take on, it was impossible to anticipate how much how that momentum would continue.
COUSIN BRUCE, WABC RADIO DJ: Hi everybody all over America this is the WABC party go, go.
SUSANNA HOFFS, THE BANGLES: That song was absolutely contagious and I think the teenager (ph) found a voice. MURRAY THE K, WINS RADIO NEW YORK: Here's what's happening, baby. The Beatles.
TOM HANKS, ACTOR: There was a moment where you just heard, this is our music now. It was like here in the future.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: But I have to ask how you first found out about it.
ED SULLLIVAN, VARIETY SHOW HOST: When Sylvia and I first found out about the Beatles was at London airport with an enormous crowd of kids gathered around. And Sylvia and I were asking what was going on and they said, "The Beatles are here." And we didn't even know who the Beatles were, we never heard of them and that night I bought (ph) Ringo Starr, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and John Lennon for the show for $10,000.
NELSON GEORGE, AUTHOR, THE DEATH OF RHYTHM & BLUES: You know, for four white guys who were British, they come out of nowhere and be everywhere was quite unbelievable.
WILD: The Beatles are a bunch of guys from Liverpool, I mean, people in London would have looked down at Liverpool back then. But Liverpool was a poor town and, you see, poor towns become places where all sorts of country band gets exchange and one of them at that point was great music.
JOEL PERESMAN, PRESIDENT, ROCK & ROLL HALL OF FAME FOUNDATION: A lot of the sailors and people that were coming back to America were bringing back this record as some were pop record, some were called race records because they were by black artist.
HOFFS: The level of influence that American rock and roll, blues, country and western, Motown had on those kids growing up in England was really amazing.
GRAHAM NASH, THE HOLLIES: So I would listen to Buddy Holly and Gene Vincent and Jerry Lee Lewis, Fats Domino, all the great rock and rollers.
ERIC BURDON, THE ANIMALS: It was like a new language for us. The power of the jukebox, there is nothing quite like it.
BILL JANOVITZ, AUTHOR OF ROCKS OFF: The Beatles took a bunch of those strains, the Everly Brothers from the 50s, the big influence for them were the harmonies.
PERESMAN: So the Beatles in Liverpool are taking this pop sound but putting their own spin on it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What is the sound, how was it different from other rock and roll and pop?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It just happened that all of a sudden, hundreds of rock groups all from Liverpool made records and it was a bit more like the original rock and roll than the stuff they've had over the last few months.
WILD: Initially, there was no tradition of great British bands conquering America. That had not happened but it's that moment where everything turns.
JOHN HEILEMANN, EDITOR OF NEW YORK MAGAZINE: There's no single moment that more embodies the moment when rock and roll became the province of teenagers. That is something that you would not just love but that you would go crazy for.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The Beatles are coming into this country and taking all the women away and everybody is going crazy about them. They love ...
MICKY DOLENZ, THE MONKEES: It was like aliens landed. Look at that and look on how they act and they -- wow.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (Inaudible)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They got everything. They were (inaudible) all and they didn't get to see what kind of police protection. (inaudible).
PATRICK GOLDSTEIN, ENTERTAINMENT JOURNALIST: The reporters have the same attitude that most adults in America had which was no one took musicians seriously. They didn't understand anything about youth culture.
GILMORE: The press had gone into this with the idea that this was the useful novelty that could be dismissed and maybe even deflated in a press conference.
KEVIN RYAN, RECORDING THE BEATLES AUTHOR: When you saw them sparring with the press, it was just another aspect of them that made them even more unique.
QUESTLOVE, MUSICIAN/RECORD PRODUCER: Elvis was the first wave of mega fan-dome (ph) then The Beatles sort of blew that out the water to the point where even Elvis was loosing sleep.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The city never witnessed the excitement stirred by these youngsters in Liverpool.
But ladies and gentlemen, The Beatles.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The first interview had everyone talking.
DENNIS RODMAN, BASKETBALL PLAYER: Look at these guys ...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Now, Dennis Rodman sits down with Chris Cuomo for an exclusive face-to-face interview on North Korea, his infamous rants and rehab. New Day, live tomorrow morning on CNN. (END VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Ladies and gentlemen ...
HOFFS: The Beatles showed up with their great sense of humor. They're completely infectious pop songs. They're wooo (ph), you know, they're everything. It was just impossible not to fall in love with them.
HANKS: As soon as they started playing on the Ed Sullivan Show, we all knew they're playing a live, because that doesn't sound like the record.
QUESTLOVE: The idea of driving, swinging R&B mixed with imaginative word playing lyrics and harmonies and the perfect three minute record. They define it.
WILD: The Beatles took this dream of what America represented. The freedom that was in American music and they brought it back to us with an excitement and a ferocity that we didn't have. They lived a longer era.
Seventy-three million people watched that night.
BOB EUBANKS, RADIO DJ: When the Beatles did the Sullivan Show, everything at the radio station changed, they were no more request other than the Beatles.
DAVE CLARK, THE DAVE CLARK FIVE: Looking back, I believe without Ed Sullivan they wouldn't have been the British invasion.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Gerry and the Pacemakers.
WILD: It wasn't just The Beatles, the British invasion had legs because there was more great music to back it up.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A big hello. Come on.
RICK HUXLEY, THE DAVE CLARK FIVE: Rick Huxley.
LENNY DAVIDSON, THE DAVE CLARK FIVE: I'm Lenny.
DENIS PAYTON, THE DAVE CLARK FIVE: I mean I'm Denis.
CLARK: I'm Dave.
JIMMY O'NEILL, HOST: For the first six months they were singing they sold over a million records a month. And in the words of one of their biggest hit songs we're mighty "Glad All Over" to them with us tonight.
Ladies and gentlemen, The Dave Clark Five.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's a rival with the Beatles now at the top singing in group in Britain. How do you feel about that?
CLARK: We are very pleased. But I don't think we -- you did say we'll be rivals. We got a completely different sound.
We were the first band to tour America. We did -- I think it was 46 cities. Then you realized you've made it.
HEILMANN: Then suddenly it's like the gates of hell are open.
And, you know, every transatlantic ocean liners seems have to have another British band that rockets up to the top of the American charts.
NASH: There was this powder keg of energy from the young people in England and touched the flame to infuse and boom.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They've been kings out there, but they are here and they are The Zombies.
PAUL SHAFFER, MUSICIAN: I love The Zombies because they were keyboard orientated. Rod Argent, the first guy to really develop the idea of rock and roll soloing on a keyboard.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That is a first time. We welcome now for their top four with their top hit, "You Really Got Me", The Kinks.
JANOVITZ: The Kinks were already, you know, very big band in the UK, but if you break in America you break big and you sell a lot of records.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Before you were called The Animals you had another name what made you change it to The Animals?
ERIC BURDON, THE ANIMALS: Well, because we were a bunch of animals.
WILD: The Animals were greedier R&B based band with Eric Burdon who wasn't cute like the Beatle. He was a little more dangerous.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Now, you're going to do the new record first?
BURDON: Yeah.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And it's called ...
BURDON: The House of the Rising Sun.
WILD: That song was the song that Bob Dylan had already recorded a year too earlier like a folk traditional song.
BURDON: Bob came along with his album, The House of Rising Sun. I was crying out to be rocked.
PETE TOWNSHEND, THE WHO: The English group music's that's been also arose were groups not only with performing their own stuff compact on the stage. They didn't need anyone else. They just had the four blokes with their own device guitars they can do a lot.
CLARK: The Who are just sort of like in that catalytic converter of rock and roll. They were maybe the most explosive musical unit.
Yeah. It was interesting. The Beatles all lock in and played together and help each other.
The Who is like four different creatures who weren't even like noticing each other.
Everyone in The Who was like the lead player in The Who.
PERESMAN: With all these great bands who created this thirst in music, but the one that really had the true, true talent have really stood the test of time.
DEAN MARIN: Five singing boys from England who sold a lot of albums. It's called the Rolling Stones that I've been rolled while I was stone my self. I don't know what they singing about but they -- here they are.
SMOKEY ROBINSON, SINGER/SONGWRITER: They become stones. We are the bad boys, of this British Invasion, and the girls went crazy.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (inaudible)is this section (ph), I think.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And you've been doing this stuff for how many years of it?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Two years.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Two years. How much longer do you give yourself doing this thing, going around being (inaudible)?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, I don't know. I never thought we've be -- I'll be doing it for two years even, you know. I think we sort of pretty well setup to at least another year.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BRIAN JONES, THE ROLLING STONES: When we first started playing together, we started playing because we must be playing (inaudible) Blues and how they move is one of our greatest idols and it's a great pleasure to find these people in this show tonight. It really is a pleasure.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thanks for having us.
JONES: So I think it's about time you shut up and we have (inaudible) on things.
GOLDSTEIN: The Rolling Stones invite Howlin' Wolf, who is a 60- year-old black man from the south side of Chicago who never in a million years would have been in Shindig, and there he is.
QUESTLOVE: The Stones clearly wore their heart on their sleeves for losing R and B. You can hear traces of Delta Blues inside of hits guitar. They try to be as authentic to the core as possible. Even so much that, you know, there are first few American recordings were done in Chess in Chicago.
JONES: Before they get to Chicago, can't use to (inaudible) that's where it started. You know, the white people then know nothing about it even (inaudible).
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Because it's unique (ph), (inaudible), isn't it?
GEORGE: In America, even in the black community to some degree, had abandoned certain aspects of black culture even by the mid '60s. The Blues in particular had been sort of pushed aside by Soul music and R and B which considered more modern.
JANN WENNER, FOUNDER AND EDITOR, ROLLING STONE: The Stones, The Animals, The Yardbirds, they have a various groups who picked up the American Blues where the Americans was entitled (ph) to let it go.
DAVE CLARK: And in strange way, we were taking back to America, what America are given us, which is American Music.
RICK CLARK: You and Chuck have kind of taken England by a storm. How do you feel about other people borrowing your material?
LITTLE RICHARD: I am very grateful to know that my material is the type of material that the entertainers today would like to use.
GEORGE: The British Invasion played a huge role and not just introducing themselves to America but reintroducing a lot of black music. To me, it's (inaudible) America.
CHRIS CONNELLY, JOURNALIST: The same year that the Beatles play on, it's all under (ph) for the first time (inaudible) the TAMI Show comes out as a movie. You know, and TAMI shows got everybody.
SHAFFER: The TAMI Show was really the first rock and roll concert movie. Stone's headlining and the first time that, as white kids got to see James Brown, and nobody, you know, will ever get over it.
GEORGE: Everyone remembers James Brown's performance. He gave them what black audience has been seeing for years, but what would have even seen outside of the black community. And people are electrified by it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: James Brown just kills the show just like -- lots of praise that haven't got (ph) some music, he wrecks house
GEORGE: And it really began his journey into becoming an age dream (ph) figure.
SHAFFER: The Stones then slows and they refer to it as the biggest mistake they ever made following James Brown.
We see, you know, jagger (ph), coming alive, you know, doing things that he hadn't done before. GEORGE: It was great because you're seeing a season professional. It was James Brown and a young performer and band figuring out who the hell they are.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NORM: When I stay put, I mean stay put.
JOHN LENNON: Don't cane me, sir. I was led astray.
NORM: Oh shut up, John. They're waiting for you in the studio.
RINGO STARR: Gear, I'm dying to do a bit of work.
PAUL MCCARTNEY: Oh, it's the teacher's pet.
GEORGE HARRISON: Crawler.
LENNON: Betrayed the class?
STARR: Lay off.
NORM: You've got to move on. They're waiting for you.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
KEVIN RYAN, AUTHOR RECORDING THE BEATLES: "A Hard Day's Night" is sort of just perfectly encapsulated Beatlemania. It is the most perfect representation of 1964 Beatles.
DAVID WILD, WRITER: Brian Epstein said, "If the Beatles were going to go, they were going to go big." And they went big.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BRIAN EPSTEIN, BEATLES MANAGER: The facts as the Beatles were exposed right to depict souls (ph), exposed them to the public even more and perhaps just this hop singing neither would (ph).
(END VIDEO CLIP)
EUBANKS: They made the announcement that they were going to tour America. Beatles wanted $25,000. Well, I didn't have $25,000. And so, I borrowed $25,000 on the House.
There were no computers but we sold it out in three and a half hours...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: 17,000 screaming youngsters have jammed the way into the huge amphitheater. But they are the lucky ones. Outside, thousands of others were not supporters.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Here they are. The Beatles.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BEATLES: Going to let you down, let you down. Because I've told you before, oh, you can't do that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HANKS: The Beatles output was phenomenal. They seem to always be either touring, making a movie, or making a record.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hello. You see these little fellows? They are the Beatles. Inflatable Beatles. They are yours for just $2.
QUESTLOVE: They had posters and magazines and stickers and dolls and cartoons. Like this is the start of where the teenager becomes the most desirable target for the dollar.
GEORGE: I live in the projects in Brooklyn, you know, in a black community and the Beatles were everywhere. So, it wasn't like this was a white phenomenon. They were everywhere.
WILD: The Beatles created a rock industry. They were selling in ways that no one had ever sold before and they were playing in venues that were (inaudible) they played before.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SULLIVAN: Ladies and gentlemen. Honored by their country, decorated by their queen (ph) and loved here in America, here are the Beatles.
BEATLES: Help me if you can, I'm feeling down. And I do appreciate you being around. Help me get my feet back on the ground. Won't you please, please help me? Help me, help me.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, do you have plans where to spend this money?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What money? He said.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Doesn't they give any to you?
BEATLES: No, no.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (Inaudible)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WILD: The Beatles thought every other band that writing your own music made you more powerful.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
HARRISON: And I've never doubt (inaudible). Let's get running to see that. (Inaudible) got running.
(END VIDEO CLIP) GEORGE: I think it was really trying about (inaudible) Stones is. They did tons of coverage in their first couple of hours. It wasn't until they really figured out how to write their own songs that they really became a real band. They really have to find their own voice.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RINGO: I can't get no satisfaction. I can't get no satisfaction. Because I try and I try and I try and I try. I can't get no, I can't get no. When I'm driving in my car. And the man comes on the radio. He's telling me more and more about some useless information. Supposed to fire my imagination. I can't get no, oh no, no no...
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE: There were the dialog that was going on between soul music and the British Invasion. A, because there's a way for me to knot to the mainstream. And B, because the songs, you know, were good.
And satisfaction is fantastic. Using all the words even, and he doesn't care. He just kind of singing the song.
QUESTLOVE: At the time Motown and the British Invasion, they're going hand and hand sort of redefining what America dances and listens and socializes too.
ROBINSON: Motown, it evolved with the rest of the world, but we did have to compete with this British Invasion for (inaudible).
ROBINSON: The first time I heard "You Really Got a Hold on Me" by the Beatles, that was very, very, very happy.
The Beatles chose one of my songs and they put great songs.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I did something wrong. Now, I long for yesterday.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BOB DYLAN: This is titled, Hey, Mr. Tambourine Man. I'm going to play the song (inaudible).
HEILEMANN: A lot of the stuff that are on the road in '63, '64, '65 was very political. It wasn't only what the Beatles were doing or it wasn't what the Rolling Stones were doing or the Kinks were doing or any of those Rock and Roll Bands. And for a period of time, there was this distinction between the folk culture and the Rock and Roll culture.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DYLAN: Hey Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me. I'm not sleepy and there is no place I'm going to.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GILMORE: In 1964, during that first tour, the Beatles had the opportunity to meet Bob Dylan. He understood what they were doing, musically, and they were awakened by the more personal perspective of his songs. Inaudible) was a huge influence on John Lennon.
WENNER: I've been inspired in to writing more serious songs, deeper songs and be more experimental lyrically.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BEATLES: I once had a girl, or should I say, she once had me.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GOLDSTEIN: Bob Dylan, going electric, is another one of his -- the seismic changes in the pop music era in the '60s.
QUESTLOVE: He was bold enough to leave his comfort zone.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DYLAN: I ain't going to work on Maggie's farm no more.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HEILEMANN: It's not just about Dylan going electric, but it's also about the fusion of an emerging tradition of popular music that was really political with Rock and Roll which, in largely, not been overtly political.
QUESTLOVE: There's nothing like the feeling of your audience not being with you and walking out of people to that person.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You know, (inaudible) anymore. He's part of your establishment and forget him.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They are my friends.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
QUESTLOVE: They felt betrayed like years of us, we are (inaudible) and you sold out.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DYLAN: How does it feel? How does it feel to be on your own with no direction home?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
QUESTLOVE: Not only that he take it but he managed to just so called him all to make them see his vision.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DYLAN: Like a rolling stone.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WILD: Other musicians started bringing poetry and politics and soul searching to popular music.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
THE HOLLIES: Men shall know and the men shall see. We all are brothers and we all are free.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NASH: It was obvious to me and The Hollies that we had a responsibility as artist to reflect our world around us and we utilize our music to be able to reach people.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
NASH: Pop musicians in today's generation, I mean, the fantastic -- they could rule the world.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, I felt (inaudible). We show it to the world. So why don't we do more of it?
NASH: We can't stop (inaudible) before they ever started.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I disagree. I don't believe you.
NASH: You know who start (inaudible)? You know who start (inaudible)? People that are over 40.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Really? They really not--
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WILD: That conversation was unstoppable. You couldn't shut it down.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
THE KINKS: 'Cause he's oh, so good and he's oh, so fine, and he's oh so healthy, in his body and his mind. He's a well respected man about town doing the best things so conservatively.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WILD: I think Ray Davies in the Kinks and Pete Townshend from The Who were the two social commentators. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
THE WHO: People try to put us down, talking about my generation, just because we get around, talking about my generation. Things they do look awful cold, talking about my generation. I hope I die before I get old, talking about my generation. This is my generation. This is my generation, baby. Why don't you all fade away? Talking about my generation. And don't try to dig what we all say, talking about my generation. I'm just talking about my generation.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PETE TOWNSHEND, THE WHO: I do politically move nation to nation is really to turn right down these barriers between people.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All of them were obsessively listening from one another. And what became the game was who can take Rock and Roll some place more interesting.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
THE BEATLES: If I needed someone to love, you're the one that I'd be thinking of. If I needed someone.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
QUESTLOVE: You know, records had been two or three of your singles, some coverage of some other artist song and just a bunch of feeling. Rubber Soul, basically, started the idea of the record as a complete statement. That's really a game changer.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
THE BEATLES: In my life, I love you more.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MICHELLE PHILLIPS, THE MAMAS & THE PAPAS: I think that the Beach Boys and Brian felt that he didn't fit in to this new British invasion thing that was happening.
RYAN: When the Beach Boys are Rubber Soul, Brian Wilson was inspired to try to create something as pure and beautiful and this is album that everything was great.
PHILIPS: I remember going over to Brian's house and I looked into the living room and I saw that everything had been taken out, except the piano. And this living room is completely filled with sand. He said, "I'm going to write the greatest album, ever recorded."
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP) BRIAN WILSON: Nice, nice pass.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
JANOVITZ: In the mid '60s, you see Brian Wilson retreating into the studio and he is concentrating on writing and producing these amazing songs.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
THE BEACH BOYS: I may not always love you but long as there are stars above you. You never need to doubt it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WILD: The recording studio had been a rigid place where there were engineers literally in like suits and ties and the lab coats, when all of a sudden, there were these crazy young geniuses who reinvented the studio as an instrument to be played with.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
THE BEACH BOYS: God only knows what I'd be without you.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GEORGE: Technologies are evolving for how to record and Brian Wilson was absolutely in a cutting edge to that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
THE BEACH BOYS: Wouldn't it be nice if get were older, then we wouldn't have to wait so long.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CHRIS CONNELLY, JOURNALIST: Music in the '60s was like getting great art movement. The greatest practitioners of it pushed one another to be better.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Not the mic on the piano, quite low (inaudible).
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SUSANNA HOFFS, THE BANGLES: In the studio, the Beatles' natural creativity was sort of brimming over and George Martin was a brilliant collaborator and champion of that.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (Inaudible).
(END VIDEO CLIP) GEORGE MARTIN, RECORD PRODUCER: You can slow down or speed up in the tape. You can put in backward stop. You could put in electronic sounds which you can pass (inaudible).
RINGO STARR, THE BEATLES: Something out was on air. I couldn't tell you what 'cause we have a special (inaudible) and goes like this. And the guitar change into piano and so, you know. And then you may say, "Why don't you use the piano because the piano sounds like a guitar?"
HEILEMANN: There were FM Radio stations but did nothing but place (inaudible) over and over for the first three or four days when they came out because that's was all anybody wanted to listen to.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
THE BEATLES: Lucy in the sky with diamonds.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HOFFS: Sgt. Pepper's became the theme. He dropped and he landed an (inaudible) crackle and then you'd be taken away on his journey.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
THE BEATLES: I read the news today, oh boy.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
TOM HANKS, ACTOR: Sgt. Pepper was our opera. It sounded unlike anything we were used to.
MORLEY SAFER, JOURNALIST, 60 MINUTES: In the '60s, lyrics are generally infantile and its noise not music but Sgt. Pepper album was brilliant album signifying a break from the old ways of being entertained. It really caught the moment.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TOWNSHEND: Pop music has is crucial to today's and it's crucial that it should remain and it's crucial that it should -- it should progress us all.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Pleased to meet you. Hope you guess my name.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
HEILEMANN: The British invasion changed pretty much everything. It was just not just a sound or a band or a phenomenon but it was the beginning of the most powerful decades in popular music.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
THE ANIMALS: Children danced night and day. Religion was being born down in Monterey.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
NASH: Rock and Roll music was very important in the growth of the society. We were able to speak our minds. We did shake up the world.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
PAUL MCCARTNEY, THE BEATLES: There's no desire in any of our heads to -- so to take over the world, you know. There is, however, a desire to get power in order to use it for good.
WILD: How many people that you've started loving in 1964, do you still love? The Beatles and the British invasion maybe the greatest love story, in a cultural sense, that's ever been.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
THE BEATLES: All you need is love. All you need is love. All you need is love, love. Love is all you need. Love is all you need. Love is all you need. Love is all you need. Love is all you need. Love is all you need. Love is all you need. Love is all you need. Love is all you need. Love is all you need. Love is all you need. Love is all you need. Love is all you need. Love is all you need. Love is all you need.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's the Beatles!
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: These guys are nothing but a bunch of British Elvis Presleys.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Not true. It's not true.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When the Beatles arrived, from then on, 1,000 different things arose.
MICK JAGGER, THE ROLLING STONES: Yes, it's sexual, completely.
PAUL MCCARTNEY, BEATLES: There is a desire to get power in order to use it for good.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Musicians in today's generation, they could rule the world.
ALEXANDER KENDRICK, BROADCAST JOURNALIST: Yeah, yeah, yeah, this is Beatle land, formally known as Britain, where an epidemic called Beatlemania has seized the teenage population, especially female.
DAVID WILD, WRITER: CBS, they do a story on what they probably think is probably a goofy band from England that's doing quite well.
KENDRICK: These four boys from Liverpool with their dish mop hairstyles are Britain's latest musical and in fact sociological phenomena. They symbolize the 20th century non-hero, as they make non-music, wear non-music haircuts, give non-mercy. Meanwhile, yeah, yeah, yeah, this is Alexander Kendrick in Beatle land.
WILD: Some little girl heard just a hint of what the Beatles were about and starts calling her local deejay. The local deejay asks his friend to bring over a Beatles record from England and has the vision to put it on and hear that there's something happening.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So Marsha Albert of Dublin Drive from Silver Spring has the honor of introducing something brand-new, an exclusive here at WWDC.
Marsha, the microphone here on "The Carroll James Show" is yours.
MARSHA ALBERT, MUSIC LOVER: Ladies and gentlemen, for the first time on the air in the United States, here are the Beatles singing "I Want to Hold Your Hand."
MIKAL GILMORE, AUTHOR/JOURNALIST: That song really started to take off. It was impossible to anticipate how much that momentum would continue.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hi, everybody. All over America, this is the WABC party go, go. Whew!
SUSANNA HOFFS, THE BANGLES: That song is absolutely contagious. And I think the teenager found a voice.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Here's what's happening, baby, the Beatles!
TOM HANKS, ACTOR: There was a moment where you just heard, this is our music now. It was like hearing the future.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I have to ask how you first found out about them.
ED SULLIVAN, VARIETY SHOW HOST: Well, Sylvia and I first found out about the Beatles at London Airport.
There was an enormous crowd of kids gathered around. When Sylvia and I asked them what was going on, they said, the Beatles were here. We didn't even know who the Beatles were. We had never heard of them. And that night, I booked Ringo Starr, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and John Lennon for three shows for $10,000.
NELSON GEORGE, AUTHOR, "THE DEATH OF RHYTHM & BLUES": For four white guys who were British, to come out of nowhere and be everywhere was quite unbelievable.
WILD: The Beatles are a bunch of guys from Liverpool. I mean, people in London would have looked down at Liverpool back then. But Liverpool was a port town, and these port towns become places where all sorts of contraband gets exchanged. And one of them at that point was great music.
JOEL PERESMAN, PRESIDENT, ROCK AND ROLL HALL OF FAME FOUNDATION: A lot of the sailors and people that were coming back to America were bringing back these records. And some were pop records. Some were called race records because they were by black artists.
HOFFS: The level of influence that American rock 'n' roll, blues, country and western, Motown had on those kids growing up in England was really amazing.
GRAHAM NASH, THE HOLLIES: So I would listen to Buddy Holly, Gene Vincent, and Jerry Lee Lewis, Fats Domino, all the great rock 'n' rollers.
ERIC BURDON, THE ANIMALS: It was like a new language for us. The power of the jukebox, there's nothing quite like it.
BILL JANOVITZ,AUTHOR, "ROCKS OFF": The Beatles took a bunch of those strains. The Everly Brothers from the '50s was a big influence for them with the harmonies.
PERESMAN: So the Beatles of Liverpool are taking this pop sound, but putting their own spin on it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What is the sound? How does it differ from other rock 'n' roll?
GEORGE HARRISON, THE BEATLES: It just happened that, all of a sudden, hundreds of rock groups all from Liverpool made records. And it was a bit more like the original rock 'n' roll than the stuff they have had over the last few months.
WILD: Initially, there was no tradition of great British bands conquering America. That had not happened. But it's that moment where everything turns.
JOHN HEILEMANN, "NEW YORK": There's no single moment that more embodies the moment when rock 'n' roll became the province of teenagers, something that you would not just love, but that you would go crazy for.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: There's the Beatles!
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The Beatles have come to this country and taking all our women away, and everybody is going crazy about them.
MICKY DOLENZ, THE MONKEES: It was like aliens landed. Look at how they look and how they act and they -- wow!
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We came here at 6:00 in the morning, 5:30 to see them, and all they do is push you farther and farther away. And then they don't even let you see them.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I got every Beatle record at home. And we didn't get to see them. What kind of police protection?
(SHOUTING)
BEATLES: Paul, Ringo, George, John. PATRICK GOLDSTEIN, ENTERTAINMENT JOURNALIST: The reporters had the same attitude that most adults in America had, which was no one took musicians seriously. They didn't understand anything about youth culture.
GILMORE: The press had gone into this with the idea that this was a youthful novelty that could be dismissed and maybe even deflated in a press conference.
(CROSSTALK)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: ... get a haircut at all?
(CROSSTALK)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, no.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I had one yesterday.
(LAUGHTER)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You guys are nothing but a bunch of British Elvis Presleys.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's not true. It's not true.
(LAUGHTER)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Will you sing something?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, sorry.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: No, we need money first.
(LAUGHTER)
KEVIN RYAN, AUTHOR, "RECORDING THE BEATLES": When you saw them sparring with the press, it was just another aspect of them that made them Even more unique.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Tomorrow night at 7:00, the Beatles read their own poetry on a documentary, "Meet the Beatles."
MCCARTNEY: Oh, really?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I don't get that.
QUESTLOVE, MUSICIAN/RECORD PRODUCER: If Elvis was the first wave of mega-fandom, then the Beatles sort of blew that out the water, to the point where even Elvis was losing sleep.
SULLIVAN: The city never has witnessed the excitement stirred by these youngsters from Liverpool.
Ladies and gentlemen, the Beatles!
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SULLIVAN: Ladies and gentlemen, the Beatles!
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
HOFFS: The Beatles showed up with their great sense of humor, their completely infectious pop songs, their -- the -- everything. It was just impossible not to fall in love with them.
HANKS: As soon as they started playing on "The Ed Sullivan Show," we all knew they're playing live, because that doesn't sound like the record.
QUESTLOVE: The idea of driving, swinging, R&B mixed with imaginative wordplay and lyrics and harmonies and the perfect three- minute record, they defined it.
WILD: The Beatles took this dream of what America represented, the freedom that was in American music, and they brought it back to us with an excitement and a ferocity that we didn't have, and with longer hair. Seventy-three million people watched that night.
BOB EUBANKS, RADIO DEEJAY/CONCERT PRODUCER: When the Beatles did the "Sullivan Show," everything at the radio station changed. There were no more requests, other than the Beatles.
DAVE CLARK, THE DAVE CLARK FIVE: Looking back, I believe without Ed Sullivan, there wouldn't have been a British invasion.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Gerry & the Pacemakers!
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
WILD: It wasn't just the Beatles. The British invasion had legs because there was more great music to back it up.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A big hello.
RICK HUXLEY, THE DAVE CLARK FIVE: Rick Huxley.
LENNY DAVIDSON, THE DAVE CLARK FIVE: I'm Lenny.
DENIS PAYTON, THE DAVE CLARK FIVE: I'm -- I mean, I'm Denis.
CLARK: I'm Dave.
JIMMY O'NEILL, HOST, "SHINDIG!": For the first six months they were singing, they sold over a million records a month. And in the words of one of their biggest hit songs, we're mighty glad all over to have them with us tonight. Ladies and gentlemen, The Dave Clark Five.
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You guys are rivaling the Beatles now as the top singing group in Britain. How do you feel about that?
CLARK: Boy, very pleased, but I don't think you would say we will be rivals. We have got a completely different sound.
We were the first band to tour America. We did, I think it was 46 cities. Then you realized you had made it.
HEILEMANN: And, suddenly, it's like the gates of hell are opened. Every transatlantic ocean liner seems to have another British band on it that rockets up to the top of the American charts.
NASH: There was this powder keg of energy from the young people in England, and touch to the flame to the fuse, and boom.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Maybe she's not there, but they're here, and they're The Zombies!
PAUL SHAFFER, LETTERMAN BAND LEADER: I loved The Zombies because they were keyboard-oriented, Rod Argent the first guy to really develop the idea of rock 'n' roll soloing on a keyboard.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's a first-time welcome now for that (INAUDIBLE) with their top hit, "You Really Got Me Going," The Kinks.
JANOVITZ: The Kinks were already a very big band in the U.K., but if you break in America, you break big and you sell a lot of records.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Before you were called The Animals, you had another name. What made you change it to The Animals?
BURDON: Well, because we were a bunch of animals.
(LAUGHTER)
WILD: The Animals were a grittier, R&B-based band with Eric Burdon, who wasn't cute like a Beatle. He was a little more dangerous.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Now you're going to do the new record for us?
BURDON: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And it's called?
BURDON: "The House of the Rising Sun."
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
WILD: That song was a song that Bob Dylan had already recorded a year or two earlier, like a folk traditional song. BURDON: Bob came along. His album "House of the Rising Sun," it was crying out to be rocked.
PETE TOWNSHEND, THE WHO: The English group music thing also rose with groups not only performing their own stuff compact on the stage. They didn't need anyone else. They just had the four blokes with their amplifiers, guitars, and they could do the lot.
WILD: The Who are just sort of like in that catalytic converter of rock 'n' roll. They were maybe the most explosive musical unit.
Yes, it was interesting. The Beatles all lock in and play together and help each other. The Who is like four different creatures who weren't even, like, noticing each other. Everyone in The Who was like the lead player in The Who.
PERESMAN: All these great bands created this thirst in music, but the ones that really had the true, true talent have really stood the test of time.
DEAN MARTIN, ENTERTAINER: Five singing boys from England who have sold a lot of "albeems" -- albums.
(LAUGHTER)
MARTIN: They're called the Rolling Stones. I have been rolled while I was stoned myself.
(LAUGHTER)
MARTIN: I don't know what they're singing about, Bob, but here they are at.
(APPLAUSE)
SMOKEY ROBINSON, MUSICIAN: Here come the Stones. Here's the bad boys of this British invasion, and the girls went crazy.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is it a sort of sex thing or...
MICK JAGGER, THE ROLLING STONES: Yes, it's sexual, completely.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You have been doing this now for how long? How many years is it?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Two years.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Two years?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How much longer do you give yourself doing this thing, going around being sort of...
(CROSSTALK)
JAGGER: I don't know. I never thought we would be -- I would be doing it for two years even. I think we're sort of pretty well set up for at least another year.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BRIAN JONES, THE ROLLING STONES: Well, when we first started playing together, we started playing because we wanted to play rhythm and blues. And Howlin' Wolf was one of our greatest idols. And it's a great pleasure to finally have been booked on this show tonight. It really is.
(APPLAUSE)
JONES: So, I think it's about you shut up and we had Howlin' Wolf on stage.
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
GOLDSTEIN: The Rolling Stones invite Howlin' Wolf, who is a 60- year-old black man from the South Side of Chicago who never in a million years would have been on "Shindig!" and there he is.
QUESTLOVE: The Stones clearly wore their heart on their sleeves for blues and R&B. You can hear traces of delta blues inside of Keith's guitar. They tried to be as authentic to the core as possible, even so much that their first few American recordings were done in Chess in Chicago.
JONES: The Chicago kids used rhythm and blues. And that's where it started. The white people over there know nothing about rhythm and blues at al.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Because it's Negro music, isn't it?
GEORGE: In America, even in the black community to some degree, had abandoned certain aspects of black culture by the mid-'60s. The blues in particular had been sort of pushed aside by soul music and R&B, which was considered more modern.
JANN WENNER, FOUNDER AND EDITOR, "ROLLING STONE": Stones, The Animals, the Yardbirds, the British groups picked up the American blues, where the Americans, they kind of let it go.
CLARK: And, in a strange way, we were taking back to America what America had given us, which was American music.
DICK CLARK, ENTERTAINER: You and Chuck have kind of taken England by storm. How do you feel about other people borrowing your material?
LITTLE RICHARD, MUSICIAN: I'm very grateful to know that my material is the type of material that the entertainers today would like to use. GEORGE: The British invasion played a huge role in not just introducing themselves to America, but reintroducing a lot of black music to mainstream America.
CHRIS CONNELLY, JOURNALIST: The same year that the Beatles play on "Ed Sullivan" for the first time is the year "The T.A.M.I. Show" comes out as a movie. And "The T.A.M.I. Show" has got everybody.
SHAFFER: "The T.A.M.I. Show" was really the first rock 'n' roll concert movie, the Stones headlining and the first time that us white kids got to see James Brown, and nobody will ever get over it.
GEORGE: Everyone remembers James Brown's performance. He gave them what black audiences had been seeing for years, but had not really been seen outside of the black community, and people were electrified by it.
CONNELLY: James Brown just kills the show. Just like, what's the phrase they have in Gospel music? He wrecks house.
GEORGE: And it really began his journey into becoming a mainstream figure.
SHAFFER: The Stones then close, and they were afraid it was the biggest mistake they ever made, following James Brown. We see Jagger coming alive, doing things that he hadn't done before.
GEORGE: It was great, because you're seeing a seasoned professional, who was James Brown, and a young performer and band figuring out who the hell they are.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When I say staples, I mean staples.
JOHN LENNON, MUSICIAN: I was led astray.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, shut up, John. They're waiting for you in the studio.
RINGO STARR, MUSICIAN: Can I get a word?
PAUL MCCARTNEY, MUSICIAN: Oh, it's the teacher's pet.
STARR: Oh, lay off.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, get a move on.
(MUSIC: THE BEATLES, "HARD DAY'S NIGHT")
KEVIN RYAN, AUTHOR: "Hard Day's Night" just perfect encapsulated Beatlemania. It is the most perfect representation of the 1964 Beatles.
DAVID WILD: Brian Epstein said, if the Beatles were going to go, they were going to go big. And they went big.
BRIAN EPSTEIN, BEATLES' MANAGER: The fact that the Beatles were exposed (UNINTELLIGIBLE) -- were exposed then to the public even more than perhaps just a pop singing idol would.
BOB EUBANKS, RADIO DJ/CONCERT PROMOTER: They made the announcement that they were going to tour America. The Beatles wanted $25,000. Well, I didn't have $25,000. And so I borrowed $25,000 on the house. There were no computers, but we sold it out in 3 1/2 hours.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Seventeen thousand screaming youngsters have jammed their way into the huge amphitheater. But they're the lucky ones. Outside, thousands of others were not so fortunate.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Here they are, the Beatles!
(MUSIC: THE BEATLES, "YOU CAN'T DO THAT")
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The Beatles' output was phenomenal. They seemed to always be either touring, making a movie or making a record.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hello. See these little fellows? They're the Beatles. Inflatable Beatles. They're yours for just $2.
QUESTLOVE, MUSICIAN/RECORD PRODUCER: They had posters and magazines and stickers and dolls and cartoons. Like, this is the start of where the teenager becomes the most desirable target for the dollar.
NELSON GEORGE, AUTHOR: I lived in the projects in Brooklyn, you know, in a black community. And the Beatles were everywhere. So it wasn't like this was a white phenomenon. They were everywhere.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The Beatles created a rock industry. They were selling in ways that no one had ever sold before, and they were playing venues that were bigger than anyone had ever played before.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Ladies and gentlemen, honored by their country, decorated by their queen, loved here in America. Here are the Beatles!
(MUSIC: THE BEATLES, "HELP")
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How are you planning to actually spend this money?
GEORGE HARRISON, MUSICIAN: What money?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Doesn't he give any to you?
HARRISON: No, no, no. You see my father's (ph).
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The Beatles taught every other band that writing your own music made you more powerful.
(MUSIC)
GEORGE: I think it was really funny about a band like the Stones is they did tons of coverage on their first couple of albums. It wasn't until they really figured out how to write their own songs that they really became a real band. They needed to find their own voice.
(MUSIC: THE ROLLING STONES, "(I CAN'T GET NO) SATISFACTION")
GEORGE: There was a dialogue that was going on between soul music and the British Invasion. A, because this is a way for me to make a nod to the mainstream. And B, because the songs, you know, were good.
(MUSIC: OTIS READING, "(I CAN'T GET NO) SATISFACTION")
GEORGE: His "Satisfaction" is fantastic. He doesn't even know the words even, and he doesn't care. He's just kind of singing the song.
QUESTLOVE: At the time Motown and the British Invasion, they're going hand in hand in sort of redefining what America dances and listens and socializes to.
SMOKEY ROBINSON, SINGER/SONGWRITER: Motown, it evolved with the rest of the world. We did have to compete with this British Invasion for places on the charts.
The first time I heard "You Really Got a Hold on Me" by the Beatles, I was very, very, very happy.
(MUSIC: THE BEATLES, "YOU REALLY GOT A HOLD ON ME")
ROBINSON: The Beatles chose one of my songs, and they wrote great songs.
(MUSIC: SMOKEY ROBINSON, "YESTERDAY")
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BOB DYLAN, SINGER/SONGWRITER: This is called "Mr. Tambourine Man."
JOHN HEILEMANN, EDITOR, "NEW YORK MAGAZINE": A lot of the stuff that Dylan wrote in '63, '64, '65 was very political. It wasn't really what the Beatles were doing, and it wasn't what the Stones were doing or The Kinks were doing or any of those rock 'n' roll bands. And for a period of time there was this distinction between the folk culture and the rock 'n' roll culture.
(MUSIC: BOB DYLAN, "MR. TAMBOURINE MAN")
MIKAL GILMORE, AUTHOR/JOURNALIST: In 1964, during that first tour, the Beatles had the opportunity to meet Bob Dylan. He understood what they were doing musically and they were awakened by the more personal perspective of his songs. JANN WENNER, FOUNDER & EDITOR, "ROLLING STONE": Dylan was a huge influence on John Lennon. I think it inspired him to write more serious songs, deeper songs and be more experimental lyrically.
(MUSIC: THE BEATLES, "NORWEGIAN WOOD")
PATRICK GOLDSTEIN, ENTERTAINMENT JOURNALIST: Bob Dylan going electric was another one of those big seismic changes in the pop music era in the '60s.
QUESTLOVE: He was bold enough to leave his comfort zone.
(MUSIC: BOB DYLAN, "MAGGIE'S FARM")
WILD: It's not just about Dylan going electric. But it's about the fusion of an emerging tradition of popular music that was really political with rock 'n' roll which had largely not been overtly political.
(CROWD BOOING)
QUESTLOVE: There's nothing like the feeling of your audience not being with you and walking out on you. People took it personal.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You know, it's a part of "you're establishment" and "forget it."
QUESTLOVE: They felt betrayed. Like "You're supposed to be our Woody Guthrie, and you sold out."
(MUSIC: BOB DYLAN, "LIKE A ROLLING STONE")
QUESTLOVE: Not only did he take it, but he managed to just choke-hold them all and make them see his vision.
WILD: Other musicians started bringing poetry and politics and soul searching to popular music.
(MUSIC: THE HOLLIES, "VERY LAST DAY")
GRAHAM NASH, MUSICIAN, THE HOLLIES: It was obvious to me and the Hollies that we had a responsibility as artists to reflect our world around us, and we utilized our music to be able to reach people.
Pop musicians in today's generation are in a fantastic position. They can rule the world.
PETER NOONE, MUSICIAN: I don't argue.
NASH: Why don't we do more of it?
We can stop world wars before they ever started.
NOONE: I disagree. I don't believe in...
You know who starts world wars? People that are over 40. NASH: Really?
WILD: That conversation was unstoppable. You couldn't shut it down.
(MUSIC: THE KINKS, "WELL-RESPECTED MAN")
WILD: I think Ray Davies from The Kinks and Pete Townshend from The Who were the two social commentators.
(MUSIC: THE WHO, "MY GENERATION")
PETE TOWNSHEND, MUSICIAN/SONGWRITER, THE WHO: A new political move, nation to nation, is really to try and break down these barriers between people.
WILD: All of them were obsessively listening to one another, and what became the game was, who can take rock 'n' roll someplace more interesting?
(MUSIC: THE BEATLES, "IF I NEEDED SOMEONE")
QUESTLOVE: You know, records had been two or three of your singles, some covers of some other artist's songs and just a bunch of filler. "Rubber Soul" basically started the idea of the record as a complete statement. That's really a game changer.
(MUSIC: THE BEATLES, "IN MY LIFE")
MICHELLE PHILLIPS, SINGER/SONGWRITER, THE MAMAS & THE PAPAS: I think that the Beach Boys and Brian felt that he didn't fit into this new British Invasion thing that was happening.
(MUSIC: THE BEACH BOYS, "I GET AROUND")
WILD: When the Beach Boys heard "Rubber Soul," Brian Wilson was inspired to try to create something as pure and beautiful and this album, that everything was great.
PHILLIPS: I ended up going over to Brian's house and I went into the living room, and I saw that everything had been taken out except the piano. And the living room was completely filled with sand. He said, "I'm going to write the greatest album ever recorded."
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Nice, nice.
BILL JANOVITZ, AUTHOR: In the mid-'60s, you see Brian Wilson retreating into the studio, and he's concentrating on writing and producing these amazing songs.
(MUSIC: THE BEACH BOYS, "GOD ONLY KNOWS")
WILD: The recording studio had been a rigid place where there were engineers in suits and ties and lab coats, when all of a sudden there were these crazy young geniuses who reinvented the studio as an instrument to be played with.
(MUSIC: THE BEACH BOYS, "GOD ONLY KNOWS")
GEORGE: Technology was evolving for how to record. And Brian Wilson was absolutely on the cutting edge of that.
(MUSIC: THE BEACH BOYS, "WOULDN'T IT BE NICE?")
CHRIS CONNELLY, JOURNALIST: Music in the '60s was like any great art movement. The greatest practitioners of it pushed one another to be better.
STARR: ... on the piano quite well.
SUSANNA HOFFS, SINGER, THE BANGLES: In the studio, the Beatles' natural creativity was sort of brimming over, and George Martin was a brilliant collaborator and champion of that.
GEORGE MARTIN, RECORD PRODUCER: You can slow down or speed up a take. You can put in backwards stuff; you can put in electronic sounds, which you couldn't possibly reproduce live.
STARR: Something happens on air, I couldn't tell you what, because we have a special man who sits here and goes like this, and the guitar turns into a piano. And then you may say, "Why don't you use a piano?"
"Because the piano sounds like a guitar."
(MUSIC: THE BEATLES, "SERGEANT PEPPER'S LONELY HEARTS CLUB BAND")
HEILEMAN: There were FM Radio stations that did nothing but play "Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" over and over for the first three or four days of it coming out, because that was all anybody wanted to listen to.
(MUSIC: THE BEATLES, "LUCY IN THE SKY WITH DIAMONDS")
HOFFS: "Sergeant Pepper's" became the thing. You drop the needle on it and you would hear a crackle and then you'd be taken away on this journey.
TOM HANKS, ACTOR: "Sergeant Pepper" was our opera. It sounded unlike anything we were used to.
MORLEY SAFER, JOURNALIST: The '60s, lyrics are generally infantile, and it's noise, not music. But the "Sergeant Pepper" album was a brilliant album, signifying a break from the old ways of being entertained. It really caught the moment.
TOWNSHEND: This music is crucial to today's art, and it's crucial that it should remain art, and it is crucial that it should -- it should progress as art.
(MUSIC: THE ROLLING STONES, "SYMPATHY FOR THE DEVIL")
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The British Invasion changed pretty much everything.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was not just a sound or a band or a phenomena. But it was the beginning of the most powerful decade in popular music.
(MUSIC: ERIC BURDON AND THE ANIMALS, " MONTEREY")
NASH: Rock 'n' roll music was very important in the growth of the society. We were able to speak our minds. We did shake up the world.
MCCARTNEY: There's no desire in any of our heads to sort of take over the world. There is, however, a desire to get power in order to use it for good.
(MUSIC: THE BEATLES, "ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE")
WILD: How many people that you started loving in 1964 do you still love? The Beatles and the British Invasion may be the greatest love story, in a cultural sense, that's ever been.
(MUSIC: THE BEATLES, "ALL YOU NEED IS LOVE")
