Category: Music

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No soul

Beatles fans around the world are having orgasms of delight at the announcement, a couple of days ago, that the SDE version of Rubber Soul is coming later in the year.

SDE is Super Deluxe Edition. We have already had these for Sgt Pepper, Revolver, The Beatles, Abbey Road and Let It Be.

There are lots of videos and postings and goodness knows what with people listing and commenting on the contents. Enough to say there are multiple versions, cd and bluray, vinyl, coloured vinyl, whatever…. Completists will get them all. Did we say Apple was trying to money grab from the fans at multiple hundreds of pounds per version? No, we didn’t.

Rubber Soul is OK. We have written about it before, and it’s not on our list of favourites. The lads were still touring but coming to the end of the Fab Four era and getting into more serious stuff. Rubber Soul marks a boundary. It’s got a more Dylan feel. Most of the songs are fine, but the album as a whole doesn’t amount to much. Nothing really stands out. It’s pleasant but unmemorable. It’s even hard to remember the track titles or order.

Rubber Soul also had an American version with different tracks.

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Happy 70th birthday

It’s Eurovisoon Song Contest time again, the 70th anniversary of the first. Here in the UK, the BBC put yesterday’s first semi-final on BBC1 (it is popular, but presumably it’s also an easy option).

As ever, there were some duff songs and some good ones. Israel was included and progressed to the final. Some countries have withdrawn because they are included, and we could hear some chants in the audience. So sad that people have to spoil an otherwise jolly event.

The BBC commentators, you know, those who talk through the songs, said that we can only vote on-line. I’m not sure if that is true for other countries, but the impression I got was that they could use phones. You would ring a specific number for a song and register a vote. It cost 15p or something, though I don’t know why. Anyway, it would be added to your phone bill. Easy peasy.

Now you go on-line. You need a credit card. I have not tried this, nor will I. Presumably you give them all your personal details, card details including security code then goodness what happens after that. It’s not even clear who “them” are, or if it’s in any way secure. Maybe you have to agree to marketing and advertising and crap.

It sounds like the kind of things scammers do, especially on porn sites. Give us your details, thanks, we’re selling it to goodness-knows-who. No thanks.

Another nice thing spoilt.

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Tom Lehrer

When I was at school in the late 60s, our Music teacher would play us records by Tom Lehrer. Not the very rude ones, but the more acceptable ones.

If you don’t know TL, here’s a clip:

If that doesn’t work, here’s a link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=taui8bOM4_c

Lehrer was a very clever chap. He had a Masters from Harvard by the age of 19. He sang comic, and not so comic songs to amuse his chums.

He chose to release them and they were a big success, but then Lehrer retired from the showbiz in around 1960 after just a few years. He died in 2025 at a ripe old age.

His biography is very interesting and worth a read.

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