This Week In Hippie Music History
The biggie of course is that Jerry Garcia’s birthday was on August 1st. He would have been 65 years young. Luckily and happily his tunes live on.
But there is one more hugely notable event:
August 4, 1966: John Lennon is outed as having said that The Beatles are more popular than Jesus. Although, other dates have been noted as the day this event actually took place. However, Robert Fontenot, (a great oldies music fan) at About.com’s Oldies Music site explains the events this way:
“July 29, 1966, when the teenybop magazine “DATEbook” published an excerpt of an earlier John interview where he stated that the Beatles were “more popular than Jesus.” Maureen Cleave’s original interview in the London Evening Standard had raised no eyebrows four months later, but in America, it exploded.”
The original interview from the Standard quotes Lennon as saying, “Christianity will go. It will vanish and shrink. … We’re more popular than Jesus now; I don’t know which will go first-rock ‘n’ roll or Christianity. Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. It’s them twisting it that ruins it for me.”
However it happened the main point is that all hell broke loose. There was album burning, radio stations quit playing their music, people hollering at them to fly home, the Vatican denounced John Lennon’s remarks — although later forgave him after Lennon apologized. People thought it was a publicity stunt. It was just the biggest mess resulting in the final Beatles U.S tour. For a long version of the story visit the great News of the Odd.
If you think about it, this wouldn’t happen to this extreme now. Of course the media highlights and scrutinizes every celebrity comment that gets said. But I’m not sure we’ve seen another quote in music create such a stir that has the decades worth of staying power that Lennon’s did.
Can you think of one?
I wasn’t there, but personally I think that to say people over-reacted is an understatement. How many of us say stuff we wish we hadn’t? What if our lives were highlighted each evening on the news. Living life would be very hard and most of us would end up short in the friend’s department I bet. We waste a lot of time scrutinizing others. Could you stop for just one day, a week? It’s interesting to think about.
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