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Record shops were great to spend time in.
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I could spend three or four hours just strolling round.
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That was one of the most exciting places to hang out.
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You break the veneer of the hip joint employee.
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All it is, is a kind of like, "All right?" - just one of them,
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and you're like, "I own this town and everything in it."
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That's how it felt.
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When people walked around town,
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if you had some albums under your arm, it told people who you were.
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Something to read on the bus on the way home from the record shop.
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Really a magical moment, when you rush home and you put the music on.
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You'd have to extract the record from its sleeve
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and place it on the turntable.
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The first time you drop a needle on a record,
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it's ten points if there's a little bit of skid and then...
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Bump, biting into it, as the needle hit the vinyl.
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And then the music comes in.
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There's nothing as wonderful as that.
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The unsung hero in popular music's epic history is not a performer,
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or a band, or even a song.
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It's this - the long-playing album.
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A creative canvas on which musicians could express themselves
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like never before.
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It turned record labels into business empires,
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turned humble musicians into exalted immortals...
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..and helped transform popular music from disposable teenage distraction
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to an art form.
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This is the story of how, from the mid-'60s to the late '70s,
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the long-playing album changed popular music for ever...
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..the era when albums ruled the world.
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Around 130 grams of vinyl and acetate mix, 1,600 feet of groove,
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33 and a third revolutions per minute -
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the long-playing vinyl record was unveiled to the world
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by Columbia Records in 1948.
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With up to 22 and a half minutes of sound per side,
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it was the perfect vehicle for classical music
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and soundtracks to popular musicals.
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It was a product aimed at, and bought by, adults.
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I remember a lot of soundtrack albums.
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Your parents went to see a show or a film, then they'd get
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West Side Story soundtrack, or Oklahoma! soundtrack or My Fair Lady.
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And it was very much... I saw LPs as being part of the grown-up world.
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Along with soundtracks and classical music, the LP soon became home
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to easy listening collections and jazz recordings.
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But while parents listened to their LPs,
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teenagers were dancing to a different beat.
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# Wop-bop-a-loo-bop a-lop-bam-boom Tutti frutti... #
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This was rock'n'roll, preserve of a smaller, cheaper disc.
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A 45 is a little guy with a big fat hole in the middle,
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slips on to this penis.
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How very phallic, how very sexual.
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But as the '50s became the '60s,
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teenagers' disposable income grew and rock'n'roll,
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increasingly called pop music, began to creep onto the grooves of the LP.
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Many albums of that era
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by pop artists contained the singles and then some duff tracks,
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a few covers, and some filler.
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The artistic pinnacle is a hit single as a pop artist,
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and an album, in a way, is often always perceived
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as a kind of cash-in on the single rather than the other way round.
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The artistic opportunity the LP could provide
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was still waiting to be discovered.
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Intellectually, it was fallow.
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The minds of the young people hadn't really expanded yet.
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# I'm all shook up. #
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But change was in the air.
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In New York's Greenwich Village, folk music was about to show
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that the LP could be the canvas for a new kind of musical expression.
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In the early 1960s, American folk music was enjoying a renaissance.
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Folk captured the spirit of protest
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in a society still scarred by racial segregation.
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Society itself is changing during the early '60s,
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both technologically and socially,
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and there's a growing sense
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that music itself should address some of that.
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# I've seen trouble all my days... #
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Into this scene stepped a 20-year-old Bob Dylan.
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His 1962 debut was a collection of folk standards.
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But for his second record, he did something different.
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# Oh, where have you been, my blue-eyed son? #
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He recorded an album almost entirely made up of original songs.
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# Oh, where have you been, my darling young one? #
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That marks a change
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and one that's quite noticeable among his peers
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and general public, that the songs are credited to Bob Dylan.
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He is the artist behind this album.
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Here were 13 songs that tackled love, war, peace and race.
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I ran into him at a party,
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and he was in a back bedroom, playing to some girls,
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trying to impress them, and he played Masters Of War
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and A Hard Rain's Gonna Fall, and I was like, what?!
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It was the most powerful thing I had ever heard.
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# Come, you masters of war
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# You that build the big guns... #
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Freewheelin' was Dylan's statement on the world around him.
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Bob Dylan was clearly developing the idea
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of looking at the album as a collection.
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There was serious thought put into the make-up
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of what this album was going to be.
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This was a landmark.
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This was a new chapter in American music.
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# The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind
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# The answer is blowin' in the wind... #
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Everything about Freewheelin' seemed to herald a new era,
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right down to the cover.
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Nobody did covers like that.
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It was so confident, so oblique, so casual, like,
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"Yeah, I got a girlfriend, so what?
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"Here she is. It's not glamorous, it's nothing. It's just reality."
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The whole thing, just...powerful.
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# I'll know my song well before I start singing
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# And it's a hard And it's a hard... #
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The expansive canvas of the long player
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had allowed Bob Dylan to find his voice.
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In return, Dylan had given the album a new purpose.
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While the early albums from British bands like The Rolling Stones,
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The Beatles and The Kinks were still just collections of pop songs,
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Dylan's next records would continue
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to push the boundaries of what an album could be.
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He pushes that further and further,
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by introducing 11-minute songs
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on Highway 61 Revisited or Desolation Row,
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and then having what is one of the very first double albums
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with Blonde On Blonde, where you have side-sprawling tracks.
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And with these albums now charting in the US top 10,
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Dylan's vision for the album was entering the mainstream.
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Dylan's career, in a way, provides a blueprint
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for how artists that follow him want to pursue their careers.
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They want to be able to pursue their own artistic vision
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and they want to pursue it on album.
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In California, this artistic vision was heightened
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by the addition of a new ingredient.
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PSYCHEDELIC ELECTRIC GUITAR PLAYS
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Diethylamide, popularly known as LSD.
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If you haven't heard of LSD, you will.
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LSD was the catalyst behind a psychedelic subculture
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that had the album at its core.
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A whole kind of chunk of your mind gets opened up
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and a lot of the musicians had fairly good experiences with acid.
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By 1966, the folk music revival had reached California,
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where bands like Jefferson Airplane
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had absorbed it into a new musical melting pot.
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# Lord, look at me here... #
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Jack and Jorma were blues men.
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Paul liked outer space, and Marty wrote love songs.
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And I like folk music,
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so you got a real smorgasbord of stuff, and I liked it that way.
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But it was the acid that took the music of the West Coast underground
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in entirely new directions.
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Expansive psychedelic rock LPs like this were tailor-made
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for their tune-in, drop-out audience.
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I mean, one reason why album culture suited psychedelic culture
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is that if you were sprawled out or sitting cross-legged
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and being semi-meditative to the music, the last thing you wanted
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was to have to get up and, you know, turn the record over
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or change the record any more often than you had to.
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Call your friends and come on over
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and everybody sitting listening to the whole album all at once,
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you made comments about it afterwards, smoked a bunch of dope
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or have wine or whatever you do, and it was great.
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But while this new audience
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devoured the records of the psychedelic scene,
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one place this new album-based music couldn't be heard was radio.
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# I need love, love
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# To ease my mind... #
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The big American radio stations,
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I mean, the giants, you know, in LA,
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93 KHJ, for example, the Boss Jocks, they were playing singles,
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so, you know, there wasn't a lot of platform on air
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for album music until the arrival of KSAN in San Francisco.
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KSAN was a local station that revolutionised American radio.
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In 1967, a KSAN DJ connected to the psychedelic scene,
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called Tom Donahue, stopped broadcasting chart hits
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and started playing album tracks instead.
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This is Tom Donahue at KSAN,
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K-S-A-N, Metromedia Stereo 95, San Francisco, Oakland.
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This new format was an instant success.
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By the late '60s,
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every town in America had an FM station
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with at least a late-night free-form show, if not all day long.
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It was a massive game changer.
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The origination of the engine,
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the first part of the engine
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that powered album sales in America through the '70s.
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Donahue's radio revolution soon crossed the Atlantic
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and found its way aboard the pirate radio stations
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based off the coast of Britain.
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The turning point for me
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was hearing John Peel do Perfume Garden late at night out there,
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and as John described it one night,
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in his stone solitude in the middle of the North Sea,
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playing this amazing music that he'd brought back from America with him.
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The concept of the album as a revolutionary musical force
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was spreading.
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And in London, it would now emerge as the object
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and the idea that would dominate the next decade of music history.
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MUSIC: I Can't Explain by The Who
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By the mid-'60s, swinging London had
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become the hippest city in the world.
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Acts like The Who, Dusty Springfield
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and Manfred Mann had scored hit single
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after international hit single.
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But the biggest singles band of them all, The Beatles, had been
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absorbing American album music, from Dylan to the psychedelic scene.
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At the start of '60s, your parents loved them.
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Your mum would take you to see Help!, A Hard Day's Night,
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and maybe she'd buy the LP for herself.
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And by the end of the '60s, your parents despised The Beatles
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and they were symbolic of everything that
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they were afraid was going to happen to you -
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that you were going to grow your hair, you were going to take drugs.
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When I saw that Rubber Soul album cover and they're looking down,
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you looked at them and went,
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"Uh-oh, these guys have been psychedelicised."
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After The Beatles ended their 1966 world tour, they returned to
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London's Abbey Road Studios to begin another recording session,
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but this time, things would be different.
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Out of the blue, John says to George Martin, "On this record,
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"we're going to create sounds that no-one's ever heard before.
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"We don't have to worry about reproducing them live
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"because we're never going to tour again."
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At the end of 1966,
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The Beatles started work on Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
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and so began the most ambitious album recording session to date.
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When you see shots of George Harrison bundling out of a Rolls-Royce
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and in through the door of Abbey Road with reams and reams of A4,
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waving at everyone, head down,
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getting into the studio, getting to work, it's like...
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They must have felt like they were splitting the atom in there.
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For those inside Abbey Road, it was clear the band wanted this
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to be a different kind of recording session.
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John, especially, was looking for something new.
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Things weren't in the studio to create things new,
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so that was the gauntlet that was thrown down.
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Analogue four-track studio technology
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was to be pushed to its limits.
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Every time we were going to use an instrument,
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they were fed up with listening to a guitar sounding like a guitar,
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or a piano sounding like a piano, a cowbell sounding like a cowbell,
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so we did all we could to try and mask those sounds.
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You knew it was a guitar, but it had some sort of quirkiness to it.
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This intensive approach to recording was another influence picked up
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from the American psychedelic scene.
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The idea that it's possible to really spend time in the studio
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and experiment and explore.
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Brian Wilson was doing that with Pet Sounds
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and Paul sort of picked that baton up as well.
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Here we go, then. We'll send the tape. Are you ready, Richard?
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Marshalling the band was veteran producer George Martin.
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OK, Jeff? Right, here we go.
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He turned the studio into the LP's final instrument.
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George was brilliant at that.
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He was like a schoolmaster and we were the schoolchildren, you know?
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The last tracks on the record were laid down in April 1967.
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That night, set up a monitor mix,
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and there was just the most unbelievable atmosphere.
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# Woke up, fell out of bed Dragged a comb across my head... #
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No-one had ever heard anything that sounded like that in their lives,
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it was like going from a square black and white picture
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into CinemaScope Technicolor.
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And Ron Richards was sitting on the floor by the mixing console,
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and Ron was the producer of The Hollies.
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And Ron had his head in his hands
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and he said, "I'm going to give the business up."
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That was his intention, it was that amazing.
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# Ah... #
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What The Beatles had created was arguably
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the world's first concept album.
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Since they weren't touring any more,
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The Beatles would go on the road in their imaginations
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as Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.
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# It was 20 years ago today... #
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This is the start of his concept. It was some fictitious band
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and they were tuning up at the Albert Hall.
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They're creating a kind of quasi-live set
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and bring in a lot of ideas
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that are quintessentially English, you have to say, you know?
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The sort of musical idea of... they had a brass band.
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And then you hear a laughter.
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The reason why the laughter's there is that we're supposed to be
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the audience, the listener of that album is supposed to be
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sitting in the audience of a theatre.
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# We're Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
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# We hope you will enjoy the show... #
286
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And the way they flow into each other.
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CHEERING
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The way that the stories and the themes reappear.
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# We're Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
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# We hope you have enjoyed the show... #
291
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There's a cohesive thread that binds all these songs together.
292
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The album has a beginning and a middle and an end.
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This was a revelation.
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# Sgt Pepper's Lonely Sgt Pepper's Lonely... #
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The concept of an imaginary band on tour was played out
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on the album sleeve as well.
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Bela Lugosi and God knows who, Lenny Bruce, WC Fields,
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Laurel and Hardy.
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Oh, look, there's Marlon Brando. Oh, there's Bob Dylan.
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This is one of...might be the most recognisable album cover of all time.
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00:18:15,400 --> 00:18:19,000
As a last, innovative touch, the final groove on the record
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was cut back on itself so, in theory, it would play into infinity,
303
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just like the influence of the music itself.
304
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Sgt Pepper is the template for everything we've come to know
305
00:18:32,480 --> 00:18:35,520
now as the great long-playing record.
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00:18:37,080 --> 00:18:41,280
Sgt Pepper shot to number one in the UK and became the longest
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and highest charting of all The Beatles' albums in America.
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00:18:49,440 --> 00:18:51,080
By the end of the year,
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sales of albums in the US passed the 1 billion mark for the first time.
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Albums were now outselling singles in both the US and UK.
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Sgt Pepper, it was a catalyst.
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When you think, '66, '67, was an incredibly creative time.
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So you've got other bands that were coming through,
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particularly in London, The Underground,
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00:19:15,000 --> 00:19:17,360
bands like Pink Floyd, Soft Machine,
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who weren't conforming their songs to two-and-a-half,
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three-minute single formats.
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Some bands tried to copy the Sgt Pepper's formula.
319
00:19:28,000 --> 00:19:32,000
Some lampooned it. Others, like guitarist Jimi Hendrix,
320
00:19:32,000 --> 00:19:36,320
wanted to take the idea of artistic control a step further.
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All right!
322
00:19:39,720 --> 00:19:42,840
Hendrix had been plucked from obscurity by producer,
323
00:19:42,840 --> 00:19:45,400
Chas Chandler, in 1966.
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Together, they made two albums that established Hendrix
325
00:19:48,720 --> 00:19:51,840
as the most influential guitarist in rock.
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00:19:51,840 --> 00:19:57,080
But his 1968 LP, Electric Ladyland, would be a new departure.
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00:20:00,160 --> 00:20:01,920
After a fallout with Chandler,
328
00:20:01,920 --> 00:20:05,160
this would be Hendrix's first album without a producer.
329
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MUSIC: All Along The Watchtower
330
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Artistic control over album recording was entering a new phase.
331
00:20:14,880 --> 00:20:18,920
So Hendrix, at this point, in order to warm up, almost,
332
00:20:18,920 --> 00:20:22,560
is every single evening going to jam at a club
333
00:20:22,560 --> 00:20:25,600
two blocks down the street called The Scene.
334
00:20:25,600 --> 00:20:30,120
He would literally turn up and jam with whoever happened to be on stage.
335
00:20:30,120 --> 00:20:35,240
You know, we have the session booked for eight o'clock. No Jimi.
336
00:20:35,240 --> 00:20:39,840
And then around midnight or so, when Jimi felt he'd got enough
337
00:20:39,840 --> 00:20:44,240
players that he felt were in the moment with him and would be useful
338
00:20:44,240 --> 00:20:48,880
in the studio, he would literally walk from The Scene down to the
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00:20:48,880 --> 00:20:53,360
record plant, like a circus of people walking these two blocks in New York.
340
00:20:53,360 --> 00:20:57,960
I can think of this one fabulous night where he dragged in
341
00:20:57,960 --> 00:21:02,440
Steve Winwood, Jack Cassidy, they come in,
342
00:21:02,440 --> 00:21:06,000
Mitch gets on the drums, Jimi plugs in the guitar.
343
00:21:06,000 --> 00:21:09,520
The organ's all ready, the bass, everything.
344
00:21:09,520 --> 00:21:13,880
We open up the faders, they rehearse, one take.
345
00:21:13,880 --> 00:21:18,000
Next take, that's the master. Done. We get Voodoo Chile.
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00:21:18,000 --> 00:21:22,080
MUSIC: Voodoo Chile
347
00:21:24,000 --> 00:21:27,160
This is where we are now with long-playing records.
348
00:21:27,160 --> 00:21:30,320
We're beyond even where The Beatles were, who were, more or less,
349
00:21:30,320 --> 00:21:32,600
nine-to-five creatures in the studio.
350
00:21:32,600 --> 00:21:36,200
We're, "When will the lightning strike? We need to be ready."
351
00:21:37,720 --> 00:21:40,080
Complete control of the recording process
352
00:21:40,080 --> 00:21:42,920
allowed Hendrix to indulge his every musical whim.
353
00:21:44,360 --> 00:21:48,200
Electric Ladyland was his most adventurous record.
354
00:21:48,200 --> 00:21:51,920
And there was so much...
355
00:21:51,920 --> 00:21:55,360
so many great things he was doing in the studio that hadn't
356
00:21:55,360 --> 00:21:56,800
necessarily been heard before.
357
00:21:58,360 --> 00:22:02,320
The result was tracks of increasing length and complexity,
358
00:22:02,320 --> 00:22:05,720
such as the near 14-minute 1983...
359
00:22:07,200 --> 00:22:10,080
# Hooray, I wake from yesterday... #
360
00:22:10,080 --> 00:22:13,080
One take all the way through.
361
00:22:13,080 --> 00:22:15,920
..which Hendrix even helped mix.
362
00:22:15,920 --> 00:22:18,040
I would take one half of the console
363
00:22:18,040 --> 00:22:20,560
and I'd give Jimi, like, a vocal track
364
00:22:20,560 --> 00:22:22,320
and some other things over here
365
00:22:22,320 --> 00:22:25,080
and we would rehearse it as a performance, and then in the middle
366
00:22:25,080 --> 00:22:28,120
of the mix, we would look at each other and we would start laughing
367
00:22:28,120 --> 00:22:30,560
and say, "OK, are you ready to split? OK, go."
368
00:22:30,560 --> 00:22:34,680
And I'd get up and I'd shift positions with Jimi, and Jimi would
369
00:22:34,680 --> 00:22:37,680
take my position, and we'd go like this, "You ready to go back? Yeah."
370
00:22:37,680 --> 00:22:39,840
And then we'd bump into each other,
371
00:22:39,840 --> 00:22:42,520
he'd fall on the floor laughing, I'd fall on the floor laughing
372
00:22:42,520 --> 00:22:44,280
and then the tape would still be running.
373
00:22:46,960 --> 00:22:50,760
Electric Ladyland was the first Hendrix LP to hit
374
00:22:50,760 --> 00:22:53,840
the top of the US charts when released in 1968...
375
00:22:55,280 --> 00:22:59,920
..proving that artistic freedom could equal commercial success.
376
00:22:59,920 --> 00:23:04,560
# You jump in front of my car When you, you know all the time... #
377
00:23:04,560 --> 00:23:09,760
Classic double albums like Electric Ladyland were met with
378
00:23:09,760 --> 00:23:15,480
a certain amount of incomprehension by early reviewers.
379
00:23:15,480 --> 00:23:18,880
They weren't designed to whack you over the head the first time
380
00:23:18,880 --> 00:23:23,560
you heard them and give up all they had to offer on that first hearing.
381
00:23:23,560 --> 00:23:29,320
They were designed to gradually sink in to reveal more detail
382
00:23:29,320 --> 00:23:32,840
and subtext as you listened to them over and over again.
383
00:23:36,960 --> 00:23:39,960
Increasingly adventurous album tracks from both British
384
00:23:39,960 --> 00:23:43,640
and American bands were now dominating the ever more popular
385
00:23:43,640 --> 00:23:45,680
FM radio network in America.
386
00:23:48,680 --> 00:23:53,400
This album music was becoming a category all of its own. AOR.
387
00:23:53,400 --> 00:23:55,560
Album-oriented rock.
388
00:23:55,560 --> 00:23:58,120
You know, you've got bands who were now maturing
389
00:23:58,120 --> 00:24:03,400
and now delivering what was becoming increasingly sophisticated music.
390
00:24:03,400 --> 00:24:07,600
Fantastic sort of time for albums to burst through,
391
00:24:07,600 --> 00:24:10,640
supported by American radio in the way that they were.
392
00:24:12,600 --> 00:24:14,680
You've got The Velvet Underground,
393
00:24:14,680 --> 00:24:16,800
you had Frank Zappa And The Mothers Of Invention,
394
00:24:16,800 --> 00:24:18,240
you had Captain Beefheart,
395
00:24:18,240 --> 00:24:21,960
you had a whole bunch of stuff that would have been...
396
00:24:21,960 --> 00:24:26,880
that wouldn't even have been classified as pop music
397
00:24:26,880 --> 00:24:30,000
or rock music just a little while earlier.
398
00:24:30,000 --> 00:24:34,320
# Ever since I was a young boy I played the silver ball... #
399
00:24:34,320 --> 00:24:37,000
In London, The Who, once known as a singles band,
400
00:24:37,000 --> 00:24:40,360
released a double album called Tommy.
401
00:24:40,360 --> 00:24:44,560
Its writer, Pete Townshend, proclaimed it a rock opera.
402
00:24:51,240 --> 00:24:55,880
It's such a cliched term now, but at the time, it was exciting and fresh.
403
00:24:55,880 --> 00:25:01,640
A rock opera. Grandeur, meaning, credibility.
404
00:25:01,640 --> 00:25:04,760
And The Who weren't the only chart-friendly band to recognise
405
00:25:04,760 --> 00:25:07,320
the creative power of the album.
406
00:25:09,480 --> 00:25:13,200
Some people may see The Stones as perhaps more of a singles band.
407
00:25:13,200 --> 00:25:16,360
They think of Satisfaction, Paint It Black.
408
00:25:16,360 --> 00:25:19,400
And, of course, that's what they were to begin with, in the same way
409
00:25:19,400 --> 00:25:22,440
that that's what The Beatles were to begin with.
410
00:25:22,440 --> 00:25:25,240
But they wouldn't have the legacy they have now
411
00:25:25,240 --> 00:25:29,080
if they hadn't made the same journey The Beatles did from being
412
00:25:29,080 --> 00:25:36,760
this supernova singles act into long-playing-oriented band
413
00:25:36,760 --> 00:25:39,800
that made its reputation completely on its albums.
414
00:25:41,040 --> 00:25:45,360
Starting in 1968, The Stones made a series of four albums,
415
00:25:45,360 --> 00:25:49,400
which would be seen by many as their creative peak.
416
00:25:49,400 --> 00:25:52,240
If you think of some of their greatest tracks,
417
00:25:52,240 --> 00:25:54,880
Sympathy For The Devil, You Can't Always Get What You Want,
418
00:25:54,880 --> 00:25:57,600
Wild Horses, none of these are singles.
419
00:25:59,280 --> 00:26:01,880
The more rock bands embraced the LP
420
00:26:01,880 --> 00:26:06,320
and pushed its artistic boundaries, the more sales soared.
421
00:26:06,320 --> 00:26:10,600
By 1969, some 200 million albums were being bought annually
422
00:26:10,600 --> 00:26:16,480
in the US, and rock LPs accounted for four-fifths of these sales.
423
00:26:16,480 --> 00:26:20,320
The economics of the industry were changing, commercial success
424
00:26:20,320 --> 00:26:25,360
no longer depended on hit singles, as one band was about to prove.
425
00:26:28,800 --> 00:26:30,600
# Hey... #
426
00:26:30,600 --> 00:26:34,200
With a harder-edged raucous rock sound, Led Zeppelin hit
427
00:26:34,200 --> 00:26:39,600
the top of the US and UK charts with their 1969 debut album.
428
00:26:39,600 --> 00:26:42,760
The band was led by a veteran session guitarist.
429
00:26:42,760 --> 00:26:46,800
We're talking about a guy, Jimmy Page, who played on something
430
00:26:46,800 --> 00:26:51,840
like 60% of every hit single made in London over the previous five years.
431
00:26:51,840 --> 00:26:54,920
Led Zeppelin were Page's way out from a career of playing
432
00:26:54,920 --> 00:26:56,760
on other people's hit singles.
433
00:26:59,760 --> 00:27:04,160
The whole idea is for Jimmy Page to do everything
434
00:27:04,160 --> 00:27:10,880
he'd never done before - not make music to the clock, not make hits.
435
00:27:10,880 --> 00:27:15,040
When work finished on the band's second album later in 1969,
436
00:27:15,040 --> 00:27:17,560
Page sends Zeppelin's manager, Peter Grant,
437
00:27:17,560 --> 00:27:20,080
with an ultimatum to Atlantic Records.
438
00:27:20,080 --> 00:27:23,840
No singles were to be released, not even the sure-fire hit,
439
00:27:23,840 --> 00:27:25,440
Whole Lotta Love.
440
00:27:25,440 --> 00:27:28,000
# Yeah, what a whole lotta love... #
441
00:27:29,960 --> 00:27:35,520
Pete doing his air of threat about him, he said, "No singles."
442
00:27:35,520 --> 00:27:37,600
And everybody looked in astonishment.
443
00:27:37,600 --> 00:27:40,360
The record company, understandably, utterly baffled.
444
00:27:40,360 --> 00:27:43,520
Here's this hit in the making, we can't release it.
445
00:27:45,760 --> 00:27:48,560
But Carson wasn't about to be told what to do,
446
00:27:48,560 --> 00:27:50,840
even by Peter Grant and Led Zeppelin.
447
00:27:50,840 --> 00:27:54,560
I decided that there should be a single, right? I did that.
448
00:27:54,560 --> 00:27:56,240
And I put a single out.
449
00:27:56,240 --> 00:27:58,960
I put an edited version of Whole Lotta Love out
450
00:27:58,960 --> 00:28:02,760
and incurred the total wrath of Jimmy Page and Peter Grant
451
00:28:02,760 --> 00:28:06,840
and was immediately forced to withdraw the whole damn lot.
452
00:28:06,840 --> 00:28:10,120
I think the number was something like 3,000 went to Manchester
453
00:28:10,120 --> 00:28:12,240
before I could stop them going there.
454
00:28:15,160 --> 00:28:17,400
Even with no singles to promote it,
455
00:28:17,400 --> 00:28:22,560
Led Zeppelin II topped the charts in both America and Britain in 1970.
456
00:28:22,560 --> 00:28:26,560
Jimmy and Peter Grant and Led Zeppelin were right.
457
00:28:26,560 --> 00:28:28,320
By not having a single,
458
00:28:28,320 --> 00:28:33,320
that Led Zeppelin II album was selling like it was a single.
459
00:28:37,120 --> 00:28:38,760
Within three years,
460
00:28:38,760 --> 00:28:41,760
Led Zeppelin were the biggest grossing act in the world.
461
00:28:41,760 --> 00:28:46,480
That is probably the pinnacle of how to sell an album.
462
00:28:46,480 --> 00:28:53,760
Make great music and make it available only in its album format.
463
00:28:53,760 --> 00:28:55,960
Don't sell anybody a single.
464
00:28:57,240 --> 00:29:00,440
The single was rapidly falling out of fashion.
465
00:29:00,440 --> 00:29:01,960
By the turn of the decade,
466
00:29:01,960 --> 00:29:05,440
albums accounted for over 80% of record sales.
467
00:29:07,760 --> 00:29:10,360
TRUMPET PLAYS
468
00:29:14,200 --> 00:29:17,200
But while the rock album was on the crest of a wave,
469
00:29:17,200 --> 00:29:19,040
other musical forms were suffering.
470
00:29:20,720 --> 00:29:24,400
The popularity of jazz had been declining for years.
471
00:29:24,400 --> 00:29:27,520
Not even one of the most celebrated jazz musicians of all time
472
00:29:27,520 --> 00:29:28,960
was immune,
473
00:29:28,960 --> 00:29:32,800
Miles Davis, a long-time Columbia Records artist.
474
00:29:34,120 --> 00:29:36,960
You know, he came to me, and his words, he said,
475
00:29:36,960 --> 00:29:40,880
"These fucking young, long-haired white kids,
476
00:29:40,880 --> 00:29:42,720
"they're stealing my rip."
477
00:29:42,720 --> 00:29:46,920
He said, "How come I'm selling 70,000
478
00:29:46,920 --> 00:29:49,160
"and they're selling a million,
479
00:29:49,160 --> 00:29:50,920
"two million albums?"
480
00:29:53,680 --> 00:29:58,720
With Columbia riding high on sales of rock LPs, Clive Davis knew
481
00:29:58,720 --> 00:30:03,400
better than anyone where the album-buying market was - rock fans.
482
00:30:03,400 --> 00:30:08,000
My saying, "Miles, you know, you're playing in small jazz clubs."
483
00:30:09,880 --> 00:30:14,440
I said, "You've got to get out where the young people are,
484
00:30:14,440 --> 00:30:16,360
"you're going to be impressed...
485
00:30:17,920 --> 00:30:21,640
"..with what you hear. Somehow it's going to influence your music...
486
00:30:23,760 --> 00:30:27,480
"..and moreover, you're going to have an audience that just doesn't go
487
00:30:27,480 --> 00:30:29,160
"to your jazz clubs."
488
00:30:29,160 --> 00:30:31,280
So, for his next project,
489
00:30:31,280 --> 00:30:34,800
Miles Davis took a whole new approach to the jazz LP.
490
00:30:34,800 --> 00:30:36,560
At this particular moment,
491
00:30:36,560 --> 00:30:39,400
you suddenly get Miles Davis dropping the suit and tie,
492
00:30:39,400 --> 00:30:43,800
dropping the super jazz cool and suddenly dressing like Jimi Hendrix.
493
00:30:43,800 --> 00:30:46,320
Big shades, robes.
494
00:30:46,320 --> 00:30:49,000
And suddenly he makes this extraordinary album
495
00:30:49,000 --> 00:30:50,280
called Bitches Brew.
496
00:30:52,080 --> 00:30:55,720
The double album Bitches Brew was released in 1970,
497
00:30:55,720 --> 00:30:58,080
with a cover from artist Marty Klarwein,
498
00:30:58,080 --> 00:31:00,800
whose work had adorned Jimi Hendrix LPs.
499
00:31:05,880 --> 00:31:08,800
The music was a radical departure for jazz,
500
00:31:08,800 --> 00:31:11,040
adding rock guitar and drums.
501
00:31:11,040 --> 00:31:14,520
It was the style that became known as fusion.
502
00:31:16,200 --> 00:31:20,560
So, what you will find in fusion that you can listen to,
503
00:31:20,560 --> 00:31:23,200
that you'll pull out of it, is the groove.
504
00:31:26,440 --> 00:31:30,560
A jazz personality on top of a rock groove,
505
00:31:30,560 --> 00:31:33,880
fundamentally, and that's what fusion, fundamentally, is.
506
00:31:35,480 --> 00:31:39,120
It was interesting because during those days,
507
00:31:39,120 --> 00:31:41,720
jazz and rock started to work together
508
00:31:41,720 --> 00:31:47,560
and all of a sudden you heard jazz being played on a technical level
509
00:31:47,560 --> 00:31:49,560
that was next level.
510
00:31:51,640 --> 00:31:53,560
HE IMITATES TRUMPET
511
00:31:53,560 --> 00:31:54,600
It's like, "Whoa!"
512
00:31:56,680 --> 00:32:00,520
To record the album, Davis had assembled an astonishing array
513
00:32:00,520 --> 00:32:04,680
of young jazz talent, including drummer Billy Cobham.
514
00:32:04,680 --> 00:32:08,640
The tracks were heavily improvised, with Davis as the conductor.
515
00:32:08,640 --> 00:32:13,520
He said to me the night before, "You know that groove we played?
516
00:32:13,520 --> 00:32:15,160
"I like that, play it tomorrow."
517
00:32:15,160 --> 00:32:17,920
OK. Got there, of course I couldn't remember what to play.
518
00:32:17,920 --> 00:32:19,280
I started to play something,
519
00:32:19,280 --> 00:32:21,600
he says, "That's not what you played last night.
520
00:32:21,600 --> 00:32:23,200
"But I like that, I want it!"
521
00:32:27,840 --> 00:32:30,920
Bitches Brew changed everything for Davis.
522
00:32:30,920 --> 00:32:34,840
Hardcore jazz fans were outraged by this new direction,
523
00:32:34,840 --> 00:32:38,920
but Davis was now playing to rock fans at the Isle of Wight Festival
524
00:32:38,920 --> 00:32:40,560
in 1970.
525
00:32:40,560 --> 00:32:43,400
Is this a jazz festival? No.
526
00:32:43,400 --> 00:32:46,240
Is this a pop festival? Absolutely not.
527
00:32:46,240 --> 00:32:50,800
This is a rock, long-playing, freak-out, far-out,
528
00:32:50,800 --> 00:32:55,320
join in, trip out, go-on-your-journey festival.
529
00:32:56,800 --> 00:33:00,040
Davis tapped into this vast rock audience,
530
00:33:00,040 --> 00:33:04,200
scoring his first gold record on one of the bestselling jazz albums ever.
531
00:33:07,000 --> 00:33:10,560
The musicians from Bitches Brew would go on to form bands
532
00:33:10,560 --> 00:33:13,800
like Mahavishnu Orchestra, Weather Report
533
00:33:13,800 --> 00:33:17,160
and Return To Forever, whose LPs would cement fusion
534
00:33:17,160 --> 00:33:20,360
as jazz's dominant direction for the 1970s.
535
00:33:25,320 --> 00:33:27,240
CHEERING
536
00:33:27,240 --> 00:33:29,200
But even with sales soaring,
537
00:33:29,200 --> 00:33:32,440
not everyone had yet woken up to the power of the album.
538
00:33:36,800 --> 00:33:41,000
In Detroit, Tamla Motown was the most successful record label
539
00:33:41,000 --> 00:33:44,880
of the 1960s, an empire built on the 45.
540
00:33:44,880 --> 00:33:46,560
The core of the Detroit sound
541
00:33:46,560 --> 00:33:49,520
was the idea of the two-and-a-half-minute single
542
00:33:49,520 --> 00:33:54,240
that was instantly recognisable, that had a chorus, three verses.
543
00:33:54,240 --> 00:33:57,920
# Baby, everything is all right... #
544
00:33:57,920 --> 00:34:02,320
And a song that was effervescent, upbeat, very positive about life.
545
00:34:02,320 --> 00:34:06,800
They were not essentially, at least in the '60s, an album company.
546
00:34:06,800 --> 00:34:09,920
MUSIC: I Can't Help Myself by The Four Tops
547
00:34:12,160 --> 00:34:15,640
As the '70s dawned, Motown owner Berry Gordy remained
548
00:34:15,640 --> 00:34:19,080
committed to the label's hit factory formula.
549
00:34:19,080 --> 00:34:22,880
He imagined that he had a better sense of what made a hit record
550
00:34:22,880 --> 00:34:24,840
than any members of his staff.
551
00:34:24,840 --> 00:34:27,600
This often lead to a kind of rancorous relationship
552
00:34:27,600 --> 00:34:30,760
with the producers and sometimes with the singers and musicians.
553
00:34:31,880 --> 00:34:35,920
One of these singers was about to launch Motown into the album era.
554
00:34:35,920 --> 00:34:39,720
# Darling, please stay Don't go away... #
555
00:34:39,720 --> 00:34:42,720
Marvin Gaye was known as the Prince of Motown,
556
00:34:42,720 --> 00:34:46,120
the epitome of the label's chart-friendly sound.
557
00:34:46,120 --> 00:34:49,520
But his relationship with his label was becoming fraught.
558
00:34:49,520 --> 00:34:53,040
He felt that the company was essentially constraining him,
559
00:34:53,040 --> 00:34:56,240
constraining him in all sorts of different ways.
560
00:34:56,240 --> 00:34:59,240
He always felt that Berry Gordy was denying him
561
00:34:59,240 --> 00:35:00,840
being the full Marvin Gaye.
562
00:35:00,840 --> 00:35:04,080
You know, this is a guy who really didn't want the restrictions
563
00:35:04,080 --> 00:35:05,680
of Motown on him.
564
00:35:05,680 --> 00:35:10,320
It was a hit factory, and all of a sudden these artists wanted to grow.
565
00:35:10,320 --> 00:35:13,560
# Ooh, I bet you're wondering how I knew... #
566
00:35:13,560 --> 00:35:16,960
Following the death of singing partner Tammi Terrell,
567
00:35:16,960 --> 00:35:19,920
Gaye had become disillusioned with his pop career
568
00:35:19,920 --> 00:35:23,920
and increasingly concerned with Detroit's social problems.
569
00:35:23,920 --> 00:35:27,720
Gradually, from about 1967 onwards,
570
00:35:27,720 --> 00:35:30,680
that was the era of the urban riots in Detroit,
571
00:35:30,680 --> 00:35:35,400
he began to compile almost a kind of dossier of different things
572
00:35:35,400 --> 00:35:38,880
that were going on in the city, and that dossier became the basis
573
00:35:38,880 --> 00:35:41,840
of probably the greatest soul concept album of all time,
574
00:35:41,840 --> 00:35:43,560
Marvin Gaye's What's Going On.
575
00:35:43,560 --> 00:35:45,040
This is it.
576
00:35:45,040 --> 00:35:47,360
This is What's Going On, Marvin Gaye.
577
00:35:47,360 --> 00:35:49,640
Best sleeve, don't you think?
578
00:35:52,600 --> 00:35:57,520
MUSIC: What's Going On by Marvin Gaye
579
00:35:57,520 --> 00:36:00,880
In 1970, under Berry Gordy's radar,
580
00:36:00,880 --> 00:36:05,560
Gaye had begun work on some new material, not hit singles
581
00:36:05,560 --> 00:36:09,600
but an album, and a radical new direction for Motown.
582
00:36:09,600 --> 00:36:12,040
# Mother, mother... #
583
00:36:12,040 --> 00:36:13,120
CHEERING Thank you!
584
00:36:13,120 --> 00:36:16,720
# There's too many of you crying... #
585
00:36:16,720 --> 00:36:19,800
You knew when you heard it that it was important,
586
00:36:19,800 --> 00:36:24,440
and this was a move on, not just in terms of what he was saying,
587
00:36:24,440 --> 00:36:26,080
ie, "What's going on?"
588
00:36:26,080 --> 00:36:29,720
It was more the construction of the whole piece.
589
00:36:32,640 --> 00:36:37,600
The tracks on What's Going On seemed to melt into one another.
590
00:36:37,600 --> 00:36:39,400
A theme of social commentary
591
00:36:39,400 --> 00:36:43,600
and snippets of conversation gave the album a documentary feel.
592
00:36:43,600 --> 00:36:47,280
This was a concept album in the new rock mould.
593
00:36:47,280 --> 00:36:52,000
It was probably like the early days of rock'n'roll
594
00:36:52,000 --> 00:36:56,120
where bands like The Stones and The Beatles were basically emulating
595
00:36:56,120 --> 00:37:00,520
their blues gospel idols from America.
596
00:37:00,520 --> 00:37:03,360
But here, the roles were reversed.
597
00:37:03,360 --> 00:37:05,240
For the first time, the black acts
598
00:37:05,240 --> 00:37:07,520
were starting to imitate the rock acts.
599
00:37:10,480 --> 00:37:12,600
Musically, Gaye brought
600
00:37:12,600 --> 00:37:16,920
nearly a decade of songwriting experience to bear.
601
00:37:16,920 --> 00:37:20,760
Everything there, jazz, funk, soul, it was all there.
602
00:37:22,320 --> 00:37:26,400
Berry Gordy was worried Gaye's new direction would alienate
603
00:37:26,400 --> 00:37:27,640
his core audience.
604
00:37:27,640 --> 00:37:31,720
But released in May 1971, What's Going On became
605
00:37:31,720 --> 00:37:35,360
Marvin Gaye's first LP to break the Billboard Top 10.
606
00:37:35,360 --> 00:37:39,280
This album came out like a smooth assassin, it was like...
607
00:37:39,280 --> 00:37:41,560
It crept up on you. You know, it's screaming.
608
00:37:41,560 --> 00:37:45,960
It should be a rock album, its statements are so strong.
609
00:37:45,960 --> 00:37:50,280
But yet it's delivered so coolly and so smoothly.
610
00:37:50,280 --> 00:37:53,240
The fact that it gets to the end and he goes up on that high note,
611
00:37:53,240 --> 00:37:57,000
"Ooooh", and then it comes back in like the record begins,
612
00:37:57,000 --> 00:38:01,680
and the fact that it doesn't resolve, it just trots off into the distance,
613
00:38:01,680 --> 00:38:05,400
almost suggesting that that music is playing still
614
00:38:05,400 --> 00:38:07,000
somewhere in the universe.
615
00:38:08,520 --> 00:38:11,760
Within a year, it had sold two million copies
616
00:38:11,760 --> 00:38:14,920
and become Motown's biggest-selling LP.
617
00:38:14,920 --> 00:38:18,160
Even Motown had now entered the album game.
618
00:38:19,560 --> 00:38:22,920
It was with What's Going On that they began to realise
619
00:38:22,920 --> 00:38:25,120
that there was a market in the album,
620
00:38:25,120 --> 00:38:29,440
and then that subsequently set the tone for big albums
621
00:38:29,440 --> 00:38:34,360
by Diana Ross, Stevie Wonder's three albums in the '70s.
622
00:38:34,360 --> 00:38:35,960
It's this moment where rock
623
00:38:35,960 --> 00:38:38,680
and the whole idea of the long-playing record
624
00:38:38,680 --> 00:38:42,960
actually now infiltrates every sphere of music.
625
00:38:42,960 --> 00:38:46,920
The early '70s saw musicians from all backgrounds embracing
626
00:38:46,920 --> 00:38:50,600
the approach, and commercial potential, of the rock album.
627
00:38:50,600 --> 00:38:54,360
Bands like Jethro Tull fused rock with English folk.
628
00:38:54,360 --> 00:38:56,680
MUSIC: Aqualung by Jethro Tull
629
00:38:58,360 --> 00:39:01,120
The Doobie Brothers mixed rock with country.
630
00:39:03,840 --> 00:39:05,360
And in the glam rock scene,
631
00:39:05,360 --> 00:39:08,880
the power of the album divided two of the biggest artists...
632
00:39:08,880 --> 00:39:11,040
MUSIC: Starman by David Bowie
633
00:39:11,040 --> 00:39:13,240
..Marc Bolan and David Bowie.
634
00:39:14,760 --> 00:39:17,760
The crucial difference, really, between what T-Rex
635
00:39:17,760 --> 00:39:21,120
and Marc Bolan were doing and what David Bowie
636
00:39:21,120 --> 00:39:23,880
and the Spiders from Mars were doing
637
00:39:23,880 --> 00:39:27,200
can be summed up in two words - long player.
638
00:39:27,200 --> 00:39:32,520
MUSIC: Cosmic Dancer by T-Rex
639
00:39:32,520 --> 00:39:36,160
Bolan was a glam rock pioneer, but it was the single,
640
00:39:36,160 --> 00:39:38,520
not the album, that was his focus.
641
00:39:38,520 --> 00:39:40,640
I think Marc Bolan and David Bowie,
642
00:39:40,640 --> 00:39:42,760
they always had different goals.
643
00:39:42,760 --> 00:39:45,120
Marc Bolan wanted to have singles,
644
00:39:45,120 --> 00:39:46,480
he wanted to emulate
645
00:39:46,480 --> 00:39:50,560
the singles that he grew up with by Little Richard, Elvis Presley.
646
00:39:50,560 --> 00:39:54,360
David made great albums and let the single be damned.
647
00:39:54,360 --> 00:39:57,240
He did get great singles out of the albums,
648
00:39:57,240 --> 00:40:01,480
but it wasn't his purpose, it wasn't his primary purpose.
649
00:40:01,480 --> 00:40:04,840
Bowie used LPs to stretch himself as an artist.
650
00:40:06,760 --> 00:40:09,440
I hadn't seen him for a whole year and a half
651
00:40:09,440 --> 00:40:13,000
and he came to my apartment in full Ziggy regalia.
652
00:40:13,000 --> 00:40:16,080
No eyebrows, spiky orange hair and all that.
653
00:40:16,080 --> 00:40:19,840
But when this voice came out of that person, it was my friend David.
654
00:40:19,840 --> 00:40:21,920
# Now, Ziggy played guitar
655
00:40:21,920 --> 00:40:25,600
# Jamming good with Weird and Gilly
656
00:40:25,600 --> 00:40:28,000
# And the Spiders from Mars... #
657
00:40:28,000 --> 00:40:31,880
He was the first rock star to invent a rock star.
658
00:40:31,880 --> 00:40:36,600
To invent a person with another name. That's unbelievable.
659
00:40:36,600 --> 00:40:38,880
And then he could still be...
660
00:40:38,880 --> 00:40:42,320
The album could be Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars.
661
00:40:42,320 --> 00:40:44,000
# Ziggy really sang... #
662
00:40:44,000 --> 00:40:50,120
So, you know, Bolan was the pathfinder, in a way,
663
00:40:50,120 --> 00:40:51,640
when it comes to glam rock.
664
00:40:51,640 --> 00:40:57,160
But it was David Bowie, it was Roxy Music, those were the artists
665
00:40:57,160 --> 00:41:01,840
that really benefited long-term because they were LP artists.
666
00:41:06,120 --> 00:41:09,320
As well as allowing artists the space to grow creatively,
667
00:41:09,320 --> 00:41:11,760
the album also allowed them to look inward
668
00:41:11,760 --> 00:41:14,000
and explore a more personal agenda.
669
00:41:15,920 --> 00:41:17,080
In the early '70s,
670
00:41:17,080 --> 00:41:20,200
a new kind of musician started to adopt the album -
671
00:41:20,200 --> 00:41:21,840
the singer-songwriter.
672
00:41:21,840 --> 00:41:24,560
Suddenly it was like people kind of sat down
673
00:41:24,560 --> 00:41:28,800
and were contemplating people more and were wanting to know more what
674
00:41:28,800 --> 00:41:33,240
they had to say and what they had to say about the world, as it were.
675
00:41:33,240 --> 00:41:35,920
Therefore, it became more introspective.
676
00:41:35,920 --> 00:41:40,680
# Tonight you're mine completely... #
677
00:41:40,680 --> 00:41:45,360
Carole King had spent the 1960s writing hits for other people.
678
00:41:45,360 --> 00:41:48,760
A lot of what we did in the early days,
679
00:41:48,760 --> 00:41:50,680
creating a really good track
680
00:41:50,680 --> 00:41:52,960
and getting a couple of good-looking kids
681
00:41:52,960 --> 00:41:55,880
and putting them on it, that was a different business.
682
00:41:55,880 --> 00:41:59,800
But stardom in the era of the album depended on a different
683
00:41:59,800 --> 00:42:01,160
set of qualities.
684
00:42:01,160 --> 00:42:05,320
# You got to get up every morning
685
00:42:05,320 --> 00:42:09,200
# With a smile on your face and show the world... #
686
00:42:09,200 --> 00:42:14,280
In 1970, King and producer Lou Adler, of Ode Records, began work
687
00:42:14,280 --> 00:42:17,920
on a collection of songs with the working title Tapestry.
688
00:42:17,920 --> 00:42:22,240
I certainly knew and Carole knew that we were making an album.
689
00:42:22,240 --> 00:42:26,520
It was obvious that we were trying to complete something.
690
00:42:28,120 --> 00:42:33,040
And not just go for a hit single or something. It was way past that.
691
00:42:33,040 --> 00:42:37,080
# So far away
692
00:42:37,080 --> 00:42:43,600
# Doesn't anybody stay in one place any more? #
693
00:42:43,600 --> 00:42:48,440
Tapestry would be the most personal and intimate work of King's career.
694
00:42:50,680 --> 00:42:53,320
In the older sessions, you went in, whatever the lights were,
695
00:42:53,320 --> 00:42:54,880
that's what you recorded under.
696
00:42:54,880 --> 00:42:56,120
And these kind of sessions,
697
00:42:56,120 --> 00:42:59,280
if you are doing a ballad, you turned the lights down a little bit.
698
00:42:59,280 --> 00:43:03,080
# Long ago I reached for you... #
699
00:43:03,080 --> 00:43:05,480
When I describe what Tapestry means to me,
700
00:43:05,480 --> 00:43:09,240
I always describe it as the musical equivalent of your big sister
701
00:43:09,240 --> 00:43:12,200
or your big brother putting the kettle on
702
00:43:12,200 --> 00:43:14,760
when you're having a really bad time, and they are like,
703
00:43:14,760 --> 00:43:17,320
"Come over here, come on, we will sort it out.
704
00:43:17,320 --> 00:43:20,080
"We'll have a cup of tea, we'll fix the world."
705
00:43:26,560 --> 00:43:31,760
# Stayed in bed all morning Just to pass the time... #
706
00:43:31,760 --> 00:43:35,760
# There's something wrong here There can be no denying
707
00:43:35,760 --> 00:43:42,720
# One of us is changing or maybe we've just stopped trying... #
708
00:43:42,720 --> 00:43:45,760
The final running order of Tapestry was
709
00:43:45,760 --> 00:43:50,760
a masterclass in one of the secrets of a great album - sequencing.
710
00:43:50,760 --> 00:43:56,000
I must have spent two weeks or more on the sequence of Tapestry.
711
00:43:56,000 --> 00:44:00,200
Coming out of the right chord into the right chord of the next song
712
00:44:00,200 --> 00:44:04,720
so that you don't, you know, abruptly shake somebody,
713
00:44:04,720 --> 00:44:08,960
not only shake them but musically shake them.
714
00:44:08,960 --> 00:44:14,000
The transition from So Far Away to It's Too Late was a classic example
715
00:44:14,000 --> 00:44:15,600
of Adler's sequence.
716
00:44:15,600 --> 00:44:18,960
What I really like is that you're going from this chord,
717
00:44:18,960 --> 00:44:22,560
it's a fade-out, actually, so we don't get a proper ending on
718
00:44:22,560 --> 00:44:24,760
So Far Away, but it sets you up nicely
719
00:44:24,760 --> 00:44:26,520
for that move to the A minor 7th.
720
00:44:29,680 --> 00:44:31,840
Because that chord is there again.
721
00:44:31,840 --> 00:44:34,680
So there's this really nice harmonic relationship.
722
00:44:34,680 --> 00:44:36,160
They're in different keys
723
00:44:36,160 --> 00:44:39,240
but they are echoing the song that's come before.
724
00:44:45,800 --> 00:44:49,840
Tapestry was released in the US in March 1971.
725
00:44:49,840 --> 00:44:53,360
All that pop kind of thing that she had come from,
726
00:44:53,360 --> 00:44:58,520
she poured into this album, but it's very personalised too.
727
00:44:58,520 --> 00:45:01,880
And that's quite a potent combination.
728
00:45:01,880 --> 00:45:06,800
The album spent 15 consecutive weeks at the top of the US album charts -
729
00:45:06,800 --> 00:45:09,840
the only time a female solo artist would achieve this
730
00:45:09,840 --> 00:45:12,160
in the entire 20th century.
731
00:45:12,160 --> 00:45:17,160
No solo album would outsell it until Thriller over a decade later.
732
00:45:17,160 --> 00:45:20,800
Tapestry was confirmation that the era of the album encouraged
733
00:45:20,800 --> 00:45:23,600
a new kind of star.
734
00:45:23,600 --> 00:45:27,440
Carole and I won five Grammys that year,
735
00:45:27,440 --> 00:45:29,760
the most by a female artist at that time.
736
00:45:29,760 --> 00:45:36,040
We won Best Album Of The Year and Song Of The Year
737
00:45:36,040 --> 00:45:39,480
and Single Of The Year.
738
00:45:39,480 --> 00:45:43,720
So that validated Carole King as an artist.
739
00:45:43,720 --> 00:45:49,400
# ..Like a natural woman. #
740
00:45:49,400 --> 00:45:52,600
Artists like James Taylor, Joni Mitchell
741
00:45:52,600 --> 00:45:57,200
and Don McLean contributed to the singer-songwriter boom.
742
00:45:57,200 --> 00:46:02,640
# And I think it's gonna be a long, long time... #
743
00:46:02,640 --> 00:46:06,800
Britain's answer was Elton John, who scored seven consecutive
744
00:46:06,800 --> 00:46:09,960
number one LPs in the US in the early '70s.
745
00:46:09,960 --> 00:46:13,680
# I'm a rocket man... #
746
00:46:13,680 --> 00:46:16,400
Only The Beatles ever surpassed this feat.
747
00:46:19,800 --> 00:46:22,760
But in contrast to the intimate stripped-back
748
00:46:22,760 --> 00:46:25,920
style of the singer-songwriters, other musicians were using
749
00:46:25,920 --> 00:46:29,680
the LP to create ever more elaborate musical landscapes.
750
00:46:29,680 --> 00:46:31,640
This was progressive rock.
751
00:46:33,800 --> 00:46:36,160
In a strange way we were musical scientists.
752
00:46:36,160 --> 00:46:39,480
We had lots of ingredients of different instruments around us
753
00:46:39,480 --> 00:46:42,520
and we had lots of different kinds of musical knowledge.
754
00:46:42,520 --> 00:46:44,560
And I didn't want to play three chords
755
00:46:44,560 --> 00:46:46,880
and just sort of do blues solos and things.
756
00:46:46,880 --> 00:46:49,440
I wanted to go to different levels and fuse music
757
00:46:49,440 --> 00:46:50,840
and put things together.
758
00:46:54,760 --> 00:46:59,400
The most popular album band on the Billboard charts for 1972 was
759
00:46:59,400 --> 00:47:02,520
a prog band, Yes.
760
00:47:04,120 --> 00:47:11,080
Yes music was as convoluted as it was excellent.
761
00:47:15,000 --> 00:47:19,160
Songs often spanned entire sides of vinyl.
762
00:47:19,160 --> 00:47:22,440
Double albums became triple albums.
763
00:47:22,440 --> 00:47:27,320
Such grandiose music required similarly creative sleeve design.
764
00:47:27,320 --> 00:47:32,080
Yes found their visual identity through artist Roger Dean.
765
00:47:32,080 --> 00:47:34,800
I never tried to paint music.
766
00:47:34,800 --> 00:47:40,400
What I was looking for in the imagery was something that
767
00:47:40,400 --> 00:47:43,160
would stop people, make them think,
768
00:47:43,160 --> 00:47:47,160
and have something that was from the same source as the music,
769
00:47:47,160 --> 00:47:50,360
rather than an image of the music.
770
00:47:50,360 --> 00:47:53,360
That was desperately important to us, desperately important,
771
00:47:53,360 --> 00:47:58,000
because the cover was as important as to what was inside.
772
00:47:58,000 --> 00:48:00,560
I mean, they say you can tell a book by its cover.
773
00:48:00,560 --> 00:48:03,120
You can also tell a vinyl by its cover.
774
00:48:07,960 --> 00:48:11,680
Increasingly extravagant packaging allowed Dean to explore
775
00:48:11,680 --> 00:48:15,720
entire narratives through a single album design.
776
00:48:15,720 --> 00:48:20,240
When we did the Yessongs album, it was a great opportunity to
777
00:48:20,240 --> 00:48:23,600
tell the story because it was a triple album with a booklet.
778
00:48:23,600 --> 00:48:28,560
Landing on a new planet, life restarting
779
00:48:28,560 --> 00:48:33,120
and humans and cities coming about.
780
00:48:37,680 --> 00:48:42,280
Yes's huge album sales gave Dean's artwork huge exposure.
781
00:48:44,720 --> 00:48:49,800
We did sell an enormous number of posters and calendars and books.
782
00:48:49,800 --> 00:48:53,000
I've looked at figures ranging from 60 to 100 million,
783
00:48:53,000 --> 00:48:54,680
so it's a lot of pieces.
784
00:48:54,680 --> 00:48:56,400
But iconic sleeves
785
00:48:56,400 --> 00:49:00,040
and progressive sounds didn't only meet in the world of rock.
786
00:49:02,800 --> 00:49:06,440
The albums of the Parliament Funkadelic collective created
787
00:49:06,440 --> 00:49:09,480
a funk universe every bit as creative as prog.
788
00:49:11,480 --> 00:49:15,640
It was the most insane, ridiculous, creative,
789
00:49:15,640 --> 00:49:21,480
ludicrous band collective of all time, Parliament Funkadelic.
790
00:49:21,480 --> 00:49:26,880
Just the most genius insanity that music has ever produced.
791
00:49:28,560 --> 00:49:31,760
Bands like Parliament Funkadelic, they were much more
792
00:49:31,760 --> 00:49:37,840
like the R&B, soul, funk versions of the Grateful Dead.
793
00:49:37,840 --> 00:49:41,720
Band leader George Clinton's clash of psychedelic rock,
794
00:49:41,720 --> 00:49:47,520
soul and funk met its match with the album artwork of Pedro Bell.
795
00:49:47,520 --> 00:49:52,520
It's Afrocentric, it's mad, it's kind of got Satanic qualities to it,
796
00:49:52,520 --> 00:49:56,160
it's challenging all sorts of different things.
797
00:49:56,160 --> 00:49:59,720
Just look at the breasts of this weird-looking woman here.
798
00:49:59,720 --> 00:50:02,400
One is a map of the world,
799
00:50:02,400 --> 00:50:05,720
the other is a musical turntable on the end of her nipples.
800
00:50:05,720 --> 00:50:08,840
I think it is very hard not to like a record which, on the sleeve,
801
00:50:08,840 --> 00:50:12,280
it describes the record company as, "Vinyl Binbanglers"
802
00:50:12,280 --> 00:50:16,120
and where the bass musicians are called "bass thumpasaurians".
803
00:50:16,120 --> 00:50:21,920
Cosmic Slop, No Compute, Trash A Go-Go, March To The Witch's Castle,
804
00:50:21,920 --> 00:50:27,000
The Nappy Dugout, and two skeletons having sex in the corner.
805
00:50:27,000 --> 00:50:28,920
Excellent!
806
00:50:30,600 --> 00:50:32,000
For the '70s music fan,
807
00:50:32,000 --> 00:50:35,880
the album sleeve became a symbol of their identity.
808
00:50:35,880 --> 00:50:38,280
It actually summed up a lifestyle.
809
00:50:38,280 --> 00:50:41,360
When people walked around town,
810
00:50:41,360 --> 00:50:45,840
if you had some albums under your arm, it told people who you were.
811
00:50:45,840 --> 00:50:48,200
If you walked in somebody's house and there were racks
812
00:50:48,200 --> 00:50:51,360
and racks of album covers, it is
813
00:50:51,360 --> 00:50:55,040
a bit like going into somebody's library and you would look to see
814
00:50:55,040 --> 00:50:57,200
what books they read to kind of ascertain
815
00:50:57,200 --> 00:50:58,960
what kind of person they are.
816
00:50:58,960 --> 00:51:01,280
The same thing happened with the album cover.
817
00:51:01,280 --> 00:51:05,840
Of all the iconic images on '70s album sleeves,
818
00:51:05,840 --> 00:51:10,640
one above all appeared to define the era...
819
00:51:10,640 --> 00:51:16,200
# Ticking away the moments that make up a dull day... #
820
00:51:16,200 --> 00:51:21,120
..Pink Floyd's 1973 album, The Dark Side Of The Moon...
821
00:51:23,800 --> 00:51:26,400
..one of the highest-selling albums in history.
822
00:51:26,400 --> 00:51:31,000
# Digging around on a piece of ground in your home town... #
823
00:51:31,000 --> 00:51:34,200
When I was growing up as a child in the late '70s and early '80s,
824
00:51:34,200 --> 00:51:37,720
it was a commonly held belief that there was a factory somewhere
825
00:51:37,720 --> 00:51:41,080
in Germany which only pressed copies of Dark Side Of The Moon.
826
00:51:41,080 --> 00:51:42,920
It just seemed convincingly true
827
00:51:42,920 --> 00:51:45,240
because practically every household,
828
00:51:45,240 --> 00:51:48,840
everyone's parents' household, had a copy of Dark Side Of The Moon.
829
00:51:48,840 --> 00:51:50,680
You could not avoid that record.
830
00:51:53,200 --> 00:51:55,800
The Dark Side Of The Moon would sell some 40 million copies
831
00:51:55,800 --> 00:51:57,040
in its lifetime.
832
00:51:58,440 --> 00:52:01,880
Yet it was released with a stark sleeve design with no mention
833
00:52:01,880 --> 00:52:04,080
or photo of the band.
834
00:52:07,600 --> 00:52:11,440
The cover art was the brainchild of Hipgnosis design agency.
835
00:52:12,840 --> 00:52:15,080
Hipgnosis never worked for record companies,
836
00:52:15,080 --> 00:52:17,400
we only worked for the artists,
837
00:52:17,400 --> 00:52:21,600
we were commissioned directly to work for all the people who we worked for.
838
00:52:21,600 --> 00:52:24,560
The record companies hated us with a vengeance.
839
00:52:24,560 --> 00:52:27,520
Storm and Po from Hipgnosis went into EMI with the cover
840
00:52:27,520 --> 00:52:32,000
and EMI went, "A record cover with no picture and no name?
841
00:52:32,000 --> 00:52:35,640
"Can't have that." They went, "Tell you what, we can,
842
00:52:35,640 --> 00:52:37,160
"because we're with Pink Floyd.
843
00:52:37,160 --> 00:52:40,240
"That's what they want, what they're having and what you're doing."
844
00:52:40,240 --> 00:52:44,360
At no point when you're flicking through the racks in a record shop,
845
00:52:44,360 --> 00:52:48,280
unless you knew what that was, you would not know that's Pink Floyd.
846
00:52:51,240 --> 00:52:55,000
The themes on Dark Side were uncompromisingly adult.
847
00:52:55,000 --> 00:52:57,320
The idea was that the album
848
00:52:57,320 --> 00:53:02,800
would sort of focus on the pressures that we were feeling, I suppose.
849
00:53:02,800 --> 00:53:05,680
Or the sort of things that impinge on your life.
850
00:53:05,680 --> 00:53:07,600
# Money... #
851
00:53:07,600 --> 00:53:14,000
Money, the acquisition of too much, in a way, mortality, time,
852
00:53:14,000 --> 00:53:18,280
rather than teenage love, which we felt perhaps other people did better.
853
00:53:18,280 --> 00:53:24,040
The band's attitude to publicity was similarly uncommercial.
854
00:53:24,040 --> 00:53:27,680
They didn't do one press interview, not one press interview.
855
00:53:27,680 --> 00:53:30,000
There wasn't even a picture.
856
00:53:30,000 --> 00:53:34,040
Cos why would you want a picture of someone you haven't interviewed?
857
00:53:34,040 --> 00:53:36,840
And you weren't going to reproduce a picture of their covers
858
00:53:36,840 --> 00:53:41,520
cos they weren't on the cover. But it didn't do them any harm.
859
00:53:41,520 --> 00:53:45,600
It was just extraordinary that they got away with it, in a way.
860
00:53:45,600 --> 00:53:48,000
I think at the time we were being a bit grand
861
00:53:48,000 --> 00:53:51,560
and felt that we didn't really want to be too involved in the
862
00:53:51,560 --> 00:53:54,280
sort of promotion that the record company were doing.
863
00:53:54,280 --> 00:53:56,880
I think there was a playback at the planetarium.
864
00:53:56,880 --> 00:54:00,360
And I think that we decided that we weren't going to turn up for this.
865
00:54:00,360 --> 00:54:02,880
Quite why, I have no idea.
866
00:54:02,880 --> 00:54:05,720
Despite Pink Floyd's disdain for publicity,
867
00:54:05,720 --> 00:54:10,200
Dark Side Of The Moon spent 14 years in the Billboard Top 200.
868
00:54:13,000 --> 00:54:16,280
No other album has ever come close to this feat.
869
00:54:19,000 --> 00:54:23,280
This piece of work, I think they will still be listening to in
870
00:54:23,280 --> 00:54:26,880
the same way they listen to Mozart, you know, in hundreds of years' time.
871
00:54:26,880 --> 00:54:30,440
It is just perfect, there are no rough edges.
872
00:54:33,160 --> 00:54:36,680
You're going to ask me why I think Dark Side was successful.
873
00:54:36,680 --> 00:54:39,160
And, erm...
874
00:54:39,160 --> 00:54:43,560
My answer is, it's more than one reason,
875
00:54:43,560 --> 00:54:48,520
it isn't just because the drums are so fantastic or anything like that.
876
00:54:48,520 --> 00:54:51,600
It is actually the fact that the lyrics are extraordinary
877
00:54:51,600 --> 00:54:53,840
and they are more relevant to a 50-year-old than
878
00:54:53,840 --> 00:54:56,200
they are to a 23-year-old, in many ways.
879
00:54:56,200 --> 00:55:02,800
# And if the dam breaks open many years too soon
880
00:55:02,800 --> 00:55:07,800
# And if there is no room upon the hill... #
881
00:55:07,800 --> 00:55:12,680
Dark Side turned Pink Floyd into one of the biggest bands in the world.
882
00:55:12,680 --> 00:55:16,360
But an album was now capable of even more than that.
883
00:55:16,360 --> 00:55:21,200
# I'll see you on the dark side of the moon... #
884
00:55:21,200 --> 00:55:25,520
In 1973, the first release from a start-up independent label
885
00:55:25,520 --> 00:55:29,480
called Virgin Records was delivered to be cut to vinyl.
886
00:55:29,480 --> 00:55:32,000
MUSIC: Tubular Bells by Mike Oldfield
887
00:55:35,800 --> 00:55:40,200
Each side was a single experimental instrumental track.
888
00:55:40,200 --> 00:55:44,000
It was written and performed by a complete unknown.
889
00:55:44,000 --> 00:55:47,880
It featured no lyrics and no songs.
890
00:55:47,880 --> 00:55:52,520
It's always every young musician's dream to make their own album.
891
00:55:52,520 --> 00:55:58,320
That's what life is about. I thought one day I will make my own album.
892
00:55:58,320 --> 00:56:03,840
In 1973, young musician Mike Oldfield sent a set of home demos
893
00:56:03,840 --> 00:56:09,360
to every record company in London. No-one was interested.
894
00:56:09,360 --> 00:56:13,680
But then they came to the attention of an independent record shop owner.
895
00:56:13,680 --> 00:56:19,680
Somebody brought a tape that he had made which was the sort of makings
896
00:56:19,680 --> 00:56:27,160
of Tubular Bells that he had recorded in his flat above his mother's house.
897
00:56:27,160 --> 00:56:29,160
It was captivating.
898
00:56:30,480 --> 00:56:32,880
Branson saw something in Oldfield's tapes
899
00:56:32,880 --> 00:56:35,520
that the record companies didn't.
900
00:56:35,520 --> 00:56:38,640
When he launched his own record company a few months later,
901
00:56:38,640 --> 00:56:41,560
Oldfield was the first person he called.
902
00:56:41,560 --> 00:56:45,560
They said, "OK, we'll give you a week in the studio."
903
00:56:45,560 --> 00:56:49,960
And in that week I did a huge part of Tubular Bells, nearly all of it.
904
00:56:55,240 --> 00:56:58,800
Oldfield played almost every instrument on the record
905
00:56:58,800 --> 00:57:00,640
and composed all the music.
906
00:57:02,440 --> 00:57:04,800
I knew it would be a long and difficult job
907
00:57:04,800 --> 00:57:07,360
and take me quite some time.
908
00:57:07,360 --> 00:57:12,280
The studio was a big thing and cost hundreds of dollars per hour.
909
00:57:13,480 --> 00:57:18,680
So, to be allowed free rein of a studio was quite a special thing.
910
00:57:18,680 --> 00:57:22,320
The album was released in May 1973.
911
00:57:24,720 --> 00:57:28,920
Richard Branson arranged a live television recital to promote it.
912
00:57:28,920 --> 00:57:31,240
But Oldfield was less keen.
913
00:57:31,240 --> 00:57:33,960
I'd finished the album and I was pretty exhausted,
914
00:57:33,960 --> 00:57:35,920
and then they came to me and said, "All right,
915
00:57:35,920 --> 00:57:38,920
"now you've got to do all that again, but live.
916
00:57:39,920 --> 00:57:42,000
Oldfield's mesmerising instrumentals
917
00:57:42,000 --> 00:57:45,000
had been meticulously constructed in the studio.
918
00:57:45,000 --> 00:57:48,640
He hadn't considered the complications of performing it live.
919
00:57:50,200 --> 00:57:51,920
I think we counted once,
920
00:57:51,920 --> 00:57:56,040
over 1,800 or 1,900 overdubs on Tubular Bells,
921
00:57:56,040 --> 00:57:58,840
and I had to work out how to translate that studio production
922
00:57:58,840 --> 00:58:00,920
into a live concert.
923
00:58:00,920 --> 00:58:04,080
And...it was exhausting.
924
00:58:04,080 --> 00:58:07,080
On the way there, he said to me, "I'm afraid I just can't do it."
925
00:58:07,080 --> 00:58:09,520
You know, "I just can't face it."
926
00:58:09,520 --> 00:58:13,760
I'd got a very old Bentley which cost about £300,
927
00:58:13,760 --> 00:58:16,680
which my parents had given me for a wedding present,
928
00:58:16,680 --> 00:58:19,640
and I was driving him there in it,
929
00:58:19,640 --> 00:58:23,560
and I pulled in and I said to Mike, "Look, you know,
930
00:58:23,560 --> 00:58:25,960
"if you can overcome your psychological problems,
931
00:58:25,960 --> 00:58:27,720
"the keys are yours."
932
00:58:27,720 --> 00:58:31,960
And Mike sort of sat there for about five seconds and said,
933
00:58:31,960 --> 00:58:34,040
"I think I'm feeling slightly better."
934
00:58:34,040 --> 00:58:36,560
MUSIC: Tubular Bells
935
00:58:40,760 --> 00:58:43,480
That night he performed at the Queen Elizabeth Hall
936
00:58:43,480 --> 00:58:45,080
and brought the house down.
937
00:58:53,080 --> 00:58:56,440
It was absolutely, you know, breathtaking.
938
00:58:56,440 --> 00:59:00,240
I mean, a standing ovation for, I don't know,
939
00:59:00,240 --> 00:59:01,600
20 minutes at the end.
940
00:59:04,200 --> 00:59:06,520
The audience absolutely loved it, which was...
941
00:59:06,520 --> 00:59:10,760
You know, rapturous reception, which was rather nice.
942
00:59:10,760 --> 00:59:12,080
And I got the Bentley.
943
00:59:13,920 --> 00:59:17,640
Tubular Bells has sold 18 million copies worldwide
944
00:59:17,640 --> 00:59:20,440
and spent nearly 300 weeks in the charts.
945
00:59:20,440 --> 00:59:25,840
It was the album upon which Richard Branson built his empire.
946
00:59:25,840 --> 00:59:29,840
Obviously Tubular Bells, you know, made an enormous difference
947
00:59:29,840 --> 00:59:33,200
and it really kicked off our record company.
948
00:59:36,360 --> 00:59:39,480
By the end of 1974, in America,
949
00:59:39,480 --> 00:59:43,480
more money was being spent on records than movies or sports.
950
00:59:44,800 --> 00:59:46,600
And the major record labels
951
00:59:46,600 --> 00:59:49,960
were joining the ranks of the corporate elite.
952
00:59:49,960 --> 00:59:52,680
By the early '70s, most of the record companies
953
00:59:52,680 --> 00:59:54,520
have interests in lots of areas.
954
00:59:54,520 --> 00:59:58,720
RCA, you know, home for David Bowie during the 1970s
955
00:59:58,720 --> 01:00:00,840
and that fantastic stream of albums he produced,
956
01:00:00,840 --> 01:00:03,920
also owns the Hertz rental car company.
957
01:00:03,920 --> 01:00:07,120
MCA has, you know, Universal Studios.
958
01:00:07,120 --> 01:00:10,160
Now, with companies themselves thinking big,
959
01:00:10,160 --> 01:00:13,720
you get, equally, the promotion of artists
960
01:00:13,720 --> 01:00:16,720
who are kind of megastars during this period -
961
01:00:16,720 --> 01:00:19,640
people like Elton John, for instance.
962
01:00:19,640 --> 01:00:22,480
Captain Fantastic And The Brown Dirt Cowboy,
963
01:00:22,480 --> 01:00:25,680
selling something like 1.3 million copies
964
01:00:25,680 --> 01:00:28,360
within its first four days of sales.
965
01:00:28,360 --> 01:00:32,920
So, huge budgets are then bequeathed to those stars
966
01:00:32,920 --> 01:00:36,680
because they're seen as sure-fire bets.
967
01:00:39,720 --> 01:00:45,480
In 1975, Queen began recording their fourth album, A Night At The Opera.
968
01:00:45,480 --> 01:00:49,520
At the time, it would be the most expensive album ever made.
969
01:00:49,520 --> 01:00:51,040
It was painstaking.
970
01:00:51,040 --> 01:00:53,840
We were using four studios at once at one point
971
01:00:53,840 --> 01:00:58,000
and there'd be a different member in each studio doing different things.
972
01:00:58,000 --> 01:01:02,440
# Oh, oh, people of the earth... #
973
01:01:02,440 --> 01:01:05,760
Speeding and stopping the machines and slowing them down
974
01:01:05,760 --> 01:01:10,080
and speeding them up again and recording that.
975
01:01:13,040 --> 01:01:16,120
It seemed to take for ever, actually.
976
01:01:16,120 --> 01:01:20,000
For four months, the band overdubbed track after track.
977
01:01:20,000 --> 01:01:23,160
We really did take it so that the tape...all the oxide
978
01:01:23,160 --> 01:01:27,560
was almost worn away, it was actually transparent in places.
979
01:01:27,560 --> 01:01:30,560
The result was a sprawling, diverse album
980
01:01:30,560 --> 01:01:34,720
which indulged the band's influences from music hall to opera.
981
01:01:34,720 --> 01:01:37,200
# I see a little silhouetto of a man
982
01:01:37,200 --> 01:01:41,160
# Scaramouch, scaramouch Will you do the fandango? #
983
01:01:41,160 --> 01:01:45,280
We were sort of almost showing off what we could achieve in the studio.
984
01:01:45,280 --> 01:01:47,080
- # Gallileo
- Gallileo... #
985
01:01:47,080 --> 01:01:50,440
Oh, yeah, making records in the '70s was a lot of fun.
986
01:01:50,440 --> 01:01:54,760
You usually own the studio, like, you'd block book it.
987
01:01:54,760 --> 01:01:56,800
You would live in that studio for two months.
988
01:01:56,800 --> 01:02:01,680
You'd have Ping-Pong tables, pool tables, dartboards.
989
01:02:01,680 --> 01:02:05,920
The record company's role was simply to write the cheque.
990
01:02:05,920 --> 01:02:07,480
So, yeah, you know, the idea
991
01:02:07,480 --> 01:02:09,840
of anyone going to a Queen album session
992
01:02:09,840 --> 01:02:11,640
and discussing the merits of the songs
993
01:02:11,640 --> 01:02:14,080
with Freddie Mercury and Brian May, pretty unlikely.
994
01:02:14,080 --> 01:02:15,880
You know, they knew what they were doing.
995
01:02:18,760 --> 01:02:21,400
But investment in these headline artists
996
01:02:21,400 --> 01:02:23,920
didn't tell the whole mid-'70s story.
997
01:02:23,920 --> 01:02:28,920
In 1973, Arab nations had declared an oil embargo
998
01:02:28,920 --> 01:02:30,440
and the price of oil,
999
01:02:30,440 --> 01:02:33,720
a key substance in the manufacture of vinyl, had quadrupled.
1000
01:02:33,720 --> 01:02:35,960
There's a shortage of PVC vinyl,
1001
01:02:35,960 --> 01:02:38,760
the oil offshoot that records are made from.
1002
01:02:38,760 --> 01:02:42,320
The price has shot up £60 in three months to £210 a tonne.
1003
01:02:42,320 --> 01:02:44,040
With vinyl costs soaring,
1004
01:02:44,040 --> 01:02:47,600
record companies turned to cheap solutions to balance the books.
1005
01:02:47,600 --> 01:02:50,800
Best of albums and greatest hits compilations and, you know,
1006
01:02:50,800 --> 01:02:54,120
cheapy chart compilations become a kind of mainstay
1007
01:02:54,120 --> 01:02:57,360
of the record companies' revenue stream.
1008
01:02:57,360 --> 01:03:00,360
When I was at EMI, we started doing 20 Golden Greats,
1009
01:03:00,360 --> 01:03:04,920
which was, you know, an enormous income earner for EMI
1010
01:03:04,920 --> 01:03:07,080
at a time when we struggled in the mid-'70s.
1011
01:03:08,880 --> 01:03:11,480
You paid no recording costs.
1012
01:03:11,480 --> 01:03:15,920
You know, you just basically compiled it and you made an ad.
1013
01:03:15,920 --> 01:03:18,480
You know, that kept the books balanced.
1014
01:03:18,480 --> 01:03:24,400
Best of albums by The Carpenters, The Stylistics and Abba
1015
01:03:24,400 --> 01:03:29,160
were the UK's highest sellers in '74, '75, and '76.
1016
01:03:29,160 --> 01:03:31,440
And in the huge rock market,
1017
01:03:31,440 --> 01:03:34,680
there was another way to package collections of hits cheaply -
1018
01:03:34,680 --> 01:03:36,280
the live album.
1019
01:03:39,120 --> 01:03:41,320
It's better than a greatest hits
1020
01:03:41,320 --> 01:03:44,520
because the greatest hits were kind of like for the part-timers
1021
01:03:44,520 --> 01:03:46,080
or the non-serious fans -
1022
01:03:46,080 --> 01:03:49,320
the "here today, gone later today" crowd.
1023
01:03:49,320 --> 01:03:53,280
Live albums, though, had their cake and ate it all up.
1024
01:03:53,280 --> 01:03:59,280
You know, you had all the hits but done in a new, unfamiliar style.
1025
01:03:59,280 --> 01:04:01,680
It was easy as pie to make a live album.
1026
01:04:01,680 --> 01:04:05,360
You would just show up with a truck that had a 16-track recorder in it,
1027
01:04:05,360 --> 01:04:07,240
set up the mics, you know,
1028
01:04:07,240 --> 01:04:09,720
take a feed off the stage mics,
1029
01:04:09,720 --> 01:04:12,560
and labels were thrilled that a live album
1030
01:04:12,560 --> 01:04:14,760
took relatively nothing to produce
1031
01:04:14,760 --> 01:04:17,320
and you could still get millions of sales.
1032
01:04:17,320 --> 01:04:20,360
It was an LP recorded in 1975
1033
01:04:20,360 --> 01:04:23,680
that showed just what a cash cow the live album could be.
1034
01:04:25,000 --> 01:04:28,680
British guitarist Peter Frampton had released four studio albums,
1035
01:04:28,680 --> 01:04:31,960
none of which had even scratched the US top 20.
1036
01:04:31,960 --> 01:04:34,960
# I wondered how you're feeling... #
1037
01:04:34,960 --> 01:04:36,880
For his first live album,
1038
01:04:36,880 --> 01:04:40,680
he took to the stage at San Francisco's Winterland Arena.
1039
01:04:40,680 --> 01:04:44,080
It was 7,000 people, you know, in Winterland,
1040
01:04:44,080 --> 01:04:49,200
and when we walked out, got this huge ovation,
1041
01:04:49,200 --> 01:04:54,360
and because of that, I think we forgot that we were recording
1042
01:04:54,360 --> 01:04:57,880
and the audience just brought something to the show
1043
01:04:57,880 --> 01:05:00,640
and we just did one hell of a show that night.
1044
01:05:00,640 --> 01:05:04,440
# I want you to show me the way... #
1045
01:05:04,440 --> 01:05:07,120
The recording of a live LP was the reverse
1046
01:05:07,120 --> 01:05:11,680
of the often lengthy, complex sessions of a studio album.
1047
01:05:11,680 --> 01:05:14,480
I remember standing at the back of the control room,
1048
01:05:14,480 --> 01:05:17,880
leaning up against the wall, and Ray just put...he said,
1049
01:05:17,880 --> 01:05:20,880
"I'm not going to do a mix, I'm just going to put all the faders up."
1050
01:05:20,880 --> 01:05:22,320
He said, "Check this out."
1051
01:05:22,320 --> 01:05:24,560
And I don't remember what he played first.
1052
01:05:24,560 --> 01:05:26,480
I just remember us all going...
1053
01:05:27,880 --> 01:05:31,320
..and just the energy that we'd captured from that,
1054
01:05:31,320 --> 01:05:34,480
it was just quite special.
1055
01:05:34,480 --> 01:05:36,520
# I want you... #
1056
01:05:36,520 --> 01:05:40,480
The mix of Frampton's best material, his rapport with the audience
1057
01:05:40,480 --> 01:05:45,080
and the instantly recognisable talkbox was a smash hit.
1058
01:05:45,080 --> 01:05:47,640
MUSIC PLAYS ON IPHONE
1059
01:05:59,200 --> 01:06:00,880
HE LAUGHS
1060
01:06:03,280 --> 01:06:06,440
I'm going to have to disinfect my iPhone now!
1061
01:06:15,640 --> 01:06:19,560
The album became the biggest-selling record of 1976 in America
1062
01:06:19,560 --> 01:06:22,920
and the biggest-selling live rock album of all time.
1063
01:06:22,920 --> 01:06:27,000
# I can't believe this is happening to me... #
1064
01:06:27,000 --> 01:06:31,960
You couldn't go in anyone's car, anyone's house,
1065
01:06:31,960 --> 01:06:37,720
or walking down the street, you heard Comes Alive coming from somewhere.
1066
01:06:37,720 --> 01:06:42,240
And even I would change the channel on the radio...
1067
01:06:42,240 --> 01:06:43,720
now, I wish.
1068
01:06:43,720 --> 01:06:45,000
# I want you... #
1069
01:06:45,000 --> 01:06:48,520
Live albums, best-of collections and bankable megastars
1070
01:06:48,520 --> 01:06:49,840
kept the industry growing.
1071
01:06:51,400 --> 01:06:55,040
But attitudes to risky new releases were changing.
1072
01:06:55,040 --> 01:06:57,720
The record companies, after the oil crisis, in a sense,
1073
01:06:57,720 --> 01:07:01,120
become more conservative in their choices,
1074
01:07:01,120 --> 01:07:03,600
they become, perhaps, more businesslike.
1075
01:07:05,720 --> 01:07:08,760
With most debut LPs failing to hit profit,
1076
01:07:08,760 --> 01:07:11,200
labels cut back on new releases.
1077
01:07:11,200 --> 01:07:14,840
And in America, album-oriented radio,
1078
01:07:14,840 --> 01:07:18,040
which once championed the artistic freedom of the LP,
1079
01:07:18,040 --> 01:07:21,000
was becoming increasingly resistant to new music.
1080
01:07:21,000 --> 01:07:24,680
MUSIC: In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida by Iron Butterfly
1081
01:07:24,680 --> 01:07:26,760
Now, bigger, you know,
1082
01:07:26,760 --> 01:07:29,800
corporate companies had got hold of radio in America
1083
01:07:29,800 --> 01:07:32,920
and were beginning to want certain tracks played
1084
01:07:32,920 --> 01:07:34,600
from certain albums, you know.
1085
01:07:34,600 --> 01:07:37,040
Radio had gone from playing every new song
1086
01:07:37,040 --> 01:07:41,040
that the music industry put out, to a very tight playlist,
1087
01:07:41,040 --> 01:07:42,560
and no-one in a competitive market
1088
01:07:42,560 --> 01:07:44,880
wanted to be the first one to try out a new song.
1089
01:07:44,880 --> 01:07:46,200
So, increasingly,
1090
01:07:46,200 --> 01:07:49,440
the universe of songs being played on the radio was shrinking.
1091
01:07:49,440 --> 01:07:53,800
Album-oriented radio was still key to breaking the vast US market,
1092
01:07:53,800 --> 01:07:56,920
but in order to break the tightening playlists,
1093
01:07:56,920 --> 01:08:00,280
new artists needed a new approach to creating a record.
1094
01:08:05,800 --> 01:08:09,480
In the early '70s, Tom Scholz was an engineering graduate
1095
01:08:09,480 --> 01:08:12,000
and wannabe rock star in search of a record deal.
1096
01:08:13,840 --> 01:08:17,640
I realised somewhere around 1973 or '74
1097
01:08:17,640 --> 01:08:23,680
that the only way I was going to get a chance to have my music heard
1098
01:08:23,680 --> 01:08:27,040
was if I could find a way to get it on the radio.
1099
01:08:28,600 --> 01:08:30,960
Scholz built a studio in his basement,
1100
01:08:30,960 --> 01:08:34,400
where he set about creating songs that could break US radio.
1101
01:08:35,600 --> 01:08:38,400
From that point on, I was pretty much independent.
1102
01:08:38,400 --> 01:08:40,680
I could play every single part
1103
01:08:40,680 --> 01:08:43,840
and I not only didn't need anybody else,
1104
01:08:43,840 --> 01:08:46,440
I really had learned the hard way
1105
01:08:46,440 --> 01:08:49,680
that the only way that I was going to be successful
1106
01:08:49,680 --> 01:08:52,640
is if I did everything the way I heard it.
1107
01:08:56,080 --> 01:08:58,480
Scholz used his engineering know-how
1108
01:08:58,480 --> 01:09:01,840
to produce a sophisticated, radio-friendly sound.
1109
01:09:01,840 --> 01:09:03,400
# More than a feeling... #
1110
01:09:03,400 --> 01:09:05,640
This was no rough and ready demo.
1111
01:09:05,640 --> 01:09:08,200
# More than a feeling... #
1112
01:09:08,200 --> 01:09:12,520
Every guitar note, every melody, every vocal,
1113
01:09:12,520 --> 01:09:14,120
was thoroughly produced.
1114
01:09:16,560 --> 01:09:19,240
More Than A Feeling is a sensational track.
1115
01:09:19,240 --> 01:09:21,360
He was a brilliant, brilliant producer.
1116
01:09:21,360 --> 01:09:24,040
The vocals are panned a little bit towards the centre
1117
01:09:24,040 --> 01:09:27,720
to give more phasing on the line on purpose.
1118
01:09:29,080 --> 01:09:32,920
# ..As clear as the sun... #
1119
01:09:32,920 --> 01:09:34,760
If you listen very closely, you can tell
1120
01:09:34,760 --> 01:09:37,960
that there's two singers singing the same part.
1121
01:09:37,960 --> 01:09:42,280
Here there's four guitar... lead guitar parts come in.
1122
01:09:42,280 --> 01:09:45,280
There's one on each side playing at the same note,
1123
01:09:45,280 --> 01:09:47,200
then there's a harmony part on top of it.
1124
01:09:47,200 --> 01:09:51,800
There are two electric guitars, one on each side.
1125
01:09:51,800 --> 01:09:54,520
There are two acoustic guitars on each side.
1126
01:09:54,520 --> 01:09:58,240
There's a lead guitar running off under the vocals.
1127
01:09:58,240 --> 01:10:02,320
There's a total of eight guitars playing, plus the bass, of course.
1128
01:10:02,320 --> 01:10:06,160
# ..Till I see Marianne walk away... #
1129
01:10:06,160 --> 01:10:10,440
Scholz's sound caught the ear of producer John Boylan.
1130
01:10:10,440 --> 01:10:14,680
I remember taking the two-track tape and flying to New York with it
1131
01:10:14,680 --> 01:10:18,720
and playing it at the singles meeting in New York
1132
01:10:18,720 --> 01:10:22,800
for Ron Alexenberg and the entire Epic staff and they went nuts.
1133
01:10:22,800 --> 01:10:25,720
And I knew that something was going to happen with this record
1134
01:10:25,720 --> 01:10:28,200
right then and there.
1135
01:10:28,200 --> 01:10:31,400
Boylan persuaded Epic Records to sign Scholz
1136
01:10:31,400 --> 01:10:35,120
and vocalist Brad Delp under the name Boston
1137
01:10:35,120 --> 01:10:38,200
and the debut album was released in the summer of 1976.
1138
01:10:40,000 --> 01:10:42,280
A band was assembled to perform the music,
1139
01:10:42,280 --> 01:10:44,400
and just weeks after More Than A Feeling
1140
01:10:44,400 --> 01:10:48,080
was played on FM radio, Boston played their first gig.
1141
01:10:48,080 --> 01:10:49,800
I guess they could have accommodated
1142
01:10:49,800 --> 01:10:52,800
something like 1,000 people in the stands.
1143
01:10:52,800 --> 01:10:54,320
There was a riot.
1144
01:10:54,320 --> 01:10:55,760
3,000 people showed up.
1145
01:10:55,760 --> 01:10:58,800
They broke down the fence, the promoter was arrested.
1146
01:10:58,800 --> 01:11:01,640
It was the most exciting show of all time!
1147
01:11:04,960 --> 01:11:07,720
More Than A Feeling helped turn Boston's album
1148
01:11:07,720 --> 01:11:11,760
into one of the biggest-selling debut albums in history.
1149
01:11:11,760 --> 01:11:16,480
And not only that, it heralded a whole new style of rock music.
1150
01:11:16,480 --> 01:11:22,160
I would say Boston was the first album of a certain genre,
1151
01:11:22,160 --> 01:11:24,000
and that genre was continued on
1152
01:11:24,000 --> 01:11:27,800
by acts like Journey and Styx and Kansas
1153
01:11:27,800 --> 01:11:32,440
and other artists that had a sonic signature,
1154
01:11:32,440 --> 01:11:36,120
you know, that sounded great on the radio, that were definitely rock,
1155
01:11:36,120 --> 01:11:40,440
but also melodic and also had a lot of other things going for it
1156
01:11:40,440 --> 01:11:43,280
than just a plain ahead rhythm and blues
1157
01:11:43,280 --> 01:11:45,240
kind of rooted rock'n'roll.
1158
01:11:45,240 --> 01:11:49,720
# And I guess it's just the woman in you... #
1159
01:11:49,720 --> 01:11:53,280
The kind of music that was dominating American FM radio
1160
01:11:53,280 --> 01:11:54,560
began to change.
1161
01:11:54,560 --> 01:11:58,520
AOR was no longer album-oriented rock.
1162
01:11:58,520 --> 01:12:01,360
In the '70s, it did become adult-oriented rock,
1163
01:12:01,360 --> 01:12:03,400
and there's, I think, a simple reason,
1164
01:12:03,400 --> 01:12:05,680
is that the audience became adults.
1165
01:12:05,680 --> 01:12:07,840
Let's face it, they weren't going to be teenagers
1166
01:12:07,840 --> 01:12:09,240
and college kids for ever.
1167
01:12:09,240 --> 01:12:11,560
Album-oriented rock became adult-oriented rock
1168
01:12:11,560 --> 01:12:13,640
only because the audience became adults.
1169
01:12:13,640 --> 01:12:18,480
Of course, the downside of groups like Foreigner, Journey,
1170
01:12:18,480 --> 01:12:23,320
REO Speedwagon, was that we now had the formula.
1171
01:12:23,320 --> 01:12:27,120
We now had the rules, the map,
1172
01:12:27,120 --> 01:12:29,440
we could build it in the laboratory.
1173
01:12:29,440 --> 01:12:32,480
A little bit of Zep, a little bit of Beatles,
1174
01:12:32,480 --> 01:12:34,320
a little bit of this and that
1175
01:12:34,320 --> 01:12:37,320
and we could come up with this really beautiful anthem
1176
01:12:37,320 --> 01:12:40,960
that would sound perfect on FM radio in America.
1177
01:12:40,960 --> 01:12:44,520
So, a lot of these records are fantastically well-crafted,
1178
01:12:44,520 --> 01:12:47,800
but they're kind of sealed hermetically.
1179
01:12:47,800 --> 01:12:50,960
There's no air in them. There's no life, they don't breathe.
1180
01:12:50,960 --> 01:12:55,320
# Welcome to the Hotel California... #
1181
01:12:55,320 --> 01:12:57,640
Polished melodic rock was becoming
1182
01:12:57,640 --> 01:13:00,200
a feature of the American charts.
1183
01:13:00,200 --> 01:13:02,320
# Such a lovely face... #
1184
01:13:02,320 --> 01:13:05,160
In 1977, the Eagles' Hotel California
1185
01:13:05,160 --> 01:13:07,440
was knocked off the number one spot
1186
01:13:07,440 --> 01:13:10,240
by the biggest-selling album of the year,
1187
01:13:10,240 --> 01:13:12,000
Fleetwood Mac's Rumours.
1188
01:13:12,000 --> 01:13:15,240
# Don't stop thinking about tomorrow... #
1189
01:13:15,240 --> 01:13:18,040
An album like Rumours, for instance,
1190
01:13:18,040 --> 01:13:21,760
manages to combine the kind of rhythmic,
1191
01:13:21,760 --> 01:13:25,840
catchy element of rock'n'roll
1192
01:13:25,840 --> 01:13:29,400
with something that's slick and smooth.
1193
01:13:30,640 --> 01:13:35,120
# Loving you isn't the right thing to do... #
1194
01:13:35,120 --> 01:13:39,880
Perhaps its audience were seeking something akin to easy listening.
1195
01:13:39,880 --> 01:13:42,480
They wanted something that was comforting
1196
01:13:42,480 --> 01:13:44,800
and could be stuck on in the background.
1197
01:13:44,800 --> 01:13:47,440
But they are a generation that's grown up with rock'n'roll,
1198
01:13:47,440 --> 01:13:49,640
so they're used to the idea of a beat.
1199
01:13:51,040 --> 01:13:55,920
Everyone of a certain age probably has a copy of Rumours.
1200
01:13:55,920 --> 01:13:58,440
It became part of the furniture
1201
01:13:58,440 --> 01:14:02,320
of being an adult in the 1970s.
1202
01:14:02,320 --> 01:14:05,160
# Go your own way... #
1203
01:14:05,160 --> 01:14:09,280
But it wasn't just the album buyer that was growing up.
1204
01:14:09,280 --> 01:14:11,280
It was musicians too.
1205
01:14:11,280 --> 01:14:13,520
The British prog artists,
1206
01:14:13,520 --> 01:14:16,120
famous for pushing the envelope of the album
1207
01:14:16,120 --> 01:14:19,960
in the early '70s, were now increasingly accused of indulgence.
1208
01:14:23,280 --> 01:14:27,920
I think progressive music started with every good intention.
1209
01:14:27,920 --> 01:14:31,720
It started in the way we've been describing of, you know,
1210
01:14:31,720 --> 01:14:35,000
pushing out, "Let's experiment, let's see how far we can go.
1211
01:14:35,000 --> 01:14:38,320
"Let's introduce lots of other different elements into it."
1212
01:14:38,320 --> 01:14:42,000
And I remember my turning point with all of this came watching
1213
01:14:42,000 --> 01:14:43,760
Yes at Madison Square Garden...
1214
01:14:47,480 --> 01:14:51,120
..where there were pods
1215
01:14:51,120 --> 01:14:54,520
lowered down through dry ice, you know, onto the stage.
1216
01:14:54,520 --> 01:14:56,520
The pod opened
1217
01:14:56,520 --> 01:15:00,280
and the drummer steps out through the dry ice...
1218
01:15:02,560 --> 01:15:07,640
..all to very dramatic music going on, and I began to think,
1219
01:15:07,640 --> 01:15:09,960
"Whoa, hang on a minute.
1220
01:15:09,960 --> 01:15:13,000
"We have now come about as far away
1221
01:15:13,000 --> 01:15:15,640
"from Elvis being at the RCA Studio
1222
01:15:15,640 --> 01:15:17,800
"in '56 as you could possibly get."
1223
01:15:17,800 --> 01:15:22,360
All those guys that were in their early 30s by the mid-'70s,
1224
01:15:22,360 --> 01:15:24,280
they were all pretty ropey.
1225
01:15:24,280 --> 01:15:28,040
It wasn't just the LP, it was The Rolling Stones too.
1226
01:15:28,040 --> 01:15:31,560
It wasn't just Pink Floyd, it was David Bowie too.
1227
01:15:31,560 --> 01:15:35,080
The promise of the long-playing album was no longer
1228
01:15:35,080 --> 01:15:38,640
delivering for a new generation of music fans.
1229
01:15:38,640 --> 01:15:42,880
But once again, the album was about to be reinvented.
1230
01:15:45,320 --> 01:15:48,320
No, it's extremely provocative, you know.
1231
01:15:48,320 --> 01:15:50,720
MUSIC: Holidays In The Sun by The Sex Pistols
1232
01:15:50,720 --> 01:15:52,160
Starts with, you know,
1233
01:15:52,160 --> 01:15:54,920
what we can only assume are jackboots marching.
1234
01:15:59,200 --> 01:16:00,600
At the time...
1235
01:16:03,280 --> 01:16:05,920
At that point, it's all over.
1236
01:16:05,920 --> 01:16:07,960
Everything that's gone before that
1237
01:16:07,960 --> 01:16:10,440
has now been deemed fucking irrelevant,
1238
01:16:10,440 --> 01:16:12,760
as soon as he starts anti-singing.
1239
01:16:15,800 --> 01:16:18,520
# I don't wanna holiday in the sun
1240
01:16:18,520 --> 01:16:21,760
# I wanna go to the new Belsen
1241
01:16:21,760 --> 01:16:24,760
# I wanna see some history... #
1242
01:16:24,760 --> 01:16:26,960
In 1977, the Sex Pistols
1243
01:16:26,960 --> 01:16:31,240
released their debut album, Never Mind The Bollocks.
1244
01:16:31,240 --> 01:16:36,120
Punk, in a sense, defined itself against hippy.
1245
01:16:36,120 --> 01:16:39,320
Whatever hippies did, punks did the opposite.
1246
01:16:39,320 --> 01:16:42,200
Hippies play long instrumental solos,
1247
01:16:42,200 --> 01:16:45,200
punks play short solos or no solos at all.
1248
01:16:45,200 --> 01:16:48,280
Hippies make conceptual, thematic double albums,
1249
01:16:48,280 --> 01:16:50,600
punks make short singles.
1250
01:16:50,600 --> 01:16:53,000
It was designed specifically to be
1251
01:16:53,000 --> 01:16:55,000
whatever the hippies didn't do.
1252
01:16:56,240 --> 01:17:00,520
# Sensurround sound in a two-inch wall... #
1253
01:17:00,520 --> 01:17:04,400
We were quite Stalinist, you know, like breaking from the past,
1254
01:17:04,400 --> 01:17:05,920
till it meant nothing to us,
1255
01:17:05,920 --> 01:17:08,520
apart from a few revered icons,
1256
01:17:08,520 --> 01:17:10,840
like The Velvet Underground or Iggy Pop.
1257
01:17:12,600 --> 01:17:15,360
Never Mind The Bollocks brought
1258
01:17:15,360 --> 01:17:16,840
a new way of thinking to the LP.
1259
01:17:16,840 --> 01:17:20,480
Short songs, no sleeve notes and stripped-down production.
1260
01:17:20,480 --> 01:17:25,200
MUSIC: Pretty Vacant by The Sex Pistols
1261
01:17:25,200 --> 01:17:30,240
Now, this guitar riff, this is probably alone...
1262
01:17:30,240 --> 01:17:33,160
You don't need much more of a reason
1263
01:17:33,160 --> 01:17:34,720
to produce The Sex Pistols.
1264
01:17:39,480 --> 01:17:41,160
It's one of the first things you learn
1265
01:17:41,160 --> 01:17:43,440
when you pick up the electric guitar is that riff.
1266
01:17:44,560 --> 01:17:48,720
I wanted it to sound like real steel.
1267
01:17:48,720 --> 01:17:50,200
No flab at all.
1268
01:17:50,200 --> 01:17:53,920
# There's no point in asking You'll get no reply
1269
01:17:53,920 --> 01:17:55,960
# Oh, just remember... #
1270
01:17:55,960 --> 01:17:59,560
Just two musicians played almost all the music on the record -
1271
01:17:59,560 --> 01:18:02,920
drummer Paul Cook and guitarist Steve Jones,
1272
01:18:02,920 --> 01:18:05,080
who also played the bass parts.
1273
01:18:05,080 --> 01:18:08,520
He just played exactly the same thing on the bass guitar
1274
01:18:08,520 --> 01:18:10,840
as he played on the guitar.
1275
01:18:10,840 --> 01:18:14,920
He just followed the root note, one octave down.
1276
01:18:14,920 --> 01:18:18,720
You've got a perfect harmonic sequence of - boomf - an octave
1277
01:18:18,720 --> 01:18:21,000
and then a fifth of an octave and then...
1278
01:18:21,000 --> 01:18:23,040
And that's where the power came from.
1279
01:18:23,040 --> 01:18:26,320
# ..And we don't care. #
1280
01:18:26,320 --> 01:18:30,640
The more you look at it, it's got the words sex and bollocks on it,
1281
01:18:30,640 --> 01:18:35,560
and it might be the most provocative piece of popular art ever.
1282
01:18:35,560 --> 01:18:38,080
But, despite its rebellious stance,
1283
01:18:38,080 --> 01:18:39,960
Never Mind The Bollocks was
1284
01:18:39,960 --> 01:18:43,280
no less sophisticated an album in its creative intent.
1285
01:18:43,280 --> 01:18:46,040
# I am an antichrist... #
1286
01:18:46,040 --> 01:18:50,680
It was the politics and the fashion and the thinking.
1287
01:18:50,680 --> 01:18:55,120
Youth culture had died before that point, it wasn't really...
1288
01:18:55,120 --> 01:19:00,280
Kids weren't empowered, they were just still seen as kids.
1289
01:19:00,280 --> 01:19:04,760
The Sex Pistols came along saying that the established order
1290
01:19:04,760 --> 01:19:06,880
was about to change.
1291
01:19:06,880 --> 01:19:09,480
It did, for ever. It's never gone back.
1292
01:19:09,480 --> 01:19:14,080
While punk purports to have kind of introduced a ground zero
1293
01:19:14,080 --> 01:19:16,960
approach to everything that had come before -
1294
01:19:16,960 --> 01:19:22,360
goodbye, horrible, self-indulgent concept album, progressive,
1295
01:19:22,360 --> 01:19:24,720
long-haired fools -
1296
01:19:24,720 --> 01:19:28,360
Never Mind The Bollocks actually turns out to be perhaps
1297
01:19:28,360 --> 01:19:32,000
one of the greatest rock concept albums of all time.
1298
01:19:32,000 --> 01:19:33,760
# ..An anarchist... #
1299
01:19:33,760 --> 01:19:38,280
Never Mind The Bollocks went to number one in the UK in 1977.
1300
01:19:38,280 --> 01:19:40,880
That's it, for them. It's all they ever did.
1301
01:19:40,880 --> 01:19:43,600
That's their one statement to the world.
1302
01:19:43,600 --> 01:19:46,280
And imagine getting it so right once.
1303
01:19:47,760 --> 01:19:50,600
I made ten albums and in my own mind
1304
01:19:50,600 --> 01:19:52,560
they don't match up to that.
1305
01:19:52,560 --> 01:19:54,320
And I'm an arrogant bastard.
1306
01:19:55,600 --> 01:19:57,600
Seriously.
1307
01:19:57,600 --> 01:20:03,000
And I'd give them all up to have written that. I truly would.
1308
01:20:03,000 --> 01:20:06,920
1977 also saw debut albums from The Stranglers,
1309
01:20:06,920 --> 01:20:08,720
The Clash and The Damned.
1310
01:20:08,720 --> 01:20:11,000
# Be a man, can a mystery man
1311
01:20:11,000 --> 01:20:12,400
# Be a doll... #
1312
01:20:12,400 --> 01:20:15,400
Even for this revolutionary, raw, anti-Establishment music,
1313
01:20:15,400 --> 01:20:17,520
the album was crucial.
1314
01:20:17,520 --> 01:20:18,960
Punk rock and New Wave,
1315
01:20:18,960 --> 01:20:22,760
which I think was the last great flowering of the LP,
1316
01:20:22,760 --> 01:20:27,400
cos everybody wanted their LPs, and if they were The Ramones,
1317
01:20:27,400 --> 01:20:30,440
you know, even if all their songs lasted the two minutes,
1318
01:20:30,440 --> 01:20:33,760
you still had to get your album out
1319
01:20:33,760 --> 01:20:36,560
because you weren't a grown-up rock band unless you did that.
1320
01:20:36,560 --> 01:20:40,080
# Once I had a love And it was a gas... #
1321
01:20:40,080 --> 01:20:44,480
Punk and New Wave had given the album a creative shot in the arm.
1322
01:20:45,720 --> 01:20:51,320
In 1978, record sales propelled the industry to unprecedented revenues.
1323
01:20:54,160 --> 01:20:56,760
And in a nod to the LP's early days,
1324
01:20:56,760 --> 01:21:00,840
the biggest sellers in 1978 were both soundtracks.
1325
01:21:00,840 --> 01:21:06,040
But the long-playing album was spinning on borrowed time.
1326
01:21:06,040 --> 01:21:11,480
The record industry is enjoying an unparalleled level of dominance
1327
01:21:11,480 --> 01:21:14,400
and success in 1978.
1328
01:21:14,400 --> 01:21:17,440
Sales of vinyl albums are at their peak, and then
1329
01:21:17,440 --> 01:21:22,560
that's unfortunately followed in 1979 by a massive global downturn.
1330
01:21:23,960 --> 01:21:28,160
In 1979, for the first time since album sales overtook singles
1331
01:21:28,160 --> 01:21:30,120
11 years earlier,
1332
01:21:30,120 --> 01:21:33,160
record industry profits crashed by nearly a quarter.
1333
01:21:33,160 --> 01:21:37,480
A golden age of album-led growth came to a close.
1334
01:21:37,480 --> 01:21:40,120
The industry blamed the wider recession
1335
01:21:40,120 --> 01:21:43,800
and new competition for young consumers' attentions.
1336
01:21:45,360 --> 01:21:48,840
They're concerned about the arrival of computer games,
1337
01:21:48,840 --> 01:21:51,720
both in arcades and TV consoles.
1338
01:21:51,720 --> 01:21:56,560
They're concerned about video recorders, and most of all,
1339
01:21:56,560 --> 01:21:58,720
they're concerned about cassette recorders.
1340
01:21:58,720 --> 01:22:01,040
# You must be my lucky star... #
1341
01:22:01,040 --> 01:22:04,120
Changing technology was undermining the record industry's
1342
01:22:04,120 --> 01:22:06,360
LP-orientated business model.
1343
01:22:06,360 --> 01:22:09,400
# I just think of you... #
1344
01:22:09,400 --> 01:22:13,680
The cassette transforms the way in which people can listen to music.
1345
01:22:13,680 --> 01:22:18,320
They're no longer trapped by the physical object of the LP,
1346
01:22:18,320 --> 01:22:21,040
they can also tape the album, mix up the tracks
1347
01:22:21,040 --> 01:22:22,760
and make their own compilations.
1348
01:22:22,760 --> 01:22:26,080
So, it brings a completely different experience of listening
1349
01:22:26,080 --> 01:22:28,680
into the equation of the album,
1350
01:22:28,680 --> 01:22:31,960
one that reduces the album's kind of
1351
01:22:31,960 --> 01:22:35,120
monolithic presence in youth culture
1352
01:22:35,120 --> 01:22:37,480
during that period and beyond.
1353
01:22:37,480 --> 01:22:40,920
As sales of LPs continued to struggle into the early '80s,
1354
01:22:40,920 --> 01:22:43,120
a new way of selling music
1355
01:22:43,120 --> 01:22:47,880
and a new canvas for artists' creativity was about to emerge.
1356
01:22:47,880 --> 01:22:50,680
MTV was launched in 1981.
1357
01:22:50,680 --> 01:22:53,880
Its brash, iconic branding signalled a new approach
1358
01:22:53,880 --> 01:22:55,360
to selling music.
1359
01:22:57,640 --> 01:23:00,920
What made MTV so different is that everybody else
1360
01:23:00,920 --> 01:23:03,720
who had done music on TV
1361
01:23:03,720 --> 01:23:08,480
had tried to make music for the TV form, create a story arc through it.
1362
01:23:08,480 --> 01:23:09,760
And we said, "No, no.
1363
01:23:09,760 --> 01:23:12,280
"We're going to make TV for the music form -
1364
01:23:12,280 --> 01:23:14,120
"mood, emotion, attitude."
1365
01:23:14,120 --> 01:23:15,600
That was new, that was different,
1366
01:23:15,600 --> 01:23:17,560
that was revolutionary at the time.
1367
01:23:17,560 --> 01:23:20,960
# Video killed the radio star... #
1368
01:23:20,960 --> 01:23:25,000
The music video changed the whole way music was marketed for a while.
1369
01:23:25,000 --> 01:23:27,320
I mean, in the old days, you'd have to hear a song
1370
01:23:27,320 --> 01:23:29,920
five, six, seven, eight, nine times and then you'd say,
1371
01:23:29,920 --> 01:23:31,680
"I've got to have this thing."
1372
01:23:31,680 --> 01:23:33,200
But with the music video,
1373
01:23:33,200 --> 01:23:37,000
because you had that extra level of entertainment and visual thing,
1374
01:23:37,000 --> 01:23:42,280
sometimes the conversion from experience to purchase
1375
01:23:42,280 --> 01:23:43,640
happened a lot faster.
1376
01:23:43,640 --> 01:23:46,120
Within a year of its launch,
1377
01:23:46,120 --> 01:23:50,680
MTV had made an indelible mark on the industry.
1378
01:23:50,680 --> 01:23:54,400
Clearly the most influential album was Thriller, Michael Jackson.
1379
01:23:54,400 --> 01:23:56,200
# Cos this is thriller
1380
01:23:56,200 --> 01:23:57,880
# Thriller night... #
1381
01:23:57,880 --> 01:24:01,680
He and Madonna were the first video artists
1382
01:24:01,680 --> 01:24:03,920
that really conceived of everything,
1383
01:24:03,920 --> 01:24:06,200
the record around the video.
1384
01:24:06,200 --> 01:24:08,560
They sort of thought of it as one piece.
1385
01:24:08,560 --> 01:24:10,760
# Killer, thriller... #
1386
01:24:10,760 --> 01:24:13,120
All of a sudden, the emphasis was
1387
01:24:13,120 --> 01:24:16,480
now making singles that would make a good video.
1388
01:24:16,480 --> 01:24:20,800
People were writing for video and were abandoning the album concept.
1389
01:24:20,800 --> 01:24:24,800
The whole idea, then, of the video being the art form
1390
01:24:24,800 --> 01:24:28,960
and you're going to divert huge amounts of resource
1391
01:24:28,960 --> 01:24:33,960
from your core album into the marketing of that album.
1392
01:24:33,960 --> 01:24:36,880
You're going to suck half the budget away from what previously
1393
01:24:36,880 --> 01:24:39,960
had been the recording costs into now marketing that album.
1394
01:24:41,080 --> 01:24:43,200
The era of the video had arrived.
1395
01:24:43,200 --> 01:24:48,480
EVIL LAUGHTER
1396
01:24:48,480 --> 01:24:51,280
The long-playing album would never again be
1397
01:24:51,280 --> 01:24:54,000
the driving force of the music industry.
1398
01:24:54,000 --> 01:24:57,720
But, even long after the needle lifted from its golden age,
1399
01:24:57,720 --> 01:25:00,080
its influence lives on.
1400
01:25:00,080 --> 01:25:02,960
I consider myself extremely fortunate to have been
1401
01:25:02,960 --> 01:25:06,360
in the music business in what I think will be looked back on
1402
01:25:06,360 --> 01:25:09,000
as a golden era, and that is the vinyl era,
1403
01:25:09,000 --> 01:25:11,960
I think was the most productive, the most musical
1404
01:25:11,960 --> 01:25:14,440
and the most forward-thinking era in the entire
1405
01:25:14,440 --> 01:25:16,200
140 years of the music industry.
1406
01:25:16,200 --> 01:25:18,880
Things like Pink Floyd, Dark Side Of The Moon,
1407
01:25:18,880 --> 01:25:22,200
would never have been able to exist
1408
01:25:22,200 --> 01:25:26,480
without the LP, and so there were
1409
01:25:26,480 --> 01:25:31,280
beautiful albums produced that only would work in LP form.
1410
01:25:31,280 --> 01:25:33,800
It's like sitting by an old fire, a crackly piece of vinyl.
1411
01:25:33,800 --> 01:25:35,920
There's something really comforting about it.
1412
01:25:35,920 --> 01:25:38,600
You could sit there over a lovely cup of tea
1413
01:25:38,600 --> 01:25:40,920
and you could have people round to listen to it.
1414
01:25:40,920 --> 01:25:44,440
It wasn't just this experience that happened in your ears only.
1415
01:25:44,440 --> 01:25:46,360
Every single time you listen to the record,
1416
01:25:46,360 --> 01:25:48,560
you've got to do the same thing - handle it with care,
1417
01:25:48,560 --> 01:25:50,640
put your finger in the middle, keep it balanced,
1418
01:25:50,640 --> 01:25:52,560
put it on the platter, do that.
1419
01:25:52,560 --> 01:25:55,600
You can't just casually throw it and hope that it...
1420
01:25:55,600 --> 01:25:57,480
You've got to do the same ritual,
1421
01:25:57,480 --> 01:25:59,400
that preparatory ritual,
1422
01:25:59,400 --> 01:26:02,080
- before you sit back and go...
- HE SIGHS
1423
01:26:02,080 --> 01:26:06,480
That was like a gift, a gift to yourself or a gift to somebody else,
1424
01:26:06,480 --> 01:26:08,240
and it was a magical experience.
1425
01:26:08,240 --> 01:26:11,800
My favourite quote from any rock star is
1426
01:26:11,800 --> 01:26:13,960
Ray Davies of The Kinks said that
1427
01:26:13,960 --> 01:26:16,600
when he looks at someone's LP collection,
1428
01:26:16,600 --> 01:26:18,480
he always feels like weeping,
1429
01:26:18,480 --> 01:26:20,960
because it's like looking into their soul.
1430
01:26:20,960 --> 01:26:24,400
And anybody that collected LPs
1431
01:26:24,400 --> 01:26:27,400
in that golden age can understand that.
1432
01:26:27,400 --> 01:26:31,360
The record collection was really the art collection
1433
01:26:31,360 --> 01:26:35,080
of the ordinary man, of the working man or woman, you know?
1434
01:26:35,080 --> 01:26:38,520
And it's only now, as they slip into history,
1435
01:26:38,520 --> 01:26:41,440
that we see their real beauty and their real power.123433
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