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From: andrew@grkermi.UUCP (Andrew W. Rogers)
Newsgroups: net.music
Subject: Re: IS SGT. PEPPER REALLY A CONCEPT ALBUM?
Message-ID: <649@grkermi.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 3-Oct-85 08:39:26 EDT
Article-I.D.: grkermi.649
Posted: Thu Oct  3 08:39:26 1985
Date-Received: Sun, 6-Oct-85 05:38:48 EDT
References: <1198@daemen.UUCP> <441@mhuxr.UUCP>
Reply-To: andrew@grkermi.UUCP (Andrew W. Rogers)
Organization: GenRad, Inc., Concord, Mass.
Lines: 33

In article <441@mhuxr.UUCP> mfs@mhuxr.UUCP (Marcel F. Simon) writes:
>> All my life, I have been informed that the Beatles' SGT. PEPPER'S LONELY
>> HEARTS CLUB BAND is the first real concept album.  My question is: WHAT'S 
>> THE CONCEPT?

Actually, I thought the first "concept album" was "The Colorful Ventures"!  :-)

>I am not sure there was a specific, album-unifying concept. Sgt Pepper,
>however, was the first full-length LP to be connected from song to song...

True.  Other firsts: SPLHCB was the first LP to include lyrics, and the first
single LP in a gatefold package.  (Those trivia books which list it as the
first single LP with a color photo on the back are wrong, though; the first 
Love album featured such a photo nearly a year before SP.)

>...There is also the powerful strain of loneliness and alienation that runs
>throughout: the non-communicating parents and child of "She's leaving home",
>the desperation of "With a Little help from my Friends" and the out and out
>despair of "A Day in the Life"

You could say the same thing about "Pet Sounds" (at least if you ditch "Sloop
John B", included at Capitol's insistance).

>This was not the first time a group had attempted to link songs together.
>The Who's "A Quick One (while he's away)" is one major example. SGT PEPPER,
>however, was the first LP to be so linked from beginning to end.

Paul McCartney admitted that "A Quick One" inspired the Beatles to make SP
appear unified.

>Marcel Simon

AWR


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