endless amount of cinematographic soundtracks, The Beatles’ catalog is sill
untouchable and no original version of their songs can ever be heard in any film.
Another striking example of The Beatles’ boundless freedom is the B side of their
very last album, Abbey Road, which includes a long medley unfit for radio playing by
any stretch of the imagination, as if it being played therefore promoted by the radio did
not matter anymore. By then, The Beatles privileged relationship with their recipient was
such an accepted fact that it was no longer an issue, a luxury that no artist in the music
business could afford today: suffice to remember the desperate efforts Miley Cyrus did
during the 2013 MTV Video Music Awards in order to solicit public attention, where,
scantly dressed in a latex bikini, she simulated a copulation with a male singer on stage,
to feel the pressure of today’s laws of spectacle. By opposition, one can think of the
John Lennon and Yoko Ono album entitled Unfinished Music No. 1: Two Virgins, the
cover of which showed both artists in their birthday suits – the album was at the time
sold under wrapping paper to prevent further scandal. Whereas Lennon and Ono’s
move was purely personal, a bit avant-garde and furthermore contained no sexual
innuendo of any kind, that of Cyrus is purely provocative and highly sexualized, very
much functioning along the semiotic codes of mere publicity, as the artist is irremediably
spectacularized. On the contrary, once they had achieved success and recognition,
fairly early on in their careers, The Beatles, as senders, never had to struggle to
establish a positive, stimulating relationship with their recipient, nor to work at
maintaining it, and that is what allowed them to create freely and to grow as artists, not
only musically but lyrically as well. One of their later songs, “Get Back,” is perhaps one
of the best illustration of this lyrical freedom, for it openly tackles very touchy subjects
such as marijuana and especially transexualism, a long time before Lou Reed:
“Jojo left his home in Tucson Arizona for some California Grass (…)
Sweet Loretta Martin thought she was a woman, but she was another
man.”
The coda added in one of the studio versions after a false ending is more provocative
yet:
“Get back Loretta,
Your mommy waiting for you,
Wearing her high heel shoes,
And her low neck sweater,
Get back home Loretta…” (“Get Back”)
Much before sexual fluidity was in the air – not mentioning the legalization of cannabis –
The Beatles were already evoking themes that would become major issues in the
decades to come, as true artists often do, and the receiver welcomed this new message
without expecting any other effort or intention from the senders other that of pleasing
themselves – again, as true artists.
The one to the last project of The Beatles, the would-be live, down to earth film
and record Let it Be (originally entitled Get Back) shows as well how The Beatles
73