The Joy of Easy Listening


The Joy of Easy Listening

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Tonight's the night for something sophisticated,

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something suggestive, not explicit.

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Something relaxing, not demanding.

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Something that won't divert your attention away from more pressing matters.

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You need something that doesn't make trouble

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that complements the furnishings and doesn't have too much to say for itself.

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You don't need troublesome lyrics or choppy guitar chords.

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So just lean back, banish the blues,

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relinquish rock and roll and give disco the heave-ho.

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Tonight, you need something that has all of that...

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and none of it.

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What you need tonight is easy.

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# Time to get ready... #

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CORK POPS # Time to get ready for... #

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If rock and roll was born out of the greyness, stuffiness and ration book mentality

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that followed the Second World War, so too was a music that became known as easy listening.

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Its architects, and they looked just like that,

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were a group of men who were trapped between two worlds -

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just a little too old and square for the teenage revolution of the late '50s,

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but too modern and groovy for the old world.

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They were supreme melodicists on the run from jazz and big bands

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in search of a music to call their own,

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a music for the new consumer age.

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An age of reconstruction,

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of gliding along freeways and autobahns in sleek cars.

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A modern, comfortable age full of hope

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and most importantly, love, in what had been a very cold climate.

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These men were not looking for the heartbreak hotel.

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They wanted to be kings of the road with their own brand of can-do music.

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Composers and arrangers like Percy Faith, Ray Conniff and Bert Kaempfert were a quiet band of men

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who didn't stand out in the crowd, but they were dedicated

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to decorating the air with a soundtrack for what they thought should be the good life.

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You can really trace

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this popular, light orchestral, at least in America,

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to a gentleman named Paul Weston who came out of the big band era.

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And in the mid-'40s, he was coming out with what initially he called "mood music".

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It was a euphemism for being in the mood for love

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because most of the music was very slow and sleek.

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And so he came out with albums like Music For Dreaming,

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Music For Romancing, Music For Two People Alone.

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And he claimed that one of his fans said, "This music is very easy listening."

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The man who first took this new kind of music

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to international acclaim in the late '50s and early '60s

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was ex-swing musician Percy Faith.

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He championed the "sweet strings" approach

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and used instruments to replace any troublesome lyrics.

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He once said, "I want to satisfy the millions of devotees of that pleasant American institution

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"known as the quiet evening at home,

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"whose idea of perfect relaxation is the easy chair, slippers and good music."

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In adapting popular songs and film themes,

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Faith proved that the most important element of easy listening was the arrangement.

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Arrangers are the unsung heroes of the business.

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Percy Faith, I mean...

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Just about all my life, he was terrific.

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In 1963, Percy Faith came out with this pioneering album called Music For Young Lovers.

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Instead of somebody singing the lyrics, you would have pizzicato strings. You might have some horns.

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Each arranger had a different system

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of making it so that it wasn't too overwhelming or obtrusive,

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but at the same time if you listen to the arrangements, there was an art to them.

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What a lot of the great arrangers do in easy listening

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is they get to the truth of what a pop song is and the pop song is this bit,

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so let's keep putting this bit in again and again and again.

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Classical snobs and jazz snobs would say, "Melody, that's for little kids, that's sing-songy."

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No-one understood the importance of a good tune better than Ray Conniff,

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the easy listening maestro of the American Cold War landscape.

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He played with Artie Shaw in the '40s, but tired of being a struggling, penniless jazzer,

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he began studying popular music.

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He really was focusing on what are the biggest songs of the day

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and how can I arrange them

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to have them have an even broader impact.

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And he included in that research air play, sheet music sales, you know, everything,

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and would go to the Billboard offices once a week and read the charts.

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One of the things he discovered about songs at that point was the value of a hook

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and how a hook can transform a song into a hit.

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Meanwhile, in Germany, easy listening music was bound to fall on keen ears.

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The influx of American big band and jazz music, suppressed during the war,

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was the soundtrack that became synonymous with the country's reconstruction.

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A young musician called Bert Kaempfert was already working

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on his own European blueprint for easy listening,

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a music that could combine traditional German folk tunes and modern American style arrangements

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with more exotic world music rhythms

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and perhaps even the beats and instrumentation of something called rock and roll.

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We had a lot of visitors at the house. In the evening,

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there was a group of people who always came and brought records along and played music for each other.

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I think he got inspired by all that.

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He loved these sounds from other countries

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and I think he sort of incorporated it in his own music.

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Then Ray Conniff was of course very famous

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and who my father really admired and studied was Henry Mancini.

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CLARINET MUSIC

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I remember that we would listen to records

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and we would stop the record and listen again and listen again

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and we would talk about how he did it.

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Many years later, my father was told that Henry Mancini actually made a note in one of his own scores,

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with the drummer, the drum part says, "Brushes a la Kaempfert."

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MUSIC: "Afrikaan Beat" - Bert Kaempfert

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And when he was told that, he was so pleased.

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He was actually proud.

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Easy listening arrangers were an important asset to record companies as in-house orchestrators.

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With the development of high fidelity and stereophonic sound in the late '50s,

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part of the job of the in-house arranger was to record the kind of music

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that would best showcase these new technologies.

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Stu Phillips was resident arranger at Capitol Records.

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That was the whole point

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of this orchestral setting of all these pop songs

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because it was a good way of showing off stereo.

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It gave a broader, a much bigger palette for sound

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than a couple of guitars and a bass and a drum.

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Rock music was intended to be played on a Dansette or to come out of a transistor radio.

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It's mixed in a way to sound punchy and vibrant for those mediums...

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..whereas there's something about light music,

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I guess because it's appealing to an older demographic who have got slightly more money,

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they might invest in the latest amazing stereo equipment rather than a Dansette.

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It says something about the way the music was intended

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to be played or listened to.

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Yeah, here we've got the Super Stereo Sensation.

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You know, the "Super Stereo" emphasising the sort of dynamic range of the...

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I suppose some of them were almost done just to demonstrate hi-fis

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and while you were in the shop buying your stereo, you might buy an album or two to go with it.

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You've got the technology. You'd better use it.

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But it didn't stop there.

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High fidelity sound needed its own furniture.

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The stereophonic radiogram was far too big for the average teenage bedroom.

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It was designed for the new middle-class living rooms of the parents relaxing downstairs.

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With emerging technologies and dedicated furniture at their disposal,

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easy listening masters set about creating sophisticated textures and soundscapes

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for the new connoisseur of the 33rpm long-playing record.

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I think easy listening is a pursuit of sound itself

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without worrying about its greater meaning.

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When you're a kid, you don't know what instruments are on a record.

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You just hear a noise.

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EASY LISTENING ORCHESTRAL MUSIC

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When I was a kid, I was obsessed with the music on the test card.

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I used to like having BBC Two on in the background

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when children's programmes were on the other side, which drove my sister nuts.

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It sounded otherworldly because there were no vocals.

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There were no signposts as to what it was meant to be.

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A lot of it would have been easy listening.

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I used to record these things off the TV. I had to think of titles. I didn't know what they were called.

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You'd find that once you start arranging something for larger forces,

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it takes the edges off sonically.

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It softens things with all those multiple voices. You can play the exact same harmonic material,

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but the different timbre will make it sound "easy".

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In 1961, Billboard announced the official arrival of something called easy listening music

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by giving it its own chart.

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This was made up of anything that wasn't rock and roll,

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but many artists who found themselves on the chart were distinctly UNEASY with the term.

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Billboard needed to know which chart to put it in.

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Radio needed to know which format to put it in, so they can attract a certain kind of advertiser.

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And easy listening was probably... It always kind of...

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You know, it wasn't my father's favourite term.

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I don't think it says much to be honest.

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What it says is it is not disturbing.

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It is music that is pleasant to hear, pleasant to listen to,

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but it's by no means easy music, not at all.

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I mean, the skills you have to have to write that kind of music

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and also to perform it are significant.

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I think the problem with the moniker "easy listening" is that it implies sterility.

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But I think when you listen to my father's arrangements, there's nothing sterile about them.

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In the early '60s,

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Bert Kaempfert, now also a talent scout for Polydor Records,

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was prowling Hamburg, looking for interesting musicians to sign.

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The Top Ten and Star Clubs were now the home of rock and roll

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and Kaempfert was impressed by a British band who called themselves The Beat Brothers...

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in those days.

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Yes, my father signed The Beatles.

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As a producer. It was a personal contract.

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He was very modern

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and he could feel the music and the drive and the passion that was in there.

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He was too much of a music lover himself.

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Kaempfert recorded four singles with The Beat Brothers backing the singer Tony Sheridan.

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But Polydor weren't interested and the group returned to the UK where they met Brian Epstein.

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Paul or John rang my father and said, "Look, there's someone here who can do something with us.

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"Would you let us go?" And my father said, "Of course."

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Kaempfert released The Beatles from their contract and Epstein moved in.

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Later, an executive from Polydor was sacked

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and Brian Epstein declared, allegedly, that he had never heard of Bert Kaempfert.

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If early easy listening had provided a refuge for older audiences

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wishing to avoid the jungle drums and harsh sounds of rock and roll,

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it was faced with a new challenge in 1963.

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# Ooh

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# She loves you, yeah, yeah, yeah

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# She loves you, yeah, yeah, yeah With a love like that... #

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What would it do when The Beat Brothers became The Beatles

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and a new kind of popular teenage music was born?

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Big band member James Last had been in Hamburg when they first performed and was inspired

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by the early recordings of what was about to become a worldwide phenomenon.

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INSTRUMENTAL ARRANGEMENT: "Hey Jude" - The Beatles

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Most instrumental arrangements of British and American pop music,

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often performed in nonstop medleys with an emphasis on dancing and having a good time,

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would become hugely popular with older audiences not comfortable with the originals.

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This was the beginning of a strange, shadow world

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in which easy listening would deliver an alternative, more middle-aged pop culture.

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There was a kind of truth to it. It was like they were the avant-garde.

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When we look back on this peculiar history of popular music between 1950 and 2000,

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you'll probably learn more about it by listening to some James Last compilations than in any other way

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because you're getting to the technical essence of why it pleases people.

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Unlike a lot of American rock and roll,

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The Beatles seemed ready-made for easy listening treatment.

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Capitol Records arranger Stu Phillips was formulating a plan for a Beatles song book

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with the company's orchestra The Hollyridge Strings.

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We had very smart, sophisticated melodies on some of these songs.

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And I played around with them and I said,

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"If I do them a little different, they really are pleasant music."

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I said, "OK, what I need to know now is what songs are going to be in their first album."

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So we wired George Martin in England

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and asked him if he could help us out and tell us what he figured the first Beatle album was going to be.

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Phillips' easy listening versions of The Beatles' songs were an instant hit.

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Stripped of their vocals, incessant drumbeats and jangling guitars,

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Lennon and McCartney's melodies were given full rein with his lush string arrangements.

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Some people say it takes the soul out.

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It just is a different aspect of the same soul.

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I feel inspired when I listen to it. I feel invigorated. It cleanses the musical palette in a lot of ways.

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INSTRUMENTAL ARRANGEMENT: "A Hard Day's Night" - The Beatles

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This alternative shadow version of pop music was tailored for an older audience

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that in 1963 thought that The Beatles just made an unpleasant racket.

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We have in recent years raised them to such a totemic status that it's almost impossible for us to imagine

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that people didn't like them in the '60s. We think everybody liked them.

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It brings the song

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to an older audience. You hear it on the elevator.

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You hear it in the shopping centres.

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And you realise that the melodies were timeless

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and not just pop records of the time.

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Easy listening was now being played everywhere without offending anyone

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or demanding their attention.

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It was music to be heard, but not listened to while at work or at play.

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Some called it elevator music.

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Oddly enough, for something that was inoffensive, it became incredibly offensive, didn't it?

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It was for your parents, it was square, it was unthreatening.

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It was too soft, it was too sweet.

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It seemed to be a complete betrayal of the energy that was creating rock, you know.

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EASY LISTENING, MELODIC MUSIC

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I call all of it elevator music because it's going by the same principles.

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It's using certain instruments,

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under-arranging it in a certain manner to make you listen actively if you want,

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but also facilitating what you might call peripheral listening.

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American FM radio would come to be dominated by easy listening stations,

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all playing an easily digested diet of music that many music lovers regarded as inauthentic.

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But if it wasn't the real thing, what was it?

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MUSIC: "Magic Moments"

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There'd be an easy listening, beautiful music channel I would listen to,

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so in the daytime on Top 40 AM radio I would hear Neil Sedaka sing Laughter In The Rain,

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then there'd be a ghostly version of it by Lenny Dee and his organ.

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# Oh, I hear laughter in the rain... #

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I see no problem.

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A song can take different directions, different styles, done beautifully with strings.

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When you heard the elevator version of the song,

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you're listening to the original at the same time in your head,

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so there's this kind of what you would call a depth of field,

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an aural depth of field going on.

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We know the original songs, but yet... "Oh, my God, there's a version of Mellow Yellow,

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"but I can hear Donovan singing it while I'm hearing this orchestral group playing it."

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But these were times when ideological battle lines in music were being drawn.

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Rock and roll and pop had come to stand for something hard, uncompromising and young.

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Stu Phillips' easy listening versions attempted in vain to heal a generational rift

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that had already happened.

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The kids didn't buy 'em. The kids didn't buy that.

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That was sacrilege, what I was doing to their songs. No, they didn't buy 'em.

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I just admired what they were doing and felt I could do something with what they had,

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so that the parents of the kids that love it might find it interesting. And they did.

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I really felt that by the time people like Stu Phillips

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and The Hollywood Strings were doing covers of The Beatles

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and Elvis Presley and The Four Seasons and Simon And Garfunkel, that was a peaceful co-existence.

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It wasn't anti-pop. It was appreciation of the melodies.

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SHOUTS OF "Ole!"

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Easy listening found a much needed ambassador

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when in 1965, an attractive young man took the scene by storm.

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Herb Alpert, a classically trained trumpet player with a liking for jazz,

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had originally been inspired by the sights and sounds of the Tijuana bullfight

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to create an entirely new sound.

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The trumpet section in the stands

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would do this series of... # Da-da, ba-da-ba-da-bay... #

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Between that,

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you know, drinking some wine from a bota bag, it was a great experience

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and I translated that into a sound.

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LATIN-STYLE MUSIC

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I'm thinking, "This easy listening is not like something you have to sit down and hash out

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"and what the heck they're trying to do..."

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It had that commercial ring to it and it was not threatening, so it was easy to listen to.

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Herb's music ignored the angst, frustration and heartache

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associated with chart-topping rock and roll and pop.

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It was light, happy and easy to listen to and to make.

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I think it was easy because I had nothing in my head.

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I'd go into the studio with musicians that I liked, in the studio that I liked

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and I would just form this sound that was real easy for me to make.

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I recorded some songs in 20 minutes.

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So there was a humanness to it.

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And it...worked.

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Herb was the acceptable pop face of easy listening -

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the handsome front man of The Tijuana Brass.

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But easy listening music was usually created by shadowy arrangers,

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waving their batons, and anonymous session musicians.

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In Hollywood, Capitol Records agonised about what to put on the album covers

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for Stu Phillips and The Hollyridge Strings to help sell the music.

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They came up with all these crazy ideas for an album cover

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and one of them was myself and a bunch of little children ages four to seven.

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That was The Hollyridge Strings because we couldn't just photograph the musicians. It meant nothing.

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So the other idea is they went and got a whole bunch of secretaries

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and boy runners and everything else under the sun

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and they dressed them all up and we shot that.

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And then they had the lettering version.

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And by the time they got done, everyone decided they liked the lettering version.

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I guess they felt the names of the songs were going to sell that more than any crazy little picture.

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If audiences were familiar with the music of the famous easy listening arrangers,

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they could be forgiven for not knowing what they actually looked like.

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These were modest older men who often avoided the limelight.

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Despite writing easy listening classics like Spanish Eyes and Strangers In The Night,

0:27:310:27:35

Bert Kaempfert didn't appear on stage until the early '70s.

0:27:350:27:40

My father was not really interested in appearing in public.

0:27:410:27:45

He was not very good at presenting the orchestra, fronting the band,

0:27:450:27:50

going out to be the band leader, seen and filmed.

0:27:500:27:53

He was interested in studio work. He loved his work at home.

0:27:530:27:58

He did his arrangements, went to the studio and recorded his LPs.

0:27:580:28:03

Then when they became famous and he was asked, "Would you mind coming and promoting the record,"

0:28:030:28:09

he normally shied away from that.

0:28:090:28:12

Kaempfert wasn't alone.

0:28:140:28:17

The kings of easy listening were often eerily absent

0:28:170:28:20

both from public life and from the sleeves of their albums.

0:28:200:28:25

This was because they tended to look more like bank managers than pop stars,

0:28:250:28:29

men who weren't pretty boys born to pout or strike a pose for the camera.

0:28:290:28:33

This is a fairly early Ray Conniff,

0:28:360:28:39

very sort of Mad Man look... or Mad Men, isn't it, look.

0:28:390:28:43

There's an awful lot of girls on easy listening covers.

0:28:440:28:48

The band leaders don't look great.

0:28:480:28:51

The composers look even worse and the lyricists... Don't go there.

0:28:520:28:58

Sammy Cahn said that Burt Bacharach was the only composer who didn't look like a dentist.

0:28:590:29:05

So I suppose if you're going to have someone who isn't the band leader on the cover, have a pretty girl.

0:29:050:29:11

Here's another Ray Conniff.

0:29:130:29:15

This is slightly later, I think.

0:29:150:29:17

Oh, there's Ray. You don't want him on the front, really, do you, in full colour?

0:29:190:29:24

There's another one. A bit later, I think.

0:29:250:29:28

A bit more sultry.

0:29:280:29:29

Actually, this might be a bit earlier.

0:29:330:29:35

Lots of beautiful girls.

0:29:370:29:39

He was usually on the back.

0:29:400:29:42

But he liked the mood that the covers set

0:29:420:29:47

because they were usually quirky and stylised.

0:29:470:29:50

Remember, they're band leaders and in the performances because it's kind of faceless musicians,

0:29:510:29:56

it removes the emphasis on the individual and the individual artist

0:29:560:30:01

who is expressing their angst or something that happened to them.

0:30:010:30:06

It's not like someone there nagging, telling you about themselves all the time,

0:30:060:30:12

like a Joni Mitchell album.

0:30:120:30:14

Once you've removed the lead singer singing his own songs about himself or herself,

0:30:160:30:22

then once you've got that out of the way,

0:30:220:30:25

you can concentrate on the timbre and the different textures

0:30:250:30:28

and the more interesting subtleties within the music and the sound.

0:30:280:30:33

Musically, the big news of the early '60s was the rapid spread of British and American pop music.

0:30:380:30:45

But as it developed and became more ambitious,

0:30:460:30:49

pop would occasionally fuse with an easy listening aesthetic

0:30:490:30:53

to produce a new kind of hybrid composition and sound.

0:30:530:30:57

In the household of Henry Mancini,

0:30:580:31:00

you could hear everything.

0:31:000:31:03

MUSIC: "The Pink Panther Theme" - Henry Mancini

0:31:030:31:06

The British invasion had descended upon my home.

0:31:100:31:14

# I'm in pieces, bits and pieces... #

0:31:150:31:19

I was a Dave Clark Five crazy person. Beatles, forget about it. All of it I was listening to.

0:31:190:31:25

# All I do is sit and cry... #

0:31:250:31:29

We played music and we played it loud and we played it all day.

0:31:290:31:33

You know, my dad was a real huge Beach Boys fan.

0:31:380:31:41

When we played Beach Boys records, he would really love it.

0:31:410:31:45

I think it had to do with the harmonies and the melodies. They had such a unique sound.

0:31:450:31:50

It wasn't his music that was playing. It was ours, so he was forced to listen to it.

0:31:540:31:59

The Beach Boys, Brian Wilson is another easy listening master.

0:31:590:32:04

I'm using "easy listening" here as a complement

0:32:040:32:07

because what easy listening at its very best involves...

0:32:070:32:11

You think of people like Jimmy Webb.

0:32:110:32:14

It involves something that ultimately is deeply strange and mysterious.

0:32:140:32:19

Well, I loved the rock palette mixed in with strings

0:32:190:32:24

and I loved crashing those disparate elements together.

0:32:240:32:29

I just used instruments.

0:32:300:32:32

I used all kinds of instruments in different ways.

0:32:320:32:36

# Would you like to ride in my beautiful balloon...? #

0:32:360:32:41

Jimmy Webb's compositions sometimes provide the perfect ground for rock and easy listening to do battle.

0:32:410:32:48

# We could float among the stars together, you and I... #

0:32:480:32:52

Despite being part of the generation that was preparing to turn on, tune in and drop out,

0:32:520:32:58

Webb's songs were massively popular with the parents of his generation,

0:32:580:33:02

as performed by artists from Frank Sinatra to Glen Campbell.

0:33:020:33:06

His composition Up, Up And Away, originally sung by The Fifth Dimension,

0:33:080:33:13

became an instant easy listening hit.

0:33:130:33:16

He's not an easy listening composer.

0:33:160:33:19

When he's composing, he's not writing for the easy listening market,

0:33:190:33:23

but his songs were performed by other people,

0:33:230:33:26

so Up, Up And Away was performed many, many times facelessly, so it became easy listening.

0:33:260:33:31

# Up, up and away

0:33:310:33:34

# In my beautiful, my beautiful balloon... #

0:33:340:33:39

It's kind of a "whistle while you work" song.

0:33:440:33:47

It's the only one I ever wrote like that.

0:33:470:33:50

It was completely mindless and today, when I do Up, Up And Away,

0:33:500:33:55

I'm very sentimental about it.

0:33:550:33:57

It's like, "Were we ever that...

0:33:570:34:00

"..you know, goosebump crazy that we loved life so much,

0:34:010:34:06

"that we just wanted to get in a balloon and float away and that was OK?"

0:34:060:34:11

Because that song's not about drugs. It's about balloons.

0:34:110:34:15

You would see Up, Up And Away as a title much more on an album that wasn't Jimmy Webb's

0:34:160:34:21

than was Jimmy Webb's.

0:34:210:34:24

This album is The Billy Vaughn Singers,

0:34:240:34:27

the title Up, Up And Away, again a very popular piece,

0:34:270:34:31

one of the most popular pieces in terms of being covered.

0:34:310:34:35

So the arrangers and producers of these kinds of albums, Jimmy Webb's material is very musical,

0:34:350:34:42

so there's a lot of interesting musicality within the piece,

0:34:420:34:46

so probably the arranger thought, "I'll do that one, rather than Louie Louie."

0:34:460:34:52

And then... This is great, actually. This is a great record.

0:34:520:34:56

"The Bright, Bouncy, Beaty Sound of Ray Martin, His Orchestra And Chorus."

0:34:560:35:02

"Up, Up And Away". I don't know how many albums there were with hot air balloons on, but there was a lot.

0:35:020:35:09

The fact that it has no meaning says everything about us and who we were and what we thought about

0:35:090:35:15

and what we did and where we went with our lives

0:35:150:35:19

because we really didn't care.

0:35:190:35:22

Webb proved that easy listening didn't have to be easy, happy or wishy-washy.

0:35:240:35:30

It could be melancholic, even existential.

0:35:300:35:33

I like this one. # I am a lineman for the county... #

0:35:330:35:38

APPLAUSE

0:35:380:35:41

# And I drive the mainroad

0:35:410:35:45

# I'm searching in the sun

0:35:450:35:48

# For another overload

0:35:480:35:54

# And I hear you singing in the wire... #

0:35:550:35:59

A lot of the best easy listening music is really quite specific.

0:35:590:36:03

Wichita Lineman is about a subject that nobody else has written about.

0:36:030:36:07

# And the Wichita Lineman

0:36:070:36:12

# Oh, he's still on the line... #

0:36:140:36:18

I don't think to write a really good easy listening song, it has to be an easy subject.

0:36:180:36:23

But they almost always tend to be love songs.

0:36:230:36:27

Music journalists were confused by Webb's use of string arrangements and classic songwriting,

0:36:270:36:33

by the audiences he attracted and by the old guard artists who clambered to perform his songs.

0:36:330:36:39

They took a few swings at me

0:36:390:36:42

for being a middle-of-the-road guy.

0:36:420:36:45

"Jimmy Webb and His Orchestra or whatever you call it, they're in town tonight!"

0:36:450:36:51

They'd prep my picture in a white suit in People Magazine

0:36:510:36:57

and they'd say, "Who is this guy? Who cares?"

0:36:570:37:01

INAUDIBLE

0:37:070:37:09

As the '60s progressed, easy listening came to be more and more associated

0:37:090:37:15

with a certain kind of sophisticated lifestyle -

0:37:150:37:18

an aspiring, moneyed, adult existence

0:37:180:37:21

in which music was merely the add-on,

0:37:210:37:24

something that played in the background while you got on with more important things,

0:37:240:37:30

something that didn't get in the way.

0:37:300:37:34

You're creating a mood for people's lives, how they live, where they live,

0:37:340:37:38

the furniture that they have, the cars that they drive...

0:37:380:37:42

..the roads that they drive along,

0:37:440:37:46

the sea in the middle distance.

0:37:460:37:49

It's basically creating a soundtrack to a wonderful lifestyle.

0:37:510:37:55

CAR APPROACHES

0:37:550:37:58

We see it linked to this kind of groovy '60s notion of futurism

0:37:580:38:04

or '50s notion of futurism

0:38:040:38:07

and that notion of Space Age bachelor pad music.

0:38:070:38:11

And there's something kitschily appealing about the circumstances

0:38:110:38:15

in which it was supposed to be listened to.

0:38:150:38:18

It would have been either for a romantic dinner

0:38:200:38:24

or a seduction scene.

0:38:240:38:26

Whether that was going to happen or not, it made you feel that that was a possibility in your life.

0:38:280:38:33

It would've been a lifestyle thing and it wouldn't have just been about the music.

0:38:330:38:38

It's made a lot of the time as a means of showing off your stereo equipment possibly to a young lady,

0:38:380:38:44

possibly as a prelude to getting your leg over.

0:38:440:38:47

The theory that these records can be used for seduction is implied, I think, by this cover here.

0:38:470:38:54

I don't know who's on this, actually. They might be brother and sister.

0:38:540:38:58

It could be The White Stripes of their time. Who knows their relationship?

0:38:580:39:03

He looks a bit bookish. He's not really interested.

0:39:030:39:06

He's showing off his hi-fi. She's wishing he had other things on his mind

0:39:060:39:12

and wasn't just into showing off his super-stereo sound.

0:39:120:39:16

Here...

0:39:170:39:19

It's got further developed.

0:39:190:39:21

It's getting a bit more intimate. This could be later in the evening.

0:39:210:39:25

Another Pepe Jaramillo. Quite racy for a Pepe cover.

0:39:250:39:29

He's usually more "sun and cactuses".

0:39:300:39:33

And then here, this is a kind of voyeuristic thing going on here as well

0:39:340:39:39

because this is Only Love by The Brass Ring.

0:39:390:39:42

You've got a little peephole to see that this is...

0:39:430:39:47

It suggests that's what listening to this...

0:39:480:39:52

This is where it could get you.

0:39:520:39:54

With a sore lip.

0:39:540:39:57

Excruciating.

0:39:570:40:00

Here we've got Aimi MacDonald here and Ronnie Carroll.

0:40:010:40:05

This is a musical that Bacharach and David wrote - Promises, Promises,

0:40:050:40:11

from the film The Apartment, I think it was. It was based on that.

0:40:110:40:16

Great stuff.

0:40:160:40:19

Fantastic kinky boots here. Nice slip-ons and white socks.

0:40:190:40:23

Some Sta-Prest trousers.

0:40:230:40:27

So it's kind of about swinging, those mid-'60s...

0:40:270:40:30

Well, not swinging.

0:40:300:40:32

It was about, um...

0:40:320:40:34

Extra-marital sex. That's right(!)

0:40:340:40:37

There's a difference!

0:40:400:40:42

So, yes, I like this record, particularly the recording because it's very British.

0:40:440:40:48

It's a very British version of a very American product.

0:40:480:40:52

Despite the social unrest and political upheavals of the '60s

0:40:560:41:00

or perhaps because of them,

0:41:000:41:02

easy listening music resolutely avoided politics of any kind.

0:41:020:41:07

It seemed disengaged

0:41:090:41:11

with the world in which it was being made.

0:41:110:41:14

Like the Strings of Mantovani playing in a world shocked to the core by a recent war,

0:41:140:41:20

it seemed convinced that all was well.

0:41:200:41:23

It doesn't appear to have any context, it doesn't appear to have any content.

0:41:250:41:30

Lyrically, it's un-hip.

0:41:300:41:32

It's always quite positive, quite cheery. It's not necessarily going to be dark.

0:41:320:41:39

Those people that followed easy listening, whatever kind of easy listening it was,

0:41:390:41:43

they didn't get Bob Dylan.

0:41:430:41:45

And so, therefore, if you aligned yourself with those people, that was a naff thing to do.

0:41:460:41:52

It's the mentality that you have to be either one thing or another thing.

0:41:520:41:57

And I don't have it. I don't have that mentality.

0:41:570:42:02

But I know that I've run into it and people have said, "Are you with us or against us?"

0:42:020:42:08

And I said, "Well, I'm with you!"

0:42:100:42:12

"Well, you know, but you can't play in Las Vegas. If you play in Las Vegas, you're against us."

0:42:130:42:19

"Well, why is that? What does that have to do with it? That's just a venue where people go to hear..."

0:42:190:42:26

"Yeah, but you can't play Las Vegas because that's 'the man'. That's working for 'the man', you know?"

0:42:260:42:32

And this was real. This was real.

0:42:320:42:35

It's not written anywhere that pop music, rock music, any kind of music, has to engage with current events.

0:42:350:42:43

And I don't think it's necessarily a flaw in light music that it doesn't engage with the times

0:42:430:42:49

because that's clearly the exact opposite of what it's intended to do.

0:42:490:42:53

Its purpose is to disengage you from the times.

0:42:530:42:57

Perhaps part of easy listening's apparent indifference to what was happening in the real world

0:43:000:43:05

was the temperament and attitudes of its creators,

0:43:050:43:09

men who thought that music and politics should be kept apart.

0:43:090:43:12

My father was not a very political person,

0:43:130:43:17

but he was a person with a strong desire for peace, you know.

0:43:170:43:21

He had lived through the war and they were...

0:43:210:43:25

They wanted things to be good and to become better.

0:43:260:43:31

He wanted to make music to make people happy

0:43:310:43:33

and he kept his own political views, which he had many, out of his music...

0:43:330:43:38

"You know it's going on" was kind of my dad's attitude,

0:43:390:43:43

especially when I kind of was saying how the Everyman listened to my dad's music.

0:43:430:43:49

Everyman probably had a son dying in Vietnam.

0:43:490:43:52

Does he then want to go home and listen to music about dying in Vietnam?

0:43:520:43:57

No, maybe he just wants to listen to something that makes him happy and want to dance with his wife.

0:43:570:44:03

You know, my dad, he was not a tumultuous kind of guy. He was very easy-going.

0:44:070:44:12

He would much sooner write something pleasing than something erratic and crazy,

0:44:120:44:18

but if he had to, if someone did a film on the Vietnam War and wanted his music,

0:44:180:44:24

he'd be right there.

0:44:240:44:26

But in terms of his own style and how he liked to project himself,

0:44:260:44:30

he was an easygoing, peaceful guy.

0:44:300:44:33

MUSIC: "Windmills of your Mind"

0:44:350:44:38

Since Apocalypse Now, it's been assumed that the soundtrack to the Vietnam War was provided

0:44:420:44:47

by the likes of The Doors, Jefferson Airplane, Jimi Hendrix and even Wagner.

0:44:470:44:53

But easy listening was there, too.

0:44:550:44:57

I have one wonderful thing somebody sent me of a soldier

0:45:020:45:07

in Vietnam

0:45:070:45:09

and he's in his little cubby-hole thing there and he's got a little table.

0:45:090:45:15

And on that table is the Hollywood Strings.

0:45:150:45:20

He actually carried that whole thing with him

0:45:240:45:28

through from America to Vietnam and it was something that he played.

0:45:280:45:33

MUSIC: "Good Vibrations"

0:45:340:45:37

The second half of the '60s was the heyday of easy listening

0:45:430:45:48

since it offered a pleasant refuge from many other musical forms

0:45:480:45:53

that were straying into the danger zone of "difficult" music.

0:45:530:45:57

Pop music develops in this insane way between the end of 1964 and the end of 1967.

0:45:570:46:03

It's never changed as much since.

0:46:030:46:06

Fuelled largely by drugs, it moves in this completely different direction.

0:46:130:46:18

But at the same time classical music had changed and become a rather austere

0:46:200:46:26

and foreboding place.

0:46:260:46:28

Jazz had changed and become a lot more experimental.

0:46:300:46:35

So unless you were prepared to put the work in, there isn't a lot for you other than light music.

0:46:370:46:45

Ironically, it was also the heyday of easy listening because it WAS the late '60s

0:46:480:46:53

when all musics were beginning to co-exist in an atmosphere of shared sonic experimentation.

0:46:530:46:59

There was no exclusion. It wasn't like, "We're not gonna play this."

0:46:590:47:05

There was this melange on the radio

0:47:050:47:08

that created social progress.

0:47:080:47:11

It created... "Oh, these people are OK because listen to this song.

0:47:110:47:17

"I dig it."

0:47:170:47:19

The fact that Jimi Hendrix might put on a Mantovani record just to get away from that damn acid rock

0:47:190:47:25

that everybody was playing around him.

0:47:250:47:28

MUSIC: "Smoke Gets In Your Eyes"

0:47:280:47:32

Jimi Hendrix gave a great interview in a London paper about one day all music would be

0:47:320:47:37

coalesced, all the different musics would be coalesced into one thing.

0:47:370:47:44

And I was reading this interview and crying because I said, "This guy, he's a messenger.

0:47:440:47:50

"He's telling us about the future of music."

0:47:500:47:55

The only thing is that he was wrong!

0:47:550:47:57

MUSIC: "A Swinging Safari" BY BERT KAEMPFERT

0:47:570:48:01

as part of the Swinging Sixties, easy listening jumped on the same bandwagon as rock

0:48:050:48:10

when it came to the imagery of the sexual revolution.

0:48:100:48:14

Album covers were increasingly colonised by pseudo-psychedelic imagery and scantily-clad chicks.

0:48:140:48:21

Apparently, easy now also meant available.

0:48:270:48:31

But if it played its own part in the hippy project to unite all musics,

0:48:320:48:38

the easy listening solution was very different from the result envisaged by the lofty quest

0:48:380:48:45

that now dominated the experiments of progressive rock.

0:48:450:48:49

It is indeed pre-rock,

0:48:500:48:53

but it feels the pull of rock and the pull of all music.

0:48:530:48:57

Easy listening has a lot of sources.

0:48:570:48:59

So it will be aware of Latin rhythms, be aware of big bands,

0:48:590:49:05

it'll be aware of country music, if you like.

0:49:050:49:07

It picks and chooses from wherever, with no great respect from where.

0:49:070:49:13

MUSIC: "I Am The Walrus" BY THE BEATLES

0:49:130:49:18

Respectful or not, easy listening was now benefiting from a middle-aged backlash

0:49:180:49:24

against the seemingly drug-obsessed youth culture and from rock's slide into the obscure.

0:49:240:49:30

# I am he as you are he As you are me

0:49:300:49:33

# And we are all together... #

0:49:330:49:37

A lot of people are turned off by that, baffled by it. Older people in particular.

0:49:370:49:42

Even if they were into The Beatles a little bit to start off with.

0:49:420:49:47

And that's because if you were 40 in 1965, they were in their 20s.

0:49:470:49:52

Of course you don't want to listen to I Am The Walrus.

0:49:520:49:57

If you look at the charts in 1967... Again, you think 1967, the Summer of Love, Jimi Hendrix.

0:49:570:50:03

The most prevalent trend in the singles chart in Britain in 1967 is

0:50:040:50:09

sort of very mawkish easy listening.

0:50:090:50:12

The bestselling records were Ken Dodd or Engelbert Humperdinck, Val Doonican.

0:50:120:50:18

They sold huge amounts of records.

0:50:180:50:21

# Tears for souvenirs

0:50:210:50:25

# Are all you left me... #

0:50:250:50:30

If you look at the bestselling lists in the '60s, most of the Top Tens are people like that,

0:50:300:50:36

not The Who or The Kinks.

0:50:360:50:39

People talk about Engelbert Humperdinck keeping The Beatles off the top of the charts

0:50:390:50:44

as though that's an anomaly. That's a trend.

0:50:440:50:47

# Please release me

0:50:470:50:52

# Let me go... #

0:50:520:50:55

I didn't go for, "Ah don't love you any mowah!" You know, all that.

0:50:550:51:00

# I don't love you any more... #

0:51:000:51:06

His version of Please Release Me was a slower, lusher, more romantic version of a country song

0:51:060:51:12

that had already been a hit for Dolly Parton in the States.

0:51:120:51:17

She's two very good friends of mine.

0:51:170:51:19

Dolly Parton. She's a lovely lady. You just got it, didn't you?

0:51:210:51:26

-Just got it.

-A bit slow!

0:51:260:51:28

# That I will always

0:51:300:51:34

# Want her near... #

0:51:340:51:38

It seemed shocking that the record prevented The Beatles from having their 13th number one hit

0:51:380:51:44

with a double A side of Penny Lane and Strawberry Fields.

0:51:440:51:49

-It was shocking, yeah.

-Was it a bit like, "Yes!"?

0:51:500:51:54

I said, "Yes!"

0:51:560:51:58

But I just went, "Yeah.

0:51:580:52:01

"I hope they're not mad at me."

0:52:010:52:04

# Let me go! #

0:52:050:52:11

There had been a period without many singers like that, but only briefly.

0:52:120:52:16

It wasn't really a throwback. It was more a continuation of what had gone before.

0:52:190:52:24

Country Joe and the Fish didn't mean as much in 1967 as Tom Jones did.

0:52:240:52:29

Listening to the chart, you get a good idea of what it was like to live in Worcester in 1967,

0:52:290:52:35

rather than hanging round Soho.

0:52:350:52:37

It was a release valve for all that stuff that was going on at the time.

0:52:370:52:42

And when this ballad came along, people went, "Wow!"

0:52:440:52:47

They listened to all the rock and roll stuff going on, which I loved.

0:52:470:52:52

Then all of a sudden this ballad surprised people. It took them by surprise, more than anything else.

0:52:520:52:58

Jimmy Webb's MacArthur Park, composed as part of an intended cantata, was a more surprising hit.

0:53:000:53:07

Originally sung by the actor Richard Harris, it was elaborately orchestrated, lasted over 7 minutes

0:53:070:53:13

and had a weird lyric about a melting cake.

0:53:130:53:17

It's totally eccentric,

0:53:170:53:19

but yet contains elements

0:53:190:53:22

of mass appeal. That, to me, is another trick of easy listening.

0:53:220:53:27

# Someone left the cake out in the rain

0:53:270:53:31

# I don't think that I can take it

0:53:320:53:36

# Cos it took so long to make it

0:53:360:53:39

# And I'll never have that recipe again... #

0:53:400:53:46

Superficially, a lot of that extreme '60s LA pop easy listening

0:53:460:53:51

seemed to, you know, avoid some of the rules of making it palatable to the mass audience,

0:53:510:53:58

yet still made it palatable to them.

0:53:580:54:00

MUSIC: "This Guy's In Love With You"

0:54:000:54:03

Herb Alpert didn't have any mass appeal problems.

0:54:050:54:08

Even when he turned his hand to singing in 1968, it was, as ever,

0:54:080:54:13

all very easy and very successful.

0:54:130:54:16

This Guy's In Love was very easy because I have a friend by the name of Burt Bacharach!

0:54:170:54:23

Who writes a good song with Hal David.

0:54:230:54:26

# Yes, I'm in love... #

0:54:260:54:30

"Who looks at you the way I do?" Hello.

0:54:310:54:35

That's heavy.

0:54:350:54:37

# If not I'll just die... #

0:54:370:54:43

As the '60s closed out with guitars in overdrive,

0:54:570:55:01

The Carpenters appeared, like an aberration.

0:55:010:55:04

A smiling, clean-cut, brother and sister act that was soft, smooth and easy on the ear.

0:55:040:55:11

They seemed to come from another time, or another history,

0:55:110:55:16

but Herb Alpert signed them to his own easy listening star label, A&M Records.

0:55:160:55:22

They were thought of as old-fashioned and a little corny.

0:55:220:55:25

It wasn't music I normally listen to, but I recognised something in her voice.

0:55:250:55:32

# I think I'm gonna be sad

0:55:320:55:34

# I think it's today Yeah... #

0:55:340:55:39

I was born a throwback

0:55:390:55:42

with a love not only for music, different types, but for records

0:55:430:55:48

as well and sound. And radio.

0:55:480:55:53

So my arrangements, my songs and all, have a little bit of this and a little bit of that,

0:55:530:55:59

and have their own sound to them.

0:55:590:56:03

There was a year there that records did not sell.

0:56:030:56:09

It was like they tanked and the feedback I was getting from my own company was,

0:56:090:56:14

"Why did you sign these turkeys?"

0:56:140:56:17

Herb decided to give them one more chance and handed Richard Carpenter

0:56:200:56:25

a little-known Burt Bacharach composition previously recorded by Dionne Warwick.

0:56:250:56:31

PIANO INTRO TO "Close To You"

0:56:310:56:33

I looked at the song and the melody.

0:56:400:56:42

And I came up with my arrangement, which is a slow shuffle.

0:56:470:56:51

Chunk-a, chunk-a, chunk-a.

0:56:510:56:54

# Why do birds... suddenly appear...chunk-a... #

0:56:560:57:01

# Every time you are near

0:57:010:57:06

# Just like me

0:57:060:57:09

# They long to be

0:57:090:57:11

# Close to you... #

0:57:110:57:15

The version that Burt had done with Dionne, it's straight eight.

0:57:150:57:20

# ..suddenly appear... #

0:57:210:57:23

It's the bom ka-dunk...

0:57:230:57:25

# Every time... # For me, it just needed that little bit.

0:57:250:57:31

# Just like me

0:57:310:57:34

# They long to be

0:57:340:57:37

# Close to you

0:57:370:57:41

# On the day that you were born the angels got together

0:57:420:57:47

# And decided to create a dream come true... #

0:57:470:57:52

And, uh...

0:57:530:57:55

..it made... it just made a hell of a difference. It made a hell of a difference.

0:57:550:58:01

# Waa-aa-aah Close to you... #

0:58:020:58:09

The Carpenters had breathed new life into the art of vocal easy listening

0:58:090:58:13

but by the early '70s the orchestral music of arrangers like Ray Conniff, Percy Faith and Bert Kaempfert

0:58:130:58:20

had quietly slipped from view.

0:58:200:58:22

Virtually overnight.

0:58:240:58:26

# Close to you... #

0:58:280:58:31

One theory I have is that certain people took over management of record companies

0:58:310:58:38

and they didn't want to hear it any more. It was baby boomers taking power

0:58:380:58:43

and wanting new stuff.

0:58:430:58:46

My father was massively popular in the United States until about the early '70s.

0:58:460:58:52

The '60s were really his heyday.

0:58:520:58:54

The charts were Ray Conniff, Elvis Presley and The Beatles. They were the three biggest artists.

0:58:540:59:00

There are a lot of, you know, pop and rock music...

0:59:000:59:05

..zealots out there

0:59:050:59:07

who really think that all of that other music was...ugh.

0:59:070:59:12

Despite the fall from grace of its orchestral originators,

0:59:230:59:27

easy listening was gliding through the century, taking many different, sometimes surprising forms.

0:59:270:59:33

It would even enjoy a revival.

0:59:330:59:36

The good life still needed a soundtrack.

0:59:360:59:39

# Not a cloud in the sky Got the sun in my eyes

0:59:390:59:44

# And I won't be surprised if it's a dream... #

0:59:440:59:50

Easy listening would also provide a safety net for some pioneering rock and roll and pop artists

0:59:500:59:57

who were, inevitably, getting older.

0:59:570:59:59

-# Down dooby-doo down down... #

-In 1975, Neil Sedaka showed how a maturing rock and roll performer

0:59:591:00:06

could drift into the world of easy listening with exactly the same material.

1:00:061:00:12

# Breaking up is hard to do... #

1:00:121:00:15

Breaking Up Is Hard To Do, I wrote it in 1962 as a rock and roll song.

1:00:151:00:20

The tune originally was a sad lyric with a happy tune.

1:00:201:00:25

# Down dooby-doo down down...

1:00:251:00:28

# Breaking up is hard to do

1:00:281:00:32

# Don't take your love... #

1:00:321:00:34

A sad...sentiment with a happy tune.

1:00:341:00:39

But yet...

1:00:401:00:41

it again was a number one song 15 years later

1:00:411:00:45

as a slow, romantic ballad.

1:00:451:00:47

# Don't take your love

1:00:471:00:55

# Away from me

1:00:581:01:01

# Don't you leave my heart

1:01:021:01:06

# In misery... #

1:01:061:01:10

My songs are right in the middle of the pop, of the rock...

1:01:111:01:18

# Breaking up is hard to do... #

1:01:181:01:24

They kind of span in-between those

1:01:241:01:27

and the easy listening.

1:01:271:01:30

The easy listening stations started playing maybe James Taylor, certainly us.

1:01:301:01:36

And all of a sudden we kind of created a whole new...

1:01:381:01:43

..category, which was adult contemporary.

1:01:451:01:49

-Which...

-What does that mean?

1:01:491:01:52

It means it's a different name for easy listening!

1:01:521:01:56

# My love must be a kind of blind love... #

1:01:581:02:04

Baby boomers were getting older and started wanting to relax.

1:02:041:02:07

They found music with vocalists that... The Eagles could very easily segue into easy listening.

1:02:101:02:16

And I think some of those performers did do some easy listening stuff.

1:02:161:02:21

# Take it easy

1:02:211:02:25

# Take it easy

1:02:251:02:28

# Don't let the sound of your own wheels drive you crazy... #

1:02:281:02:35

The charts now throbbed with the biorhythms of middle-aged America,

1:02:351:02:40

mixing country and western stars with ageing folk hipsters.

1:02:401:02:44

Having recovered from a period of career success overload, Herb Alpert was back,

1:02:521:02:58

minus the Tijuana Brass, with his own smooth, easy jazz.

1:02:581:03:03

But through it all there was always Richard and Karen Carpenter,

1:03:061:03:10

working their way towards worldwide album sales of over 100 million.

1:03:101:03:15

Their global success now guaranteed the survival of Herb's record label,

1:03:181:03:22

but to some executives at A&M, easy listening music was still a middle-aged embarrassment.

1:03:221:03:28

That kills me. I...

1:03:301:03:32

There were a whole lot of people at the label

1:03:321:03:36

who really... begrudged us our success, which in turn was THEIR success!

1:03:361:03:44

# Long ago

1:03:441:03:46

# And oh so far away... #

1:03:461:03:50

They got to keep their jobs!

1:03:501:03:53

I suppose they're aimed at...

1:03:541:03:57

Yeah, a kind of audience

1:03:571:03:59

that had grown out of pop music.

1:03:591:04:02

I imagine the Carpenters were for people who grew up with Herman's Hermits rather than The Who.

1:04:041:04:10

And this is their adult music.

1:04:111:04:14

# Talking to myself and feeling old

1:04:141:04:20

# Sometimes I'd like to quit

1:04:211:04:24

# Nothing ever seems to fit

1:04:241:04:26

# Hanging around

1:04:261:04:30

# Nothing to do but frown... #

1:04:301:04:33

If you listen to Rainy Days and Mondays, that's like a record

1:04:331:04:38

that sounds like it's really delving into the soul of a woman doing the ironing while on Valium.

1:04:381:04:45

# Rainy days and Mondays

1:04:451:04:47

# Always get me down... #

1:04:471:04:53

A song like Goodbye To Love is about as emotionally intense a four minutes of music

1:04:541:05:00

as has ever been recorded.

1:05:001:05:02

# No-one ever cared if I should live or die

1:05:021:05:08

# Time and time again the chance for love has passed me by

1:05:081:05:14

# And all I know of love... #

1:05:141:05:16

There's something not quite right. It is quite unsettling.

1:05:161:05:20

It always felt a little bit like that. It was too good to be true.

1:05:201:05:25

Obviously, with hindsight, we know there were problems.

1:05:251:05:29

They shouldn't have toured nearly, nearly as much

1:05:291:05:34

and I should have spent... Well, taking everything into consideration,

1:05:341:05:38

Karen passing on at 32 years of age and everything else,

1:05:381:05:44

but... just shouldn't have done all that.

1:05:451:05:48

We should have concentrated more on...just making records.

1:05:481:05:53

And...

1:05:531:05:55

And me writing some more songs.

1:05:561:05:59

We get so obsessed with the idea of how things turned out and it became Woodstock and Altamont

1:06:001:06:06

that the idea that many millions didn't agree with that or like that

1:06:061:06:11

and found rock music extraordinarily repetitive and rough and peculiar,

1:06:111:06:15

in their heads something like The Carpenters was natural.

1:06:151:06:19

It wasn't just... once Heartbreak Hotel came out,

1:06:191:06:25

that that was it and everything was rock and roll and pink and black.

1:06:251:06:29

It wasn't like that at all.

1:06:291:06:32

It was a mixture.

1:06:331:06:36

And all one has to do is look at the pop charts

1:06:361:06:39

and see that...at the same time that Heartbreak Hotel was a number one record,

1:06:391:06:46

so was Hot Diggity by Perry Como.

1:06:461:06:50

And the same thing is happening in the '60s on satellite radio.

1:06:501:06:54

To them, the '60s doesn't start until The Beatles hit.

1:06:541:06:59

In late '63 or early '64.

1:06:591:07:01

So forget nineteen-sixty-one, two and three!

1:07:011:07:05

And it's starting to happen now to the '70s.

1:07:071:07:11

If they're doing the '70s,

1:07:111:07:14

you bet your bottom dollar it's going to be disco.

1:07:141:07:17

Period. Like nothing else existed in the '70s.

1:07:181:07:22

Rock historians weren't very interested in telling the story of Nelson Riddle,

1:07:221:07:28

but more Frank Sinatra.

1:07:281:07:31

They weren't interested in telling the story of Burt Bacharach, but Bob Dylan

1:07:311:07:36

because, you know, this story over here is more ethereal in a way.

1:07:361:07:40

It's doing interesting things, but not leaving great cultural traces like Dylan and Hendrix.

1:07:401:07:48

# So many nights

1:07:481:07:52

# I'd sit by my window... #

1:07:521:07:57

You Light Up My Life was number one for umpteen weeks.

1:07:571:08:02

It was inspirational.

1:08:031:08:05

You had to stop your car...

1:08:061:08:10

and, and weep when you heard that.

1:08:101:08:14

MacArthur Park was another...

1:08:141:08:18

It was a magnificent, innovative Jimmy Webb piece

1:08:181:08:23

that was so above the throng, you had to stop your car.

1:08:231:08:28

People say, "I don't listen to that kind of music."

1:08:281:08:33

What is that?

1:08:341:08:36

We never even thought about that.

1:08:361:08:40

It was like, "Oh, yeah, did you hear that crazy Three Dog Night song about Jeremiah was a bullfrog?"

1:08:411:08:46

Anything goes. Flo and Eddie, Frank Zappa, whatever. Let's play some music here.

1:08:461:08:53

# I'll find the place to rest my spirit if I can

1:08:531:08:58

# Perhaps I may become a highwayman again

1:09:001:09:05

# Or I may simply be a single drop of rain

1:09:071:09:14

# But something will remain... #

1:09:151:09:18

Now we do know that our music... that we are what we hear.

1:09:181:09:23

We're not what we eat. We are what we hear.

1:09:231:09:27

# Nobody does it better... #

1:09:271:09:32

In 1979, Billboard's Easy Listening chart was officially rechristened the Adult Contemporary chart,

1:09:321:09:38

where '60s acts grow old gracefully alongside new easy listening and middle of the road performers.

1:09:381:09:45

# ..half as good as you

1:09:451:09:51

# Baby, you're the best... #

1:09:511:09:54

I was a ghost from the '50s.

1:09:541:09:56

People asked, "Didn't you used to be Neil Sedaka?" I was favoured on the Adult Contemporary

1:09:561:10:03

because of my age. Things that went to number 15 on the Pop went to number one in Adult Contemporary.

1:10:031:10:10

Adult Contemporary, I thought, was an attempt for the baby boomers

1:10:101:10:15

to have their own version of easy listening music.

1:10:151:10:18

You listen to stars that were cutting edge.

1:10:181:10:22

The ones that survived went on to do very middle of the road stuff. Imagine if Jim Morrison was alive.

1:10:221:10:28

He'd be crooning Sinatra songs. It would be very frightening.

1:10:281:10:33

Not at all frightening was a young, good-looking Frenchman called Philippe Pages,

1:10:331:10:39

who had trained as a concert pianist but was attracted to the melodies of British and American pop music.

1:10:391:10:45

In 1976, he changed his name to Richard Clayderman

1:10:451:10:50

and became the reigning champion and pretty face of instrumental easy listening and light music.

1:10:501:10:56

TRANSLATED FROM FRENCH:

1:10:581:11:01

It was the music that I liked to interpret.

1:11:011:11:05

Everything I listened to by The Beatles or other groups I wanted to transcribe for piano.

1:11:051:11:11

I really enjoyed them more than classical music. Was I gifted enough to be a classical pianist?

1:11:111:11:18

I don't think so.

1:11:181:11:20

It's the melodies that I try to feel the most when I play them.

1:11:221:11:26

It's a music that is half-classical because of the arrangements and half popular music

1:11:261:11:32

because it is much simpler than classical music.

1:11:321:11:36

When I met him he was 23. He was OK, good-looking, but not exceptionally good-looking.

1:11:391:11:45

But he was good-looking.

1:11:451:11:48

But every month after I have met him, he was looking better.

1:11:481:11:54

He was looking at people while playing. This is one of the keys of his super, super success.

1:11:561:12:04

He was not a piano player watching his keyboard.

1:12:041:12:08

He was a piano player watching the audience.

1:12:081:12:11

Songwriter, producer and manager Olivier Toussaint chose Clayderman

1:12:131:12:17

to perform his song Ballad for Adeline, which became an instant easy listening classic.

1:12:171:12:23

In fact, Ballade pour Adeline seems to be simple, but it's not so simple, you know.

1:12:441:12:49

But it's not complicated. It's a combination of something not complicated, but sophisticated,

1:12:491:12:56

simple, but without being...

1:12:561:13:00

-Oh!

-LAUGHTER

1:13:001:13:04

You've got to add something with the orchestra to make it pleasant, to make it easy to listen

1:13:071:13:14

while making the piano sounding like a star.

1:13:141:13:19

Always...not always, but most of the time, bring drums.

1:13:221:13:28

Drums, bass, guitars. Like a pop recording, you know?

1:13:281:13:32

But if you listen to it, it's not disturbing. And that's the key.

1:13:351:13:40

As for easy listening music, it's a music we can listen to in different situations.

1:13:501:13:57

At home, in the car, at a restaurant.

1:13:581:14:01

It's a music we can listen to with pleasure everywhere.

1:14:031:14:07

So I think that easy listening fits me well.

1:14:081:14:12

It's grand. It's good.

1:14:121:14:14

# I'm easy like Sunday morning

1:14:191:14:23

# That's why I'm easy

1:14:251:14:30

# I'm easy like Sunday mo-o-orning... #

1:14:321:14:39

Easy listening is fine, it's fine

1:14:391:14:41

because there are times when you want to sit back and just, you know,

1:14:411:14:46

just relax and listen to music that is going to be soothing to the mind and to the heart.

1:14:461:14:52

And...I got into that category.

1:14:521:14:56

MUSIC: "Casino Royale"

1:14:561:14:58

For a '60s easy listening singer like Engelbert Humperdinck, you could do a lot worse

1:15:051:15:11

than take that well-trodden trail to where the old kings of easy, like Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin,

1:15:111:15:17

and the odd rock and roll legend like Elvis Presley, found a home.

1:15:171:15:22

The city of inauthenticity, where the crap tables jumped and the easy cabaret went on forever.

1:15:221:15:28

Las Vegas.

1:15:281:15:30

Actually, it was very exciting in the early days of Las Vegas.

1:15:321:15:37

The first hotel I ever played at, the Riviera Hotel, Dean had a piece of it.

1:15:371:15:43

He had a piece of the hotel and he'd make cracks onstage.

1:15:431:15:47

"You know, I got a piece of this hotel. I've been here two weeks now

1:15:471:15:52

"and I've checked every room. I can't find her."

1:15:521:15:57

# When the moon hits your eye Like a big pizza pie That's amore... #

1:15:571:16:03

He took a shine to me, so he put his name up on the marquee.

1:16:031:16:08

"Dean Martin presents Engelbert Humperdinck."

1:16:101:16:13

He never called me Engelbert or Enge.

1:16:151:16:19

"Humpy Bumpy Lumpy Dumpy, sit over here, pal." He'd do that.

1:16:191:16:23

And I had great times with that magnificent person.

1:16:231:16:28

# That's amore. #

1:16:281:16:33

Las Vegas could have witnessed the end of the easy listening story.

1:16:381:16:43

The music might have withered and died there in the desert heat, but that didn't happen.

1:16:431:16:49

By the late '80s, its emphasis on the delights of simply absorbing some pleasant sounds

1:16:511:16:57

found contemporary expression in some of the most unlikely situations.

1:16:571:17:03

Easy listening was alive and well. It was just chilled out on Ecstasy.

1:17:031:17:09

At the time,

1:17:091:17:11

both of us were in clubs in Newcastle that were like the Hacienda.

1:17:111:17:15

When you came home, you listened to another kind of music, which didn't really have a name.

1:17:171:17:23

You'd put on something to relax to.

1:17:231:17:26

It might be Penguin Cafe Orchestra or William Orbit or a bit A Man Called Adam,

1:17:261:17:32

those kinds of things. That later became what people called chill out,

1:17:321:17:37

which is not really something I'd...

1:17:371:17:40

I don't really like the word. I don't like the word.

1:17:401:17:44

But it was a very... There was a lot of different kinds of sort of down tempo music.

1:17:441:17:50

If you were looking for the happy impulses of a kind of easy listening music in the pop charts of the '90s,

1:17:551:18:02

Lighthouse Family had it all -

1:18:021:18:04

a posy-Ecstasy journey to the heart of a music designed to celebrate the good life.

1:18:041:18:10

# Lifted

1:18:101:18:13

# Lifted, lifted

1:18:131:18:18

# We could be lifted from the shadows

1:18:201:18:24

# Lifted... #

1:18:251:18:30

I think we did actually have our roots in happy, uplifting house music

1:18:301:18:37

of the late '80s, early '90s.

1:18:371:18:41

We just created the sort of sounds that made us feel good.

1:18:411:18:45

And that was what we set out to do,

1:18:451:18:48

to create those sort of songs that did that, for us.

1:18:481:18:52

-# We could be

-Lifted...

-#

1:18:521:18:55

It's like you create this little world, this mood.

1:18:551:18:59

And I think... Ocean Drive is a blueprint of that.

1:18:591:19:04

I think it is that. It's this kind of...blue sky,

1:19:041:19:08

feel good sunshine coming out of the speakers.

1:19:081:19:12

Cos we hear what people say about Lighthouse Family.

1:19:171:19:22

It's like they're saying it doesn't mean anything. Well, it does.

1:19:221:19:27

You might not like it, or get it,

1:19:271:19:31

but it does actually mean something.

1:19:311:19:34

And it isn't just there to make the room look pretty.

1:19:341:19:38

# So blue

1:19:381:19:41

# The sun's gonna shine on everything you do... #

1:19:411:19:47

Only somebody who doesn't understand the whole purpose of what it's about would say,

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"This type of music makes you feel good so it is not music."

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Ultimately, it's about trying to get the best out of life.

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That's the fundamental of it. Trying to get the best out of life.

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# The boys watch the girls while the girls watch the boys who watch the girls go by

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# Eye to eye, they solemnly convene to make the scene

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# Making music to watch girls by. #

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Maybe the best of life had already happened. Who could tell

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in a culture now dominated by post-modernism, post-feminism and post-everything?

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In a world in which recycling, appropriation and nostalgia were everywhere,

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that old enemy of everything that was supposed to be authentic in music enjoyed a revival.

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Austin Powers was unfrozen and Burt Bacharach was rediscovered.

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Easy listening was back, relaxing us into the 21st century.

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MUSIC: "Soul Bossa Nova"

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This was obscure music. This was music that no-one really knew and people still crave that.

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The paradox was they were craving music dismissed originally as unhip.

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They were finding that to be hip.

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All this cool and uncool business. I... You know, really.

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I'm just sick to death of hearing it.

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It's...poppycock!

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These sounds that suddenly, freed of the rift that there was in the '60s between one and the other,

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were liberated.

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I think the young generation now likes that music. They chill out with that kind of music.

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They say it's great to chill out to.

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Music that is exciting enough not to be boring.

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You have enough to listen for, but you can also just have it play on the side while you do something.

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Easy listening might have become interesting as a retro experience,

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but we rarely heard about its life as a hugely successful music that was still happening.

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Contemporary easy listening was, as ever,

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ignored by music journalists or dismissed as totally unhip.

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Press people do not like that kind of music and they do not like people having such a big success

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with that kind of music. What can I do? Imagine, for example, Richard Clayderman is beloved

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by two critics in the world, but hated by millions of people.

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I really would prefer the opposite side of my story.

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PLAYS "Ebony and Ivory"

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Richard Clayderman now has 350 gold and platinum albums to his name

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and has recorded more than 1,200 songs.

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He's performed 2,000 concerts and has received more than 50,000 bouquets of flowers from his fans.

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According to the Guinness Book of Records, he is the most successful pianist in the world

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and has spent 20 of the last 30 years away from home, playing his music across the globe.

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When I'm in China, I interpret some Chinese melodies and the public is really touched.

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When I'm in South America, I'll interpret some melodies that are well-known there.

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My repertoire is different, but the way I interpret things is the same.

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Very often, I play pieces by Billy Joel, Elton John or Stevie Wonder.

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Onstage I do a medley of Stevie Wonder songs,

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but again I do it in my own style with my piano. I try to bring something different to them.

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When I think of easy listening, I think of an alternate history of pop

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where the blues and jazz sort of only happened in a white way, if you like.

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I think of the sting of rock and roll not happening in easy listening.

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Incredibly tuneful, so it's deeply, deeply enjoyable, to an extent.

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In America, when they evoke Richard's music,

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they say elevator music

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because they try to find a way to do something which would be like...

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..to hurt you.

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But, em,

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I said easy listening because we don't know how to... how to describe this music.

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Easy listening can always be new because it always has someone else's new music,

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however spiky, sexy or subversive, to inspire it to new heights of mildness, joyousness

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and mass acceptability.

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James Last, who in the '70s was pumping out two albums every month,

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refuses to grow old and intolerant of pop music.

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He's still determined to elevate the latest thing.

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# Can't read my, can't read my No, he can't read my poker face

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-#

-She's got to love nobody

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# Can't read my, can't read my No, he can't read my poker face

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-#

-She's got to love nobody...

-#

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If it's done well,

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certain people just make whatever it is look easy.

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So Bing Crosby...

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There are more men, I guarantee you, in the shower especially,

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thinking, "I sound just like him! He's just a lucky stiff!"

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We think it lacks all the fibre and the dirt and the rebellion,

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but in another sort of way it's got its own mystery and its own quality

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as the production of musicians who didn't follow the party line of what was important to follow.

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Quite a brave, radical decision!

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MUSIC: "A Swinging Safari" BY BERT KAEMPFERT

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Hello? Can someone let me out the booth?

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