LECTURE 5: "A Hard Day's Night", by The Beatles

This week, we focused on the film "A Hard Day's Night" by The Beatles to examine Popular Music as Cultural Phenomenon.

In the film, London is represented quiet different as in the film ‘Bend it like Beckham’. This time, London looks very ‘British’. We saw too how 'Pop' is mixed with consumerism and politics, and how it influences in them.

In the 60’s, The Beatles are the culture in the streets; they are a hybrid between American Rock ‘n’ Roll and American Blues (Americanization).

The culture in Britain in the 60’s was influenced by America; Hollywood and Disney became very popular at that time. Although there was a constant American influence, Bond’s books and The Beatles had influence too on the British people. We know this as a “commodification”.

We focused on the youth culture at 60's too. In the film we see that it is seen as "structed irresponsability" between the adults and childhood.

We analysed the concert scene in the film. There are three important factors:

1)There is a crazy audience on the scene.   

2)All of them were young girls.

3)The concert was on TV

With these three factors, we can say that the ‘Beatlemania’ has born.

Beatles’ songs were normally about love songs. They were quite repetitive; is in that moment when we noticed that Popular Music is STANDARSIDED = It is always the same (the same rhythm, same lyrics about love…).

At the beginning, The Beatles were a subculture (they were not popular) that went mainstream although normally, subcultures are forms of resistance against the popularity.

What were popular on the Britain’s 60’s? Rock, Drugs, Students Revolution (May of 68, France), Hippies, Love, Vietnam, Music.