Turns out Sgt. Pepper is pure hype

Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band is commonly viewed as the most outrageous innovative psychedelic album ever made. Is it even psychedelic is what I ask?  


Paul McCartney called it his or the Beatles' "Freak Out" but it was nothing like Frank Zappa's Freak Out. Freak Out was less contrived or pop like. Even though the tunes were catchy they were much more far out than the almost show tune like "with a Little Help From My Friends". 


There's a limited amount of poetry and social commentary save for a Day in the Life. Even that was disjointed by McCartney's falling out of bed routine that just seemed like filler. 


Freak Out is arguably not even the best of the psychedelic albums. Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band's Safe as Milk was as trippy and far out as anything released in 1967. It was poetic and sonically pleasing. It was far out but not so far as it lost you. It took way more chances than the Beatles did with Sgt. Pepper which is basically a a non daring pop album. 


Safe As Milk was not playing it safe it was all about a new kind of trip the Beatles would never be ready for because while Pink Floyd were pushing the boundaries the Beatles were inventing new ways to say I love you which is a pop formula used to suck in the ideals of youth. That temporary optimism that marketers seek to exploit. 


Safe as Milk goes to places the likes of the Doors, Byrds,  etc wouldn't dare go. The Beatles tried to pick up on the Californian psychedelic sound but they listened to the Mama's and the Papa's and thought that was it or  decided that's as far as they would go. Scott McKenzie put flowers in peoples hair and the Beatles did nothing to mess up the 'do. In pop music land or "Pepperland" the wind never blows. They live in a pill capsule. Everyone and everything is safe and warm. The flowers never wilt people never die. That's the Beatles. They're no different than Justin Beiber now. They're Lady Gaga because they're sold off as being "daring". 


They want err Paul the leader of the Beatles wants Carnival of Light to be released but why?  He wants to continue the illusion they were psychedelic innovators but the truth is they were not. They were factory workers in a pop warehouse. 

Charles Manson and the Beatles

It's 1969...and Charles Manson's family is on their way to a massacre...unfortunately they get lost. They intended to go kill Sharon Tate and others but instead wind up at a Beatles convention instead. A bunch of union jackasses and some analingualizing walrus fucks are standing around cardboard cut out of the Flab four circa 1965 listening to worn out 45's. Everyone is indulging in the favorite Beatle drink "delusion".

Suddenly there's a knock on the door...No alarm at this retro party where Beatle trading card, cum stained panties and other memorabilia are traded. Why it must be the lads, everyone says in unison....

OOPSSS....Wrong lads and Lassies.....what happens next is similar to frogs in a blender.....

My Carnival of Light did not use Beatle samples

Carnival of Light mp3

Since I first aired my interpretation of the Beatles' Carnival of Light several comments by fans, newspaper & Wikipedia articles have stated I used samples of actual Beatle tracks to create the song above. That is completely false and without insight.

On November 16th  2008 I created a parody of the whole Carnival of Light experience. What I borrowed was song outlines keeping in harmony with United States Copyright law.

My parody was designed to make fun of what I call the Beatle Police. These are overzealous fans who correct other Beatle fans like they created a felony if they did not know some obscure Beatle fact. I'm sure everyone has met one. With all the misinformation out there about the Beatles it only makes matters worse. Why I've even seen instances were Beatle Police argued with Paul McCartney about his own life. He lived his life they studied it and or read countless books/took college courses etc etc. So as soon as I titled my video The Beatles Carnival of Light?  Beatle Bootleg...then ended it abruptly 3 minutes later with "probably not" I stimulated a public debate. This drove the Beatle Police crazy. That was my intention to make fun of them.

The other thing I was making fun of was the Beatles themselves who refused to release the track. They released all sorts of bad demos but this didn't make the cut because of sibling rivalry. George Harrison reinvented himself with Cloud Nine and the Traveling Wilburies. Meanwhile Paul was struggling in some ways but still considered himself to be the most important Beatle alive. There was really no other reason other than power struggle why George would not allow the track. He was the one who brought in all exotic instruments. Surely he was open to experimentation. I mean just look at that perm he got in the late 70's. So with life being so short, why not release it?   Paul and John used to tell George he could only have 1 song..now George had the power to tell Paul he could have none.

The way I made fun of this silly ego trip was by creating sonic chaos. I was trying to create the sound of 2 wild animals fighting. You can hear them roar at each other. That was Paul & George.

I think in many ways they drifted a part over the years. Just look at Paul at the Concert for George. He never looked so out of place. Now George is gone which makes the fight even more ridiculous. He no doubt told his wife no to COL.

Now I had to poke a little fun at Paul McCartney as well. He was lobbying to have this avant garde song released. It was very much a bohemian adventure of free form art. This is all fine and dandy but I just have a difficult time relating to a billionaire bohemian. So I borrowed a little bohemian Beatle influence for the song's structure. In no way did I intend to replace any Beatle track. I was more interested in symbolism.

My song is so chaotic it is naturally transformative. It's decidedly different from the Beatles Carnival of Light. I made fun of the minimalism a bit but also to distinguish my song from theirs. I resisted copying the readily available description of the  real COL. Instead I tried to create something that sounded as if it could be but wasn't.

The title Carnival of Light was necessary because it is an instrumental and one requirement for a parody is you must identify what you're making fun of. It's a complex parody but I feel that Beatle fans are sophisticated enough to understand.

Initially I only intended it for streaming broadcast. Since that time Beatle Bootleggers have distributed my song across numerous file sharing networks as well as pressed actual compact discs. So a few weeks ago I made my song available on Itunes and other large mp3 online warehouses. I did have it on a few smaller mp3 sites but there wasn't much of a push on my part to distribute it. I feel the need to push the song now even if no one downloads it just to identify the track as mine. As of right now Beatle fans/file sharers believe my song to be cut up pieces of Beatle tracks.

Again actual Beatle samples were never used. I used similar instruments available at the time the Beatles recorded Penny Lane. The drums are not from Strawberry field. The bass line is loosely based on Michelle but it is not Michelle(why even Paul McCartney when he wrote Michelle was doing it as a joke. He was at an art school party and they were listening to French folk music. So he began to mimic the musical style.  All the songs sounded alike. Most of the other s sounds I created are so distorted, stretched, played backwards, cut up into pieces etc they relate to nothing from the Beatles.

Some changes and lot has been learned of late

I've started a new website http://www.psychedelictripper.com

This will go directly to one of the online retailers selling my psychedelic music. I hope to have a whole album ready in a few weeks. I'll also be working on a psychedelic acoustic album under a different name. This will be an acoustic avant garde production. I was hoping for some sales from my Carnival of Light parody/interpretation but that remains to be seen. I need to get organized and focussed.

Focussed?  That segues to the next segment of distractions and what I have learned having to deal with them.

Not long after I introduced Beatle fans and the Beatle Police to my version of Carnival of Light plays dropped off drastically. I deleted my video so I can't go back and check when this happened but it was probably in the spring of 2009. At the time I figured people just got bored so I didn't look into the matter too much.

Little did I know but several people were bootlegging my track under various guises.

I'm not sure who put my song on file sharing networks first but once it got on there it was lumped together, uncredited with a bunch of other songs by the Beatles. The thing is my track was not the Beatles. My track was only meant to sound as if it were but wasn't.

One of the file sharers was a vulgarian called dorkgork. This is where it becomes confusing. He presented my song on the file sharing sites as part of a Beatle bootleg cd "Now and Then". What I am not sure of is if he was the one who spliced up my track, mixed it with other Carnival of Light songs till the time read 13:48.

You see up in Scotland a small record company called raskol records released a bootleg cd called "Now and Then". Now I do not know if this contained my song or not or whether the vulgarian was working with them.

My feeling is the Scotland punk/ska label collected Beatle songs off of file sharing sites and released it. The DorkGork vulgarian downloaded this and added my song and others to the virtual cd he promoted on  file sharing networks and youtube.

Everyone's a director though because another youtuber/Beatle fan put up his own video of the vulgarian's unrequested mix called "All Outfakes Mixed in One" on his youtube channel.

After that(I'm supposing) 3 Englishman create their own CD called Beatles Carnival of Light "Fakes, Frauds, and Phonies". They collected various parodies and versions of the unreleased track and press up actual compact discs. I know because I saw one on Ebay. I asked the seller if it was a CDR or a professional pressing. The answer was the latter. I confronted two of the pirates and was deferred to someone else acting as their representative. I did not like his attitude or lies at all. I mean they pressed actual cd's!  I was told that was not the case. I was also told they didn't promote them to file sharing websites but I found a page the other day that did just that. Then he tried to suggest no harm was done. That was when I nearly lost it.

It goes back to noticing not a lot of people were paying attention to my song. I had it for sale in late 2008 on Soundclick and Snocap. I left Soundclick and Snocap was taken over or something. I wasn't getting any attention because people were giving my song away for free!  In no way shape or form did I authorize this. I also didn't authorize releasing it on a cd!  Perhaps those who press cd's should know that can carry with it huge fines and jail time. I mean come on Kermit the Frog singing Hey Jude was placed on a cd!  I guarantee that is copyrighted and NOT in the public domain.

My song is copyrighted as well. I have the individual tracks to prove so in a court of law if I have to.

Perhaps what was really insulting is credit was never given to me. The newspaper who interviewed Paul McCartney about Carnival of Light had a video link to my song. Several other websites had links to my song. The video was labeled. Yet despite this they tossed my song in a haystack.

I wonder if anyone has ever tried to go after file sharing sites?  It is not an easy task. For one thing you have to convince them the track was yours and that can take several angry emails. Then you have to remind them to flag the titles, length, etc. Then the file sharer just changes things up a bit and you're back where you started.

I don't know why Paul McCartney is sitting on his hands about Carnival of Light. Does he actually expect sales will be generated?  As soon as it is released it will be on the file sharing networks and handed out for free.

Strange that the Beatles didn't explore strings from their own backyard

This is a Weber Aspen 2 Mandolin. It's a Celtic style. Very simple look but high quality parts and construction. It's the one I'll be saving up for.

Now back to the Beatles. They would explore Indian instruments like the Sitar but ignore the Mandolin. Why even Elvis or his producers used the Mandolin in "It's now or Never"...think that was the tune. It's a very nice sound. It's cheerful and full. Another aspect is the Mandolin has a medieval minstrel quality. The Beatles were often dubbed electric folk.

The heathen Rolling Stone held medieval instruments for an album cover. But it wasn't until very recently Paul McCartney picked up the instrument. Well I guess that means that since I am much younger than he I still have time.

I've always wanted a Mandolin. Not sure why Paul never picked one up. Perhaps he has a life?  He did try the Fugal Horn.

Just look at the Madolin....8 strings....chiming out...no ringing out.....it's the same scale as the violin. I tried that last summer for the first time....I thought it was fun. The small frets, neck and high tension make the Mandolin a difficult instrument to play but I think one would compliment my acoustic and classical guitars immensely.  Hopefully sales can increase so I can afford this beautiful $1600 instrument.

I can hear several Beatle songs in my head that would have welcomed the Mandolin....Girl, Here Comes the Sun, and others....it's not a bluegrass instrument exclusively.....it's also a classic...

The Beatle Island

I seem to recall a hippy dream of the Beatles and other 60's groups to live on an island in Greece. An actual island was purchased but then sold..at a profit. In some ways that sums up the 60's idealism. Groups like the Beatles "grew up" as it were.

Innocence is a fragile hallucination that is quickly replaced by another commonly shared fantasy called "reality". This world is made up of generally 1 commonly shared reality. In the 60's, especially the late 60's new realities started competing with the old. They soon turned into or merged with the older reality.

The driving force behind the extinguishment of all counter realities is $$$. Money will always be the curse of our fragile existence.  A value has been placed upon the land below our feet. We live on borrowed time. We always owe. Value is placed upon shiny things. Is that because even at night they shimmer? Night?  You know the time we feel most vulnerable. We return to are timid ways. We invent electric candles so we're not so frightened. In a nutshell we are out of touch.

I think drugs helped perpetuate the new reality myth. The 60's groups were the pied pipers and the flocks of sheeple followed in droves. Eventually the shit hits the fan though. The 60's musician a corporate puppet eventually crashes back to earth. The corporate wheel shift and the counter reality is tweaked a bit. Yes there was always a man behind the curtain.

You did have beatniks from the 40's and 50's influencing the new reality but they would have only really influenced a small percentage. Things became so colorful though anyone was fair game to be sucked in. There's a commonality in all this too...the innocence of youth the ideal.

Young people are searching for their identity from 10-12 all the way up to one's early 20's. During that time they are vulnerable and most impressionable. Again they're trying to find themselves and the last thing they want to be is their parents so they rebel. The classic Beatnik  tale of a rebel without a cause. All the while the corporate machine helps these young people out by giving them new ideas. The influence of their rebellion is not locally based, it is now a global influence. With satellite intervention it is as if the gods themselves command the misguided youth.

So there you have it Beatle islands being formed by silicon chipped gods.

Paul McCartney is a billionaire now. I bet he no longer fixes holes or does the laundry. John moved to NYC, an island for the vain. Ringo got sober held out and is now second in line to the Beatle throne. George might have been the one who came the closet to living on that island. He was an avid gardener I have read. No mention if he ever picked up a spade but I guess he referred to himself as a gardener before a Beatle.

My island was formed in the mid 70's a child. For some reason everything seemed warmer back then. There were many adult things going on in the world such as gas shortages but out of that came a new sort of Victory Garden. Instead of easing the burden on the war effort to finance the murder of 10's of millions, this new reality was about getting back to basics...back to nature. Instead of the condemnation of life so prevalent in the so called "greatest generation" as well as the modern replacement war to create terror movement....the victory garden of the 70's was about nurturing life. Yes that's an island I could live on. I've been a vegetarian most of my life. I've been a strict one since 1992. For me gardening and music will always go together. I just need to move into a better garden.

BEATLES- Origin of their name

I think we've all heard John Lennon talk about a man on a flaming pie or something and said Beetles with an A. I think this is just John's way of being of beat(ha!)ing around the bush.

Beatles most definitely came from the Bohemian culture the Beatles had become part of during their art school days and also through their travels.

Marlon Brando's the Wild One must have been quite popular for the Beatles and other young people living the bohemian lifestyle.As impressive as Brando was as an actor they would have also been impressed by Lee Marvin as well. Lee's biker gang just happened to be called "The Beetles".

Other characters from this era would have impressed the Beatles as well such as James Dean. A lifestyle was either emerging or being revealed.

I've been studying Bohemian Grove and bohemian ways for some time now. I mostly look at music. Take the French Chanson Begone Dull Care. It travels from France(origin of the Bohemian culture), goes to Scotland and then to the West Coast of the United States. Bohemian Grove out in California is full of French, Scottish and other symbolism. Why you have signs in French even. At the Cremation of Care ceremony they play the bagpipes and Begone Dull Care.

Begone Dull Care is also an avant garde animation made by a Scottish artist. This artist brilliantly scratched, painting, and drew on film frame by frame.

Begone Dull Care is the motto or state of mind of the Bohemian no matter where they are. The Beatles certainly became part of this group and no doubt helped them become very successful.

I'm not really sure what goes on at Bohemian Grove. Why I don't even think Alex Jones uncovered much. For all I know he's a member. I suppose there are bad people at the grove who do bad things in the real world but what's good and what's bad is hard to define. You can go to work everyday, pay your taxes and never cuss but does that make you a good person?  Why the less fortunate could use your job so they could have a piece of the flaming pie.

I think despite what I've speculated over the years about Bohemian Grove I've always been my own type of bohemian. I don't really want to work or toil away for someone. I prefer playing my guitar and singing under a shady tree, gardening, riding my bike, and playing with my dog.

Perhaps all people who become obsessed with music become bohemians?   It's really hard not to be. When you start to create you develop a sense of godliness. You are now creator. When someone comes along and instructs you how to lead your life you want nothing to do with their notion. They can take your body but not your soul you think. Your spirit is free. I think that's exactly what people like the Beatles were after. Some people are just not meant to fit into the rat race.

Incredible String Project

For me string instruments will always be the perfect tool for expression. I'm currently writing a new album I hope to have released this spring. It will be an avant garde acoustic album. 

One of the reasons for releasing Carnival of Light was in hopes of financing my new project. I could really use a better signal chain. By that I mean 1 or 2 nice microphones along with a nice channel strip/mic preamp or 2. 

One other thing that would make an album more interesting would be a couple more string instruments I do not possess. I'm not entirely sure what I would use but there are certain instruments I am fond of. 

One is the Mandolin. Ultimately I'd love to have a Weber Yellowstone HT but would settle for a simple more available Weber. 

Another is the Octave Mandolin. Again I'd go with a Weber. And again although one of the real fancy ones would be nice a simple one would do the job. 

Currently I have a nice Classical guitar(pictured), Martin D-28. My sole microphone is a Bluebird by Blue fed into a Joe Meek 3Q mic preamp. I have a convolution reverb plugin as well as other effects if needed. 

Mostly I could improve the very cheap signal chain. The 2 instruments would make for a nice thick sound. I do a lot of finger style but love to fire in with the crimson sound of a thick rhythm section. Any patrons of the arts or investors interested feel free to contact me. 

CARNIVAL OF LIGHT

On November 16th 2008 I completed a track called Carnival of Light. The track was my response to Paul McCartney lobbying the press to help him release the Beatles' Carnival of Light. In many ways it was a cry for help. You see the release of any new Beatle materials calls for a unanimous vote. Beatle Olivia, Beatle Yoko and Beatle Ringo all said no. So I released my version for countless reasons I shall attempt to go into.

I don't follow ever single aspect to the Beatles. I'm not one of those fans who will argue till they're blue in the face over what Paul had for breakfast back in 1965. An argument complete with supporting evidence that would make even Paul himself wonder if he was alive. So I figured Carnival of Light was on Youtube. I checked it wasn't there so I thought it would be funny if it was added.

My first attempt was a sonic collusion of sorts with out much room to breathe. I thought to myself I was simply trying to hard. I wasn't trying to copy the description I read but rather come up with something else far more mind boggling. I mean I really find it to be anticlimax to sit back and listen to a track and say "Oh there's the Barcelona chant", and oh there's this and that. You might as well swallow a jar of sleeping pills to wake up. So I was striving for something more interesting but at the same time weird or sonic-ally irritating.

What I came up was much better than even I expected. I wanted the track to have many a 1967 Beatles' sound but at the same time sound as if they had found a new drug and went off in another direction. A song that could of, might of been but never was was the emotion I was trying to evoke. All that and more was accomplished.

What else I was trying to accomplish is to infuse a great deal of symbolism. Some of this symbolism is obvious where I paint sonic pictures of beasts or freaks one might find at a carnival. Since this was a carnival of light it could not be literal but instead had to be figurative. Other messages are hidden and I will not reveal them here.

Carnival of Light(my version) had to be be packaged together all nice and tidy. I had no desire to carry on for 13:48 or whatever it was suppose to be. I wanted a digestible piece of music that might make one feel sea sick for a time but for only a spell. Some early Jimi Hendrix songs came to mind along with the works and feelings of Edgar Allen Poe. Many of the early Hendrix songs were nice neat packages full of weirdness. I like that "avant garde pop". Poe felt long stories and worse novels were a waste of time. If you can't spit out the story in a short amount of time you're nothing but a heroin dealer.

So I placed it on Youtube and watched in amazement as it became very popular. Not everyone liked it. There was the loyal royal Beatle guard who were quick to attack. They were quite ready to accept a song they never heard as being better than my "fake song" just because the unreleased Carnival of Light was the Beatles.

I also encountered many a Youtuber who was very open minded and sometimes open mouthed(as they consumed Shrooms and acid to my music)that would say things like "I don't know if this is it but it's incredible" or "I know this is not the real Carnival of Light but it's awesome none the less". I really appreciate these sorts of attitudes and compliments.

Over the course of time numerous others put up their own versions of Carnival of Light. Some were better than others but most were just really bad jokes. Then late last year someone started cutting up my version, mixing it with other songs and calling it "all outfakes mixed in one". This track was distributed across various file sharing platforms under the title Beatles Now and Then Bootleg. Up until about a week ago I had absolutely no idea how widespread this was.

I had not been looking at what was on Youtube for a while now. Then I came across several videos using my track and giving all credits to some Bulgarian with the user name Doregore. Another youtube user TheoneBeatle had the nerve to try and quiz me about my own production! This pimpleheaded 17 year old was going around apologizing to the Bulgarian bastard about reposting "his song". Then I see all these people commenting on these videos and marveling at the sound. Absolutely no credit was given.

I resolved to remove my Carnival of Light video along with all my videos and ask that the content be removed. Their reaction? One youtuber named birdturd405 ignored all requests. TheOneBeatle tried to quiz me about DoreGore. The latter of which proceeded to basically go tell me to F-off. At that point I had no alternative but to have Youtube remove all content.

Now I have begun going after the file sharing sites. A word to the pimple headed teenagers posting that file "all outfakes mixed in one", I'd be very careful. Don't even think for a second you can be clever and rename it. Just imagine how you will be killed by your parents when your internet provider either cancels your service or puts you on SLOWWWWWW.

From the get go I shared my song with the world and the world heard it. Now others couldn't have that and started distributing it and selling it under their own name. Now I have to put a price on it. I have to point out it was my creation. Unfortunate but true.