Archive for March, 2017

Sometime around 1966, The Beatles became adults. “She Loves You” was replaced by “She’s Leaving Home.” The joy of their early pop music was nowhere to be found in pieces like “Nowhere Man” and “Eleanor Rigby.” Very much in this vein, “For No One” is about the end of a relationship, where people are discarded like worn out clothes – very shocking for the “love generation” of 1966. Unless you were there, it’s difficult to understand or explain the sense of social upheaval the The Beatles reflected in their new lyrics at that time.

But it wasn’t only lyrically that The Beatles were evolving. Their music, thanks to the contributions of producer/arranger George Martin (1926-2016), often referred to as the fifth Beatle, expanded into areas previously unknown to pop music. For example, the original recording of “For No One” is quite baroque, featuring a clavichord and a superb French horn solo, ably played here by Alrick on the upright bass.

 

Bob Séguin – voice
Richard Séguin – mandolin
Alrick Huebener – upright bass

 

For No One

“From a Buck 6” was part of Bob Dylan’s phenomenal 1965 output that featured two albums, “Bringing It All Back Home” and “Highway 61 Revisited.” I believe that the impact of the 20 songs on these albums was not and has never been equaled by any artist and contributed greatly to Dylan’s winning of the 2016 Nobel Prize in Literature. The original recording featured Mike Bloomfield of the great Paul Butterfield Blues Band on guitar, the very influential Al Kooper on organ, as well as studio veterans Harvey Brooks on bass and Bobby Gregg on drums. Steve Jobs once said that this was his favourite track of all time.

Any artist must recognize those that came before. When Dylan plugged in an electric guitar in 1965 and alienated all the folk purists, most notably Pete Seeger, he showed that many of his influences came from Rock ‘n Roll. My arrangement of the piece owes quite a lot to one of my big influences, Chuck Berry and especially his great 1959 single “Memphis Tennessee.”

Richard Séguin – voice, acoustic and electric guitars, electric bass and MIDI guitar (B3 organ)
Roch Tassé – drums

From a Buick 6