“披头士”五大秘闻

“披头士”五大秘闻 　　1. “GUITAR BANDS ARE ON THE WAY OUT, MR. EPSTEIN.” 　　“吉他乐队已经过时了，艾普斯坦先生。” 　　Those were the infamous words of Dick Rowe – the talent scout for Decca Records – to the Beatles’ manager after a nervous first audition in January 1962. The band had been invited to London on the strength of their live performances in Liverpool, arriving in the midst of a swirling snowstorm on New Year’s Day. But they failed to impress Rowe, who in rejecting them inadvertently became forever known as the man who turned down the most successful band in history. Rowe wasn’t about to make the same mistake twice though – he signed up the Rolling Stones later that year. 　　1962年1月，当战战兢兢的披头士试演完后，迪卡唱片公司(Decca Records)星探迪克·罗(Dick Rowe)对乐队经纪人说了这句“名言”。在利物浦的数场出色表演使他们受迪卡之邀去到伦敦，到达当天是元旦，伦敦刮着凶猛的暴风雪。但他们最终还是没能惊艳到罗先生，当然他万万没想到，被他狠狠拒绝的披头士即将成为历史上最为成功的乐团。不过，后来他至少没有再犯相同的错误——于下半年签约了滚石(The Rolling Stones)。 　　2. THEY RECORDED THEIR DEBUT ALBUM IN A DAY. 　　他们一天就录完了首张专辑。 　　Having started out playing Liverpool’s famous Cavern Club and performing at various venues in Hamburg, the Beatles travelled to London in 1963 to record their first full-length album, Please Please Me. With four singles already released, the band faced the marathon task of recording ten new songs in just under thirteen hours. The result was an invigorating work of early rock-‘n’-roll that shot straight to the top of the charts. (By comparison, the later Beatles albums took several months to record – and the single “Strawberry Fields Forever” required 60 hours of mixing.) 　　披头士最初在利物浦著名的洞穴俱乐部(Cavern Club)以及德国汉堡市的不少夜店里表演过，直到1963年才去伦敦录制首张专辑《请取悦我》(Please Please Me)。当时，因为之前录好的四首单曲都已发行，他们面临着必须在十三个小时以内连续录完十首新歌的艰巨任务。结果，他们新颖的摇滚曲风让听众为之振奋，专辑立即火箭般蹿升到了排行榜首位。(相比之下，他们后期的专辑一般会花几个月完成——录制于1967年的单曲《永远的草莓地》(Strawberry Fields Forever)甚至花了60个小时。) 　　3. THEY INSPIRED INTERNATIONAL “BEATLEMANIA”. 　　许多国家爆发了“披头士狂热”。 　　Fan reactions to Beatles concerts became so frenetic that they gave rise to a phenomenon dubbed ‘Beatlemania’ by the press. By 1963, and still without a full-length LP to their name, the Beatles were regularly stealing the show from the more mature acts they toured with. Before long, the hysterical shouting – particularly from their female fans – grew so loud that they drowned out the songs themselves. The constant racket frustrated the band members, who gave no more live performances after 1966. 　　观众对披头士的表演疯狂到难以自制，英国媒体将这个前所未有的现象称为“披头士狂热”。尽管在1963年巡回演出时他们还没出过一张完整的专辑，但披头士经常抢过那些更有名的乐团的风头。稍后的表演中，女粉丝失控的叫喊声几近会完全淹没歌声。这使乐团成员感到懊恼，因而在1966年后他们再也没进行过现场演出。 　　4. THEY BROUGHT INDIAN CLASSICAL MUSIC TO A MAINSTREAM AUDIENCE. 　　他们将印度经典音乐介绍给了西方的主流听众。 　　The Beatles became interested in Indian culture in the mid-1960s; Harrison learned to play the sitar, and later that decade the group studied transcendental meditation in the Himalayas. Many of the Beatles’ later albums mixed elements of Indian classical music with psychedelic rock, folk, or classical music. Harrison contributed sitar to ‘Norwegian Wood’ (Rubber Soul, 1965) and ‘Within You Without You’ (Sgt. Pepper, 1967). Yet surely the best example of this musical fusion can be heard on ‘Tomorrow Never Knows’ (Revolver, 1966), which was inspired by teachings of the Tibetan Book of the Dead. 　　披头士在60年代中旬开始对印度传统音乐感兴趣：吉他手乔治·哈里森学会了弹锡塔琴，60年代末，整个乐团都去了喜马拉雅山学习超觉静坐。乐队的许多晚期作品都掺杂着印度传统音乐、迷幻摇滚、民间音乐和西方古典等曲风。哈里森曾在多首歌中演奏过锡塔琴，包括1965年的《Norwegian Wood》以及1967年的《Within You Without You》。而无可争议的是，1966年的《 Tomorrow Never Knows》是披头士西印音乐融合曲风中的最佳典范，其中歌词灵感来源于《西藏度亡经》(The Tibetan Book of the Dead)。 　　5. A NUMBER OF FANS INSIST THAT “PAUL IS DEAD”. 　　许多粉丝坚称：“保罗已经死了!” 　　You may be aware that we’ve already lost two Beatles; John Lennon was tragically shot dead in New York in 1980, while George Harrison died of cancer in 2001. However, in 1969 rumours circulated that Paul McCartney had died in a car accident two years previously and had been replaced with a lookalike. Conspiracy theorists pointed to a number of ‘clues’ hidden in the group’s lyrics and album sleeves; for example, that the Abbey Road cover symbolised a funeral procession, in which white-wearing John and the black-clad Ringo play the “priest” and “undertaker” respectively, while Paul’s eyes are closed. 　　你可能知道，两位披头士已不在人世：约翰·列侬1980年在纽约不幸遇刺身亡，而乔治·哈里森于2001年死于癌症。1969年，人们纷纷传说保罗·麦卡特尼两年前在一次车祸中也已丧命，现在的保罗只是替身。阴谋论者指出，乐团的歌词和专辑封面设计里隐藏着“线索”，比如说，《艾比路》(Abbey Road)的封面照片象征着一场葬礼，其中穿白色衣服的列侬代表着走在送葬队伍最前面的“神父”，穿黑色西装的鼓手林格 · 斯塔则代表着“殡仪员”，而紧闭双眼的麦卡特尼则代表着尸体。