Paul and Ringo

Paul and Ringo. What do they have in common? Yes, I've seen them both. I've missed the boat on George and John. If all were available and I could only see two, I think I would pick Paul and Ringo. From what I've read John was kind of a jerk. He was all love-ins and "All you need is love" and all that, but it didn't always translate well into his own life. If John didn't introduce the "musician" Yoko into the mix, the Beatles would have stayed together a lot longer. She did unbelievable stuff and John just let her do it. If Shakespeare was around he would have written a play about the Beatle break up. George was a little weird, too. He was all into the sitar (he and Ravi Shankar and the only people that like the sitar) and inflicted it on all the rest of us. He was into weird religious stuff too. He got sued once for plagiarism. Sometime listen to "My Sweet Lord" and a song from the 1950's, "He's So Fine". He may not have consciously plagiarized, but they are eerily similar. Although it was worth it because he wrote a song, "This Song", about it the experience which is my favorite George Harrison song.

Paul was the one that was all about music. If you take away all the Beatles songs, he's still got a million hit records. Anyway, I'm in Kentucky and I find out he's going to be in Louisville. Of course, I get tickets. Then he gets sick and postpones his show to a time when I won't be there. Arghhhh!!! But he'll be in Pittsburgh when I'll still be back East. So I go with Stub Hub, sell my Louisville tickets and buy Pittsburgh tickets. No problem. Wrong. Many, many problems. Not at all as easy as it might sound. At least not for me. It caused me much anguish, but it got done.

Anyway. The concert was so great. It would be like if your talking with someone famous, like a president and you think nothing of it and then in the middle you think, "Wait, I'm talking to a president." I felt like that a bunch. "Wait I'm listening to Paul McCartney singing Hey, Jude." He came out for an encore and I thought he couldn't possibly top what he had done. Oh yeah, I forgot about Let it Be and Yesterday. Someone pinch me.

How about Ringo. Of the Beatles, he seems the most well adjusted. George - too Buddhist, John - too weird, Paul - too driven, Ringo - just right. Both Paul and Ringo must be like a million years old, but they seemed as spry and strong-voiced as ever. Ringo had his "All-Starr Band". Get it? Ringo sang a half to a third of the songs then he also had on stage guys from Toto, Santana, etc with him. They weren't recognizable, but their songs and voices were, so that was fun.

I remember seeing a Marx Brothers movie on TV and my parents saying, "You know, their all dead now." What? How could you let that happen? I know that doesn't make sense. I knew it at the time. But I still feel like that. Some day all four Beatles will be gone. Its a shock that we've let two of them get away. How did we let that happen?