THE LAST FIFTY YEARS

 
Only fifteen years of the last fifty have taken place in the Twenty-First Century. The rest took place in the Twentieth. I am no expert and was a child at the time, but the last fifty years has been interesting especially the nineteen sixties part. We begin there. Fifty years ago was 1965! The Beatles released an album called Beatle’s ’65. It was a sensible title since it has a built in reminder of when it came out. Ringo sang one song. I think it was Honey Don’t. That was a great one! I have another record called The Best of ’68. Guess when that was released? It contains some great tunes done orchestral-style by Terry Baxter and his Orchestra. It is worth the price of admission (two bucks) just for their version of Mission: Impossible! For some reason they did not include a timely version of a Beatle song.

The Cold War was going strong and we had just missed Armageddon by a hair in Castro’s mustache back in 1962. We have never let them off the hook. That’s why they drive old beat up cars. The Sixties was a great time for cars. My favorite is the Mustang in Bullitt from 1968. Probably my most watched film to date. By the Sixties, most GI’s from WW2 were raising kids who went to college and got radicalized. They protested Vietnam and took drugs then settled down somewhat and raised their own children. Some of these are called Gen-Xers. Most of their parents got divorced and that is what defines them. As babies, they listened to their parents’ Beatle records, mostly Yellow Submarine. After the Beatles broke up there was a period known as the Dark Ages. It is also called the Seventies. A lot of nasty hair was cultivated. Classic rock was recorded and listened to very loudly. The war finally ended and hippies grew up, cut their hair and worked for Merrill Lynch.

Culturally, the period drew to a close as the Sex Pistols broke. Most people were confused by the phenomenon but UK Anarchy lines up loosely with the development of Post-Modernism and what some erudite people call post-history, meaning that the usual narratives don’t apply anymore. They don’t, frankly. Moving on, the Eighties produced great post-punk music if you were the right age. English bands wanted to rule the world again. This led to the Stone Roses (from Manchester) who paved the way for Oasis. Oasis was said to borrow from the Beatles but I don’t share that view. They simply fulfilled their destiny. The Nineties were the time of Indie Rock (Brit Pop) and computers invading every aspect of life. Soon, after the turn of the new century, we began our wars against Muslim Extremists. Not much has changed since then.