Liverpool Legends (Another Living Legend That Will Live Long After Lots Of Other Living Legends Have Died)

 

 

Kelly and I have seen the Liverpool Legends three times, and we both agree that their show is excellent. If the Beatles would have had modern concert equipment, this is what they would have sounded like live.

 

What makes them stand out from other Beatles tribute groups is the presence of Louise Harrison, George’s sister. She put the group together, and often sits on stage during intermission answering questions.

 

If you get the chance to see them, either in Branson or as they tour, take it.

 

 

 

That's right - Paul, John, George, Ringo, together again.

* I stole the "Living legends..." line in the title from Eric Idle in The Rutles: All You Need Is Cash.

"What Kind Of Camera Do You Have" And Other Discourteous, Ill-Mannered, Insolent Questions

I’ve taken and sold lots of photographs, and even put myself through college taking pictures. I can’t count the number of times people have asked, “Ooooh, what kind of camera do you have?”

Why is that?

I’ve written and sold many dozens of stories and articles, even wrote a book or two, and no one has ever said, “Hey, nice article. What kind of word processor do you use?”

Why is that?

Aren’t photography and writing both forms of creative expression? Don’t both require technical skill enhanced and empowered by individual sensitivity and emotion and vision? Aren’t they both the result of perspective, of thought, even passion? Aren’t they both intimate and personal, and when done well, universal?

Aren’t they both, you know, Art?

So why is it that the one seems to be the result, perhaps the inevitable result, of mere equipment, while the other is not? Did anyone ever say, “Leonardo, that’s some picture – what kind of brushes you using?” or, “Michy, that David, it’s nice. What kind of chisel you do that with?”

I doubt it.

Is it just me? Has this happened to you?

What do you think?

Were Elvis And John Lennon As Happy As You?

Elvis would have been 76, and John Lennon would have been 71. All these years later, we still listen, we still care.

While both were hugely successful commercially, I don’t know that either of them was especially happy. We went to Graceland for Elvis Week last year, and while we marveled at his awards and his costumes and his palace, I walked away with only a feeling of loneliness, of isolation, of a sad man-child lost in or hiding behind a caricature of the what people thought of him.

Obviously not John Lennon, but Kevin Mantegna playing
the Beatle with Liverpool Legends in Branson, Missouri.

Lennon, on the other hand, spent much of his last ten years trashing the work he had done with that little band of his. The party line is that he was a happy house husband for the five years following his second son’s birth, but many accounts describe his day-to-day existence as grim and lonely, tortured by dark fame, drugs and loss of self-esteem.

It is hard to believe that either man enjoyed his celebrity, and the money didn’t seem to buy anything but more distance from who they really were.

Both Elvis and John Lennon appear on the annual lists of top-earning dead celebrities, but I suspect they both would resent it.

I wonder if they would have pursued their paths had they known where they would end. I wonder if they would have preferred a life of contentment in anonymity, like most of us. Like me.

What do you think? What would you do?