Why Beatles is so overhyped?

What exactly they changed in music?

I'm not sayin that they are bad,i actually like them,i just can't understand why so much fuzz.

>he hasn't listened to pre-Beatles music

George

Scaruffi

Take shrooms or LSD, then listen to their music. For me it all clicks into to place when I'm on pyscdelics. It changes how you hear music while sober as well. It's kinda hard to explain if you haven't tried pyscdelics.

Imagine it when the most famous band of all time, a band so famous they had to stop performing because people freaked out so much for them that their screams would drown out the band's instruments, starts doing shit that is completely non-mainstream. It explodes like wildfire.
The only thing the Beatles did that can't be fairly easily traced to more obscure artists is Helter Skelter, which is some wild fucking noise rock if I've ever heard it. Mostly, The Beatles took things they found in the fringes of the musical landscape and adapted them into their own pop recordings. Their revolution happened in bringing it to the masses.

i have no idea about other obscure bands of the time but this makes sense

Listen to the Sup Forums Beatles cover album. A 21st century take on the songs will make them tick for you.

I personally thought most songs were insufferable. Love the Beatles though.

There was no other band like The Beatles at the time. In the early 60s, no other band had infiltrated the mainstream media like they did. And the albums they made from 1966-1970 were a specific sound that almost no other musical group at the time could accomplish.

This.

it's like if chubby checker all of a sudden made death metal songs that everyone loved while Let's Twist Again was still rocking the charts.

They just have so many memorable songs, almost everything they recorded from 1965-1970 was memorable in its own way. They may not have been the most experimental group ever to grace the earth, but they created music that people who just got into music and people who have heard thousands of albums/artists can both enjoy. You might not like The Beatles, and you certainly aren't obligated to by any means, but you cannot deny the way their music has touched and enriched peoples lives. It has real power to it.

They (or I guess Brian Epstein) created the modern idea of the "rock group" (as opposed to a star/singer/teen idol and their backing band). They were ostensibly just four friends of equal stature who picked up some instruments, started a band and hit it big. This in turn inspired a ton of people to do the same and start their own groups. That's why you have a ton of groups who don't sound anything like the Beatles still citing them as an influence.

As for the music, they had a really good ear for catchy melodies and a talent at incorporating a diverse range of influences into accessible pop music. Back then, I think it was unusual to have talented pop songwriters who were also performers (and teen sex symbols, for what it's worth). Elvis, for example, sang other people's songs, and nobody really cared who Bill Black & Scotty Moore were (unfortunately). Same thing with Buddy Holly & the Crickets (who were actually a huge influence on the Beatles and, AFAIK, wrote most of their own stuff).

tl;dr - A significant part of it was the image & the time/place they were in, but they were also accomplished songwriters and competent musicians, and that shouldn't be discounted.

This. Whether it's your cup of tea or not, they were exceptionally good songwriters. They had an unbelievable talent for taking sounds not already in the mainstream and making them into seamlessly natural pop and rock songs.

I used to think they were overhyped too, but that was before I listened to Tomorrow Never Knows. The Beatles music that the average person knows (Hey Jude, Yesterday, All You Need Is Love) perhaps is overhyped, but the deep cuts are simply phenomenal.

Not to diminish their musical talent, but I think part of the reason their cultural influence is so enduring is that they have not one, but two instantly recognizable looks: the identical suits+moptops and the Sgt. Pepper outfits. That plus other iconic images like OP's pic. I think a lot more people know what the Beatles look like than know what the Rolling Stones look like, even if they've heard of both and that makes them loom larger in people's minds.

See also: Elvis

They were certainly very good at image, that's true. Certainly more talented than the Stones though anyway, and I'm a Stones fan. Jagger would admit as much too.

George bringing Indian music and spirituality to the band was one of the most innovative moments in modern music imo

Yeah, most of the big hits are perfectly decent pop songs, but the songs that the general public don't really know are their best. You could play some of the songs of Sgt. Pepper or Revolver or Magical Mystery Tour and a lot of people wouldn't believe you if you told them it was by The Beatles.

they stopped touring and concentrated on making music in studio that they couldn't even recreate live making good use of new technology and remained incredibly popular doing this

Listen to music in the early 60's and compare it to what the Beatles were doing at the time.