Why is NMA often labeled political when most of the songs are not?

[Space]

Must just be me because their early albums just sound like rock n roll  Diverse influences maybe, but not a diverse sound.

Just curious, have you ever heard The Beatles cover of the show tune "Till There Was You"?
If you think that sounds like rock and roll then you probably think Susan Boyle sounds like rock and roll.

[Darkness]

Yes I have heard it. It's just one song though. I don't see your point by just mentioning one song, but that doesn't mean I want you to name every early Beatles song that is different.

[Master Ray]

Some great Beatles tunes posted here... I will agree with anyone who is in touch with the utter magnificence of what John, Paul, George and Ringo did... in less than a decade, they turned popular music on its ass and rewrote it forever!   

But I don't see how it relates to the 60's (where everything was pretty much a blank slate) and then the 80's, when those NMA boys first came along and popular music was crowded with rock, punk, soul, metal, disco, new wave and any combinations of the above...

The Beatles, wonderful as they are, got to lay their tracks down on an open road.  Many bands followed, sucking up those various influences that I just mentioned.

So back to my point I made, rather a lot of posts back... you cannot equate the playing fields of the 60's (when The Beatles started) to the 80's (when NMA started)...

 

[Pol]

Didnay slang aff oor Susan lol
To the point. Politics affects so much of our day to day life its all most impossible to make a statement without it being political in some way.

[Space]

Yes I have heard it. It's just one song though. I don't see your point by just mentioning one song

I mentioned a number of songs in my posts.

I said a large % of The Beatles early material was not rock and roll. Folk, soul, show tunes, Motown, Spanish-influence (they sang "Besame Mucho")...they didn't begin their careers as a straight ahead rock combo. Much more than one song of a different style.

[Space]

But I don't see how it relates to the 60's (where everything was pretty much a blank slate) and then the 80's, when those NMA boys first came along and popular music was crowded with rock, punk, soul, metal, disco, new wave and any combinations of the above...

Why do you say the '60s was an open slate but the '80s was not? New Model Army had the opportunity to play whatever they felt like. They could have used kitchen utensils to make their music. Every band no matter when they start has an open slate before them.

All bands have influences. The port city of Liverpool allowed for The Beatles to be exposed to a wide variety of musical styles. They admit that living in a port city expanded their musical horizons (large influx of various recordings and people). If anything, a band in the 80s like NMA would have even greater access to a far wider musical spectrum than even The Beatles had. It is no wonder that NMA are not afraid to go beyond the guitar-bass-drum model of music.

[szmurf]

Yes I have heard it. It's just one song though. I don't see your point by just mentioning one song

I mentioned a number of songs in my posts.

I said a large % of The Beatles early material was not rock and roll. Folk, soul, show tunes, Motown, Spanish-influence (they sang "Besame Mucho")...they didn't begin their careers as a straight ahead rock combo. Much more than one song of a different style.

Funny you should mention that.  I just heard the following in a Pokey LaFarge interview the other day:

But I'm a sucker for a good melody, a sweet sort of melancholic tune, like I did in that "Let's Get Lost." And that - I think I write - writing songs from that vein - it definitely has roots in the past, but I mean - you know, you hear that in today's music in different ways, perhaps not so attached to earlier stuff. But, you know, the Beatles were a good representation of that. I think the Beatles really - they could write songs that were sweet and melancholic but definitely rooted in sort of that Tin Pan Alley and early pop tunes.

[Rusco]

Now is it the same dude writing multiple topics about them around the net... 

[Amandistan]

Speaking of the Beatles WTF was that "I am the Walrus" song about?  I am assuming drugs were part of the creative process because that is by far the strangest song ever. This may piss people off but I think it's a stupid song.

[Bever]

"Everything is politics"

T. Mann

[Space]

WTF was that "I am the Walrus" song about?

No one can tell you what "I Am The Walrus" is about. It is a song that evokes a feeling. Whatever you feel from that song, then there it is. The lyrics are a stream of things that really are not linked at all. As an artist uses his brush and colors to create a painting, in "I Am The Walrus" Lennon used his lyrics to create a feeling. Each individual lyric line in "I Am The Walrus" is like an artist's brush stroke. "Yellow matter custard, dripping from a dead dog's eye," "sitting on a cornflake," "you get a tan from standing in the English rain," "pornographic priestess," "pretty little policemen in a row".....it all comes together to create a picture/a feeling. What picture you see/feel is up to you.