Yesterday, I came across a fab 1985 BBC documentary that I couldn't stop watching. The documentary, British Rock: The First Wave, is narrated by actor Michael York and features amazing performance footage of various British bands that invaded the U.S. once the Beatles broke through in 1964.
The bands and the songs took me back with a rush to 1964 and '65, when English mania was at its peak. And yet, I never saw the Beatles or the Rolling Stones live back then. Most people didn't. What we experienced was the collective joy of the music on AM radio and that it posted a menacing threat to adult authority figures.
The British bands were at first exclusively for girls and then all kids. Their songs explained and celebrated the complexity of adolescent life, from true love to sexuality. And how they won us over wasn't on television or in magazines but with merchandise.
The Beatles were on everything back then, from trading cards and lunch boxes to hand puppets, pens, pin-on buttons, toy wigs and haircuts. For the first time, music from abroad in all its pop glory flooded the zone and adults were helpless. It didn't hurt that first-wave English pop-rock was overwhelmingly positive.
This is before the Internet, cell phones and social media, when word of mouth in school and music on transistor radios were how kids found common ground. If you didn't live through the hysteria, it's hard to fully understand the phenomenon.
My only beef with the documentary is that it left out the Dave Clark 5, the Beatles biggest rival in 1964, and the huge female stars such as Petula Clark, Dusty Springfield and Lulu, who caught the ears of boys.
Since it's 97 degrees in New York and summer is upon us, here's British Rock: The First Wave (sadly, the person who uploaded the documentary didn't allow for embedding, so simply click on the "Watch on YouTube" link below for playback)...
Bonus: Not to be left out, here's the DC5...
