Episode 5 - Help!

In the fifth month of our year with the Beatles, Graeme Burk and Rob Jones are joined once again by Shannon Dohar for their discussion of Help! They talk about several songs on the album -- including "Help!", "I Need You" and "I've Just Seen a Face" -- that solidify the direction of the band. They also talk about the Beatles' flexibility with genre and what made "Yesterday" the song that not only changed the trajectory of the Beatles, but that of popular music. For extra-credit homework, Graeme, Rob and Shannon all watched the 1965 film Help! and delighted in the Marx Brothers-esque antics of John, Paul, George and Ringo. They discuss what would make this different to TV shows like The Monkees and how this film might have shown the fissures in the group that would manifest in the second half of the 1960s.