Welcome to another post on my blog. Last week, we started a new topic in the Music Through Time unit: Beatlemania. We completed a blog post about a Beatles song, I did it about the song, "I Want to Hold Your Hand". For this post, we had to look at two perspectives for the Beatles tour of New Zealand - for and against the tour.
For Tour:
The youth of New Zealand were for and happy with the tour of the Beatles. They were fans and were crazy about the Beatles songs. More than 3 000 excited fans, mainly girls, gathered at the airport, and at least 4 000 at the Hotel St George, where the Beatles were staying. The girls screamed on seeing their idols.
The songs of the Beatles and their contemporaries (including the local Beatles pastiche, Ray Columbus and the Invaders, with their huge hit "She's a Mod") were listened to by a generation of youths who felt that they were suddenly liberated from many of the inhibitions of their parents, and who believed that only they knew how to enjoy themselves properly.
Against Tour:
The parents, the older generation, were against the Beatles tour because their songs were inappropriate, about sex and drug use.
Some were on religious and traditional views who saw the Beatles leading to sin and trouble making. They protested with many signs.
Thomas Pearce, an Auckland politician said, "I welcomed home of footballers. There were all fine young men, but there was no civic or mayoral reception for them. If we are going to pander to the hysteria, antics, adulation, rioting, screaming, and roaring and all the things these bewigged musicians engender, then I think we should make a point of honouring any youths with a sporting background who are at least endeavouring to act in the best traditions of the young men of this nation."
