1967 – Think Bensonium

Day 455: The fool on the hill, The Beatles

Roderick Benson — Thu, 17 Jun 2021 23:00:43 +0000

The day John Lennon was assassinated I came home from school and my Mum told me the news as I came through the front door of our house in Gurney Crescent Seaforth. At the time I actually did not know much about the Beatles but this was all to change as over the following months Sydney radio stations were full of Beatles music. As I got to know their music better, I began collecting some of their albums and one album I bought was a compilation called the Beatles Ballets. This was one of the tracks on this album and at the time I think it became one of my favourite Beatle songs. Unfortunately, I could not find the original recording of “The Fool on the Hill” on Youtube so the best I could do was get this performance of the tune from Paul McCartney which is pretty decent.

Now this was originally meant to be the final Covid Island Discs song as the UK was scheduled to come out of lockdown on the 21^st of June. However, due to the UK government not shutting down travel from India, as post Brexit they wanted to get a quick trade deal with this nation, we now have the Indian delta variant spreading rapidly through the UK population. This means that the government announced on the 14^th of June that they are delaying the removal of lockdown restrictions until the 19^th of July. So I will continued posting on this web page new songs for another month.

Day 422: Society’s Child, Janis Ian

Roderick Benson — Sat, 15 May 2021 23:00:45 +0000

Another very old classic from Janis Ian. This is the second time she has appeared on Covid Island Discs.

Day 400: Waterloo Sunset, The Kinks

Roderick Benson — Fri, 23 Apr 2021 23:00:35 +0000

Well we have hit day 400 of Covid Island Discs. Given this is something that is all part of living in Britian I thought I would share a very pretty song from British band the Kinks about an inner city London sunset. Of course in order to experience a Waterloo sunset from the comfort of your home you would need to now be either very rich or paying a large chunk of your salary in rent.

Day 367: Penny Lane, The Beatles

Roderick Benson — Sun, 21 Mar 2021 00:00:46 +0000

Covid Island Discs Covid Island new year’s Day

So what mega band do I open up the second year of Covid Island Discs (hopefully the UK lockdown won’t last for two years)? Well surely it has to be arguably the greatest rock and roll band of all time and that is the Beatles. I have already cited several Beatle songs last year but this one is also another classic – Penny Lane. As mentioned previously, whenever I listen to the Beatles I always wish I could go back in time to the 60s when the Beatles were actively at work producing such incredible ground breaking music.

Day 193: Nights in white satin, The Moody Blues

Roderick Benson — Mon, 28 Sep 2020 23:00:00 +0000

So many classic rock and roll songs that have now slipped into history. Probably the most famous Moody Blues song of all.

Day 191: Whiter shade of pale, Protocol Harum

Roderick Benson — Sat, 26 Sep 2020 23:00:00 +0000

“Skip the light fandango.” Another rock and roll classic.

Day 47 (album cover 2 of 10): A Day in the life, The Beatles

Rbenson — Tue, 18 Aug 2020 19:32:02 +0000

An amazing album cover with amazing songs to boot. This song always makes me feel a little sad, it is so melancholic. Update: The video below is a new addition that I found on Youtube in May 2021. It replaces the original one which was just the album cover and that is why in my summary video I said that there appeared to be no video that went with this iconic song. Thankfully I have now found one so enjoy!