Hippies & The Beatles

The Beatles preceded the fan frenzy called Beatlemania from which many hippies emerged. Beatniks, hipsters and hippies are a continuation of Bohemianism. They are persons with artistic or intellectual tendencies that live and act with little regard for conventional rules of behavior. The bohemian subculture is deeply rooted in centuries old liberal European artistic scene. The Beatles were introduced to that bohemian scene when they were in their teens. It was in the red-light district of Reeperbahn in Hamburg, Germany where they had a successful gig for several months, which is a long time for young music artists. They also traveled around Europe and visited Edinburgh, Paris and Spain. In Germany, they changed their hairstyles and met some famous American Rock-N-Roll artists such as Chuck Berry and Fats Domino.

Early hippies were different from hipsters and other counterculture groups that preceded them. Many hippies followed the Beat Writers and fashions the British invasion artists introduced. And I haven't met a hippie that wasn't a Beatles fan. The Beatles introduced long hair fashions for men, Beatle boots, a new sound and new way of playing American Rock-N-Roll music. The Mod fashions that followed them from London were colorful and had abstract designs at a time when men dressed in flat, gray colors, wore short hair, combed hair backwards and used brilliantine made by Vitalis to keep the hair shining and in place. Today, many examples of British Mod fashions are found in the Austin Powers film series.

Hippies were an American youth movement that demanded more personal rights and freedoms then most Americans were willing to accept. In those days, it was not accepted for boys to wear long hair or to wear colorful clothing, for example. Needless to say, barbers disliked hippie fashions the most. Besides the fashions and trends in music, hippies also demonstrated against US policies, the Vietnam War, the arms race and for nuclear disarmament, ecology and other issues that were met with little understanding in those years. They brought new awareness and many social-political and cultural changes in the United States and abroad. Hippies questioned popular values and beliefs, and so did The Beatles. They professed ideas of peace, love, pacifism, ecology, civil rights, gay rights, freedom and so did The Beatles. In just a few years, hippies had followers allover the world. Hence, in America the label "hippy" or "hippie" is a synonym of "a social reformer", "free thinker" and also a "user of mind-expanding psychedelic drugs" such as marihuana or LSD that The Beatles also wrote songs about, for example "Day Tripper" - about LSD trip.

On July 6, 1961, John Lennon was asked by a reporter from Mersey Beat (Vol.1 No. 1) how did the name Beatles arrive? He replied "It came in a vision - a man appeared on a flaming pie and said 'From this day on you are Beatles, spelled with an A'. Thank you Mister Man, they said, thanking him." That spelling identified the band with beatniks, hipsters and hippies. The Beatles were very popular among all progressive-minded social groups of the 1960-70s and still are long after they've broken up. That made them good bridge-building Ambassadors for the 1960s Peace Movement and Hippy Movement. They were four boys from Liverpool with a great sense of humor. That's why sometimes they've been compared to the Marx Brothers. Perhaps that's why they shocked the public and their fans when they spoke out seriously and honestly on controversial issues. The most controversial of the four was John Lennon. John Lennon was charged for drug abuse in England and had to seek refuge in America. He applied for a Green Card (permanent residence) at the Immigration and Naturalization Office in New York. But even though he was still a British citizen and a fugitive from the law awaiting approval from the American authorities, he and Yoko Ono - his Japanese wife did not refrain from public criticism of the Vietnam War or President Nixon. When John Lennon was asked in 1971 whether songs like "Give Peace a Chance" and "Power to the People" were propaganda songs, he answered: "Sure. So was 'All You Need Is Love'. I'm a revolutionary artist. My art is dedicated to change."

The world as we knew it was transformed into a different state of being, a different state of consciousness by The Beatles and their followers. The band managed to unite people from all walks of life and all religions. They did not conform to any given system, did not follow the mainstream culture but created their own and stood by what they believed in. They were more then just artists or another music group. They were a new breed of bohemian artists from the Old Continent, from Europe. In the late 1960s and early 1970s The Beatles did considered themselves to be hippies. That fact is well documented in their own words and can be found in several sources such as The Beatles Anthology. In a short time, Beatles and hippies had much of the nation and the world behind them. As a result of that and the work of antiwar activists and other events that followed, President Nixon lost office, the US backed out of Vietnam and President Carter lifted the draft and gave amnesty to many draft evaders (the author was one of them). Since that time, no other generation of young Americans had to face a draft and fight in a war against their own will. Today, the US has a professional military staff dedicated to the craft, and no one is forced to join the forces against his or her will. And as we all now know, not all wars our troops participated in were necessary for national defense as much as for Wall Street. And as we know it, not all folks are made for fighting. Now, young people can grow and develop naturally without being forced to go through a boot camp at a time when they'd prefer to do other things with their life. The Music and popularity of The Beatles were also responsible for many changes in distant parts of the world; including the former Soviet Union.

I wonder if there's any other country in the world where foreigners could have been allowed to do as much as The Beatles did in America for the whole world? I also wonder if there is any other place in the world where one generation of young folks could have as much influence on its government's fundamental policies as the hippies had in a peaceful way, without overthrowing a government, and in such a short time? Those were just some miracles of The Beatles and 1960s Youth Revolution.

For many Beatles fans especially in America, the band descended on a PanAm jet from another world parallel to ours, and was greated like a divine descent. The Beatles didn't just play great music or introduce new fashions from England but most of all, brought new ideas that changed the world into a different state of being. It was also The Beatles' first coincidental interest in Maharishi Yogi and Prabhupada, the two Yoga teachers from India that made those two the best known Yoga Gurus in the world. Paul McCartney and George Harrison also finished Yoga Teachers' training courses and did a lot of teaching through their lyrics and music, for example. That's why in my opinion, they were the first Yoga Gurus for many of us, their fans and followers.

Now, here comes a free Yoga lesson. The author is also a Yoga teacher.
a) Put yourself in a good frame of mind.
b) Sit down in a comfortable position and relax.
c) Breathe slowly and regularly chanting the following Mantra: “So Hung” (“So” on the in-breath and “Hung” on the out-breath).
d) Focus your mind on the idea that All is One and You are One with All.

Now that you've had that first lesson, we'll continue with the story of The Beatles and hippies using advanced Yoga language, the language of images and symbols... Images and symbols are very difficult to decipher without proper initiation into their meaning as opposed to encryption, for example. So the following may be a bit too difficult to understand for some readers. So now, here comes the Sun! We could imagine The Beatles as the four Gods (Brahma) that created, supported and transformed the world. Those more advanced in Tantra Yoga could also imagine them to be like the four aspects of Antahkarana, for example; The Rolling Stones that followed The Beatles to the US and recorded "I Can't Get No Satisfaction" could also be included in the picture and imagined to represent the five senses and their organs. That's because those two bands were adored by their fans almost as if they were gods in the 1960s and beyond. But please don't take the above visualizations too literally. I'm using some metaphors mixed with a bit of humor to illustrate the special importance those artists and their music had for many members of my generation.

Haight-Ashbury, Chicago's Old Town, NY's Greenwich Village and other hippie Meccas of the 1960s across our planet as well as the mass events such as the Monterey Pop Festival, Summer of Love in 1967 or the Woodstock Festival in mid-August 1969 will also be long remembered as sort of sacred hippie grounds and holiday type events. So, it could be said that hippiedom is a free worldview that is followed by those that believe in world peace, love and personal freedom. It's a worldview that also has some icons such as the Peace sign or The Beatles and some loose ideas but no sacred texts, no leaders or organized institutions. Woodstock brought massive changes in public perception of reality that gained a lot of support for the Peace Movement and hippies. Between the large hippie events of the 1960s there were many others that are less known today such as "happenings", "be-ins", music festivals, concerts, coffee houses, poetry readings, pot parties, beach parties, protests etc. Anywhere where hippies gathered, at concerts, in private homes, parks, forests, beaches, on campuses etc. where there were long haired boys and girls, sounds of mellow music, the spirit of peace & love and the smell of incense was a hippie gathering.

Whether this new age will be better or worse does not depend on the stars, the position of the planets or anything like that, as some may believe. It will depend on what we believe in, what we stand up for or against before it's too late, and on how we stand up for what we believe in. So Flower Children, have hope and keep the faith. May the groove (energy, force, Shakti) be with you always.

In conclusion, The Beatles caused irreversible mental changes on a scale never before seen that had a great influence on the development and spread of the hippie movement syndrome across the Universe. Peace!

Adam Wojtanek
aka. The Polish Hippy