A lot of Ricky Rochelle's songs have been pretty intense lately, and I can totally roll with that. But I can also appreciate him lightening things up a little with his new single "Beetles on High." This track finds Ricky going back to a more straight-forward pop-punk style. On a surface level, the song pokes fun at The Beatles for taking an obscene amount of drugs in the later 1960s. But at a deeper level, the song expresses tremendous admiration for the remarkable music that The Fab Four created under the influence. "At a higher consciousness than they even understood," sings Ricky, "their worst songs were symphonic; even 'Blue Jay Way' was good." This song reminds me of this old bit Bill Hicks bit:
And if you don't believe drugs have done good things for us, do me a favor. Go home tonight. Take all your albums, all your tapes, and all your CDs and burn them. 'Cause you know what, the musicians that made all that great music that's enhanced your lives throughout the years were real fucking high on drugs. The Beatles were so fucking high they let Ringo sing a few tunes!
The fact that we're still talking and writing songs about the stoned Beatles 60 years later seems to reinforce the whole point of "Beetles on High." Yeah, those guys were really high, but their music was world-altering and next-level brilliant. There's always that one person with the hot take that The Beatles sucked after Help!, but that's just crazy talk. "Beetles on High" manages to be both hilarious and affectionate, and it's obvious it was written by someone who's a true music lover. It's streaming now at all the usual places!
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