It's All Coming Back To Me Now - Spandau Ballet vs The Beatles

Spandau Ballet in all their 80's glory

VS 

The Beatles in a field....

....who wins?

It's All Coming Back To Me Now - 

The Ballet vs The Beatles: The Battle

by Jo Michelmore

This week, a very good friend of mine and a good friend of its my kind of scene posed an interesting question via their facebook status. Let me tell you what that question was:

“How were Spandau Ballet not bigger than the shitty Beatles?” 

Well, you know, how could I let that question sit? It’s not often you get asked the big questions in life, so it only seems appropriate that I help my gorgeous friend and you, dear readers, answer such an important question. Let’s look at this seriously. How were Spandau Ballet not bigger than the shitty(?!) Beatles. I don't know. Maybe we should look at a few things and hand out some points. For those who aren't aware, Spandau Ballet were an 80's new romantic pop band. Chances are, you've heard of The Beatles. See, automatically The Beatles should get a point and I haven't even mentioned the fact that Spandau Ballet were named after a piece of graffiti on the back of a toilet door (which should automatically give The Beatles another point). There’s also this…

Spandau Ballet 

While Spandau Ballet spent their career writing high school type rhyming lyrics like these: 

“Gold….always believe in your soul…”

 

….The Beatles were busy earning gold records. The Beatles sold 1.6 billion records. I don't even know how many gold that makes, but I'm sure that’s a lot of gold records. Even their simplest pop songs had better-er lyrics than our Spandau friends…

“It’s been a hard day’s night…”

See?

 

Spandau Ballet 0 vs The Beatles 1

Spandau Ballet have been playing, on and off, for fifteen years. In that time, they released seven albums. From their seventh album, lets look at this track, including the simplistic;

“I just want to take us back to where we belong, we were so hot and we were oh so strong”

Um….vomit…..?

 

….while The Beatles played for only ten years, they released twelve albums. Just on numbers alone they win, but then there’s a track from their seventh album, which includes the beautiful rhyming lyrics; 

“Eleanor Rigby died in the church and was buried along with her name, nobody came...
Father McKenzie wiping the dirt from his hands as he walks from the grave, no one was saved”

Lyrical storytelling perfection. Sigh.

 

Spandau Ballet 0 vs The Beatles 2

Spandau Ballet looked like this:

The Beatles looked like this:

…ok, so no one wins that one. 

We’re still at Spandau Ballet 0 vs The Beatles 2

One more then. Spandau Ballet wrote this piece of b-grade boredom about that super big topic, love. It contains these lyrics, which could have been written by either a) a fourteen year old girl or b) a fifty-two year old man.

“Love is all that we know, so why don't you show, that love can change your heart” 

 

While The Beatles wrote this song, probably one of their definitive songs, about the same topic.

“All you need is love, love is all you need” 

So simple. So true. 

Final Score: Spandau Ballet 0 vs The Beatles 3

So there you go dear readers (and my fabulously attractive and incredibly beautiful friend). If we are talking Spandau Ballet vs The Beatles, then The Beatles win. My extremely fair points system can't be wrong. How were Spandau Ballet not bigger than the shitty Beatles? Not to take anything away from cheesy 80's pop, which is amazing all on it's own, Spandau were not bigger than The Beatles, because, ummmmm, The Beatles were better. Better at writing pop songs. And probably marketing too. That's why.

Which is not to say I don't have that goddamn "goooold....!" line stuck in my head. Damn you Spandau!