Beatles Marathon @ the Phoenix

So last Sunday at noon-ish my posse and I joined fellow musical masochists for the Classic Albums Live Beatles Marathon at the Phoenix. 211 songs, from "I Saw Her Standing There" (Please Please Me) to "Get Back" (Let it Be). 12 non-stop hours of live music, with only one break for dinner. More Beatles than I've ever listened to in my life. It felt a little bit like a Celtic folk tale in which a poor fool unwittingly puts on magic shoes that force him to dance for eternity. I crawled into bed after 1 am and I swear my feet were still tapping.

Highlights:

• The first "George" hopping happily about the stage with his bass. He had the head shake and the scream down pat.
  
• German versions of "Can't Buy Me Love" and "I Want to Hold Your Hand". (As K. pointed out, these were songs he thought he would never hear performed live -- and would likely never hear performed again.)
  
• The groovy sitar player.
  
• The spot-on vocal harmonies during "Drive My Car".
  
• The rip-roaring performance of "Helter Skelter".
  
• The supporting percussionist belting out "Why Don't We Do it In the Road?" I thought he was going to burst a blood vessel.
  
• Hearing a really good song that I'd never heard before, which happened a lot.
  
• The hipster jocks in the audience. Now I know where all the cute young guys in Toronto hang out.

Lowlights:

• The frightening, aged rockers in the audience.
  
• "Eleanor Rigby", unfortunately. The strings got ahead of themselves and "Paul" had to work to catch up.
  
• Hearing a not-so-good song that I'd never heard before, which happened a lot.
  
• Realizing I should've worn comfortable sneakers instead of knee-high leather boots.
  
• Realizing, during "Lovely Rita", that no one writes songs about web designers. I may have to get on that. ("Lovely Deb, web designer", anyone? It'll sell a million records, I swear.)
  
• The woman who was a bit too excited to meet Andy Frost of Q107's Psychedelic Psunday. (He was broadcasting from the lounge.)

Undecided:

• The long-haired fellow who probably stands in for Robert Plant during Classic Albums' Led Zeppelin performances. Good vocalist, but there was one song in particular in which his hard rock stylings totally brought down the mood and gave it a sinister edge that had never been there before. (For the life of me I can't remember which song it was -- one of the early ones, when the band was still in their mop-top phase.)
  
• The group in the audience who was either a blended multi-generational family or a cult patriarch with his many wives.

In the end, the band outlasted us, as we limped away at the end of Abbey Road at 12:30 am with Let it Be still to go.

The next day I had a medley of their songs running through my head and I had to exorcise it with Ladytron's Light and Magic. Still, the concert did the trick, and now I'm thinking of getting hold of the Beatles' entire oeuvre. Checking my iTunes library, I only have Abbey Road and half of the White Album (long story). To the used CD store!

The Beatles official website
Classic Albums Live website
Classic Albums Live promo on YouTube (That's "Paul" singing Pink Floyd's "The Wall". Weird!)