listening to beatles

garans   Sat Jan 28, 2006 9:15 am GMT
I think beatles have some deviations from the standard phonetics:

- there are no d/t in the end: she's gotta ticket to ride (ride -> rye)

- mild r, like l: cry - cly, try -tly

- murging of sounds in constructions like
should have known better -> should ý known
(mild sh and u:)
she ought to think right -> she ought't'think right
(t like Russian "r")

- sometimes almost no differences between g/k, ý:/o:
how much I care: care <-> go

It won't be long: won't -> woun't [wu:nt]
fun <->one (f almost a vowel)

Sometimes I mishear:
you can't lose it -> can't blues it

Did you notice it?
Kirk   Sat Jan 28, 2006 9:30 am GMT
One thing to note: don't necessarily assess someone's accent by the way they sing. The sheer nature of singing as compared to speaking can mask or change certain features that are present when the person is speaking, even if they're not trying to change their normal pronunciations. Also, this isn't even mentioning the huge topic of stylistics--some people use different pronunciations just for stylistic purposes or just to rhyme or make a word fit into the meter. Another thing to mention is sound quality of recorded music--sometimes the quality is such that it can make it sound like someone is saying something they really aren't or what would otherwise be understandable is muddled by instrumental or other vocalists' interfering noise.

If you want an accurate assessment of the Beatles' accents, I'd try finding audio clips of any of them speaking normally. Since singing is intended to be artistic while normal speaking isn't, we're dealing with different domains here.
garans   Sat Jan 28, 2006 9:37 am GMT
Well, Kirk, they are different domains but they belong to spoken English.
Many people learn English trying to get the sense of English songs.

The same about movies, broadcast etc.
As a foreigner I am looking for a common language, not for a language people are using at home.
Adam   Sun Jan 29, 2006 11:11 am GMT
Being Scousers, they also have a strange way of pronouncing words.

Words such as "back", "lack" etc end in the same way as the Scottish "loch."