"Mr. Clark's quintet... swirl their hair around their foreheads instead of wearing it in a beefeater bob."

Thanks to the NYT for explaining how to tell the difference between a Dave Clark 5 hairdo and a Beatles hairdo — assuming you know what the hell a "beefeater bob" is. (I'm picturing some guy saying "Hi, I'm Beefeater Bob.") The Times notes that the DC5 played Carnegie Hall and claims that the "big question" was whether they got their fans to scream more than the Beatles did 2 months ago.

The determinant in such cases is how much of the music, if any, can penetrate the sustained sound emitted by the votaries.

Yeah, that is the way the NYT insists on continuing to write in the modern world. The newspaper is hopelessly square. Where is the mod newspaper that I want to read now?

Look, here's how they describe the DC5's clothes:

They wear high, tight, wight collars, black jackets and what were once known as "ice cream pants."

Ice cream pants! Again, a helpful description. What the hell are ice cream pants? You know, I know what the Dave Clark 5 look like. These descriptions only make me wonder what these other references are. Descriptions are supposed to work the other way around.

In challenging the sonic inspirational qualities of the Beatles, Mr. Clark had one more man than the first group and two particularly penetrating instruments (saxophone and electronic keyboard) that the Beatles lack.

Congratulations on figuring out the the Dave Clark 5 has 5 guys in it.

Would it kill you to say something interesting?

The Clark group appears to play louder than the Beatles.

But you still couldn't hear them. That's the main point, as far as the Times can see. Oh, these noisy, noisy groups, and their noisy, ridiculous fans. You know the day will come when they'll figure out how to turn all the instruments and microphones up and we won't hear the girls scream anymore. We'll go deaf, of course, but before we do, we'll get to hear our favorite bands play.

Anyway, the Dave Clark 5 played for 24 minutes (the same as the Beatles). 24 unheard minutes. What pleasure. Well, they filled out th show with 2 "folk-singing groups" but it just bored the DC5 fans. And the NYT doesn't even tell us the names of those folky groups. Man, talk about getting no respect. The Dave Clark 5 fans don't care about them and the NYT won't even name them.

THE YEAR THAT BLOG FORGOT IS: 1964.

1. "Carpers, critics and killjoys" and 2. "reactionaries."

2 targets of the National Socialist party, as the NYT reports:

All the party speakers are scheduled for a whirlwind campaign that like some famous American newspaper mergers will combine the best features of both previous efforts.

Hmmm.... I'm not sure the NYT is taking the Nazis seriously enough. Like a newspaper merger? That's strange.

The new treason law provides decapitation as the extreme penality for conspiracy against the State, but whether the régime will go to the length of chopping off any notable heads is presently open to some doubt.

Notice the jocose use of the word "notable"? Does the NYT think the Nazis are just posturing?

THE YEAR THAT BLOG FORGOT IS: 1934.

The U.S. is accused of "monstrous crimes" as the peace talks begin in Paris...

.. and we accuse the North Vietnamese of "aggression."

North Vietnam's Xuan Thuy spoke first, for an hour and a half. "World opinion and progressive American opinion" are against the United States, he said, in words that were translated into French and thence into English. That the U.S. is in "a quagmire" is an idea the New York Times attributed to Thuy. Who knows what Vietnamese word led via French, then English to that NYT paraphrase?

But we readers of the NYT — we of "progressive American opinion" — know: Vietnam is a quagmire. Thuy insists that we stop bombing North Vietnam, and we seek "most earnestly" — in the words of chief American delegate Averell Harriman — "South Vietnam's freedom from attack and its right to determine its own future."

THE YEAR BLOG FORGOT IS: 1968.