The Beatles played in fascist Spain...

Creed_Clicks

I was watching a programme last night (in Spain) which briefly covered the Beatles visit to Spain. Bands get criticised for playing in Israel or Russian or China or Cuba etc. I was never a big Beatles fan, so all the one to me, but no criticism for playing in a country run by a dictator? At the same time, every second person was going on holidays to Spain in the 60s and 70s and didn't question the politics of the country.
I can't believe that none of the band knew who Franco was at the time....

Danny1969

Don't know, they did refuse to play to a segregated audience at the Gaytor Bowl in Florida though which was a bit of stand in the early sixties  

MagicPigDetective

I listened to a podcast on Franco recently.... what an evil c*#$.  It was such a dark time for Spain and it's still not that widely known how horrendous it was. I'm just wondering how much people in the UK at that time knew what about the purges, the brutality; was it reported? Perhaps it was swept under the carpet by politicians and ignored by the media, in case awkward questions were asked as to why he was allowed to retain power after ww2? I'm just speculating. 

I remember being in Bilbao once, speaking to some basques, I unwisely mentioned Franco during a political discussion, they just spat on the floor in disgust at the mere mention of his name. 

monquixote

One view would be that you don't want to punish ordinary Spanish citizens for their government and that exposing young people to liberal culture will have a positive effect. 

It's not the same as playing as "Sun City" where you are playing to a segregated audience. 

In reality they probably just didn't think about it. They were quite young chaps in a chaotic storm of activity the like of which the world had never previously seen. The benefit of hindsight and experience is not something that was available to them.

CaseOfAce

I had no idea that the Beatles had ever played in Madrid and Barcelona back in 1965.

I guess a) back then Guernica was way back in the history books and Franco was on the wane or at the very least largely forgotten and no threat to the outside world at that point ? and 
b) history is written by the victors - and people / media etc.. generally don't want to tarnish the legend of the loveable mop tops  from Liverpool that conquered the world.

Far more problematic is Queen playing Sun City in apartheid South Africa but in fairness the remaining band members seem to acknowledge it was a bad decision to do so.

As you say a band like Iron Maiden is happy to tour Russia.?

As an aside - I've got to say hats off to Andy Murray - I read at the weekend he turned down big money to play in Saudi Arabia due to the human rights abuses there. Well played sir.

ICBM

My dad worked for a large company which supplied various parts of the UK arms industry in the late 1960s and early 70s, and was sent to Franco's Spain, the Shah's Iran and apartheid South Africa on several occasions. They weren't considered pariah states by most people here at that time.

EricTheWeary

A lot of people played Sun City, remarkable how many black artists ( eg Tina Turner)in the list. I think Queen played  there four times. Bev Bevan left Black Sabbath over his refusal to play there which gives me a soft spot for him. 

I read a book a couple of years ago about the aftermath of Franco, quite a lot of what happened wasn’t known about until later and the Spanish seem to prefer not to hark back to it. I have a memory of my grandmother benefiting from cheap holidays to Spain and that she felt it wasn’t as good once Franco had gone. 

How aware or concerned The Beatles would have been I don’t know. 

Musicwolf

Franco ruled Spain until 1975.  It was already a popular holiday location for the Brits from the late 60's (maybe even the early 60's) and I went there as a child in the early 70's.  Nobody seemed terribly worried and I think that Nixon was calling him 'a great friend to the USA'.

What was important was the he wasn't a communist.  We didn't like Commies back then.  Cold War and all that old boy, knew where you were with a facist.  Take that nice Pinochet chap, Margaret loved him.....................

Philly_Q

Most of the foreign holidays I went on as a kid were in Spain, but I'm pretty sure the first time we went was in 1976, only a few months after Franco's death and the restoration of the monarchy.  I remember my parents telling me a little bit about the history, but I doubt they'd intentionally waited for the demise of Franco before visiting the country...!

Creed_Clicks

@Musicwolf I think that's it. He was anti communist, so he was ok. I often wonder how come the yanks etc weren't quick to jump in and get rid of the fascist dictator Franco as quick as they were in other countries... same in Sth America.

EricTheWeary

ICBM said:

My dad worked for a large company which supplied various parts of the UK arms industry in the late 1960s and early 70s, and was sent to Franco's Spain, the Shah's Iran and apartheid South Africa on several occasions. They weren't considered pariah states by most people here at that time.

I worked in Steelstock as a teenager and part of the job was working out how to get things past the embargo on goods from South Africa into other African countries. We’d have South African made steel shipped to a country that didn’t have an embargo then relabelled and sold on to a country that did have an embargo (most of what we sold ended up in Egypt propping up their sewerage system). 

It seemed fairly normal at the time although when I went off to be a right on student I was grabbed by a sense of guilt and stopped buying South African fruit and sang Free Nelson Mandela at every student disco. 

MagicPigDetective

The five podcasts on Franco in the below podcast series give an insight into Franco's twisted character and the horrors inflicted on the people in his name. A lot of these dictators seem to have troubled relationships with their fathers.  

https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/real-dictators/id1516194847

Philly_Q

EricTheWeary said:

It seemed fairly normal at the time although when I went off to be a right on student I was grabbed by a sense of guilt and stopped buying South African fruit and sang Free Nelson Mandela at every student disco. 

When I was a student it was unacceptable to bank with Barclays because they had interests in South Africa.  That's what we were told, anyway - I can't even remember how that information was imparted, I certainly never researched it.

EricTheWeary

Philly_Q said:

EricTheWeary said:

It seemed fairly normal at the time although when I went off to be a right on student I was grabbed by a sense of guilt and stopped buying South African fruit and sang Free Nelson Mandela at every student disco. 

When I was a student it was unacceptable to bank with Barclays because they had interests in South Africa.  That's what we were told, anyway - I can't even remember how that information was imparted, I certainly never researched it.

No I can’t remember why either, we were largely directed toward Lloyds. 

On my first day as a student we were directed to meet in H Block. I genuinely thought it was named after where the IRA prisoners were held and that Coventry Polytechnic was going to be a hot bed of radical politics. So, it was a bit disappointing to find out there was also an A Block, a B Block, a C Block…

chillidoggy

I first went to Spain in 1963. I don't remember Franco being mentioned at all.

In fact the only real memories I have is when there was a big storm one night, and the hotel wall fell down to reveal female two members of our party in bed together (which caused a bit of a hoo-haa), and me pissing on the back of Johnny Brigg's boots on the tarmac at Palma airport.

Creed_Clicks

MagicPigDetective said:

The five podcasts on Franco in the below podcast series give an insight into Franco's twisted character and the horrors inflicted on the people in his name. A lot of these dictators seem to have troubled relationships with their fathers.  

https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/real-dictators/id1516194847

A scumbag, and you still have lots of people here who say he was a great leader, and openly display fascist symbols on flags and clothing.

Philly_Q

chillidoggy said:

I first went to Spain in 1963. I don't remember Franco being mentioned at all.

In fact the only real memories I have is when there was a big storm one night, and the hotel wall fell down to reveal female two members of our party in bed together (which caused a bit of a hoo-haa), and me pissing on the back of Johnny Brigg's boots on the tarmac at Palma airport.

Johnny Briggs as in Mike Baldwin out of Coronation Street?

Hurling_Fruitmig

Philly_Q said:

chillidoggy said:

I first went to Spain in 1963. I don't remember Franco being mentioned at all.

In fact the only real memories I have is when there was a big storm one night, and the hotel wall fell down to reveal female two members of our party in bed together (which caused a bit of a hoo-haa), and me pissing on the back of Johnny Brigg's boots on the tarmac at Palma airport.

Johnny Briggs as in Mike Baldwin out of Coronation Street?

I assumed he wasn't talking about the children's TV character Jonny Briggs.

chillidoggy

Philly_Q said:

chillidoggy said:

I first went to Spain in 1963. I don't remember Franco being mentioned at all.

In fact the only real memories I have is when there was a big storm one night, and the hotel wall fell down to reveal female two members of our party in bed together (which caused a bit of a hoo-haa), and me pissing on the back of Johnny Brigg's boots on the tarmac at Palma airport.

Johnny Briggs as in Mike Baldwin out of Coronation Street?

The very same.

Musicwolf

EricTheWeary said:

On my first day as a student we were directed to meet in H Block. I genuinely thought it was named after where the IRA prisoners were held and that Coventry Polytechnic was going to be a hot bed of radical politics. So, it was a bit disappointing to find out there was also an A Block, a B Block, a C Block…

I was there in 1981/2 and I remember that when we had some sort of dispute with the Poly over rent or standards in the refectory (can't remember what exactly) we tried to get the residents of H Block to go on hunger strike in order to grab a headline.  They refused.

I was on the end of J Block, top floor.  If I recall the 19 story tower was G Block?

Funny how time plays tricks with the memory.  I look back fondly but, at the time, I don't think that I was happy there and only stuck it out for a year.  I went back to study at Leeds University 5 years later and had the best 3 years of my life.

EricTheWeary

Musicwolf said:

EricTheWeary said:

On my first day as a student we were directed to meet in H Block. I genuinely thought it was named after where the IRA prisoners were held and that Coventry Polytechnic was going to be a hot bed of radical politics. So, it was a bit disappointing to find out there was also an A Block, a B Block, a C Block…

I was there in 1981/2 and I remember that when we had some sort of dispute with the Poly over rent or standards in the refectory (can't remember what exactly) we tried to get the residents of H Block to go on hunger strike in order to grab a headline.  They refused.

I was on the end of J Block, top floor.  If I recall the 19 story tower was G Block?

Funny how time plays tricks with the memory.  I look back fondly but, at the time, I don't think that I was happy there and only stuck it out for a year.  I went back to study at Leeds University 5 years later and had the best 3 years of my life.

I’d struggle to remember it all in detail, I had a walk around a couple of years ago and the old buildings were pretty much hidden by the new ones. I think I was there 1986 to 1990. It was quite a lowbrow institution and I lived in some pretty rough places. My son in Leeds has it much nicer in terms of accommodation. 

Some high highs and some low lows whilst I was there. My Swiss friend at the time was at university in Zurich and she was impressed that I went to a poly as in Switzerland it was were the real boffins went. Unfortunately they just became known as second rate unis in the U.K.