Sixty-one years ago today, the Beatles made their first appearance on the Ed Sullivan show.

For those of us around then, we had been hearing and singing their music from our AM radios – but to see them perform (in the days before MTV music videos and later, streaming) was a singular moment. And if our parents looked with disdain at their longish hair, it was so much for the better for us.

The following years would become darker with race riots and the war in Vietnam, but on that day most of us were sheltered from the darkness that was still beyond the edges of our awareness – and we could only be thrilled in our still immature brains at the exciting world we in the Pepsi Generation thought we had coming.

And for that matter, the same was probably true for John, Paul, George and Ringo – who likely only saw for the first time what was coming to them on that initial trip to New York.

In many ways, seeing the Beatles that first time on Sullivan was like seeing the first Star Wars movie in 1977.  Both moments in time where everything that came before began to fade, looking outdated.

I feel for those generations who will never have moments like that again – given the pace of change where everything is derivative and hackneyed.