Beatles News
The last songs from George Harrison—two albums’ worth of new works with basic tracks and vocals largely complete—are nearly all missing.
The songs, first reported in 1999 by the late Billboard editor-in-chief Timothy White, and in 2001 by Harrison, were intended to be finished by Harrison friend and sometime producer Jeff Lynne.
They are part of a cache of either 37 or 35 new, never-released Harrison songs, depending on which interview you read. In a 1999 Billboard interview with White, Harrison referred to “about 37” new songs, and in a 2001 on-line chat with fans, Harrison said there were 35 new, unreleased works.
After Harrison’s posthumous 2002 album, Brainwashed, on which 12 new songs were released, that leaves either 25 or 23 whose fate remains unknown. They are reportedly lost in the famously messy, jumbled Harrison archive. [Editor’s note: A few unofficial leaks are available on YouTube.]
Source: Rip Rense/bestclassicbands.com
At the intersection of Strawberry Fields and Penny Lane, there is a golf course.
A terrible one.
Allerton Manor golf course may one day be a destination for golf in the English port city of Liverpool, but today it is not. The grass is brown. The fairways are flat. The greens are often submerged in water. Not even the regulars can escape Allerton’s striking underwhelmingness.
“My favorite part about playing here?” one golfer said, deadpan, on the day I visited. “Probably when it’s over.”
And yet Allerton Manor is here, same as always, a mix of earth tones and pale green in a quiet suburb of a small city. An afternoon round might cross paths with a few dozen golfers … and just as many Allerton residents out for a stroll. Golf is a public good here in England, and not only for those playing it, which is perhaps why this golf course is unlikely ever to go anywhere. Allerton Manor, like Liverpool around it, remains enchanted with its traditions.
The walking path to the left of the front nine will do little to disabuse you of that notion. This tiny stretch of stone and dirt connects one side of Allerton to the other, slicing through the golf course and providing the ideal shortcut for those in the know. In the summer months, vines form a canopy over the pathway, casting long shadows in the sun and providing brief glimpses into the golf landscape surrounding it.
Source: James Colgan/golf.com
“Happy Xmas (War Is Over),” a song by John Lennon released in 1971 that has become a Christmas classic, is more relevant today than ever.
As we approach 2024, a year that will certainly test our resolve as a nation and test our democracy, the opening verse of the song is a question all of us as Americans should ask:
So this is Christmas
And what have you done?
Another year over
And a new one just begun
The song’s message – calling for an end to fear and war, for hope and peace – is still applicable today, especially considering the ongoing conflicts in our nation and wars around the world. And the message of asking what each one of us can do rings as loudly today as ever. Hope is empty unless it is accompanied by helpful action.
The lyrics remind us that we should strive for a better world, where people of all races and backgrounds can live together in harmony. The song encourages us to look beyond our differences and work towards a common goal of peace and love.
As I listen again to “Happy Xmas,” I am reminded of John F. Kennedy’s inaugural address, delivered 10 years before Lennon’s song debuted. It has a similar message but with a call to action for us as a people:
Source: Fucrom
Dear People Who Hate the Paul McCartney Song “Wonderful Christmastime,”
Hi, it’s me. I’m that person who loves the song “Wonderful Christmastime.” What do I mean by “love,” you ask? I don’t mean I find myself accidentally humming along with it while I’m shopping for sherpa-lined sweatpants or driving to a December root canal. No. I mean I listen to it on purpose. I mean I seek it out.
Because you have not replied to my previous letters, I’m brainstorming my own best-guess reasons for your hatred of this song. Before we begin, please understand that hatred is almost always based on one primal, human emotion: fear.
You might fear the Paul McCartney song “Wonderful Christmastime” because you are afraid of being left out of wonderful Christmastime celebrations. These range from ironic ugly sweater bashes to sincere gingerbread-swap scenarios to glittery how-is-she-not-freezing-in-that-sleeveless-dress galas you’ll remember into your twilight years. The joy of not being alone in December!
There is a word for this fear. You are likely unfamiliar with the word itself, though you have long experienced its gnawing insidiousness. The word is “autophobia,” and it means fear of being left alone. (This is what we had before FOMO, and it’s basically the same thing.)
I, in writing this letter, have refused to leave you alone, and I hope the healing can soon begin.
Source: Andrew Meek/mcsweeneys.net
The Beatles had a unique humor about them. It’s the kind of back-and-forth that only develops between people who spend oodles of time together. That humor was readily apparent throughout their career, but with the holidays approaching, we feel inclined to revisit a rare manifestation of Paul McCartney‘s playfulness: his long-lost Christmas album.
The record was only pressed three times in 1965—once for each of his bandmates. It’s quite a sweet directive from McCartney. He created a radio show of sorts for John Lennon, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr to amuse themselves with over the holidays.
“Once I put together something crazy, something left-field, just for the other Beatles, a fun thing which they could play late in the evening,” he once explained. “It was just something for the mates, basically.”
The record begins with the warbled voice of McCartney introducing the record’s first song, “Unforgettable” by Nat King Cole. He plays presenter, putting on an accent, and hamming it up. The album then launches into Cole’s 1951 classic. Other songs on the track list include Elvis Presley’s “Don’t Be Cruel,” Peter and Gordon’s “Someone Ain’t Right,” and The Beach Boys’ “I Get Around.”
Source: Alex Hopper/americansongwriter.com
The Beatles were in the middle of a tour that had them play five shows in just three days at Japan’s famed Nippon Budokan arena — but when they weren’t performing, they were holed up in the presidential suite of the Tokyo Hilton creating a work of art that came to be known as “Images of a Woman.”
That painting, believed by some experts to be the only artwork jointly made by all four Beatles (or at least signed by all four), will be up for sale at Christie’s auction house in New York on February 1.
“Images of a Woman” is estimated to fetch somewhere in the realm of $400,000 to $600,000 and “crystallizes a magic moment in Beatles history,” said Christie’s specialist Casey Rogers during a phone interview.
“It’s such a rarity to have a work on paper outside of their music catalog that is (a) physical relic, this tangible object with contributions from all four of The Beatles,” she said of the 21.5- by 31-inch painting.
“It’s memorabilia, it’s a work of art, it appeals to probably a much larger cross-section of collectors… It’s a wonderful piece of storytelling.”
Source: Radhika Marya, CNN/yahoo.com
Following his divorce, Paul McCartney was linked to several celebs, and that included Renée Zellweger.
Renée Zellweger and Paul McCartney were spotted together multiple times in 2007, sparking speculation about their romance.
McCartney denied the rumors, stating that they were just friends hanging out in the same group.
McCartney was also linked to Elle Macpherson, but he did not discuss the rumored fling.
Paul McCartney's love life has been a topic of conversation for years now. McCartney went through lots of ups and downs, including a $48 million loss from his second marriage to Heather Mills.
In the following, we're going to take a closer look at lesser known romances, which includes the likes of Renée Zellweger. We'll take a look back at the speculation from 2007, and what both Zellweger and McCartney had to say. We'll also reveal other rumored romances that McCarntney was linked to following his divorce from Heather Mills.
Let's get started.
Source: thethings.com
No one would be foolish enough to turn down songwriting advice from Paul McCartney. The former Beatle has a plethora of hits to his name—both in the band’s discography and his own. He has so many songwriting credits, in fact, that his book The Lyrics: 1956 to the Present (which contains his thoughts on his entire discography) had to be split up into two volumes. While most of the book consists of behind-the-scenes stories from the writing of each of McCartney’s songs, there are also moments of hard-earned wisdom throughout. Find five McCartney tips you need to apply to your own songwriting, below.
1. Being self-taught has its merits
Though The Beatles were a highly revered force, you can’t chalk up their success to formal training. The group was little more than four boys who loved the blues, getting together, and creating their brand of rock magic. According to McCartney, he feels that informality actually helped the group in the long run.
“With the Beatles, we were always operating on the cusp between being conscious of how a ‘refrain’ contributed to a song and basically having no idea what we were doing,” McCartney writes in The Lyrics. “One of the things I always thought was the secret of the Beatles was that our music was self-taught. We weren’t able to read music or write it down, so we just made it up. There’s a certain joy that comes into your stuff if you didn’t [try] to make it happen.”
Source: Alex Hopper/americansongwriter.com
After 55 years, Julian Lennon has made peace with “Hey Jude.”
Julian, 60, recently spoke about the song that Paul McCartney wrote to console him while his parents, John Lennon and Cynthia Lennon (née Powell), went through a divorce. “It was ‘Hey Jules’ at first, but that didn’t quite sit well rhythmically,” Julian told Esquire in an interview published on Monday, December 18. “‘Hey Jude’ was a better interpretation. Paul wrote it to console Mum, and also to console me.”
Julian went on to admit that he doesn’t exactly love hearing the tune anymore despite its connection to his family. “It’s a beautiful sentiment, no question about that, and I’m very thankful — but I’ve also been driven up the wall by it,” he explained. “I love the fact that [Paul] wrote a song about me and for Mum, but depending on what side of the bed one woke up on and where you’re hearing it, it can be a good or a slightly frustrating thing. But in my heart of hearts, there’s not a bad word I could say about it.”
Source: Jason Brow/usmagazine.com
One of the factors that made The Beatles so special was their willingness to do whatever was best for the song. In some cases, that meant putting aside their own instrumental gifts to do so. Case in point: George Harrison’s guitar work.
When The Beatles came hurtling like a benevolent meteor out of Liverpool onto an unsuspecting world, Harrison was barely out of his teens but was already a master craftsman on his instrument. Realizing early that Lennon/McCartney songs didn’t need a lot of embellishment to make them special, he instead concentrated on developing parts that would enhance the overall effect without overwhelming it. Hence, he was more of an expert marksman than a gunslinger with his guitar work with the group.
You can point again and again to instances where a subtle touch added here or there by Harrison made a major difference. Here are five that stand out more than most.
Source: Jim Beviglia/americansongwriter.com
