Beatles News
Paul McCartney said a classic song from The Beatles' 'The White Album' came from a difficult time in John Lennon's life.Paul McCartney said John Lennon got into heroin while writing songs for The Beatles’ The White Album. John was suffering at the time. Subsequently, Paul said that John’s suffering led to a good track.The 1997 book Paul McCartney: Many Years From Now discusses”Everybody’s Got Something to Hide Except Me and My Monkey” from The Beatles’ The White Album. In the 1940s and 1950s, “monkey on the back” or “monkey” were slang terms from the jazz subculture. They both referred to heroin addiction.
Source: Matthew Trzcinski/cheatsheet.com
Last year, Ringo Starr and his All-Starr Band had to postpone tour dates due to COVID. “It was a bit awkward because the first tour went down. The second tour went down. But we have great confidence we’re going to do all the gigs this year,” Ringo tells Closer.
At 82, the former Beatle is still as excited as a schoolboy to get behind his drum kit. “Playing has never been grueling,” says the musician. “When I’m on the road, I want to play. I don’t want to sit in a hotel and relax for three days. I’d rather play every night, then have a day off so we can get to the next venue.”
During the pandemic, the nine-time Grammy winner kept himself busy by creating a five-song EP, Zoom In, from his home studio. “It was a lifesaver,” he says. “But we were all in masks, and that’s not what music is about.” Ringo also lent his drumming and singing skills long distance to pandemic projects by other artists. “I didn’t see them!” he says. “They just send the files and I do whatever I do.”
Source:yahoo.com
Brian May is a massive fan of The Beatles and their guitarist George Harrison, and he considers the one time he met him a career highlightWhile The Beatles split in 1970, the Liverpool band’s influence has lasted for generations. Many fantastic musicians emerged who fused the band’s impressive songwriting and instrumentals into their own work. Brian May considered George Harrison an inspiration for his guitar ability. He only met the former Beatle once but considered it a “precious moment” of his life. In 2001, Harrison was terminally ill due to a lengthy cancer battle. Before his death in November of that year, May reflected on Harrison’s legacy and shared the one time he met him. In an interview with Guitarist Magazine, May said he had the lucky opportunity to perform with the “Something” singer at the Grosvenor House Hotel in London for the Water Rats Ball.
Source: Ross Tanenbaum/cheatsheet.com
John Lennon said that the lyrics of The Beatles' "Revolution" contained some commentary on how people should interact with cops.John Lennon said The Beatles‘ “Revolution” wasn’t attacking the concept of revolution. In addition, he said it contained some commentary on how people should interact with cops. Notably, he regretted writing one lyric from “Revolution.” In The Beatles’ “Revolution,” John famously sings “But if you go carrying pictures of Chairman Mao / You ain’t going to make it with anyone anyhow.” In a 1971 interview from the book Lennon on Lennon: Conversations with John Lennon, the “Imagine” singer criticized the line. “The thing I regret was making a reference to Chairman Mao, which might spoil any chances I have of going to visit China,” he said. “I’d love to go and see what’s happening there. But I wrote the Chairman Mao line in the studio ’cause I didn’t have any words.”
Source: Matthew Trzcinski/cheatsheet.com
Paul McCartney said The Beatles' "When I'm Sixty-Four" was meant to be a joke. In addition, he explained how The Beatles' producer changed the song to give it some vitality.Paul McCartney said The Beatles’ “When I’m Sixty-Four” was meant to be a joke. In addition, he explained how The Beatles’ producer changed the song to give it some vitality. Notably, the tune was the Fab Four’s best foray into a certain genre.In the 1997 book Paul McCartney: Many Years From Now, Paul recalled adding “When I’m Sixty-Four” to the tracklist of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. “‘When I’m Sixty-Four’ was a case of me looking for stuff to do for Pepper,” he said.
Source: Matthew Trzcinski/cheatsheet.com
A click track helps musicians stay in sync, but Ringo Starr has never felt he needed to use it. The Beatles’ drummer has worked with a number of musicians over the years, and many have noted his impeccable timekeeping. He said that part of this talent comes from his belief that no musician is perfect. This knowledge allows him to better keep time with the other musicians in a band.
Guitarist Steve Lukather has worked with Starr in his All-Starr Band and finds himself endlessly impressed with the former Beatles’ skill.
“Ringo’s brilliant, man, very soulful, and a bad-a** drummer,” Lukather said, per The San Diego Union-Tribune. “Ringo is the chicken that laid the first egg for all the rest of the drummers in the world. There would not be any of these other rock drummers, if not for him … The grooves he plays are such an important thing. And he’s never played to a click track. He said: ‘I am the click track’!”
Starr explained that he saw the click track as a detriment to his playing.
Source: Emma McKee/cheatsheet.com
The beginning of 1969 in London, weather-wise, was a miserable affair. February and March were the coldest they'd been all decade, and spring seemed like it would never come. George Harrison's mental state mirrored the frigid weather, per "All Together Now: The Abc of the Beatles Songs and Albums." He had temporarily quit The Beatles during a recording session for the album "Let It Be," frustrated by Paul McCartney's controlling nature, among other issues, according to Newsweek. Then he got tonsillitis and temporarily lost his singing voice before being busted for marijuana possession, which at the time meant a possible prison sentence.
Source: Andrew Amelinckx/grunge.com
When it comes to sketching out his concert setlists, Paul McCartney must suffer from a veritable embarrassment of riches. In the United States alone, he has authored or co-authored 32 number-one songs — enough to comprise a single live performance all by themselves. And this doesn't even begin to account for perennial Beatles- and Wings-era favorites like the Abbey Road medley or "Live and Let Die," which are showstoppers in and of themselves.
Paul McCartney's "1964: Eyes of the Storm" makes for a truly elegant collection of photographs, a Beatle's-eye-view, if you will, of the fabled group's spectacular rise to international superstardom. Comprised of some 275 never-before-seen images, McCartney's photographs brilliantly capture the onset of Beatlemania both within and beyond the shores of the Beatles' homeland.
"1964: Eyes of the Storm" pointedly begins after the band's national ascendancy during their performance on the October 13th installment of Val Parnell's popular variety show, Sunday Night at the London Palladium. With "She Loves You" burning up the charts, the Palladium served as Ground Zero for the fan frenzy that was so peculiar to the Beatles' fame. By beginning his photograph narrative a few months hence, in December 1963, McCartney's book demonstrates the Beatles and their circle in the act of not only consolidating their brand but conquering the global music scene.
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The Beatles often experimented with recording techniques to improve their sound. However, the band never perfected the new music technologies that were emerging then, leading to some sloppy versions of their songs. One Beatles song, in particular, got “destroyed” by the constant tampering of it, according to John Lennon.
“Revolution” was released in 1968 as the B-side to “Hey Jude.” While the song got Lennon’s political views out there, it wasn’t the version he liked. The track has been released multiple times with different variations. “Revolution 1” was recorded before the official release and is noticeably slower. Paul McCartney and George Harrison believed “Revolution 1” was too slow to be a single, so they released a faster version.
In a 1974 interview for New York’s WNEW-FM, Lennon acknowledged many differences between stereo and mono mixes and pointed to “Revolution” as an example of why remixing-in-mono can sometimes make songs worse.
Source: Ross Tanenbaum/cheatsheet.com
George Harrison’s son, Dhani, grew up surrounded by legendary musicians. Harrison had many friends in the industry who would visit often, and Dhani got to know many stars that the average person could only dream of meeting. Reflecting on his childhood, Dhani said it was “mindbending” to see so many rock stars just casually hanging out in his house. George Harrison was friends with many classic rock stars. In addition to the other members of The Beatles, Harrison was also close with the members of The Traveling Wilburys, which included Bob Dylan, Tom Petty, Roy Orbison, and Jeff Lynne. He was also close friends with guitarist Eric Clapton.Since he worked closely with these excellent musicians, they often recorded and rehearsed at his home studio. Harrison’s son, Dhani, grew accustomed to coming home from school and seeing some legendary rock star. While many would consider him lucky, it did give him an interesting perspective on his situation.
Source: Ross Tanenbaum/cheatsheet.com
