Beatles News
Paul McCartney showed The Beatles’ “Yesterday” to Ringo Starr, George Harrison, and John Lennon. They decided the song shouldn’t be a single in the United Kingdom. When it became a single there, it wasn’t as popular as it had been in the United States.
Paul McCartney said Ringo Starr, George Harrison, and John Lennon didn’t want to add anything to his demo for The Beatles’ “Yesterday.” Subsequently, the band decided the song shouldn’t be a single in the United Kingdom. It eventually became a single there 11 years after its release in the United States.In the 1997 book Paul McCartney: Many Years From Now, Paul discussed the way the other Beatles reacted to an early version of “Yesterday” with no string section. “Ringo said, ‘I don’t think I can really drum on that,'” he said. “George said, ‘Well, I’m not sure I can put much on it either.’ And John said, ‘I can’t think of anything, I think you should just do it yourself.'”
Source: Matthew Trzcinski/cheatsheet.com
Spring is in full flush, so Clash has decided to revisit George Harrison’s abiding passion – gardening.
Sure, the Beatles icon’s first passion may have been the guitar, but the free-thinker could take or leave the vagaries of the music industry. Famously the first of the Fab Four to tire of the road and its endless travel, he clearly had an innate urge to put down some roots.
First developing his green finger at Surrey property Kinfauns, George Harrison then saved Friar Park – a spectacular Victorian neo-Gothic Friar Park mansion – from demolition in 1970. Perhaps the main attraction for the guitarist was the 36-acre garden – woefully overgrown, George built a team of 10 gardeners and helped them pull each weed, and plant each carefully chosen fern and flower.
In fact, his autobiography I Me Mine was famously dedicated “to gardeners everywhere”. George Harrison wrote:
I’m really quite simple. I don’t want to be in the business full time, because I’m a gardener. I plant flowers and watch them grow. I don’t go out to clubs. I don’t party. I stay at home and watch the river flow.
Source: ClashMusic/clashmusic.com
A song from The Beatles‘ Magical Mystery Tour was originally two different songs, one by John Lennon and the other by Paul McCartney. Subsequently, a sound engineer who worked on the song was enthralled with it. The tune complements some other Fab Four songs very well.
John gave fans insight into how the song came together. “One half was all mine,” he recalled. “‘How does it feel to be one of the beautiful people, now that you know who you are, da da da da.’ Then Paul comes in with [sings] ‘Baby, you’re a rich man,’ which was a lick he had around.”
Eddie Kramer is a sound engineer who worked on songs by Led Zeppelin, The Rolling Stones, David Bowie, and some tracks from Magical Mastery Tour. During a 2013 interview with Guitar World, Kramer discussed John’s role in creating “Baby, You’re a Rich Man.” He said John added electronic keyboard riffs to the track that sounded like Indian music.
Source: Matthew Trzcinski/cheatsheet.com
The Beatles worked at a non-stop pace during their career. They cranked out albums between tours in their early days. Then they churned out lush, layered, and complex albums when they focused their efforts in the studio. Leaving the road impacted their music for the better. They rarely let any errors slip onto their records, but The Beatles left two mistakes on the Abbey Road song “Her Majesty.”
Most Fab Four fans (OK, probably all of them) wouldn’t mention “Her Majesty” among Abbey Road’s best songs. Perhaps the only notable things about it are that it’s one of the first “hidden” tracks to appear on a rock album and that it’s The Beatles’ shortest song.
It wasn’t supposed to appear on Abbey Road at all. The Paul McCartney song originally sat smack dab in the middle of the Side 2 medley before being removed. You can hear the two mistakes The Beatles left in the song if you listen closely.
The noisy chords and cymbal crash at the beginning of the song were actually the end of “Mean Mr. Mustard.” The single note hanging on at the end was the beginning of “Polythene Pam.”
Paul’s gentle strumming linked the two songs before he instructed engineer John Kurlander to cut “Her Majesty” from the medley. We understand why Macca wanted it removed. The tune doesn’t fit in with the vibe of the rest of the medley. It comes across as a throwaway, so Paul wanted it thrown away.
Source: cheatsheet.com/Jason Rossi
John Lennon said a track from The Beatles’ The White Album has random lyrics that he never wrote down. He said George Harrison and Yoko Ono helped him put the track together in the studio. He compared creating the song to throwing a pair of dice or using the I Ching to predict the future.
John Lennon said a song from The Beatles’ The White Album has “random talking” for lyrics. In addition, it includes snippets of music from Ludwig van Beethoven. Notably, the random qualities of the song are an asset.“You know, but all the words on ‘Revolution 9’ were just random talking,” he said. “There was nothing written down, bits of film script, this and that. I think it was just George, Yoko, and I. I did a lot of it with loops and chopped-up old Beethoven that was lying around EMI or any bits and pieces, stuck them together.”John gave fans more insight into the composition of “Revolution 9.” “And we did songs sort of like priming the canvas … tracks that I didn’t know if they were going to be for [‘Revolution 9’] or not,” he said. “Just where we had the tape on, a bit of echo on, and a cup of tea or something, and George and I just talked for about 20 minutes.”
Source: Matthew Trzcinski/cheatsheet.com
The Beatles rose to unprecedented fame in the 1960s. The band was comprised of Paul McCartney, John Lennon, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr; the former three got together in 1958 and secured Starr as their drummer in 1962. From there, the quartet’s lives changed forever, and they found themselves in the throes of the greatest fame a band has ever known.
The band’s leading songwriters were Lennon and McCartney, who were often both credited on songs regardless of whether it was actually the work of just one of them. And Lennon, who was credited on a major Beatles hit, has come out and said that it was entirely McCartney who took the band in a new direction.
When The Beatles initially formed back in the late 1950s, Lennon and McCartney set themselves apart as the band’s core songwriters (much to George Harrison’s dismay, apparently). And as that fame climb continued, Lennon and McCartney took turns — almost to the point of competition — penning the band’s biggest hits. Ultimately, the two were often credited on each other’s songs even if the other didn’t write it, and that stands true for “Can’t Buy Me Love” — a song that took the Beatles to new levels of fame. 1964 was the year of The Beatles, and that January, McCartney and the gang were staying in Paris when he penned “Can’t Buy Me Love,” which would go on to solidify the band’s icon status and send them even further to the top that same year. And despite having credit on the song, Lennon attributed the whole piece to McCartney — his first time writing a song solo for the group.
Source: Julia Mullaney/cheatsheet.com
The Beatles star George Harrison was a fantastic songwriter, but he was pitted against the genius minds of John Lennon and Paul McCartney.
Bob Dylan once mused that Harrison was almost wasted because of his proximity to his Fab Four bandmates.
He said: "George got stuck with being the Beatle that had to fight to get songs on records because of Lennon and McCartney. Well, who wouldn’t get stuck? If George had had his own group and was writing his own songs back then, he’d have been probably just as big as anybody."
But everything changed in 1963 when Harrison finally penned a song he felt was worth something.
The band's second album, With The Beatles, included the song Don't Bother Me, which was one of Harrison's first songs for the band.
The melancholy song is a classic heartbreaker penned in Harrison's signature style.
And while it is not one of the songs that Beatles fans might pick as their favourite, it was good enough to be included in the album. It also spurred Harrison on to keep writing songs for the band; even if Lennon and McCartney felt they had it covered.
Harrison later recalled: "At least it showed me that all I needed to do was keep on writing, and then maybe eventually I would write something good."
Source: Callum Crumlish/express.co.uk
The Beatles have impacted every generation. Despite being over 60 years old, modern audiences still recognize The Beatles’ music, and many listen to it consistently. However, it’s not exactly music that would get played in the club, as that’s typically pop and dance songs. Still, Paul McCartney said he heard one song by The Beatles at a party, and everyone kept dancing.
“Twist and Shout” is a 1961 song written by Bert Berns and Phil Medley. The Top Notes originally recorded the track but it didn’t become a hit until it was covered by The Isley Brothers in 1962. The Isley Brothers’ version reached No. 17 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 and No. 42 on the U.K. Singles chart.
The eccentric dance track skyrocketed in popularity after it was covered by The Beatles in 1963 on their debut album, Please Please Me. It was later released in the U.S. as a single in 1964, where it peaked at No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100. It failed to reach No. 1 because The Beatles’ own “Can’t Buy Me Love” held that spot.
Source: Ross Tanenbaum/cheatsheet.com
The Beatles practically owned the charts in the 1960s. They had 20 No. 1 hit singles and several No. 1 albums. Since the Fab Four were constantly at the top, it blocked other acts from reaching the summit. The Beatles even prevented a cover of a John Lennon song from becoming a No. 1 single in 1963.
It’s hard to overstate The Beatles’ success in the 1960s. They had an incredible 64 top-100 songs during their active career. Nearly half of those — 31, to be precise — came in 1964 alone. On three occasions, their albums kept other Beatles records from hitting No. 1.
The band started cannibalizing their own success almost as soon as they hit the charts in 1963. The Beatles kept a cover of the John Lennon song “Do You Want to Know a Secret” from hitting No. 1 in May 1963.
“Do You Want to Know a Secret,” one of The Beatles’ originals on Please Please Me, was officially a Lennon-Paul McCartney song. Yet John wrote the song and recorded a demo (complete with a flushing toilet) during one of the Fab Four’s Hamburg, Germany, residencies.
Source: Jason Rossi/cheatsheet.com
Paul McCartney and John Lennon were songwriting equals in The Beatles, but the bassist still looked up to his bandmate. He craved compliments that rarely came. Macca praised John by calling him the Elvis of the Beatles, but he typically drew the line at mimicking his friend. Still, Paul copied John in one of the last songs he made as a member of the Fab Four.
Paul McCartney (left) and John Lennon sing into a shared microphone during a 1966 concert in St. Louis.
The Beatles stood on their last legs when they recorded Abbey Road in 1969. The contentious recording sessions that produced the Let It Be album and infighting over who would be their next manager all but drove the band apart. Abbey Road was the last thing the band did as a foursome.
Paul copied John on the song that channeled some of the energy and attitude The Beatles had earlier in the decade with “Oh! Darling.”
The song was a spiritual cousin of the pleading, 1950s-style love songs the Fab Four made in their early days. Paul’s singing takes his vocal cords to their breaking point. John did the same on “Twist and Shout” from The Beatles’ 1963 debut, Please Please Me. His impassioned vocals shredded his voice and left him ashamed of his effort on the song, but it was a highlight on the album.
Source: Jason Rossi/cheatsheet.com
