Beatles News
Aside from writing and releasing music, the Beatles created A Hard Day’s Night. According to George Harrison, filming early in the morning was difficult for these self-described “night owls.” Here’s what we learned from one interview from 1964.
John Lennon, Paul McCartney, Harrison, and Ringo Starr appeared in the Beatles, also creating films like Yellow Submarine and A Hard Day’s Night.
In 1964, this group released their music film, featuring the original song of the same title. They acted as themselves, detailing a typical day in the rock band. With A Hard Day’s Night as one of their first acting projects, there were some challenges for these musicians.
The Beatles earned praise for A Hard Day’s Night, appearing in promotional interviews together. Some challenging aspects were the work hours — and waking up early to film the original production.
Source: Julia Dzurillay/cheatsheet.com
The Beatles’ “Twist and Shout” inspired David Bowie’s “Let’s Dance.” Only one of the two songs reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100.
The other song lasted longer on the chart.
David Bowie’s “Let’s Dance” was co-produced by another famous musician. The musician drew influence from The Beatles‘ “Twist and Shout” while making the song. Subsequently, “Let’s Dance” became a massive hit in the United States.
During a 1995 interview with Interview Magazine, Bowie discussed his artistic evolution. “I tried passionately hard in the first part of the ’80s to fit in, and I had my first overground success,” he said. “I was suddenly no longer ‘the world’s biggest cult artist’ in popular music.”
Bowie discussed his feelings on “Let’s Dance” and his subsequent work. “I went mainstream in a major way with the song ‘Let’s Dance,'” he said. “I pandered to that in my next few albums, and what I found I had done was put a box around myself. It was very hard for people to see me as anything other than the person in the suit who did ‘Let’s Dance,’ and it was driving me mad — because it took all my passion for experimenting away.”
Source: Matthew Trzcinski/cheatsheet.com
Paul McCartney claims he was behind the title of The Beatles‘ “Eight Days a Week.” However, he started a rumor decades ago that drummer Ringo Starr came up with the title.
The littlest things inspire Paul, even passing phrases from those around him. One sentence was all it took to make a Beatles hit. Such was the case for “Eight Days a Week.”
In The Lyrics: 1956 to the Present, Paul wrote that he came up with the song’s title after having a chauffeur drive him to John Lennon’s house. He needed a driver because the police had recently taken away his driver’s license after too much reckless driving.
“The problem was we all liked to drive fast, and I myself had been caught one too many times,” he explained. “The police took my licence away, and I was banned from driving for a year. If I wanted to get somewhere, I had to take a bus or train or sometimes hire a driver. By the time I was unbanned, we’d actually earned enough money to get a driver.
Source: Hannah Wigandt/cheatsheet.com
When The Beatles hired Ringo Starr, original drummer Pete Best’s fans revolted, and manager Brian Epstein wondered if they were right to. Best’s looks and attitude onstage won him many fans. Though John Lennon, Paul McCartney, and George Harrison didn’t feel that Best fit in with them, Epstein wondered if Starr would be any better. According to Starr himself, Epstein didn’t believe he had the personality for the job.Best joined The Beatles in 1960 and played with the group in Hamburg and Liverpool. In 1962, however, the band decided they wanted to move in a different direction.
Source: Emma McKee/cheatsheet.com
George Harrison claimed The Beatles formed because it was their destiny. Everything had been pre-determined for them because of something they did in their past lives. The spiritual Beatle believed in reincarnation and karma.
The Beatles performing on 'Top of the Pops' in 1966.
As someone who followed Hinduism dedicatedly (although his wife, Olivia, claims he never belonged to any spiritual organization), George believed in reincarnation and karma. In his memoir, I Me Mine, he explained, “Every action has an equal and opposite reaction,” which is karma. You’ll be reincarnated if you do something in a past life that causes ripples. Then, your soul will be forced to walk the Earth over and over until you set things right.
In 1967, on The Frost Programme (per George Harrison on George Harrison: Interviews and Encounters), he explained, “I believe in re-birth, and then you come back and go through more experience, and you die and you come back again and you keep coming back until you’ve got it straight. That’s how I see it.”
Source: Hannah Wigandt/cheatsheet.com
Released on March 22, 1963, via EMI’s Parlophone label, the George Martin-produced LP heralded the arrival of the decade’s premier band as they climbed up the charts to the number one position.
The album’s John Lennon/Paul McCartney-penned title track was released as a single earlier that year. It was the Beatles’ second U.K. 7-inch (after 1962’s “Love Me Do”) and their first in the U.S.
On this day in 1963, the band appeared on the British television show Thank Your Lucky Stars for a mimed performance of the “Please Please Me” single. Broadcast across much of the U.K., the exposure greatly bolstered the Fab Four’s success.
Source: Rod Brakes/guitarplayer.com
The names. The feud. The money. The legacy. Buckle up. It’s about to get toasty. We’re diving into the history and meaning of the Michael Jackson song, “The Girl Is Mine,” featuring Beatle Paul McCartney.
Written by Jackson and producer Quincy Jones, “The Girl Is Mine” was recorded by Jackson and McCartney at Westlake Studios in L.A. from April 14-16. It was released on Jackson’s sixth solo album, Thriller, in 1982. That LP remains the greatest-selling popular music album of all time. Strangely, Jackson never performed “The Girl Is Mine” in his career.
The year before, in 1981, Jackson and McCartney had recorded the song, “Say Say Say” and “The Man” for McCartney’s fifth album, Pipes of Peace, which was released in 1983.
“The Girl Is Mine” topped the R&B singles chart upon its release and it peaked at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100. It hit No. 8 in the U.K. and No. 1 in Spain. After just two years, the song had sold 1.3 million copies by 1985. It was certified Gold. Though, at the same time, critics believed it was the weakest song on the masterpiece, Thriller. The cover photograph for the single was taken by McCartney’s wife, Linda.
Source: Jacob Uitti/americansongwriter.com
Paul McCartney once revealed his favorite version of George Harrison‘s Beatles song, “While My Guitar Gently Weeps.” It wasn’t the original recording from The White Album. Interestingly, George’s favorite wasn’t the original either. Paul McCartney and George Harrison on a tour bus in 1966.
Each Fab Four had creative ways of coming up with songs. They had their influences and other things to help them. George’s go-to was spirituality and philosophy. In his 1980 memoir, I Me Mine, George said Chinese philosophy helped him write “While My Guitar Gently Weeps.”
George explained that he had a copy of I Ching, the Chinese classic Book of Changes, which seemed to him to be based “on the Eastern concept that everything is relative to everything else, as opposed to the Western view that things are merely coincidental.”
He continued, “This idea was in my head when I visited my parents’ house in the north of England. I decided to write a song based on the first thing I saw upon opening any book—as it would be relative to that moment, at that time.
Source: Hannah Wigandt/cheatsheet.com
Last year, Dolly Parton was inducted into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame, an honor she initially balked at after she asserted that she didn’t make rock ‘n’ roll music. She ended up accepting the award, though, and the whole incident led her to set out to record a rock album of her own. She has already said she wants to reunite Led Zeppelin’s Robert Plant and Jimmy Page on it — we’ll see if that happens! But it seems like a guest list is starting to come together and, because it’s Dolly Parton, it sure is a doozy.
Parton was on The View this week, and she talked about some of the big names that are in the works for the upcoming album. Paul McCartney, Stevie Nicks, John Fogerty, Steve Perry, and Steven Tyler have all apparently already recorded their contributions. It was said that the album would include covers of “Stairway To Heaven” and “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction.” When asked if Mick Jagger would be on it, Parton said she was trying to get him, but that “Pink and Brandi Carlisle are singing on that particular song with me.”
Source: By James Rettig/stereogum.com
It took John Lennon a while to warm up to George Harrison, but the bandmates became good friends once he did. Lennon wanted to introduce Harrison to his aunt, Mimi Smith, but he knew Smith didn’t tend to like his friends. She wouldn’t let Paul McCartney into her house and once threw a fit in front of Lennon’s girlfriend, Cynthia. Because of this, Lennon worked hard to make Smith think she would like Harrison. Ultimately, though, his efforts were unsuccessful.
Smith took custody of Lennon after calling Social Services on his mother, Julia, twice. After taking him in, Smith made it clear that she had a specific set of expectations for her nephew. She did not want him playing in a band, and she didn’t want him spending time with people she deemed unsuitable. Lennon’s first wife, Cynthia, believed Smith was jealous of Lennon’s friends.
“Mimi wanted and expected John’s devotion, and if you got in her way you were not popular,” Cynthia wrote in her book John. “She constantly hounded and oppressed him. He constantly complained that she never left him alone and found fault with everything he did. Even before his mother died she had been the closest thing he had to a parent, and he wanted to please her, but she made it impossible for him.
Source: Emma McKee/cheatsheet.com
