Beatles News
The Beatles drummer Ringo Starr has always seemed one of the more affable members of the Fab Four, swinging his head back and forth with a lopsided grin as he kept a steady rhythm for his bandmates. But not even the amiable Starr could hide his disdain for some of his least favorite songs the band ever recorded, and that dislike wasn’t lost on his bandmates, either.
Paul McCartney later said he believed Starr never “got over” the sting of hearing the Beatles track he always not-so-secretly hated. And while there seemed to be no grave animosity between bandmates (regarding this track, in particular, anyway), there certainly seems to be truth to McCartney’s claim.
Before the Beatles made their Ed Sullivan Show debut and sparked a tidal wave of Beatlemania across the globe, the future Fab Four were still cutting their teeth at EMI Studios under the strong influence of producer George Martin. The band was preparing to release their first singles, which would be an arduous task in and of itself. But considering the band had just recently lost drummer Pete Best, they were in an even greater flux. Martin, ever the businessman, hired a session drummer to fill in for Best.
There was only one problem: the Beatles had already found another drummer, Ringo Starr. Starr got on well with the rest of the band and provided a steady beat for the three guitarists up front, but Martin wasn’t sold. While recording what would become the Beatles’ debut single, “Love Me Do,” Martin told the band he wanted to cut the record without Starr. As Starr recalled in Anthology, “George Martin used Andy White, the ‘professional,’ when we went…to record “Love Me Do.” The guy was previously booked anyway because of Pete Best.
Source: americansongwriter.com/Melanie Davis
Fans of The Beatles appear to have found the art exhibit that “started” John Lennon and Yoko Ono’s relationship.
A preview night for Ono’s exhibit in Soho, London, marked the meeting point between the two, with Lennon in attendance after hearing of “a bit of a happening,” according to fans of the band. According to Paul McCartney, the exhibition had been a way of attracting musicians in the UK to contribute to a book Ono was making as a birthday present for avant-garde artist, John Cage. Her exhibition at the INDICA on November 7, 1966, is believed to mark the first time Lennon and Ono ever met.
While Lennon’s recollection of events leaves out the making of Cage’s book, Notations, which features The Words from the Fab Four, he did provide similar circumstances to his and Ono’s first meeting. Lennon is believed to have been a fan of Ono’s work before the pair met, with The Beatles member liking the humour of her exhibit, Apple. The Ceiling Painting/Yes Painting exhibit is said to have pushed Lennon into pursuing Ono as he felt “relieved” by its message.
Those at the exhibit were asked to climb a ladder and, using a magnifying glass which was dangling from the board hanging from the ceiling, could read what was printed. It says “yes”. Lennon says he “climbed the ladder, looked through the spyglass, and in tiny little letters it said ‘yes’…So it was positive. I felt relieved.”
Source: cultfollowing.co.uk/Ewan Gleadow
One of the most ambiguous and cryptically weird songs of The Beatles is Paul McCartney’s “Why Don’t We Do It In The Road?” Released in 1968 on The Beatles’ infamous White Album, the song’s meaning and subtext have consistently stumped listeners and fans of The Beatles ever since its release.
When people listen to the song, they seemingly ask themselves what in the world it is about. Well, given that the song features essentially one repeated phrase, it’s pretty difficult to surmise what Paul McCartney is singing about in the song. However, McCartney divulged where he acquired the inspiration for the song and the meaning behind it, and you would never guess where and what it is.
In Paul McCartney: Many Years from Now, McCartney relayed the whole story of the song’s origin to author, Barry Miles. McCartney started off his anecdote by stating, “I was up on the flat roof meditating” and “I’d seen a troupe of monkeys walking along in the jungle and a male just hopped on to the back of this female and gave her one, as they say in the vernacular.”
Source: americansongwriter.com/Peter Burditt
This past Sunday, February 2, saw The Beatles take home the Best Rock Performance honor at the 2025 Grammy Awards for the song “Now and Then.” This marked the first time that the Fab Four has won a Grammy since 1997. That year, the band was honored with three trophies.
In celebration of The Beatles’ latest Grammy win, a video presentation looking back at the excitement surrounding the release of “Now and Then” in November 2023 has been posted on the group’s official YouTube channel.
As previously reported, “Now and Then” was billed as “the last Beatles song,” and was created using a demo recorded by the late John Lennon around 1977, with new parts added by the surviving Beatles in 1995 and the 2020s. As noted in a description of the track that accompanies the YouTube video, the song’s release “became a cultural moment in history, uniting listeners around the world in a shared music experience as the band released their final single.”
The clip features footage and images depicting the various ways the release of “Now and Then” was promoted in cities around the world.
The video includes footage of fans purchasing physical copies of the single in various stores. It also features articles in newspapers and magazines, billboards, ads projected on buildings, and more.
In addition, the clip shows a montage of fans’ reactions to the song on social media, and snippets from the official “Now and Then” music video. The presentation with a simple note to fans that reads, “Thank you.” Beatles drummer Ringo Starr took to his social media pages to express his excitement about the band’s Grammy win.
“Wow, another Grammy. Well, done everybody,” Ringo wrote. “I send you peace and love. That’s right the beat goes on. thanks, peace and love Ringo.” The post also featured a new photo of Starr smiling and flashing a peace sign.
Source: Matt Friedlander/americansongwriter.com
A copy of a book written by John Lennon and signed by both him and his first wife has sold at auction for £2,000. The book, originally published in 1964, went under the hammer at the Cotswold Auction Company in Cheltenham.
"It's a little gem, it has drawings, poems and little articles by John," said auctioneer and director of the company, Lindsey Braune. She added it went to a "very keen bidder" on the telephone, based in the UK.
The hardback book is an illustrated collection of humorous and surreal poems, short stories and observations that Lennon wrote down. Around 300,000 copies were printed when the book was first issued.
The copy that was sold was given to the owner's son on his 21st birthday. "There's a few of these books around but they don't come up at auction that often," said Ms Braune.
Items relating to the Beatles are highly sought after by collectors. "There are so many autographs that were purported to be by them, but they were so often actually done by secretaries or roadies as the band had so many to do," Ms Braune said.
"Anything with a real John Lennon signature on it are very rare, and the fact it's the book he wrote is extra special."
Source: Jonathan Holmes/BBC.com
The Beatles picked up another Grammy Award Sunday night, with their final song “Now And Then” winning best rock performance. Neither Paul McCartney nor Ringo Starr were on hand to accept the award in person, but now Ringo has reacted to their latest honor.
“Wow, another Grammy. Well, done everybody,” he shared on Instagram, next to a photo of him giving the peace sign. “I send you peace and love. That’s right the beat goes on. thanks, peace and love Ringo.”
So far McCartney has not commented on the win.
The win was The Beatles’ eighth Grammy Award and their first in 28 years. Their last wins came in 1997 when they won best pop performance by a duo or group with vocals; best music video, short form for “Free As A Bird”; and best music video, long form for The Beatles Anthology.
They were also honored with a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2014.
While The Beatles did win best rock performance, they lost in the major category, record of the year. That honor went to Kendrick Lamar for “Not Like Us.”
Source: 100.7 KSLX
When I checked George Harrison out on the Internet, I kept finding the same words to describe him - underappreciated and overlooked. He was always seemingly eclipsed by his virtuoso Beatle bandmates John Lennon and Paul McCartney. Their towering genius at songwriting and musicianship unfortunately put Harrison in the shade. That seems unfair. He was every bit as brilliant and special in his own subtle way as they were in theirs.
Now, almost 24 years after his death in 2001 at the too-young ago of 58, his work bears renewed evaluation. In my opinion, Harrison's stunning 1970 triple album All Things Must Pass qualifies him for greatness in itself. It is an unequaled encapsulation of everything that made him remarkable and unique as an artist.
Looking Back At George Harrison's Amazing Career
Maybe you have seen a program on PBS called Concert for George that was filmed in London on November 29, 2002, one year after Harrison left us.. Some of his musician buddies got together in his memory and played his songs in a rollicking, reverential show. Eric Clapton, Tom Petty, ex-Beatles Paul and Ringo, Billy Preston, Harrison's son, Dhani, and others played and sang their hearts out. If anything, it proved how very gifted George Harrison really was and how much he is missed.
Source: Judy Bass/wideopencountry.com
Everybody knows how George Harrison started the ’70s: His seven-times platinum international chart-topping triple album All Things Must Pass reeled off the No. 1 “My Sweet Lord” in the wake of the Beatles‘ split.
Less known, though they should be, are underrated later gems like 1976’s Thirty Three & 1/3 and Harrison’s self-titled 1979 album. They spawned a trio of Top 30 hits (“This Song,” “Crackerbox Palace” and “Blow Away”), but will never be as ubiquitous as the triple-album behemoth that began the decade.
In between, Harrison had some highs (1973’s Living in the Material World and its chart-topping single “Give Me Love,” after a guest-packed charity concert and album) and some lows (1975’s decidedly uneven Extra Texture, a plagiarism scandal). The following list of Top 25 George Harrison ’70s Songs aims to put it all in perspective.
Extra Texture even gets a little love. So do a number of deeper cuts that never found their way onto radio playlists or jukeboxes with other Top 40 solo hits like “What Is Life,” “Dark Horse” and “You.” Of course, the 23-song All Things Must Past provided a deep well of material, but his other ’70s LPs yielded their own musical delights, too.
Harrison made an impressive entrance into the next decade with the No. 2 smash “All Those Years Ago,” a 1981 tribute to fallen bandmate John Lennon, but ended up going through a creative dry spell. He’d never be this musically active again.
Source: MSN
The Beatles have won their eighth competitive Grammy award thanks to a little help from artificial intelligence. The 2023 track “Now and Then” — which Billboard reports is the first song knowingly created with AI assistance to earn a Grammy nomination — was awarded Best Rock Performance on Sunday, beating out competition from Green Day, Pearl Jam, The Black Keys, Idles, and St. Vincent.
The track was pieced together using a demo that John Lennon recorded in the late 1970s, with Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, and George Harrison later providing their own contributions in the mid-‘90s, with the aim of including the final song in The Beatles Anthology project. “Now and Then” wasn’t released, however, due to technical limitations at the time preventing Lennon’s vocals and piano from being separated from the original lo-fi demo.
McCartney and Starr later managed to complete the song in 2021 with help from filmmaker Peter Jackson and his sound team, who developed machine-learning technology (a type of AI that uses algorithms to learn from data) capable of isolating and cleaning up different components of Lennon’s recording. This greatly differs from generative AI tech that can be used to create music that mimics an artist’s style and vocals, but confusion around AI terminology led to some backlash online when the track was released.
“To be clear, nothing has been artificially or synthetically created. It’s all real and we all play on it,” McCartney said in 2023, addressing speculation about AI’s role in development. “We cleaned up some existing recordings — a process which has gone on for years.”
Source: theverge.com/Jess Weatherbed
Japanese-New Zealand actress Anna Sawai is reportedly being considered to portray Yoko Ono in Sam Mendes’ highly anticipated four-part Beatles biopic project. The news has sparked excitement and discussion among fans, given Sawai’s rising prominence in Hollywood and the significance of Yoko Ono in John Lennon’s life and the Beatles’ history.
Director Sam Mendes, best known for 1917 and Skyfall, is embarking on an unprecedented cinematic journey by telling The Beatles’ story through four separate but interconnected films—one dedicated to each band member. This innovative storytelling approach is a first for a major motion picture, providing an in-depth and multifaceted view of the band’s legendary rise, relationships, conflicts, and ultimate breakup.
The films have received full cooperation from Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, and the families of John Lennon and George Harrison, ensuring an authentic and authorized portrayal of the iconic group. With major casting decisions underway, the addition of Anna Sawai as Yoko Ono could add a new layer of depth to the narrative, particularly regarding John Lennon’s later years.
Anna Sawai has been gaining widespread recognition for her talent and versatility. Recently, she captivated audiences in FX’s ShÅgun, a historical epic set in feudal Japan. Her previous credits include Pachinko, Fast & Furious 9, and Monarch: Legacy of Monsters, proving her ability to take on complex roles in a variety of genres.
Source: yahoo.com/Diana Wilson
