Beatles News
Writing for The Observer newspaper in 1983, the British poet Philip Larkin declared that “when you get to the top, there is nowhere go but down”. Not a confession but rather his take on the Beatles. To Larkin’s mind, they were isolated from their peers, stranded for all eternity at the summit, there to operate in “the rarified atmosphere of hagiolatry” that their talents and the rush of “some unsuspected socio-emotional pressure” had transported them to.
Larkin was looking back over a single fractious decade, one which culminated tragically in murder, but he was on the money. Some 40 years after decades of revision and a succession of legacy projects, the Beatles’ cultural standing is set in amber. Like them or not – there are many who don’t, and many who pretend they don’t – they remain, in the poet’s words, “unreachable, frozen, fabulous”.
Source: popmatters.com
Rock fans are familiar with lineup changes since tensions between band members or creative differences often instigate disputes which result in one side leaving. Numerous bands have changed their lineup throughout the years — some have even changed their frontman. For instance, David Coverdale replaced Ian Gillan in Deep Purple, and Iron Maiden rose to fame when they recruited Bruce Dickinson after Paul Day and Paul Di’Anno’s tenures.
We all know the Beatles as the quartet featuring John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr. However, before they rose to worldwide fame with Ringo Starr, they worked with Pete Best as their drummer. Known as the fifth Beatle, Best joined the Beatles in 1960 after the band’s invitation. However, Starr replaced him only two years later, as he was dismissed by Brian Epstein, and not the band. As it turns out, John Lennon described this as a cowardly move in later years.
Source: Elif Ozden/rockcelebrities.net
Paul McCartney and John Lennon grew up in Liverpool but had different upbringings. McCartney came from a large family, while Lennon came from a small, broken home. The two became fast friends despite their differences and later formed The Beatles. McCartney said his friendship with Lennon taught him an important lesson about one’s upbringing.
McCartney grew up in a large, working-class family in Liverpool, England. He was raised by a family of 5 but had many aunts, uncles, and cousins, who were pivotal parts of his childhood. In an interview on the Smartless podcast, McCartney shared the fond memories he has of his family and said they are a crucial aspect of who he is now.
“I was very lucky with my family,” McCartney explained. “Uncles and aunties, cousins, and all of that. There were like millions of them. My dad had seven in his family. My mom had two brothers. The minute they all start reproducing and produced a big, big family. It was great. They were so wonderful and wise and funny and optimistic. I really don’t remember anything bad about it.”
Source: Ross Tanenbaum/cheatsheet.com
The soundman turned down poor Yoko Ono's microphone...
Before we get started it's worth underlining that no, Yoko Ono didn't "break up The Beatles", and that she was an accomplished and acclaimed artist in her own right before she even met John Lennon.
With all that acknowledged, it's also fair to say that her improvised contribution to John duetting with his musical hero Chuck Berry took a few people by surprise, especially Chuck himself.
As one of the pioneers of rock 'n' roll, The Beatles were all massive Chuck fans, and covered around 15 of his songs during their early years.
They repeatedly picked Berry's hits when they popped up on the radio, and you can hear the Fab Four's versions of "Too Much Monkey Business', 'Carol', 'Johnny B. Goode', 'Memphis, Tennessee', 'Roll Over Beethoven', 'Sweet Little Sixteen', 'Rock and Roll Music' and 'I Got to Find My Baby' on the official Live at the BBC compilation.
Source: Mayer Nissim/goldradiouk.com
Like the rest of The Beatles, Ringo Starr grew up in Liverpool, but left the city behind when his music career took off. Starr looks back on his hometown fondly, though he would not move back there. During an interview in 2008, Starr said there wasn’t much he missed about living in Liverpool. The offhand remark angered many of the city’s residents.
Starr was born in Liverpool, England, in 1940. According to his Beatles bandmate, Paul McCartney, all of the Beatles faced hardship in Liverpool, but Starr had it the worst.
“I don’t want to bring in the violins, but we all came from hardship,” McCartney told Rolling Stone in 2015. “All of us except for George [Harrison] lost someone. I lost my mum when I was 14. John [Lennon] lost his mum. But Ringo had it worst. His father was gone; he was so sick they told his mum he wasn’t going to live. Imagine making up your life from that, in that environment. No family, no school. He had to invent himself. We all had to come up with a shield, but Ringo came up with the strongest shield.”
Source: Emma McKee/cheatsheet.com
Ringo Starr drums on the beach, sings in front of spinning backdrops, and pushes plenty of peace and love in the vibrant new music video for “Everyone and Everything,” a song hailing from the Beatles legend’s latest solo effort, “EP3.”
The colorful clip has a little bit of everything, from troublemaking cats and psychedelic imagery to Ringo marching in front of a majestic mountain backdrop. If there’s one predominant theme, however, it’s the 82-year-old Stern Show veteran’s desire to bring the world together with peace and love.
Written by former 4 Non Blondes frontwoman Linda Perry, “Everyone and Everything” is one of four tracks on “EP3,” which landed in September and is available on cassette and vinyl. The effort serves as Ringo’s third release since the start of last year, following EPs “Zoom In” and “Change the World.”
Source: howardstern.com
George Harrison loved all Beatles fans. However, he had a hard time understanding some of them. He had a problem with the fans who wanted the group to live on, despite their issues with each other as bandmates or how much they wanted to move on.
During a 1974 press conference (per George Harrison on George Harrison: Interviews and Encounters), a reporter asked George if he was “amazed by how much the Beatles still mean to people today.”
It didn’t impress George. Actually, he thought it was a problem that some people were still attached to the band. Living in the past was not good. “Not really,” he said. “It’s nice. I realize the Beatles did fill a space in the ’60s, and all the people the Beatles mean anything to have grown up. It’s like anything; if you grow up with something you get attached to it.
Source: Hannah Wigandt/cheatsheet.com
The album that we have all come to call “The White Album” is in reality called The Beatles, but virtually from the moment it was released, on November 22, 1968 (en route to topping the UK charts on December 7), it picked up its more popular moniker. Such was the impact of the album, the ninth studio outing by The Beatles, that there are some who have mistakenly cited it as the first double-album of the rock era. However, that honor belongs to Bob Dylan’s Blonde On Blonde, which was released two years earlier.
In fact, The Beatles was not even the first double-album by a band. A few months after Dylan’s opus, Frank Zappa And The Mothers Of Invention released their debut, the double-album Freak Out! And yet, 50 years after its release, The Beatles remains a groundbreaking record.
Source: Richard Havers/yahoo.com
Ken Mansfield, the former U.S. manager of the Beatles' Apple Records, died on November 17th at age 85. Mansfield, who promoted the “Fab Four” on Capitol prior to being among the first on the Apple team, had worked with such legends as the Beach Boys, Buck Owens, Glen Campbell, Judy Garland, and many others before joining the group's personal label.
Starting with “Hey Jude,” Mansfield played a crucial role in promoting both the Beatles' music, as well as other Apple acts such as Mary Hopkin, James Taylor, Jackie Lomax, and Badfinger.
In 2018, Mansfield published his second memoir on his time with working with the Beatles, titled The Roof: The Beatles’ Final Concert.
Source: Music News/myradiolink.com
The Beatles’ Revolver album, first released in 1966, has rushed to No. 1 on multiple Billboard charts following its deluxe expanded reissue on October 28. The set re-entered at No. 1 on Top Rock & Alternative Albums, Top Rock Albums and Catalog Albums (all dated Nov. 12) – its first week at No. 1 on all three lists. Revolver also re-enters Top Album Sales, Vinyl Albums and Tastemaker Albums at No. 2.
On the Billboard 200, the former No. 1 – which spent six weeks atop the list in 1966 – re-entered the list at No. 4.
For Revolver’s special edition, the album was reintroduced and remixed in a variety of expanded formats and editions, including many with previously unreleased tracks. The range included a standard digital album priced at $9.99 in the iTunes Store up through a boxed set boasting four vinyl LPs and two seven-inch singles that sold for $200 or more, depending on the retailer.
Source: Tim Peacock/finance.yahoo.com
