Beatles News
A while back on Twitter, some music dude asked his followers to name the Most Underrated Band of all time. There were many replies, but I think I identified the right candidate: The Beatles.
The request was not for the most undeservedly obscure, it was for the most underrated. And a very famous band can be underrated too. Of course some tweeters thought I was joking, but I would never joke about something like that – I have long believed that many people know the Beatles are good, but few people know just how good they are. How astronomically better they are than almost anybody else.
Turns out that I am not alone in this – that among the people who underrated the Beatles was one Paul McCartney. This at least was my takeaway from a most entertaining discussion on RTÉ1’s Arena between presenter Kay Sheehy and Pat Carty of Hot Press and The Music Machine on Dublin City radio.
Source: Declan Lynch/Declan Lynch
AMAZING!
'Imagine' a corn maze so inspiring that it requires multiple fields. This time lapse video of Mike's Maze at Warner Farm will thrill any John Lennon fan and make a dreamer out of anyone who watches it.
Imagine at Mike's Maze
Warner Farm - Sunderland, Massachusetts
Opening September 10th
If you're anything like me, you probably said 'Where the ^#$& is Sunderland?'
Don't let that stand in the way of your journey to see it in person. Driving from the NH Seacoast area, you can make it there in a couple hours.
A quick and easy two hours and eighteen minutes if you take 495 and then Route 2.
If you prefer a more NH based route?
Source: wcyy.com
On this day 49 years ago, Ringo Starr replaced Pete Best as the drummer of The Beatles.
The English rock band went on to sell hundreds of millions of records over the following decade and soon established itself as one of the most influential groups of all time.
Yet Starr’s contribution to the band was usually overshadowed by the massive celebrity and formidable talents of John Lennon, Paul McCartney and George Harrison.
The drummer was known as “the fourth Beatle” and was often portrayed as the least musically talented of the group, with some critics describing his joining the band as a stroke of pure chance.
It is a narrative that has stuck over the years – regardless of whether it is true.
Source: newsnationusa.com
Of all the Beatles’ classic albums, Let It Be is the one with the most daunting reputation. We’re all used to hearing it as their break-up album. The one where the Fabs fall apart. The one they began as a back-to-basics rebirth, until it became their tombstone. The messy film soundtrack that arrived in May 1970, just as the band was breaking up. The one Phil Spector took over. Their darkest, most divisive music. But that’s never been the whole story. This is also the album with classics like “Let It Be,” “Across the Universe,” “Get Back,” and “Two of Us.” Let It Be always raises the question: How did John, Paul, George, and Ringo make such uplifting music in their hour of darkness?
That’s the fascinating mystery behind Let It Be — and it’s about to get more fascinating. Rolling Stone took a one-on-one exclusive tour of the new Special Edition of Let It Be, which drops on October 15th. It’s a crucial box set that finally places this wildly misunderstood music in the Beatles’ story.
Source: Rob Sheffield/rollingstone.com
Paul McCartney has been making the most of lockdown. First he recorded the third in his trilogy of “McCartney” albums. Then he arranged for famous friends such as St Vincent and Beck to remix the LP. And now, here he is on McCartney 3,2,1 (Disney +, Wednesday), mucking about with super-producer Rick Rubin and talking, with undisguised enthusiasm, about the glory years of The Beatles.
At 79, McCartney’s effervescence is remarkable. He is surely fed up with questions about his humble upbringing in Liverpool. His early days playing with John Lennon. His relationship with unofficial younger brother, George Harrison. These are anecdotes that must haunt his dreams.
But no – he can’t get enough of it. It helps that on McCartney 3, 2, 1 he has an opportunity to nerd out. He is “in conversation” with producer and hit-maker Rubin in six 30 minute episodes – though in reality they’re just larking about together in a studio. And this proves the best possible environment in which to get the most out of Macca.
Source: Ed Power/irishtimes.com
In February of 1964, halfway through my sixth-grade year, the Beatles came to America. By coincidence, Aunt Shirley was returning from a trip to England on the same day the Beatles were landing at the recently renamed John F. Kennedy Airport. When we went to pick Shirley up, the airport was still crawling with dazed teenage girls; the Beatles had landed a mere couple of hours earlier. On the drive back into town, Shirley revealed that she had originally been booked on the same Pan Am jet that the Beatles were on, but at the last minute had changed her flight to TWA because, she explained, they had this great new feature: a projector was set up at the back of the aisle and a screen up front, and they showed a movie. I was aghast: For this, Shirley had missed being on the same plane as the Beatles?
Source: Jamie Bernstein/forward.com
Details of a box set of unreleased recordings from The Beatles “Let It Be” sessions have been posted on Amazon’s Spanish website prior an official announcement.
The five-CD, single Blu-ray audio set will feature the “Let It Be” album newly mixed by producer Giles Martin and engineer Sam Okell.
The box set also feature 27 previously unreleased session recordings, a four-track “Let It Be” EP, and the never before released 14-track “Get Back”’ stereo LP mix compiled by engineer Glyn Johns in May 1969.
Fans will hear early versions of songs that later ended up on “Abbey Road,” as well as songs the individual Beatles would record as solo artists: “Gimme Some Truth,” “The Walk” and “All Things Must Pass.”
The collection comes with a 100-page hard-back book with an introduction by Paul McCartney, extensive notes and track-by-track recording information and many previously unseen photos, personal notes, tape box images and more.
Source: George Lenker/masslive.com
Noel Gallagher has revealed that he’s set to release his cover of John Lennon‘s ‘Mind Games’, which he recorded to mark the late Beatles musician’s 80th birthday.
During the latest edition of his new Radio X residency, the former Oasis man spoke to Matt Morgan about taking on the 1973 single while he was working in the studio last year.
He’d been approached to contribute to a new covers album in tribute to Lennon, which was being assembled by his son Sean Ono Lennon.
“I couldn’t get involved because I was doing something at the time,” Gallagher explained. “And on the eve of his birthday, Sean said, ‘Oh you know how it’s dad’s birthday tomorrow, and can you do something on your socials?’
“I happened to be in the studio and I said, ‘Well, let’s record’. We just did a version of ‘Mind Games’ and did a little film.” (You can see that Instagram video below).
Source: Tom Skinner/nme.com
The music world lost one of its greatest drummers today when The Rolling Stones' Charlie Watts died at age 80. A flood of touching tributes and heartfelt remembrances from musicians and others celebrities have come flooding in on social media since the news was announced. The Beatles’ Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr, Grateful Dead/Dead & Company drummer Bill Kreutzmann and Stewart Copeland of The Police and Oysterhead are just a few of those who have shared messages of love and respect for Charlie Watts.
“So sad to hear about Charlie Watts, the Stones drummer, dying. He was a lovely guy,” Paul McCartney said in a video. “I knew he was ill, but I didn’t know it was this [bad]. Lots of love to his family, wife and kids and extended family, and condolences to the Stones. A huge blow to them, because Charlie was a rock and a fantastic drummer. Steady as a rock. Love you Charlie, always loved you. Beautiful man.”
Source: jambase.com
Though they were friends for decades, Ringo Starr was blindsided by the announcement of Rolling Stones drummer Charlie Watts’s death, just like millions of fans world-wide.
“I knew he wasn’t doing well, but it was a shock to me,” Mr. Starr said in a Zoom interview two hours after Mr. Watts’s death was announced.
Mr. Starr said drummer Jim Keltner called Monday to tell him that Mr. Watts, who had pulled out of the Stones’ fall tour because of an unspecified medical procedure, had taken a downturn. On Tuesday morning in Los Angeles, Mr. Starr’s phone blew up as he prepared to do some interviews in support of his four-song extended-play recording, “Change The World,” set to be released Sept. 24.
Source: Alan Paul/wsj.com
