Beatles News
In a conversation with late-night show host Conan O’Brien, former Beatles drummer Ringo Starr got real about his feelings regarding Beatles fan conventions. The multi-day festivals, much like Comic-Cons or other large-scale fan events, draw Beatles lovers of all ages, nationalities, and persuasions eager to sit back and let the evening go.
The “Photograph” singer throughout the years has had a love/hate relationship with the Fab Four’s devotees but his comments to O’Brien could be taken as a sign that the eldest Beatle, in the end, does care.
Ringo Starr, third from left, signs an autograph for a young fan as his fellow Beatles (left to right) George Harrison, John Lennon, and Paul McCartney look on | Daily Mirror/Mirrorpix/Mirrorpix via Getty Images
Starr’s spotty relationship with Beatles’ fans
In 2008, Starr took to his website to formally ask the band’s fans to stop writing him. It wasn’t clear at that point what had set off this request by the “It Don’t Come Easy” artist, but his remarks were anything but unclear. It was an unwelcoming message the artist formerly known as ‘the funny Beatle” issued to fans.
Source: cheatsheet.com
When Paul McCartney was 24, The Beatles released Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, an album which includes his track “When I’m Sixty-Four.” During an interview, Paul McCartney revealed why he used the number “64” in the song. In addition, he discussed how he would change the track if he wrote it at a later stage of his life.
What would have been different about The Beatles’ ”When I’m Sixty-Four” if Paul McCartney wrote it during another time in his life
2006 was an interesting year for Paul. The Los Angeles Times reports it was when he turned 64—an age which was especially notable since he wrote “When I’m Sixty-Four” many years prior. In addition, he earned his 64th Grammy nomination.
During an interview, Paul said “It was really an arbitrary number when I wrote [‘When I’m Sixty-Four’]. I probably should have called it ‘When I’m 65,’ which is the retirement age in England. And the rhyme would have been easy, ‘something, something alive when I’m 65.’ But it felt too predictable. It sounded better to say 64.”
Source: americansongwriter.com
In 1968 Paul Saltzman was a lost soul. The son of a Canadian TV weatherman, he was working as a sound engineer for the National Film Board of Canada in India when he received a “Dear John” letter from the woman he thought was going to be his wife. “I was devastated,” he says. “Then someone on the crew said: ‘Have you tried meditation for the heartbreak?’”
Saltzman went to see the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi – the founder of transcendental meditation – speak at New Delhi University. Emboldened by promises of “inner rejuvenation”, Saltzman then travelled to the International Academy of Meditation in Rishikesh. It was closed because of the arrival of The Beatles.
As explained by Paul McCartney in the Beatles book Anthology, the exhausted group, still coming to terms with the suicide of their manager Brian Epstein in August 1967, had arrived in Rishikesh with wives and girlfriends to “find the answer” through the teachings of the Maharishi, whom Paul, George and John had first encountered at a lecture at the London Hilton. “There was a feeling of: ‘It’s great to be famous [and] rich,” said McCartney, “but what it’s all for?’
Source: Andrew Male
Help! is one of The Beatles’ most famous movies, however, John Lennon didn’t enjoy making it. He revealed he hated being around certain people during the making of the film and swore at them while drunk. Here’s a look at why John thought it was “humiliating” to be a member of The Beatles.
John Lennon revealed The Beatles were ‘insulted’ during the making of one of their movies, ‘Help!’
In the book Lennon Remembers, John got honest with Rolling Stones’ Jann S. Wenner about his feelings regarding The Beatles. He hated having to constantly meet with fans and their obnoxious parents. If The Beatles didn’t meet with these strangers, they were faced with threats the press might turn on them.
Source: cheatsheet.com
He’s the man who once hung up on John Lennon. And despite that, he still went on to play on the ex-Beatle’s most iconic song, “Imagine,” which was recorded 50 years ago this spring.
Alan White, who now lives in the Seattle area, was just another struggling young English rock ’n’ roller when, one night in September 1969, he took his position behind the drums with his band Griffin at the matchbox-sized Rasputin club in London. White didn’t know that Lennon and his wife, Yoko Ono, were sitting anonymously at the back of the room. The next evening, the drummer was frying up a meal for some of his bandmates at the small house they shared near Wembley Stadium in London when the phone rang.
“A voice announced, ‘Hello, this is John Lennon,’” White remembers with a chuckle. “I thought it was a mate pulling my leg, put the receiver down, and went back to the kitchen.
“Luckily, the caller rang back. This time I listened and thought: Hang on. Maybe it is John Lennon.”
Source: seattletimes.com
The director of a new documentary about the Beatles in India said there was a “paradox” about the band’s success in that country.
Ajoy Bose – an author whose movie The Beatles and India premiered in the U.K. this past weekend before it gets a wider release later in the year – argued that the Fab Four’s influence on the continent went much further than their celebrated visit to learn from Maharishi Mahesh Yogi at Rishikesh in 1968.
“You can tell the Beatles’ story so many different ways,” Bose told The Guardian in a recent interview. “I always felt that the India part of the Beatles saga was bigger than Rishikesh.” He said the connection began with George Harrison’s use of sitar on the set of their movie Help!, following a short visit to Delhi in 1966.
“For me, this isn’t a story about the Maharishi,” Bose noted. “It’s about four working-class lads from Liverpool, who got deeply into Indian culture, when George was the de facto leader of the group.” He recalled his own experience of discovering the group as a young teenager. “I was from the English-speaking Bengali middle-classes, who had been into Elvis Presley, Jim Reeves and Doris Day, and who were naturally bicultural," he explained. "P.G. Wodehouse was our sense of humor, and that’s why I think there was an immediate connection with the Beatles: the wit.”
Source: ultimateclassicrock.com
When I was little, I watched the “Yellow Submarine” animated film on VCR until it practically fell apart. No, seriously – the VCR player would completely reject the movie. This is not to say that it is a good movie, certainly not by any stretch of the imagination. It is a drug-induced, hippy dream/nightmare lasting for a seemingly plotless ninety minutes. Regardless, it was foundational for my childhood. After every viewing, I would run around singing “Hey, Bulldog” and “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” for hours. I devoured every song in that movie like it was the last time I would ever hear it.
When I got older, “Yellow Submarine” was traded in for “Help” and “A Hard Day’s Night.” Again, the cycle of watching and re-watching continued. At one point in my childhood, my dad could play five seconds of any Beatles song on his guitar and I would proudly identify it with ease. While my abilities have since subsided in that department, my passion has remained.
Source: dukechronicle.com
The Beatles and George Martin were so close, George was even described as the ‘Fifth Beatle.’ He worked with the band for the entirety of their career and continued work with Paul McCartney along with many others in his long career.
How did The Beatles meet George Martin?
The Beatles met George Martin when they went to audition for the producer in 1962.
At this time, George was not a producer known for his work in pop music, and The Beatles had been turned down by Decca Records despite their manager Brian Epstein’s persistence.
In the end, Brian managed to get two meetings in with George, first on February 13, 1962, and then again on May 9.
Source: Jenny Desborough/express.co.uk
George Harrison had a very interesting career after The Beatles. Not only did he release solo work, but he also became far more involved in Indian culture, collaborating with Indian artist Ravi Shankar. He also made a supergroup with other top musicians, showing his breadth of work before his death in 2001.
How many albums did George Harrison make?
Outside of his work with The Beatles, George made 12 solo studio albums.
He also made two compilation albums, one of which was at his famous Concert for Bangladesh, as well as two albums with supergroup The Travelling Wilburys.
His first album, Wonderwall Music, came out in 1968 while The Beatles were still performing together.
Source: Jenny Desborough/express.co.uk
Ray Cordeiro considers himself the luckiest radio DJ in the world.
In a storied career spanning over 70 years in Hong Kong, Cordeiro has interviewed superstars including the Beatles and Elton John, and even received an MBE — an order of the British empire for outstanding achievement or service to the community — from Queen Elizabeth.
Cordeiro, who holds the Guinness world record for the world’s longest-working DJ, retired last month at the age of 96.
“I’ve been talking all my life about music and all, and I’d never thought that I would retire. I never thought that I was getting older,” he said.
Cordeiro was born in 1924 in Hong Kong and is of Portuguese descent. His musical tastes as a child were influenced by his brother who was 10 years older and collected records from groups like the Mills Brothers and the Andrews Sisters.
Source: ALICE FUNG/apnews.com
