Beatles News
When Paul McCartney looked back at his work in The Beatles, “And I Love Her” stood out to him as a milestone. At that point (early 1964), Paul hadn’t yet earned his reputation as a brilliant balladeer. That started to change after he wrote “And I Love Her.”
“It was the first ballad I impressed myself with,” Paul said in his biography Many Years From Now (1997). And John Lennon agreed with him. Thinking back on their rise as songwriters, John described Paul’s Hard Day’s Night gem as a warmup for “Yesterday.”
While John and Paul collaborated on many songs in those days, John had only minimal involvement in the writing of “And I Love Her.” (He probably helped with the middle section.) But Paul definitely hadn’t completed the track when he brought it into the studio.
Source: cheatsheet.com
Paul McCartney was among the many artists to remember Rep. John Lewis following the death of the civil rights icon Friday at the age of 80.
“Sad to hear the news that civil rights legend John Lewis died yesterday,” McCartney tweeted Saturday. “He was such a great leader who fought with honesty and bravery for civil rights in America. Long may his memory remain in our hearts.”
McCartney added, “How about renaming the famous Pettus Bridge that he and Martin Luther King Jr. and others walked across in the 60s for the civil rights movement and rename it the John Lewis Bridge?!!!”
Source: Daniel Kreps/rollingstone.com
When The Smithereens make music, they do it right. And it shines on their newest release, a special one-off two-song covers record of The Beatles’ 1962 single “Love Me Do” and “P.S. I Love You,” featuring session drummer Andy White, who originally performed on the two songs. Best of all for fanatics and collectors, the songs are available on 45 RPM vinyl, pressed on the Tollie label with picture sleeve, which pays tribute to original American release by the Fab Four.
The British Invasion sound permeates the Smithereens’ music, and it was a thrill for the band members to find out that White, one of the few who could actually claim to be the Fifth Beatle, had married an American woman and was living in New Jersey. The band became friendly with the legendary British drummer (Tom Jones, Herman’s Hermits, Petula Clark) and even had him guest on several special live shows before he passed away in 2015.
Source: Robert Dye/americansongwriter.com
Ken McNab's in-depth look at The Beatles' acrimonious final year is a detailed account of the breakup featuring the perspectives of all four band members and their roles. A must add to the collection of Beatles fans, AND IN THE END is full of fascinating information available for the first time.
McNab, in a compelling month-by-month chronology, reconstructs the seismic events of 1969, when The Beatles reached new highs of creativity and new lows of the internal strife that would ultimately destroy them. Between the pressure of being filmed during rehearsals and writing sessions for the documentary Get Back, their company Apple Corps facing bankruptcy, Lennon's heroin use and musical disagreements, the group was arguing more than ever before and their formerly close friendship began to disintegrate.
In the midst of this rancor, however, emerged the glorious disharmony of Let It Be and the ragged genius of Abbey Road, their incredible farewell love letter to the world.
Source: gratefulweb.com
Sir Ringo Starr nearly missed out on being one of The Beatles because he'd planned to move to America.
The music legend was working in a factory when, at the age of 19, he and a friend decided to take the plunge and emigrate, but they were put off when they saw how many forms they had to fill in, and the 80-year-old drummer often reflects on how different his life could have been.
He said: "I love the blues and wanted to go and live in Houston because I wanted to be where Lightnin' Hopkings was - my all-time favorite blues player.
"John and I went down to the embassy and we filled in all these forms - we were just teenagers filling in all these damned forms.
"So we filled them in and took them back to the embassy and they gave us more paperwork, with even more questions - sheets and sheets of it.
Source: Celebretainment/pressofatlanticcity.com
On October 9, 2011, The Beatles Paul McCartney married his third wife Nancy Shevell. At the time, the singer was 69 and Shevell was younger than him; aged 51.
McCartney, 78, and Shevell, 60, got married at London's Old Marylebone Town Hall with family and friends in attendance. It wasn’t expected that the former Beatle would marry again after he had a bitter divorce from his second wife.
McCartney had to pay out an alleged $35 million to Heather Mills in their divorce. What Shevell has in common with the musician’s first wife, Linda Eastman, is that she’s also an American.
Her father is Mike Shevell the owner of a transportation conglomerate which is estimated to be worth nearly half of a billion dollars. In 2011, the businesswoman served as the company's vice president.
She was also a board member of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. Shevell, like Eastman, has also battled breast cancer.
Source: Junie Sihlangu/news.amomama.com
It is 1965 – four years before Here Comes The Sun, as it goes – and John, Paul, George and Ringo are sprinting down a London street while filming their hit movie Help!
The pics were taken after snapper Derek Bayes heard a commotion from his office and spotted the Fab Four’s antics on New Bond Street, Mayfair.
It was May 9, a quiet Sunday, and Derek had to be quick to capture pop’s biggest ever band.
The pictures, unpublished until now, reveal a hilarious day’s filming – affected largely by the band being stoned.
Ringo Starr, who has just turned 80, has blurry memories of making the film, directed by Dick Lester.
The drummer once said: “A hell of a lot of pot was being smoked while making the film. It was great. That helped make it a lot of fun. You can see a lot of red-eyed shots; they were red from the dope we were smoking. Dick knew very little would get done after lunch. We seldom got past the first line of the script.
Source: Julie McCaffrey/mirror.co.uk
George Harrison is one of the most famous religious converts in the history of rock music. Despite this, many fans don’t know why he decided to become a Hindu. Some people convert to another religion because they have mystical experiences or fall on hard times. George, on the other hand, went down a different spiritual path because of a visit to a restaurant.
George’s journey began when he was brought up as a Catholic. According to the book George Harrison on George Harrison, he associated Catholicism with pain and fear — though he acknowledged he may have “misinterpreted” his childhood religion. He stopped caring about Catholicism when he was 12 or 13. However, religion would become an important part of his life again someday — and George’s Catholic upbringing was clearly reflected in some of his solo music.
Source: cheatsheet.com
While many rank “Yesterday” among the greatest songs ever written, Paul McCartney didn’t want to release it as a Beatles single in 1965. Paul pointed to the arrangement, which featured a string quartet and no one from The Beatles other than him.
“We were a little embarrassed about it,” Paul later said in an interview from Beatles Anthology. “We were a rock ‘n’ roll band.” While The Who’s Pete Townshend might disagree with that take, Paul got his wish about “Yesterday” remaining a non-single (at least on the U.K. market).
The following year, Paul wrote another outstanding composition that ended up with a string accompaniment: “Eleanor Rigby.” But this time around producer George Martin suggested taking all the guitars out completely.
Source: cheatsheet.com
Sir Paul McCartney has said working with Sir Ringo Starr once again was “a sort of magic.”
The 78-year-old has paired up with Starr, 80, on Beautiful Night, a track from McCartney’s 1997 Flaming Pie album which is due for re-release.
The release is coming as part of the Paul McCartney Archive Collection which also sees 32 bonus audio tracks and a 128-page book containing previously unpublished images by Linda McCartney.
Starr’s contribution has now led to a new music video of Beautiful Night being released, as well as a new EP for the track.
Speaking to PA, McCartney explained: “I’d been saying to Ringo for years that it’d be great to do something, because we’d never really done that much work together outside The Beatles.
“One night Jeff (Lynne, Electric Light Orchestra co-founder) suggested, ‘Why don’t you get Ringo in?’ and I said, ‘OK.’ It just sort of happened.”
He continued: “I had this song Beautiful Night which I’d written quite a few years ago. I’d always liked it but I felt I didn’t quite have the right version of it.
Source: Kimberley Bond/standard.co.uk
