Beatles News
George Harrison’s broken guitar string and a rare set of Beatles autographs obtained by a teenage fan in 1963 could sell for more than $5,352 at auction. The Fab Four scribbled their names down for starstruck 15-year-old Elizabeth Salt and also signed her arm following a gig on April 7, 1963.
Elizabeth, then Elizabeth McBrierty, got to meet her idols following the concert at the Savoy Ballroom in Southsea, Portsmouth. Elizabeth Salt holding her autograph book with The Beatles' signatures and George Harrison's broken guitar string.
An open autograph book with Beatles signatures and George Harrison's broken guitar string taped inside. Now, the autographs and George Harrison’s broken guitar string could sell for more than $5,352 at auction. During the performance, George Harrison snapped his guitar string, and quick-thinking Elizabeth scooped it up from the stage as a souvenir.
Elizabeth said she was “heartbroken” when her dad made her wash off the autographs from her arm – but fortunately still had her autograph book. The album is also stuffed with signatures of other stars, including the Rolling Stones, Cliff Richard, Adam Faith, Del Shannon, Bobby Vee and Billy Fury.
The book – hailed as a celebration of one of the most exciting periods for pop culture in British history – is now set to fetch thousands at auction. It could sell for between $4,014 to $5,352 when it goes under the hammer at Richard Winterton Auctioneers in Lichfield, Staffs., on February 2.
At the time, Beatlemania was just beginning following the release of Love Me Do, and Elizabeth went on to watch her heroes several times.
Elizabeth, now 79, from Lichfield, said: “I remember going with my friend who bought Love Me Do in late 1962. “That was when it started – we just got obsessed with them. “We were sat around the stage when George Harrison broke his guitar string and I picked it up.
“Afterwards they went into a room and we all just piled in. “That’s when I got their autographs on my left arm – I just held it out asking them to sign and they did.
“I was still at school and wanted to show all my friends the next day, but when I got home my dad said, ‘You’ll get blood poisoning!’ and made me wash it straight off. “I was heartbroken.”
Elizabeth, then of North End, Portsmouth, and her friends had already seen the group at the Guildhall in Portsmouth on March 30, 1963, and continued to go to as many shows as they could all along the south coast, including Brighton, Bournemouth and Southampton.
An autograph book page featuring signatures from the Rolling Stones members Keith Richards, Brian Jones, Bill Wyman, and Mick Jagger.
The album is also stuffed with signatures of other stars, including the Rolling Stones, Cliff Richard, Adam Faith, Del Shannon, Bobby Vee and Billy Fury. An elderly woman holding an autograph book with The Beatles' signatures and a broken guitar string from George Harrison.
The book could sell for between $4,014 to $5,352 when it goes under the hammer at Richard Winterton Auctioneers in Lichfield, England, on Feb. 2.
Another encounter came through The Beatles’ Fan Club at an event in London before an evening concert. Elizabeth added: “We went up to London for the fan club meet-and-greet. “It was quite weird, I can remember that John Lennon’s teeth were absolutely lovely.
“But you weren’t allowed to linger. They all shook our hands and we were moved along.” Another memory is of queuing up overnight for another concert at Portsmouth Guildhall when Elizabeth’s cousin Mary agreed to save the girls’ place in the queue so the others could watch The Beatles’ TV appearance on Sunday Night At The London Palladium.
Elizabeth also has a copy of a cutting from the Portsmouth Evening News where the writer describes meeting her and four friends who had spent ‘three nights sleeping on the pavements, with transistors and a blanket each, to buy tickets for both performances – much to the dismay and disapproval of their parents’.
Now a gran-of-four, Elizabeth, a former legal secretary, remains a huge Beatles fan. Her album also contains a further George Harrison signature and those of Ringo Starr and Paul McCartney again on another separate page.
In addition, there is a complete set of the Rolling Stones’ signatures, including Brian Jones, obtained when Elizabeth went to see the band at the Savoy Ballroom in Portsmouth.
Other 1960s stars in the book include a Cliff Richard signed photo and separate autograph, Adam Faith, Del Shannon, Bobby Vee, Tony Orlando, Dion, Billy Fury, Marty Wilde, Mark Wynter, Eden Kane, Shane Fenton – later reborn as Alvin Stardust.
Source: SWNS/nypost.com
As one of the most iconic musical groups of all time, The Beatles have had more than their share of critically well-received album releases.
From early hits like With the Beatles to transformative classics like Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, The Beatles are one of the few bands in rock history to have nothing but enjoyable hits making up their larger discography.
As fantastic as many of their musical ventures were over the years, however, there's one classic Beatles album that Paul McCartney remains less than enthusiastic about.
According to Far Out Magazine, McCartney maintains a cool-headed view of the band's 1970 tour de force Let It Be, the twelfth and final Beatles album the group released prior to their breakup in 1970.
While McCartney initially envisioned the project as an epic collaboration between himself, John Lennon, George Harrison and Ringo Starr, studio interference from Phil Spector on the album's direction ultimately led to increasing frustration for McCartney.
As an example, McCartney had hoped to present "The Long and Winding Road" as a straightforward song, using a simple arrangement of piano, bass, guitar and percussion instruments.
When Spector got his hands on the song, though, he made significant changes to "The Long and Winding Road," notably adding orchestral backgrounds at the cost of McCartney's vocal tracks.
“The album was finished a year ago, but a few months ago American record producer Phil Spector was called in by John Lennon to tidy up some of the tracks," McCartney said in 1970. "But a few weeks ago, I was sent a re-mixed version of my song ‘The Long And Winding Road’, with harps, horns, an orchestra and women’s choir added."
“No one had asked me what I thought. I couldn’t believe it,” the iconic singer-songwriter continued. “The record came with a note from Allen Klein saying he thought the changes were necessary. I don’t blame Phil Spector for doing it but it just goes to show that it’s no good me sitting here thinking I’m in control because obviously, I’m not."
Beatles producer George Martin felt the same way, remarking of the album, "It was so uncharacteristic of The Beatles. It went against everything The Beatles wanted to do with the record. He tried to use the same techniques that he used on other people’s records, and it didn’t work.”
Source: Richard Chachowski/yahoo.com
George Martin became the world’s most legendary producer with the Beatles, the studio wizard who teamed up with four lads from Liverpool to transform music. Now his music has been collected in a lavish new book, George Martin: The Scores, which will be published in April by Curvebender. It’s the first collection of his music manuscripts, opening up his personal archives. The Scores honors the late Sir George Martin on the occasion of his centenary — he was born 100 years ago, on Jan. 3, 1926.
The three-volume book includes dozens of his original handwritten scores for classics like “Strawberry Fields Forever,” “A Day in the Life,” “Here Comes the Sun,” “Yesterday,” “Live and Let Die,” and more. It also has a foreword from one of his biggest fans and closest collaborators: Paul McCartney.
George’s son Giles Martin, an acclaimed producer in his own right, tells Rolling Stone, “It’s a book of art, if you like, because his scores are very beautiful. There’s a fluidity to it. There’s a vibrancy to looking at that music on a page.”
The Scores is a project that began in the producer’ final years, before his death in 2016. “It was a very poignant project,” Giles says. “It was an idea I had with the Curvebender guys. Actually, when my dad was ill, I thought this would be a good thing to keep him going — let’s do a book of his scores.”
Martin was deeply involved in the project, despite his declining health. “He liked the idea, and then he died. I mean, he was 90,” Giles Martin says. But the producer dug deep into his vaults. “What it is, essentially, is a selection of his scores that we have taken and perfectly reproduced, in the same way that the ‘Yesterday’ score was done all those years ago. It’s a book of his scores with commentary — a deep dive into each arrangement, the history behind it, and a deep dive into how it was done.”
These are the manuscripts Martin saved after the recording sessions. Since they were his working sheet music in the studio, they include his handwritten edits, for an inside look at his creative process. Some have his ideas for alternate arrangements that didn’t make the final cut. The book also comes with an album: orchestral re-recordings of his scores, for a closer listen to his work. They were done in Studio Two at Abbey Road, the room where Martin made so much magic happen with the Beatles.
Source: Rob Sheffield/rollingstone.com
Few figures in popular culture carry the kind of gravitational pull John Lennon still commands. As a member of The Beatles, he helped reshape music in real time, first as part of a sharp-suited pop phenomenon, then as one of the central architects of rock’s psychedelic and political awakening. By the early 1970s, Lennon had lived a life few could comprehend: global adoration, unprecedented wealth, and a creative freedom that bordered on dangerous.
That perspective, hard-earned and deeply personal, is what makes a handwritten letter Lennon wrote in 1971 so striking, and so heartbreaking. The letter was addressed to Steve Tilston, then a 21-year-old folk musician riding modest underground momentum following the release of his debut album An Acoustic Confusion. Tilston had recently appeared in an interview with ZigZag magazine, where he was asked whether sudden wealth and fame would damage his songwriting.
Tilston answered honestly: he thought it would. Lennon disagreed.
According to Tilston, recalling the moment years later, “I thought it was bound to, but obviously John Lennon disagreed, and he wrote to me to point out the error of my ways.” What followed was a thoughtful, candid letter, unmistakably Lennon in tone, humour, and slightly chaotic handwriting, offering a corrective from someone who had already been to both extremes.
“Being rich doesn't change your experience in the way you think,” Lennon wrote. He continued: “The only difference, basically, is that you don't have to worry about money, food, roof, etc. But all other experiences, emotions, relationships, are the same as anybody’s.”
Then, in classic Lennon fashion, he undercut the seriousness with lived authority: “I know. I've been rich and poor. So has Yoko (rich, poor, rich). So whadya think of that.”
The letter was signed “Love, John & Yoko,” complete with doodles and, remarkably, Lennon’s phone number.
Source: Jake Danson/classichits.ie
With all the machismo that often surrounds the rock ‘n’ roll world and its inhabitants, it’s no wonder that so many rock bands have become aggressive toward one another at some point in their careers. Even without the massive egos and on-stage pressure, working with someone in close quarters can be difficult. The Eagles, Aerosmith, and, more recently, Jane’s Addiction, are all no exceptions. And neither were The Beatles.
The Beatles’ most ubiquitous conflict is certainly the months-long breakup that bookended their time together as the Fab Four. But they had their fair share of rows while they were cutting their teeth, too. According to John Lennon and George Harrison, the worst of this aggression came out in the hours-long gigs they would play in Hamburg, boosted by dangerous mixes of booze and uppers.
How The Beatles Killed Time During Their Lengthy Nightclub Sets
Even the most seasoned musician is bound to feel at least a little weary after playing at performance-level for four hours straight, and The Beatles were doing it while they were just starting out. With the help of upper pills handed out by the Hamburg nightclub waitstaff, the musicians managed to play their rock music for hours on end—some of which were spent getting rather, er, creative with the stage production.
“The things we used to do!” John Lennon later recalled in Anthology. “We used to break the stage down. That was long before The Who came out and broke things. We used to leave guitars playing on stage with no people there. We’d be so drunk, we used to smash the machinery. And this was all through frustration, not an intellectual thought. ‘We will break the stage, we will wear a toilet seat round our neck, we will go on naked.’ We just did it through being drunk.”
Source: Melanie Davis/americansongwriter.com
Paul McCartney recalls being "depressed" post-Beatles and recounts the formation of Wings in Paul McCartney: Man on the Run
PEOPLE can exclusively reveal the trailer for the new Prime Video documentary, premiering Feb. 27
Wings enjoyed a string of hits in the '70s, including "Live and Let Die" and "Silly Love Songs"
The Beatles were Paul McCartney’s entire life. When the group parted ways, he thought his pen had run dry for good.
The English singer-songwriter, 83, opens up about his life in the wake of the break-up of the iconic British invasion band (McCartney, John Lennon, George Harrison and Ringo Starr) in the new Prime Video documentary Paul McCartney: Man on the Run.
In the trailer for the Morgan Neville-directed doc — which PEOPLE is exclusively premiering — McCartney reflects on the depression he experienced after the Beatles’ break-up, and recounts how he climbed out of it while steering his career in a new direction with his '70s band Wings.
"I’ve always loved the Beatles, but Wings was the band putting out records when I was young," Neville, who directed the Oscar-winning 2013 documentary 20 Feet from Stardom, tells PEOPLE exclusively. "I remember buying them in stores and obsessing over them. Having a chance to revisit this time with Paul took me back like it took him back. In many cases, Paul hadn’t thought about those times in many years. So really it was a sense of rediscovering things together."
In the Man on the Run trailer, McCartney says, “The Beatles had been my whole life, really. When we split up, I thought I'll never write another note of music ever. I had fear of being a grown-up.”
'Paul McCartney: Man on the Run' documentary poster.
"I felt very depressed, but I was very lucky because I had Linda,” the musician continues, referring to his late wife and Wings co-founder, whom he married in 1969 and who died in 1998 at age 56.
Source: Bailey Richards/people.com
Why would a band member want to sabotage a song that could potentially become a hit? Well, there are quite a few reasons, some of them nonsensical. Let’s take a look at a few rock songs from the 20th century that ended up becoming hits, but not without some resistance from band members who (allegedly) tried to ruin them from the start.
“Across The Universe” by The Beatles (1969)
This gorgeous song, written by John Lennon, is one of the most memorable tracks in The Beatles’ discography. It inspired a movie musical based on their music, after all. And yet, apparently, Paul McCartney was not a fan. And Lennon accused him of trying to ruin the song during the recording process.
“Paul would […] sort of subconsciously try and destroy a great song,” said Lennon. “Usually we’d spend hours doing little detailed cleaning-ups of Paul’s songs; when it came to mine […] somehow this atmosphere of looseness and casualness and experimentation would creep in. Subconscious sabotage.”
He would also say in his famed 1980 Playboy interview that the “guitars are out of tune” on “Across The Universe” and that “nobody’s supporting me or helping me with it and the song was never done properly.”
“Creep” by Radiohead (1992)
The grip this alt-rock song had on the public in the early 1990s was wild. And it’s a really good song, no matter how you look at it. In the years following the release of “Creep”, though, Radiohead tired of it and would try to avoid performing it when they could. But before then, one Jonny Greenwood allegedly tried to “f*ck the song up” during recording.
In the spot where the verse shifts to the chorus, you can hear three loud blasts of noise from Greenwood’s guitar. Today, it adds charm to the song. But back then, it was apparently a bit of an accident according to Greenwood, who claimed he did not know how quiet the song was supposed it be. Member Ed O’Brien claimed that it was intentional.
Source: Em Casalena/americansongwriter.com
Take a look inside George Harrison’s childhood home, as guided tours launch for the first time.
Harrison lived at the three-bedroom house in Speke between 1950 and 1962, moving from Arnold Grove in Wavertree at the age of six. The house became a regular rehearsal spot for The Quarrymen and The Beatles, before the Harrison family eventually moved away and George enjoyed worldwide fame.
The property at 25 Upton Green was purchased by Ken Lambert at auction in 2021, who turned the house into a living museum where Beatles fans can stay overnight.
Guests can book to stay at the historic house through Airbnb, with the listing noting: “Walk and stay in George’s bedroom, where he first heard himself and the band on the radio” and “Sit and strum a guitar in the same room where George, Paul, and John sat and rehearsed during the early years.”
While the property has been available on Airbnb for more than three years, tours officially launch today (January 13), delivered by co-owner Dale Roberts. Available once a month, the tours will offer 1.5 hour guided experience inside the house, with unrestricted photography and the chance to try out the instruments inside.
Take a look inside the historic home.
Source: Emma Dukes/liverpoolworld.uk
Paul Mescal has said fans “will benefit from knowing as little as possible” about the upcoming Beatles biopics before watching them.
The actor will portray Paul McCartney in Sam Mendes’ four-film series about the Fab Four, which is currently scheduled for a simultaneous release in April 2028. He has said he will be doing his own singing for the role and has spent time with McCartney to prepare.
Speaking to Variety about The Beatles – A Four-Film Cinematic Event, Mescal was hesitant to reveal any details about the new movies. “I don’t want to get into the Beatles thing, not coyly, but actually because I think the world hopefully will benefit from knowing as little as possible going into it,” he explained.
Mescal went on to confirm that production for the forthcoming project was still ongoing. “We’re a while away from finishing,” he told the outlet. “That’s my job for all of 2026.” He also said he and co-stars Harris Dickinson (who is playing John Lennon), Joseph Quinn (George Harrison) and Barry Keoghan (Ringo Starr) were “pinching ourselves” over being involved in the biopics.
“I think the endeavour is totally singular,” he told the publication.
‘The Beatles’ cast: Joseph Quinn, Barry Keoghan, Harris Dickinson and Paul Mescal. Credit: Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty Images for CinemaCon
“On a personal level, I’m so thrilled to be working on something at this scale, but also rooted in performance with Sam and great writers.”
Mescal continued: “But also just to be living and working in London and to have some sort of stability in what has been like a kind of mad six, seven years since Normal People came out.” The Irish actor has had a busy few years since breaking out with the success of Normal People in 2020, starring in a string of films, including Aftersun and All Of Us Strangers, and taking on the lead role in Gladiator II.
Mescal’s two latest movies are indie romance The History Of Sound and Chloé Zhao’s Oscar-tipped Hamnet. The latter just won Best Drama Film at the Golden Globes 2026. He is currently working on Richard Linklater’s adaptation of the musical Merrily We Roll Along.
Meanwhile, Mescal recently explained that he intended to “ration” his work ahead of the release of the Beatles biopics in 2028. “People will get a break from me and I’ll get a break from them,” he said.
Each film of Mendes’ series about the Fab Four will be told from the perspective of one band member. They will also be the first-ever movies to be granted music rights to the Beatles’ discography.
Last month saw the likes of David Morrissey, Leanne Best, Bobby Schofield and James Norton join the cast. Other actors set to star in the films include Saoirse Ronan, Anna Sawai, Aimee Lou Wood and Mia McKenna-Bruce, who are playing Linda McCartney, Yoko Ono, Pattie Boyd and Maureen Starkey, respectively.
Source:Tom Skinner/nme.com
The Beatles Anthology was originally released as a vinyl, CD, DVD box set, and hardbound book volume in 1995. It came 25 years after the band had broken up. And according to the interviews with the group in the new Episode 9, it was better off for it.
Doing it after some time had passed, the band members said, allowed for perspective. They also — and by this time, it was just the three of them after Lennon’s assassination in 1980 — were in a better mood to talk to each other.
The acrimony surrounding the band’s breakup would have made it difficult to work on such a project — and 30 years on, the public would have more of an appetite for a retrospective.
This new edition of the Anthology has been restored and remastered by the wizardry of Peter Jackson of The Lord of the Rings fame. It was he who created the Get Back movie in 2021 out of the ashes of the previous footage shot for the Let it Be film by another director in 1969. And so 30 years after the first retrospective, we have another one with some more nuance and certainly better picture quality than before. There is also the previously mentioned new episode which is essentially a behind the scenes of the making of the 1995 version and now takes on a historical appeal of its own.
Of particular interest to Filipinos is the fate of the 10 minutes of coverage given to the band’s tour date in Manila in 1966, which was famously, or rather infamously, marked by trouble from arrival to departure, highlighted by an almighty schedule mix-up with Imelda Marcos, then the First Lady of the Philippines.
To say the band was unimpressed with their treatment would be an understatement, The segment, which had previously been the start of Episode 6 is now at the end of Episode 5. However, it still opens with Ringo Starr saying: “I hated the Philippines,” and it goes downhill from there. There is footage of people burning records towards the end of the Philippine section, giving the impression that it happened in Manila. Partly for this reason, I was moved to write an account of The Beatles’ 48 hours in Manila in my new book You Won’t See Me: When The Beatles Ghosted Imelda. It certainly takes the official narrative into account, but it also uncovers a lot of new voices along the way — some of whom give a much more rounded idea of what happened when the band came here and why.
For one thing, the fans were not unfriendly — quite the opposite. Even after The Beatles’ so-called “snub” of the First Lady, the opinion of fans and many of the older generation stayed firmly on the side of the band — in contrast to the notion that they were an unruly mob.
Source: Jasmine Payo/rappler.com
