Beatles News

Paul McCartney posted a statement of support for protests for racial justice on Friday. “We all need to work together to overcome racism in any form,” he wrote. “We need to learn more, listen more, talk more, educate ourselves and, above all, take action.”

He also added links to Black Lives Matter, Color of Change, the NAACP, Stand Up to Racism, Campaign Zero, and Community Justice Exchange.

McCartney then recounted a concert the Beatles were booked to play at Jacksonville’s Gator Bowl in 1964, and how when they learned that it would be a segregated audience they refused to play. “We never play to segregated audiences and we aren’t going to start now,” John Lennon said at the time. “I’d sooner lose our appearance money.” The concert ended up being the first nonsegregated audience there. After that, the Beatles incorporated a clause in their contracts guaranteeing audiences would not be segregated.

Source: Kory Grow/rollingstone.com

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Paul McCartney has shared a post celebrating Black Lives Matter, which reveals that The Beatles angrily refused to perform in front of a segregated audience in 1964.

The musician praised the protests and demonstrations taking place across the world following the killing of George Floyd while in custody of white police officers in Minneapolis..

“We all need to work together to overcome racism in any form,” he wrote in a statement on Twitter. “We need to learn more, listen more, talk more, educate ourselves and, above all, take action.”

McCartney, 77, then revealed that, in 1964, he and fellow bandmates John Lennon, George Harrison and Ringo Starr refused to play a gig in Jacksonville after discovering “it was going to be a segregated audience”.

Source: Jacob Stolworthy /msn.com

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In 1966 The Beatles had experienced four long years of Beatlemania. While many aspiring rock stars dream of being that famous, it took its toll on the Fab Four. Their infamous 1966 world tour would be their last culminating in a show at San Francisco’s legendary Candlestick Park on August 29.

But at the beginning of that summer, the band’s old friend Ed Sullivan came calling wanting The Beatles to perform where American Beatlemania had all started in early 1964, The Ed Sullivan Show. Already feeling burned out, The Beatles decided to send promotional videos of them performing their new singles “Paperback Writer and “Rain” instead of being there physically. It was a bold move and heralded the MTV revolution that would take place 15 years later, as George Harrison remarked in The Beatles Anthology documentary:

Source: Nate Todd/jambase.com

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The last party I attended in Fort Collins before the virus shutdown was a Beatles party. It was at the home of a friend who had been a big Beatles fan when she was young. She had been a member of The Beatles Fan Club and saw the group at Red Rocks in 1964.

I also have been a lifelong Beatles fan and I brought all of my stuff along to the party. We looked through old Beatles magazines, books, and even stacks of Beatles bubble gum cards.

But the most fun was getting out all of our old Beatles records — yes, vinyl versions – to spin great tune after great tune. It was a feast of melodic, upbeat music with those great familiar voices.

Of all the great Beatles recordings out there, the one that currently sticks in my head is from perhaps the band’s greatest album, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band and that is “When I’m Sixty-Four.” There’s a reason for that — this year on June 8 I turned sixty-four.

Source: Tim Van Schmidt/northfortynews.com

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The All Things Must Pass Orchestra Copyright: other

Festival of Chichester regulars The All Things Must Pass Orchestra, comprising musicians from Seaford, Rottingdean, Brighton, Danehill and Littlehampton, were looking forward to celebrating the song’s 50th anniversary this year.

Instead, when the coronavirus lockdown hit, their gigs were wiped from the calendar.

But now they have got together – in isolation – to celebrate Harrison’s masterpiece, a song which has taken on special new resonance in the challenging months we have been going through.

The song includes the verse:

Now the darkness only stays the night-time

In the morning it will fade away

Daylight is good at arriving at the right time

It’s not always going to be this grey

Source: midsussextimes.co.uk

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When you look at his time in The Beatles, you can say George Harrison really broke through during the sessions for The White Album (1968). On that release, George delivered “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” and “Long, Long, Long,” songs which rank among the finest of his career.

But that didn’t mean George started being treated as an equal by Paul McCartney and John Lennon. In early ’69, during the sessions for Let It Be (originally called Get Back), George still had a hard time convincing the famed Beatles songwriters to give Harrison tracks the time of day.

That’s how George ended up with some 4 minutes’ worth of material on that album. And it wasn’t for lack of trying. Prior to recording “For You Blue” and “I Me Mine,” George debuted “All Things Must Pass,” “Let It Down,” and “Hear Me Lord” for The Beatles. (They basically ignored all three.)

Source: cheatsheet.com

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Ringo Starr is an artist with an eclectic catalog. Over the years, he’s made rock songs, pop songs, children’s songs, Christmas songs, and disco songs. He once made a country album called Beaucoups of Blues.

The album, which was released early in Ringo’s solo career, was a change of pace from the material he made with the Beatles. John Lennon opened up about his feelings toward the album in an interview. In the process, John gave fans some insight into how he viewed his own work.
Country and western music are a part of Ringo’s musical DNA. Rolling Stone reports he joined an English country group called The Raving Texans during the late 1950s. In the same vein, the name “Ringo” was partially inspired by Johnny Ringo, a Western legend who was involved at the gunfight at the O.K. Corral.

Source: cheatsheet.com

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After the ugliness of the early ’69 Let It Be sessions, The Beatles declared something of a truce to record Abbey Road later in the year. For his part, George Harrison got into the spirit with two of his best (and most upbeat) songs of his Beatles years.

“Something,” the first of these the group tackled, became George’s only Beatles single (only A-side, to be precise). In July ’69, work began on the second Harrison track to appear on the record, “Here Comes the Sun.”

“It seems as if winter in England goes on forever,” George said about writing the song at Eric Clapton’s house in May ’69. “By the time spring comes you really deserve it.” And you can hear the joy in his voice as he sang the lyrics.

Paul McCartney (bass, backing vocals) and Ringo (drums) did their best to make “Here Comes the Sun” work in the studio. (Both also contributed handclaps to the track.) But the song got recorded with only three Beatles. John Lennon didn’t participate at all.

Source: cheatsheet.com

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The Beatles’ “Let It Be” evokes a majestic quality, from its serene and straight forward melody to its crescendo and eventual crash of instruments. Written by Paul McCartney, the iconic band recorded the song for their 1970 album (of the same name), their very last studio record together. A piano base stretches up to the sky, and soon electric guitars wail in unison, giving the enduring classic a soothing, cathartic quality.

“When I find myself in times of trouble, Mother Mary comes to me / Speaking words of wisdom, ‘Let it be,’” McCartney sings on the first verse. Contrary to some beliefs, he is not making a reference to Virgin Mother Mary from the Bible here; instead, it’s a nod to his mother, who was reportedly anti-religion and came to him one night in a dream, thus inspiring the song’s early roots.

“And in my hour of darkness, she is standing right in front of me / Speaking words of wisdom, ‘Let it be.’”

Source: americansongwriter.com

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