Beatles News
Acclaimed actor, director, screenwriter and producer Zach Braff has an unquenchable thirst for cinema. While he is arguably best known for his role as J.D. on the comedy television series Scrubs, Braff has long been a student of finer arts of arthouse cinema.
Braff, while scooping in the acclaim for his performance on the commercially successful comedy series, has always been a major champion of those filmmakers ploughing away within indie cinema. “They put all this money into these huge films and then no one goes to see them,” Braff once said. “That sort of shows they’re out of touch. Then everyone in town passes on my little movie and it does really well,” he added.
Keeping this ethos close to his heart, Braff famously made his directorial debut in 2004 with his film Garden State, collecting a high profile cast which included the likes of Natalie Portman, Peter Sarsgaard, Ian Holm and himself. With positive reviews, the film turned its modest $2.5million budget into a commercial success, earning a cult following in the process.
Source: Nathan Ellis/faroutmagazine.co.uk
THE Fab Four, like all good things, had to come to an end eventually. Five decades on, Luke Rix-Standing looks back at how it went down.
It wasn't quite the day the music died, but for Beatles fans the world over, it must have felt pretty close.
On April 10, 1970, Paul McCartney issued a press release alongside advance copies of his solo album, which seemed to announce the Beatles' demise.
Framed as the transcript to a Q&A, he confirmed that he did not miss his band-mates, that he was not planning anything with them, and that he could not foresee writing any future songs with John Lennon. When asked if he enjoyed solo work, he said: "I only had me to ask for a decision, and I agreed with me."
Lennon responded furiously, but his words seemed to confirm those of his band-mate. "He can't have his own way, so he's causing chaos. I put out four albums last year, and I didn't say a f***ing word about quitting." In reality, he had privately departed months before.
Source: newsandstar.co.uk
“When we talk about The Beatles,” writes Craig Brown, “we talk about ourselves.” For an international phenomenon, The Beatles were peculiarly, cussedly English. The most significant band in the history of pop, they are key figures in the past half-century of our nation’s public life, as well as in the dream lives of its citizens. The Beatles entered our bloodstreams, collective and individual, and they pulsate in them still. They were modernists, agents of change, forging the future, and they were preservationists, forever harking back to the past, real and imagined, England’s and their own.
Their most forward-and-at-the-same-time-backward-looking album was Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, released in 1967. It was, writes Brown, “an exercise in playing about with the past.” Readers of Brown’s might understand why this would appeal particularly to him, as a writer determined to make sense of British popular history, or at least to explore it, by reinventing the method of its delivery.
Source: esquire.com
![Album Cover For "Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band"](https://hips.hearstapps.com/hmg-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/images/gettyimages-74253269-1586260102.jpg?resize=480:* "Album Cover For "Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band"")
Denny Somach is the go-to guy for all things Beatles and classic rock — for good reason.
The Allentown native has decades of experience as an award-winning producer, historian, and best-selling author of “Get The Led Out: How Led Zeppelin Became The Biggest Band In the World.”
Over the course of his career, Somach has interviewed some of the biggest names in music, but perhaps none as intriguing or influential as Liverpool’s most fabulous four.
"A Walk Down Abbey Road" book cover by Denny Somach
Somach has interviewed not only members of the Beatles, but also their producers, engineers and industry personnel. He’s also showcased his expertise on countless shows, including Howard Stern, The CBS Morning News, Good Morning America and The Today Show. Whenever someone wants to know about The Beatles, Somach is the one to call.
Source: Jim Wood/mcall.com
In 1971, the state of East Pakistan was in turmoil as it sought independence to become the nation of Bangladesh during the Liberation War. It was a conflict that the world was largely unaware of until George Harrison made it a global talking point.
The former Beatles man learned about the issue over dinner from his close friend, Ravi Shankar, who initially was planning to raise $25,000 dollars to help the Bangladeshi cause. But after getting Harrison on side, his modest plans quickly grew into something rather extraordinary.
Their two very specially curated Concert For Bangladesh shows on August 1st, 1971, would go on and set a precedent for benefit gigs forever. The star-studded day would see the likes of Bob Dylan, Billy Preston, Eric Clapton, Badfinger and Ringo Starr all take to the stage to unite for a cause bigger than themselves.
Source: Joe Taysom/faroutmagazine.co.uk
John Lennon was a singer-songwriter who had a tremendous influence. Certain genres like psychedelic and avant-garde music wouldn’t be the same without him. Surprisingly, his influence also extended to horror novelist Stephen King‘s masterpiece The Shining.
The Shining remains one of King’s most acclaimed books. The book’s title refers to psychic abilities shared by some of its characters. The term was, shockingly, inspired by John’s hit “Instant Karma!”
As a solo artist, John often made unconventional music. “Instant Karma!” is one of his accessible solo songs, which is probably why it became such a big hit. Part of its appeal lies in its catchy refrain of “We all shine on!”
When John wrote that song, there’s a good chance he wasn’t thinking about horror novels. On the other hand, King used to listen to music when he wrote his books. “Instant Karma!” managed to exert a considerable influence on The Shining. The song’s refrain inspired the concept of “shining” which figures so prominently in the novel. In a way, the idea that “Instant Karma!” inspired a horror novel makes sense, as it’s a song with foreboding lyrics.
Source: cheatsheet.com
When I was a kid, I toted my Lloyds transistor radio everywhere, including when I went to bed. It would sit quietly playing on my pillow until I fell asleep and my mom would take it away.
The family’s station of choice was 680 CJOB in Winnipeg. They didn’t play much in the way of music that I liked, but I was hooked on their newscasts, which in those days could stretch 10 minutes or longer. My parents didn’t like me listening to the news before bed — “You have bad dreams!” — but that only made me want to listen more.
I do remember the night CJOB delivered the news that The Beatles had broken up. It was April 10, 1970, and even though I was extremely young, I knew this was important. When mom came into my room at the usual time to put my radio up on the bureau, I asked her, “The Beatles have broken up. Is that a bad thing?”
Source: Alan Cross/rock101.com
In the 1960s, many fans saw the Beatles and the Rolling Stones as rivals. Paul McCartney accused the Stones of copying his band. Likewise, Mick Jagger felt the Beatles copied his band. In the end, though, there didn’t seem to be any bad blood between the two groups.
The Stones showed off the goodwill they had towards the Fab Four in 1967. That was the year the Stones released their psychedelic album, Their Satanic Majesties Request. The album’s memorable cover art features a message for the Beatles hidden in plain sight.
Satanic Majesties is often understood as the Stones’ attempt to equal the Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. As such, Satanic Majesties has a psychedelic cover a la Sgt. Pepper’s. Though not as famous as its predecessor, the Satanic Majesties cover has secrets of its own.
Source: cheatsheet.com
Orthodox views of Paul McCartney’s post-Beatles career usually single out Band on the Run from 1973 as the uncontested highpoint. But, as good as that album is, this one might have the edge. It is as dizzyingly varied as its author’s late-period work with his first group, and it’s smattered with experimental, bucolic touches. And, like the two albums that sit either side of it – McCartney (1970), and Wings’s debut Wild Life (1971) – it sometimes suggests a try-out for the home-baked music later pioneered by such talents as the Beta Band and Beck on the occasions he reached for an acoustic guitar.
The album’s lyrics and mood capture the strange, uncertain aftermath of the Beatles and the 60s, and that of a man suddenly adjusting to a new life.
Source: John Harris/theguardian.com
If you ever listen to the outtakes and studio chatter from the Beatles’ Let It Be sessions (January 1969), you might catch an interesting exchange between George Harrison and someone else in the studio. In the conversation, Harrison is asked if he wants to hear the new Jimmy Page album.
“Jimmy Page,” Harrison replies. “Is he the one that was in The Yardbirds?” After he learns that, yes, it’s that Jimmy Page, Harrison asks if lunch is ready yet. Clearly, this album by Page, who’d recently played on a chart-topping Beatles cover, sparked little interest in Harrison.
But Harrison and other members of the Fab Four would soon take notice of Page’s group, which he’d named Led Zeppelin (with an assist from Keith Moon). In fact, by the end of ’69, The Beatles would watch as the Zeppelin knocked their band out of the top spot on the Billboard album charts.
Source: cheatsheet.com
