Beatles News
The Beatles are some of the most widely discussed people of all time. It feels like every time John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr tied their shoes has been thoroughly documented. However, one Beatles song has remained hidden from the public for decades. Here’s what we know about the lost Beatles track “Carnival of Light.”
Of the Beatles, John is often regarded as the avant-gardist. Paul, meanwhile, is known for making more conventional music. However, The Guardian reports Paul tried his hand at experimental music with a song called “Carnival of Light.”
Barry Miles asked his friend Paul to compose music for an electronic music festival called the Million Volt Light and Sound Rave. The festival was held in 1967 at the Roundhouse Theatre in London. Little did Miles know Paul would produce one of the great pieces of rock esoterica.
Source: cheatsheet.com
There have been some incredibly famous music stars over the years from Elvis Presley to Freddie Mercury. And, of course, surviving Beatles member Sir Paul McCartney has had to deal with the highs and lows of fame for almost 60 years. In a new interview, he revealed how he tries to put fans at ease when meeting him, but also revealed which musician he still gets nervous around himself.
Speaking with The Penguin Podcast last month, the 77-year-old said: “If I had to interview someone famous tomorrow, I’d be like thinking about it all night and all morning, ‘oh my god what am I gonna do?’
“And I imagine that’s what they’re going through and normally you can see this bit of fear in the eyes or there’s shaking.
“So I like to put people at ease and say, ‘Look, it doesn’t matter [about calling me Sir Paul], I’m just some guy.’
Source: George Simpson/express.co.uk
The Beatles’ 1969 album Abbey Road has been named the US’s biggest-selling vinyl LP of the 2010s, shifting more than 558,000 copies. The Top 10, compiled by Nielsen Music, is comprised almost entirely of old albums, from Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon (2), Bob Marley and the Wailers’ Legend (4) and Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours (9).
The only 21st-century releases on the list are Amy Winehouse’s 2006 album Back to Black (5) and Lana Del Rey’s 2011 debut Born to Die (10), the only original album from the 2010s to chart. The soundtrack to Marvel’s first Guardians of the Galaxy film, released in 2014, placed third with 367,000 sales, but features solely music released between 1968 and 1979.
Expanded allegations of child sex abuse by Michael Jackson do not appear to have affected his sales: Thriller placed sixth, selling with more than 334,000 copies.
Abbey Road also topped vinyl sales for 2019 in the US, thanks to an elaborate box set reissue to mark its 50th anniversary.
Source: Laura Snapes/theguardian.com
The Fab Four grew up in Liverpool together but had drastically different family lives. In an interview with The Penguin Podcast last month, Paul McCartney spoke of his comfortable upbringing compared to John Lennon’s. The Beatles star admitted: “I was very lucky. I had a very lovely family in Liverpool.”
The 77-year-old added: “And I can’t remember any aggro. I mean how lucky is that?
“I thought everyone had that kind of a family.”
However, it was when he met John Lennon that he discovered his future bandmate had a much harder time.
The young musician had lost his mother, while his father had left at a very early age.
Source: express.co.uk
In 1965, The Beatles started on a new path. After racking up No. 1 hits with songs like “Love Me Do” and “She Loves You” in ’64, the Fab Four began digging deeper. John Lennon, resolving to turn the lens on himself, had his most introspective moment to that point with “Help.”
Though he charted a path in a different direction, Paul McCartney was also growing rapidly as a songwriter. After delivering the masterpiece “Yesterday,” he followed with more clever work like “Drive My Car” and “You Won’t See” me on Rubber Soul (released later in ’65).
By then, John was turning out classics like the sitar-infused “Norwegian Wood” as well as “Nowhere Man” and “Girl.” To George Harrison, the prospect of matching this work must have been daunting. He didn’t have someone to bounce ideas off of and had little experience writing on his own.
Source: cheatsheet.com
One of the world’s most gifted songwriters of all time, Paul McCartney has been involved in some of the most popular and beloved music the modern world has ever known. But which one of The Beatles’ extensive back catalogue was his favourite?
In a recently unearthed interview, thanks to CBS, that question has now been answered. The star, usually very coy about picking his favourite songs, was talking to Scott Muni, a legendary broadcaster for WNEW in New York City, about his then-new song ‘We All Stand Together’ back in 1984.
The singer was promoting the track, which featured in the short animated film Rupert and the Frog Song and was credited to Paul McCartney And The Frog Chorus, when Muni hit him with the age-old question, what is your favourite Beatles song?
Source: faroutmagazine.co.uk
If you were at Paul McCartney’s 1969 marriage to Linda Eastman, you’d have noticed someone conspicuously missing — John Lennon. Actually, considering none of Paul’s Beatles bandmates attended, maybe John’s absence wasn’t so surprising.
About a week later, it was John’s turn to tie the knot with Yoko Ono. (They did so in Gibraltar.) Because of the runaway nature of John and Yoko’s nuptials, you didn’t find Paul (or anyone else) in attendance there, either.
After John and Yoko had their marriage certificate, they headed to the Amsterdam Hilton to stage their first “bed-in for peace.” If you’ve heard “The Ballad of John and Yoko,” you know most of this story.
Source: cheatsheet.com
John Lennon’s departure from The Beatles split the band and rocked fans all around the world in 1970. The break-up came shortly after the Imagine hitmaker tied the knot with Yoko Ono, with the avant-garde artist bearing the brunt of the blame from The Beatles’ fanbase. The band dissolved following the release of their final album, Let It Be, and Abbey Road, having cemented their place in rock ’n’ roll history.
The split was far from amicable, sparking a feud between Lennon and his former bandmate Paul McCartney, during which they exchanged jibes publicly through the medium of their solo songs.
Later, however, they reconciled and reignited their firm friendship, which dated back to their schooldays.
Many whispers about a potential reunion circulated over the years, particularly in the latter half of the ‘70s, but it never transpired.
Source: Minnie Wright/express.co.uk
The Walrus himself, Sir Paul McCartney, was recently interviewed by BBC Radio 4’s Sarah Montague. When Montague took McCartney to task over Coldplay’s recent decision to mercifully stop touring due to their awareness of the band’s own “carbon footprint”, McCartney reassured Sarah that he has no plans to do the same. Paul McCarney ‘refuses’ listening to John Lennon songs.
“I am aware of [his carbon footprint], and you do your best. But, it is very difficult if you’re going to tour. I AM going to go on tour in America. You can’t say… ‘we’ll go by Greyhound Bus,’ because that’s just as bad! We certainly can’t just bike our way around. It’s a reality, you just have to do it, and plant a lot of trees… that’s kind of how I offset it, is by doing things that will make up for it. If I tour, that’s going to involve travel, which is going to involve a carbon footprint.”
Source: Mike Mazzarone/alternativenation.net
Any Beatles fan looking for a way to spend their Christmas cash might consider buying the latest book about the band.
Kenneth Womack’s “Solid State: The Story of ‘Abbey Road’ and the End of the Beatles” puts the Fab Four’s recording of their last album in 1969 in context of the social atmosphere and advanced technology at their disposal. The electronic talk may be a little much for some readers, but it does indicate musical growth.
Remember, “Let it Be” was recorded before “Abbey Road” but released after. Of course, the Beatles’ breakup actually began before the band reconvened to make their last record.
Still, they rallied together to create an album with new sounds, notably George Harrison’s fascination with the Moog synthesizer, Geoff Emerick’s engineering, which complimented the band’s cohesiveness, and George Martin’s arrangements. The overdubs on the song “Because,” which was influenced by a Beethoven piano sonata, resulted in a nine-voice recording.
Source: Robert Hite/thesunflower.com
