Beatles News
An unlikely setting for songwriting, a meditation retreat at an ashram in Rishikesh, India proved one of the most creative places for the Beatles. Away from pressures of superstardom, from February to April 1968 they composed 40 songs while studying with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, founder of transcendental meditation. While in Rishikesh, Donovan suggested, because of their immense fame, the Beatles’ next album could be plain white and nameless. Thus The Beatles (aka the White Album) was born.
I spent 20 years living with and working for Maharishi in his ashrams all over the world, including his ashram in Rishikesh. I was very lucky to get a unique insight into how Maharishi and the events that happened in the ashram influenced and inspired The Beatles. So, on the 50th anniversary of The White Album’s release, what are the hidden meanings behind the songs written under Maharishi’s influence?
Mia Farrow’s sister “Dear Prudence” Farrow had abused drugs and alcohol as a teenager. While in Rishikesh, she spent nearly all her time in meditation. Trying to lure her out of her room, John Lennon and George Harrison burst through her door, singing Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Heart’s Club Band and Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da. But she just wanted them to disappear.
Source: irishtimes.com
Five years ago I stood in a room containing nothing but White Albums. For his installation We Buy White Albums, the Californian artist Rutherford Chang had filled a small gallery in Manhattan with 693 vinyl copies of the ninth Beatles album, some on the walls, some in racks.
The sleeve, designed by Pop artist Richard Hamilton, is famously blank but every one of these copies was faded, stained, torn, illustrated, signed or otherwise altered in some unique way, whether by a human hand or simply by the passing of time. As I studied them, I listened to multiple copies of side one playing simultaneously and slowly drifting out of sync, rendering these exceptionally famous songs eerie and strange.
Whether or not you consider it the best Beatles album (I do), it’s certainly the most Beatles album
There’s something about The White Album that invites listeners to mess around with it. Joan Didion stole its title for her 1979 essay collection, an elegy for the dreams of 1960s California. The producer Danger Mouse chopped it to pieces and recombined the fragments with vocals from Jay-Z’s The Black Album to create his 2004 mash-up The Grey Album. The jam band Phish covered all 30 songs on stage on Halloween night, 1994. Charles Manson, notoriously, had his own theories. Even the title has been rewritten: The Beatles called it The Beatles but their fans had other ideas.
Source: Dorian Lynskey/bbc.com
Today marks the 50th anniversary of the Beatles landmark release ‘The White Album’. The 30-track double album that upended the music world has returned to the charts once again thanks to the remastering by Giles Martin, son of the legendary Beatles’ producer George Martin.
With new mixes in stereo and 5.1 surround sound, and loads of previously unreleased extras, fans are getting to hear the Fab Four in a whole new light, including drummer Ringo Starr on a blistering 13-minute long ‘Helter Skelter’.
“It’s always been one of my favourite albums,” Ringo tells uDiscover Music. “There’s a lot of stuff that nobody’s ever heard and George’s house sessions. But the actual remastering (because of the technology we have today) is much clearer, and the drums are a little higher, so I love it.”
But Ringo has even more to celebrate. The industrious artist has a new book on the way, a collection of photos from his life and travels titled Another Day In The Life, set for release in April 2019. Spanning from his early Beatles days to his current world tours, Starr has always seen life through a lens:
“Wherever I am, I always take pictures and I’m nearly ready for Another, Another Day In The Life,” he jokes.
Source: Laura Stavropoulos/udiscovermusic.com
This week marks 50 years since the release of The Beatles’s self-titled ninth record, known more adoringly by the world as The White Album.
If the cover is as simple as they come – a sea of white accompanied by the band’s name imprinted just over halfway down – the tracks it contains are anything but: a compilation of oddities with varying genres that were clearly deemed too extraordinary for the charts (none were released as singles in the UK).
The majority of tracks were written in the spring of 1968 when the quartet famously travelled to Rishikesh in India to partake in a course of Transcendental Meditation under the guidance of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. When the band returned home, their recording sessions for the album would spark creative differences, prompting walkouts and rivalries that would continue until the group disbanded in 1970.
The White Album may showcase both the top and bottom of each band member's game, but the result remains The Beatles’s most enchanting record. Below is a ranking of all 30 tracks.
Source: @Jacob_stol/independent.co.uk
Blackbird PresentsOn December 5, 2015, stars from various musical genres, including rock legends John Fogerty, Steven Tyler and Peter Frampton, came together in New York City to tape a concert special commemorating what would have been John Lennon's 75th birthday. The show, Imagine: John Lennon 75th Birthday Concert, originally aired that month on AMC, and now a CD, DVD and two-LP set documenting the event are scheduled to be released starting in January.
The concert, which was hosted by actor Kevin Bacon, includes performances of a variety of memorable songs Lennon wrote or co-wrote for The Beatles and tunes from his solo career. Among the many other artists who took part in the show were Sheryl Crow, Willie Nelson, Kris Kristofferson, Train's Pat Monahan, The Killers' Brandon Flowers, Rage Against the Machine's Tom Morello, Aloe Blacc, The Roots and Eric Church.
Highlights from the concert included Fogerty performing "Give Peace a Chance" and "In My Life," Tyler singing "Come Together" and teaming up with Church on a rendition of "Revolution," and Frampton playing "Norwegian Wood" and duetting with Crow and Aloe Blacc on Lennon's holiday classic "Happy Xmas (War Is Over)." For the finale, most of the show's cast came together for a rousing version of "All You Need Is Love."
Source: ABC News Radio
Meat and liquor may soon be prohibited in the Indian cities of Ayodhya and Mathura.
According to the Hindu, the Uttar Pradesh government is contemplating a total ban on alcohol and non-vegetarian foods in Ayodhya – the birthplace of Rama, the seventh avatar of the Hindu god Vishnu. The items may also be banned in Mathura, the birthplace of Lord Krishnu, the eighth avatar of Vishnu and a major deity in Hinduism. Following the ban, the cities could then be declared areas of pilgrimage.
According to Uttar Pradesh’s minister Shrikant Sharma, the move is being considered in response to calls from seers and millions of devotees.
“Honouring their demands, the State government is working to declare the area around 14 Kosi Parikrama Marg in Ayodhya and the birthplace of Lord Krishna in Mathura as pilgrim centres,” Sharma said in a statement. “Once this happens, a ban on the sale and consumption of non-vegetarian food and liquor will automatically come into effect.”
Source: Jemima WebberWriter /livekindly.co
The 30-song double album that brought the world “While My Guitar Gently Weeps” and “Blackbird” landed at No. 6 on the Billboard 200 following a 50th anniversary reissue that hit shelves and streaming services Nov. 9. In returning to the charts, Billboard reports the album moved 63,000 units, with 52,000 coming from physical sales.
It’s the highest charting week from the White Album since March 29, 1969, when the release appeared at No. 5. The record, officially titled The Beatles, spent nine nonconsecutive weeks at No. 1 between Dec. 1968 and March 1969.
The White Album, known for hosting some of the Fab Four’s weirdest, heaviest and outright best compositions, found new life in 2018 thanks in-part to Giles Martin, the son of famed Beatles producer George Martin, who dove deep into Abbey Road archives to remix and repackage the famed release.
Source: Matthew Leimkuehler/forbes.com
Most Beatles fans have played the game before, possibly many times: what would you trim from The Beatles' 1968 double album (aka the 'White Album') in order to make it a more compact, single album? Producer George Martin was very vocal in the decades after The Beatles was released in his strong belief that, had what he perceived as the weaker cuts been omitted, the album could've been a masterpiece. That's not to say a great many people don't consider it just that in its released form, but the late Sir George deemed it less than the sum of its parts.
Of course the fascinating part of taking the "single-disc version of the White Album challenge" comes from fans' seeming inability to ever agree on what the definite lineup would be. (I'll indulge by offering my own personal tracklist at the end of this review.) The monumentally important news for Beatles people is that this holiday season, fans can not only argue about which 'White Album' tracks are the most vital, but which of the famous "Esher Demos" and studio outtakes are indispensable. Universal Music Enterprises has just followed up last year's super-deluxe Sgt. Pepper's box set with a 50th anniversary reissue of The Beatles.
Source: Chaz Lipp/themortonreport.com
During the recent interview with Etic’s Live, Deep Purple members spoke about a lot of topics. But only one is very interesting. Singer Ian Gillan has shared the process of writing new songs. He also talked on the band’s dynamics.
Ian Gillan said that “we’ve done everything together since then. It’s a bit like the way John Lennon and Paul McCartney used to work”. Here’s the statement:
“With Deep Purple, it’s always been the same. It’s part of the English way — it changes every day, but the elements remain the same. I’ve worked with Roger Glover since I was about 20; I was in a band called Episode Six in ’65.
He taught me how to write songs. We’ve done everything together since then. It’s a bit like the way John Lennon and Paul McCartney used to work insofar as sometimes Roger writes everything, sometimes I write everything and sometimes we do it together, but the music always comes first.
It starts the same every day, during the recording and writing session. We go into a big office six days a week. We meet up, make a cup of tea, talk about football, family, cars, rubbish; then either Ian Paice or Don or anyone kicks off and starts jamming.
Source: Feyyaz Ustaer/metalheadzone.com
Paul McCartney wrote over 300 songs with John Lennon and two new unreleased versions of the Lennon-related track Dear Friend will be released in December.
Dear Friend was the final track on Paul McCartney and Wings’ first album Wild Life, which was released in 1971.
A remastered version, and an unreleased home recording of the song, will feature on as reissue of the album, which will be released on December 7. Red Rose Speedway, which saw the light of day in 1973, will also be reissued next month.
"With Dear Friend, that’s sort of me talking to John after we’d had all the sort of disputes about The Beatles break up," the former Beatle has said.
"I find it very emotional when I listen to it now. I have to sort of choke it back. I remember when I heard the song recently, listening to the roughs in the car.
"And I thought, ‘Oh God’. That lyric: ‘Really truly, young and newly wed’. Listening to that was like, ‘Oh my God, it’s true!’ I’m trying to say to John, ‘Look, you know, it’s all cool. Have a glass of wine. Let’s be cool.’
Source: rte.ie
