Beatles News
Barber Nick Palomares, known for celebrity encounters at his shop within the Fresno Yosemite International Airport, has died.
John Lennon and Yoko Ono were among his most famous clients. His son, Nicholas Palomares, said his father died Wednesday. He passed away in his sleep at his Fresno home. Up until recent days, Mr. Palomares was still cutting hair, at age 82 – although a foot surgery a few weeks ago forced him to take a break. He also had a heart condition.
Mr. Palomares spoke with The Bee last year for a feature story about his colorful career. His 14 foot-by-20 foot space, Nicholas Jet-Set Haircutting For Men, was covered wall-to-wall with framed photos of musicians, actors, athletes and politicians he met over more than half a century of cutting hair. Barber Nick Palomares sits in his chair in his shop at Fresno Yosemite International Airport in 2017, surrounded by photos, autographs and mementos of famous people he’s encountered over more than half a century of cutting hair.
“I sort of like the fact that it becomes a statement to say, ‘Fresno is not a hick town,' " he said of his celebrity photos, "because otherwise you wouldn’t have these people coming here.’"
Source: By Carmen George cgeorge@fresnobee.com
A mum whose son passed away suddenly late last year has written an open letter to Sir Paul McCartney asking him to help save Hastings Pier in his memory.
Janet Gross’ son Brad died on November 24, 2017, at the age of 45, a week after suffering a heart attack.
Brad – who was a drummer in a number of bands in Hastings – was originally from Connecticut, USA, but moved to London 14 years ago before moving to Hastings in 2008.
In her letter to the Beatles legend, Janet referred to Friends of Hastings Pier which is trying to raise £500,000 before May 31 to keep the pier in public ownership.
She wrote: “The reason I am writing to you is that Hastings Pier is in trouble. The pier is now up for sale to a commercial buyer. The last time this happened it was left to decay and was eventually abandoned.
“The Friends of Hastings Pier is a community group fighting to keep the freehold as a community asset while leasing the above-deck as a commercial operation.
Source: Stephen Wynn-Davies/hastingsobserver.co.uk
The Holmdel Theatre Company will present a reading of Stephen Larsen's play My Old Friend on Monday, June 4th at 7:00pm. The play is about a little-known final meeting of John Lennon and Paul McCartney. This is the first public reading of the play. Admission is free and coffee is served.
The play begins on November 5, 1980. John Lennon, alone in his apartment at the Dakota in New York City, is at a crossroads. He has been having recurring dreams of death and is ready to make big changes in his life, that is if he can summon up the courage. Just then, who should appear, unannounced at his door but Paul McCartney. The two haven't seen each other for about four years. John is both glad and a bit wary at the sudden appearance of his old friend. Can they mend fences? Can they come together? Or they forever doomed to be bound by the strands and complications of their shared history?
Source: By Gary Wien/newjerseystage.com
It is hard to think about Lukas Nelson and Dhani Harrison, successful artists in their own right, without thinking about their very famous fathers, Willie and George. The two young men, friends with one another, openly embrace their fathers’ legacies. Each will perform this Saturday at BottleRock.
If you listen to this band’s self-titled 2017 debut album, the variety is striking – from plantive country ballads starkly evoking Willie Nelson to R&B to honky-tonk to gospel to acoustic folk music to rock ‘n’ roll and more. “I grew up with a hodge-podge of different influences,” Lukas said, “and when I’m writing, I’m never trying to restrict myself.
“Whatever music is playing in my head, I have to put it down. I did 39 tracks that we had mastered. We just strategically chose what we thought was a great first album and we left out some really great songs so that we’d have material to follow up with. We just picked it song by song, what was the best song and we didn’t really think about genre so much. That’s kind of how we work.”
Source: David Kerns/napavalleyregister.com
Fifty years after The Beatles' psychedelic animated movie classic, Yellow Submarine, hit theaters, Titan Comics is prepping a graphic novel take on the trippy adventure. In this Apple-approved version, Simpsons comics artist Bill Morrison re-tells the story of the cheerful, music-loving underwater world Pepperland's invasion by the marauding, music-hating Blue Meanies, who turn the citizens into statues by shooting arrows that drop green apples on their heads while imprisoning Pepperland's guardians, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, in a soundproof globe.
Just before he's captured, Pepperland's Lord Mayor sends Old Fred off in the Yellow Submarine to get help in Liverpool, where he corrals Ringo and his pals, John, George and Paul, to travel back and battle the Meanies using love and music.
Source: Gil Kaufman/billboard.com
In the earliest days of The Beatles, the fact that John Lennon and Paul McCartney began composing their own material as opposed to using songs provided by other songwriters was highly unusual. In fact, at the time — the early 1960s — it simply wasn't done. Undoubtedly in the beginning it was probably seen more as an oddity rather than an indication of the duo ultimately being credited as one of the great songwriting teams of all time.
"It wasn't the norm," Bill Harry, editor of Liverpool's Mersey Beat, the first and most recognized newspaper devoted to the local music scene, and lifelong friend of The Beatles, explains in an exclusive interview. "In America you have the Brill Building and things like that, with professional songwriters like Carole King and different people. That was the situation. The songwriters wrote the songs and the artists were given songs by the songwriters. It was similar in Britain with the A&R men. For instance, [producer] George Martin virtually insisted that The Beatles do 'How Do You Do It' by Mitch Murray for their first single, and they eventually had to talk him out of it. He finally agreed. When they first said they wanted to do their original numbers, he said, 'When you do a number as good as this, I'll let you record your own stuff.'
Source: By Ed Gross/closerweekly.com
The debate has been raging for decades, and it will never die. The two iconic British invaders are inextricably linked in history, influencing and rivaling each other in near equal measure. The Beatles may be the most celebrated rock band ever, but the Stones are the “Greatest Rock ‘n Roll Band in the World.” It’s like a battle of champions in sports, but without any rules or a scoreboard. So let’s approach this as if it were a sports series—an old-school, best-of-five, winner take all.
What are the categories to represent the games in this series? Using some of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame’s criteria—honorees must have “demonstrat[ed] unquestionable musical excellence and talent” and “had a significant impact on the development, evolution and preservation of rock & roll”—and some other factors that help quantify greatness, we came up with the following:
Innovation: Pioneering achievements that paved the way for others to follow. Doors the band opened that perhaps otherwise would have remained closed.
Inspiration: The number and quality of the groups that are deemed by music historians and critics to have built their sonic landscape upon their foundation. This of course is highly subjective, so for a neutral arbiter we turned to the internet music database AllMusic.com, whose editors determine for every recording artist the other artists or groups they “had a direct musical influence on, or were an inspiration to.”
Source: pastemagazine.com
A daft sketch about a fictional Scot created by a teenage John Lennon has gone on show in his home city of Liverpool.
The Beatle’s widow Yoko Ono loaned many treasured items to a new exhibition entitled Double Fantasy – John and Yoko.
Featured in the display at the Museum of Liverpool until next April is the “Daily Hool (Scotch edition)” made in 1957, when Lennon was 16. He creates Fungus Mucdungheap, dressed in a “drainpipe kilt”. Lennon spent happy holidays as a boy in Edinburgh and Durness in Sutherland
His handwritten newspaper cost “1 haggis” and he describes Fungus as “the son of a bagpipe who invented the haggae (plural)”.
Lennon’s readers are informed that “some Scotchmen live in caves” and “walk on their hands to save their shoes – not that they’re mean”. It finishes by saying: “Some Scotchmen have tartan hair instead of a kilt, silly n*****s,” borrowing a racist word in wider use at the time.
Source: john-lennon.com
In the decades since the Beatles’ 1970 breakup, the group’s rise and fall has been told as a myth. It’s also been told via children’s story, salacious gossip, dry history, detailed diaries, technical manuals, cartoons, and graphic novels. There are volumes dedicated to their recording equipment, encyclopedias chronicling all of the music and film the group has yet to release, collections of the photos from before they were stars—basically, if you can think of an idea related to John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr, it’s been published. This constant trickle of books can overwhelm even steadfast Beatlemaniacs, but the greatness of the music has also drawn out greatness within authors. The best books about the Beatles rank among the best pop culture writing—and criticism—ever.
Source: Stephen Thomas ErlewineContributor/pitchfork.com
In honor of the 50th anniversary of the classic animated Beatles film Yellow Submarine , an authorized graphic-novel adaption of the movie will be published on August 28 by Titan Comics.
You can get a preview of the colorful book by checking out a new video trailer that's been posted on the company's YouTube channel . The clip features animated scenes from various parts of the comic, along with text that reads, "Join John , Paul , George and Ringo on a nautical adventure as they battle to free Pepperland from the music-hating Blue Meanies."
The novel was adapted and illustrated by Bill Morrison , who's the current editor of MAD magazine and also has served as an illustrator for The Simpsons comics.
Judging by the trailer, the book's illustrations faithfully recreate the dazzling, psychedelic imagery featured in the film, which premiered in July of 1968.
Source: Midwest Communications Inc./wabx.net
