Beatles News

I was the species of moody adolescent who drove people away from me when that was the last thing I wanted, so I spent a lot of time alone. I had private enthusiasms. I liked to be in the woods by myself, I liked to sleep, I liked to swim underwater, and I liked to sit in my room and listen to music, usually repetitively, while looking at the record’s cover. The first record I did this with was the Kingston Trio’s “At Large,” which belonged to one of my older brothers. I played it often enough that I was able finally to establish who among the three men on the cover was Dave Guard, who was Bob Shane, and who was Nick Reynolds; also, who had the husky voice, who had the tenor, and who had the slightly stiff delivery. Likewise, several years later, staring at the cover of the Grateful Dead’s first record, I determined who was Bob Weir, who were Captain Trips, Phil Lesh, and Bill the Drummer, and who was Pigpen. (People tend to look like their names, and when they sing they often sound like their names, too.) When “Revolver” came out, in 1966, I already knew who the individual Beatles were—they had cunningly saturated the culture by then—but, even so, I stared at their images while I played “She Said She Said” so many times that I thought I might wear out the groove.

Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr have reunited in the recording studio for the first time since 2009. The Beatles shared a picture of themselves following a studio session on Sunday, suggesting that they had been working together on new material. Shared on Starr’s Twitter page, the caption read: “Thanks for coming over man and playing. Great bass. I love you man - peace and love.” McCartney is expected to feature on a number of tracks from Starr’s forthcoming follow-up to 2015’s Postcard from Paradise.

The current owner bought the car for spares and was unaware that it once belonged to one of the world's most successful pop stars. A rare black Porsche 928 once owned by Beatles guitarist George Harrison is being put up for auction. Harrison, who bought the car in 1980, reportedly drove it regularly when he lived in Henley-on-Thames in Oxfordshire. The vehicle is currently owned by Raj Sedha, from Leeds, who bought it for spares in 2003 without knowing its history.

Here’s the thing about Paul. As I have written before on more than one occasion, McCartney rubs a lot of people the wrong way. He’s the most musically gifted of The Beatles (though George Harrison fans would likely argue) and in some ways the most creative force in the band (which will likely make John Lennon fans see red). He has even been accused of being an occasional threat to Ringo’s self-esteem (unjustified) which seems unconscionable, especially to the most lovable Beatle’s fans. Here’s some truth that I doubt anyone would deny: Paul was and is the most driven Beatle, the one who wanted/needed to achieve. In a very real way, that has made him odd man out, even within The Beatles. Even within that close knit band of brothers, he felt his differentness.

It was a commission for Paul McCartney’s Kintyre hideaway that led to the Beatles’ most memorable album cover. Now Sir Peter Blake’s version of The Monarch Of The Glen, made in the Swinging Sixties, could go on display alongside the 19th-century original if the latter is secured for the nation. National Galleries of Scotland chiefs have revealed the idea after pop artist Blake, who painted his take on the masterpiece for McCartney’s dining room, recorded a message backing a £4 million fundraising drive to buy Sir Edwin Landseer’s picture. The National Galleries said it had four weeks to raise the final £750,000 to buy the painting from whisky giant Diageo, which had been poised to auction it off last November until it was asked to consider a “part-purchase, part-deal” gift.

A musician from Cardiff has used a sample of John Lennon on his debut album after getting permission from Yoko Ono. It’s something of a coup for Gizmo Varillas, the 27-year-old whose family are from Spain but who moved to Cardiff when he was five. The Lennon estate very rarely grants permission for Lennon’s voice to be sampled, but the singer-songwriter who grew up in the Canton area of the city, managed to persuade the wife of the late-Beatles’ guitarist to allow him to use a sample of a Lennon interview on his song No War - which features on his debut album El Dorado.

It has been shut down, demolished, and rebuilt, but Liverpool's Cavern Club remains an icon of pop history. As it celebrates its 60th year, those who were there in its heyday recall its evolution from subterranean jazz club to international music Mecca. Peter Morris was a friend of the club's first owner, Alan Sytner, who modelled the basement venue on Le Caveau de la Huchette - a jazz place he'd seen in Paris. He recalled how they were drinking at The Grapes pub in Mathew Street when the idea was formed.

David Magnus was once told that he’d never make a photographer. But, at the age of 19, in 1963 he was invited to photograph the Beatles at Stowe School — the first of many assignments he’d undertake for the band. “They were absolutely charming. They were great fun to be with and I found them very easy to work with throughout,” says Magnus, a member of Stanmore and Canons Park Synagogue. Magnus went on to photograph everyone from Gerry and the Pacemakers to Cilla Black for NEMS Enterprises, the management company formed by Beatles manager Brian Epstein.

The children's home immortalised by John Lennon in The Beatles hit Strawberry Fields Forever is to be redeveloped by the Salvation Army. An £8m scheme has been unveiled for the home, where Lennon played as a child. The venture will combine an education centre for young people with learning difficulties and an exhibition on the home, the song and Lennon's early life. The gates at the site, which is closed to he public, are a popular attraction for Beatles fans visiting Liverpool. The plans were announced on the 50th anniversary of the release of the single, which was a double-A side with Penny Lane, reaching number two in the UK charts and number eight on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in the USA.

Liverpool's most popular museum, The Beatles Story, recently asked any "Fab Four" fans celebrating their 64th birthday in 2017 to contact them. It's 50 years since the first song the Beatles recorded for their iconic 1967 album, Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, was completed. George Martin (the band's legendary producer) called When I'm Sixty-Four the album's "jokey song", a classic counterpoint to George Harrison's sombre, spiritual and sitar-influenced Within You without You which started Side Two. Yet Paul McCartney's jaunty, music hall melody now causes more angst and introspection than any of the other more exulted tracks on the album. Why? Because Baby Boomers regard it with special dread.