50th Blog

Studio Three, EMI Studios, London

and NEMS Enterprises, Monmouth Street, London

All of the Beatles but George arrived back in England on Wednesday, October 2nd. He returned this day although after this 10:00 am-1:00 pm session at EMI which saw Ringo, overdub a new vocal onto "I wanna be your man" and John and Paul do likewise for "Little Child".

During the mid-afternoon, with George, the Beatles made the 1st of 3 appearances on the BBC radio program "The Public Ear", a spoken-word magazine for which the Beatles' contributions were always of the interview variety. It was a series to which the group listened when on tour.

This interview - taped by the program's features assistant Michael Colley at NEMS' 13 Monmouth Street office - went into the edition transmitted in the Light Programme from 3:00 to 4:00 pm on Sunday, November 3rd, as part of a fascinating, almost 12 minute feature devoted to them and the "Mersey Beat" boom. Interviews with Bill Harry, Pete Best, Millie Sutcliffe (mother of the late Stuart), "beat poet" Royston Ellis (whom the Beatles had backed at the Jacaranda Coffee Bar in Liverpool one night in May 1960) and members of the public were also featured. The item was narrated by broadcaster Tony Hall, a much respected figure in the British record industry and personal friend and central London neighbor of the Beatles.

Note: The Public Ear was considered such an interesting program that some editons were re-broadcast in revised form on the Home Service as "In the Public Ear". The Beatles' interview elements from Colley's feature were included in such a program on January 14, 1964, 9:00-9:30 pm.

Ringo left the NEMS office immediately after the interview was over and drove to Southend to see a package show concert at the Odeon Cinema featuring the Everly Brothers, Bo Diddley and the Rolling Stones.

The Beatles enjoying their last day of Holiday........

The Beatles still on Vacation......................

The Beatles were still away on holidays when a 10:00am-1:15pm editing, overdubbing and mixing session took place this day in Studio Two at Abbey Road. "Little Child" and "Hold Me Tight" were edited, George Martin recorded additional keyboard passages for "Money (That's What I Want)" and "I Wanna Be Your Man", and then "All I've Got To Do", "Don't Bother Me", "Little Child", "Hold Me Tight" and "Not A Second Time" were mixed into Mono.

The Beatles are on VACATION!

Royal Albert Hall, London

The Beatles headed this afternoon show, the annual "Great Pop Prom" promoted by Valentine, Marilyn and Roxy magazines in aid of the Printers' Pension Corporation. Eleven other acts appeared, including the Rolling Stones, DJ Alan Freeman was the compere.

On September 16th, the Beatles took off for holidays, John and his wife Cynthia traveled to Paris, where they were joined by Brian Epstein, George, with his brother Peter, visited his sister Louise in the USA, who had emigrated to Benton, Illinois in 1954, and Paul and Ringo went to Greece.

The Beatles - (Victory) Memorial Hall, Northwich

Public Hall, Preston

After this show, Paul drove 25 miles to the Imperial Ballroom in Nelson, arriving just after midnight, to appear on a panel judging the "Imperial Miss 1963" contest, part of the annual "Young Ones" Ball, sponsored by the local newspaper - the "Nelson Leader".

Studio Two, EMI Studios, London

On July 5th, Brian Epstein verbally agreed to the group undertaking a June 1964 concert tour of Australia, and on December 2nd the contract was formally signed. Now though, to satisfy demands from Australian radio, the group recorded four messages for broadcast there, three addressed directly to Bob Rogers (a DJ at the Sydney station 2SM) and one "open-message", to be used by any station. These semi-scripted, semi-spontaneous lines consisted of typically witty Beatles chatter and were the first of a number of speech items the group taped at EMI over the years.

The recordings were made between 2:30 and 6:30 pm along with ten takes of a re-make of "Hold Me Tight", first attempted for "Please Please Me" on February 11th, but completed more successfully this time around.

Between 7:00 and 11:30 pm, which meant running 90 minutes over the blocked time of 10:00, the Beatles set about another re-make, of George's Don't Bother Me", with ten takes needed to complete the recording, and then resumed work on two songs began the previous day, taping 16 more takes of "Little Child" and six more of "I Wanna Be Your Man".

Studio Two, EMI Studios, London

Back to EMI for more work on the second album, to be released as "With The Beatles". From 2:30 to 6:00 pm the group recorded three new Lennon-McCartney numbers: one take of "I Wanna Be Your Man", Ringo's vocal vehicle on the album (the previous day, John and Paul had also given it to the Rolling Stones, they taped their version on October 7th, released it on November 1st and it was their first top 20 hit within a month), two takes of "Little Child" and 15 takes of "All I've Got To Do".

In the evening session, 7:00 to 10:15 pm, nine takes were recorded of another Lennon-McCartney song, "Not A Second Time", and the first seven of "Don't Bother Me", George Harrison's debut as a composer.