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Beatles News
Like any good story, the documentary about the making of the Beatles’ latest album — neither of which existed yet — needed a climax.
It was Jan. 30, 1969, and the world-renowned rock band decided to stage a performance on the roof of its Apple Corps building in London for family, friends and film cameras. The 42-minute show became the grand finale of the band’s documentary, “Let It Be.”
It was also the last public performance that the most commercially successful band in history would ever give. As police shut down the show for causing a ruckus, John Lennon declared: “I’d like to say thank you on behalf of the group and ourselves, and I hope we passed the audition.”
“It wasn’t an audition,” said Beatles historian Mark Lewisohn. “But they always had the perfect lines.”
The rooftop show and the associated “Let It Be” album are a
Source: Marisa Iati/washingtonpost.com
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Convincing the masses to watch a three-part, eight-hour docuseries on a band that broke up over 50 years ago? The only subject monumental enough to make that possible is the Beatles. Peter Jackson’s Get Back follows the band members through the making of the last studio album they would release together, Let It Be, and everything that happened behind the scenes that led to the end, showing never-before-seen footage and giving an in-depth look into the power dynamics among the bandmates. Any casual fan could tell you what became of Lennon, Harrison, McCartney, and Starr after the Beatles fell apart, but the series has introduced casual fans to a whole new cast of characters: the musicians, producers, lovers, and hangers-on who made the sessions what they were—for good and for bad. Yoko Ono’s a household name, and most viewers probably know a thing or two about Linda Eastman as well, but what happened to the rest of
Source: Meredith Moran/slate.com
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During a November discussion with B&N CEO James Daunt, legendary Beatle Paul McCartney revealed that when The Beatles first entered the music scene, the band was excited just to be making money.
“It was only later that we discovered that what we were doing was art, and there were things like muses,” McCartney said, adding, “When we first got out of Liverpool, it was money … we were kids without jobs, suddenly there was a job, and so we wanted to get paid, and the more money, the better.”
Though McCartney said the band enjoyed having money and made jokes — such as, “‘Well, let’s write a swimming pool! You need a new extension, let’s write it. Come on, sit down’” — McCartney believes that money and art don’t need to be mutually exclusive.
Source: By Jenna Romaine/thehill.com
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“Get Back,” Peter Jackson’s three-part, nearly eight-hour documentary series chronicling the few weeks in which the Beatles wrote and created “Let It Be,” has enthralled fans of the Fab Four since it was released on Thanksgiving Day.
The documentary finds the band facing a looming deadline while simultaneously feeling the pull of their individual creative endeavors. Its hours of previously unseen footage find John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr in turn collaborating, bickering and laughing; bored, anxious, angry and gleeful. Throughout it all, classic songs like “The Long and Winding Road,” “I Me Mine” and “Don’t Let Me Down” emerge.
Source: Travis M. Andrews/washingtonpost.com
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Our culture lionizes independent thinkers and creators, from Beethoven to Einstein to Musk. Eccentric, driven, working alone in their garrets and labs, they are struck by inspiration and change the world – call it the cult of genius.
Get Back, filmmaker Peter Jackson’s new three-part, eight-hour documentary series about the Beatles, reminds us that the process of creation is often a more complicated affair, involving not a single prodigy but a group of individuals labouring together, elevating each other – and, if they are both talented and lucky, producing something great.
Source: Marcus Gee/theglobeandmail.com
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George Harrison of The Beatles felt listeners could learn a lot about Cat Stevens (also known as Yusuf and Yusuf Islam) from his songs. George had a very strong opinion on Stevens as a musician. During an interview, he revealed what he thought about Stevens taking a long break between albums.
George responded enthusiastically to Stevens “Yeah, I like Cat Stevens a lot — actually before, earlier when you asked me who I like, Cat Stevens has been a consistent person that I’ve enjoyed,” he said. “I’ve always liked his voice, he’s got a lovely voice, and he always seems to have style, class, you know? Good melodies, good production.”
George then commented on Stevens’ life. “And also, I think in his life he’s been through a lot of heavy ups and downs, and I don’t blame him for taking two years to make a record,” George said, laughing. “You know, I like him a lot.”
Source: cheatsheet.com
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English actress Hayley Mills joined host Kenneth Womack to talk about being born into a show business family, having a Beatle take her on a date, writing her new memoir and more on "Everything Fab Four," a podcast co-produced by me and Womack (a music scholar who also writes about pop music for Salon) and distributed by Salon.
Multiple award-winner Mills, whose father is legendary actor Sir John Mills and mother novelist-playwright Mary Hayley Bell, got her start in acting at the age of 12 in the British crime drama "Tiger Bay." Hailed as a child screen prodigy, Mills went on to star in six Disney films in six years including "Pollyanna" and "The Parent Trap," making her a breakout star in the early 1960s – not unlike the Beatles.
Source: salon.com
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Peter Jackson's documentary series "The Beatles: Get Back" premiered on Disney+ over Thanksgiving weekend. The three-episode special, which ran 470 minutes, was culled from over 60 hours of original studio footage and 150 hours of audio recordings.
To preserve continuity, streamline themes, and get the final running time under eight hours, the following moments were edited out:
Day 1: Paul shows up to Twickenham Studios with 11 new songs, plus a formula for a future unknown pandemic vaccine he jotted down in the cab on the way over.
Day 2: Peter Sellers drops by Twickenham to say hello to Ringo, his co-star in the upcoming film, "The Magic Christian." The visit is cut short when Yoko Ono asks Sellers if he'll call her estranged husband's divorce lawyer and threaten him using the Clouseau voice.
Source: salon.com
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I’m desperate to hang out some more with the Beatles, and I know I’m not alone in feeling this. I miss Paul, John, George and Ringo. I feel like we had such a great Thanksgiving weekend together—them making iconic songs, sipping tea and mildly bickering, and me on the couch, lying in the darkness, microwaved leftovers on my chest.
Source: Jason Gay/wsj.com
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The widow and son of former Beatle John Lennon have given away 50 rare records of Happy Xmas (War is Over) to charities and record shops so they can raise funds.
Yoko Ono and Sean Ono Lennon said they wanted to "spread Christmas cheer".
A note attached to the gifts urged the charities to use the limited edition 12-inch vinyl acetates to "sell, auction [and] raise money".
Liverpool-based The Brain Charity said it was "hugely moved" by the gesture.
"We feel absolutely bowled over by this astonishingly generous surprise Christmas gift," Chief Executive Nanette Mellor said.
The one-sided 12" acetate featuring John and Yoko was hand-cut on the lathe at the legendary Abbey Road Studios.
Each edition is stickered and numbered out of 50 and includes a machine printed signature from Yoko, making them collectable.
Source: BBC News
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Paul McCartney gave the world many great albums with his band Wings. Despite this, critics weren’t always receptive to the band. Paul himself once thought one of Wings’ albums was a disaster. He later softened his stance on the album while spending time with David Bowie.
During an interview with Reverb.com, Paul said lots of listeners compared Wings to The Beatles. Paul admitted The Beatles were a difficult act to follow. Despite this, he said Wings is an underrated band.
“The interesting thing is that, looking back on some of the work, some of the stuff, it’s better than you think it was, but because it got such harsh criticism … from me,” he said. “The critics gave us a hard run, but I was particularly hard on us. I remember looking at a book, there was an album we did, I think it was Back to the Egg, which didn’t do well, and I remember thinking, ‘God, complete disaster.'”
Source: cheatsheet.com
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George Harrison was known as the quiet Beatle, and sometimes also wanted to be invisible.
“Beatle George Harrison, above, is due in court here today to answer assault charges,” John Lennon reads from a newspaper in a scene in Peter Jackson’s The Beatles: Get Back. “Harrison is accused of assaulting a photographer last May as he and Beatle Ringo Starr left a nightclub.”
The accused looks fairly bewildered, as did much of the audience. The story intermittently creeps back into the documentary, making its presence known while Harrison largely ignores it and moves on.
In The Beatles: Get Back, Jackson shows how news items about The Beatles have a tendency to take on lives of their own. Paul McCartney improvises his version of Michael Housego’s article “The End of a Beautiful Friendship,” about Harrison quitting the band, while the rest of the group rolls through old time rock and roll.
Source: Tony Sokol/denofgeek.com
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Musical superstar Phil Collins plays the drums but he doesn’t take stick from anyone. One person who discovered that to their detriment was none other than Sir Paul McCartney.
A passing remark led to bitterness years later and the opening of old wounds. How did it all go down? Take this story at Face Value…
What did Paul McCartney say to annoy Phil Collins?
The year was 2002. Collins and McCartney were attending “Party at the Palace.” This prestigious event celebrated the Golden Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II. It was a time for smart suits, canapés and (we’re guessing) extreme politeness.
Collins mentioned the encounter during a 2016 interview with the Sunday Times. He had in his hand a first edition copy of The Beatles authorized biography by Hunter Davies (1968). Why not ask the Liverpudlian legend to sign it? Paper grew on trees. Opportunities like that didn’t.
Source: Steve Palace/thevintagenews.com
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George Harrison and Michael Jackson discussed one of Van Morrison’s songs during a radio interview. George and Jackson had different opinions of the track. Listeners in the United States and the United Kingdom had essentially the same reaction to the song.
According to the book George Harrison on George Harrison: Interviews and Encounters, the quiet Beatle appeared on a radio show called Roundtable alongside Jackson in 1979. Guests on the show discussed their opinions of new songs. One of the songs George and Michael discussed was Morrison’s then-new single “Natalia.”
Source: cheatsheet.com
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Hardcore fans of The Beatles like to think they know everything about the band. Most have bootlegs of recording sessions, live shows, and bookshelves full of books documenting—sometimes to the hour—what any of them were doing personally and creatively during the group’s 10-year run.
Yet even those fans are hailing Peter’s Jackson’s new Disney+ exclusive docuseries, The Beatles: Get Back, which curates and culls down 50+ hours of footage from the Get Back sessions that reveals, from a fly on the wall perspective, when the creative magic was coming to a close in early 1969.
Even with anecdotal stories or their voices captured in the recording sessions bootlegs, the docuseries is the most contextual and revealing artifact to exist that expresses, in their own words and deeds, what was going wrong amongst the Fab Four. And because of that, the new knowledge gleaned for fans and music historians is nothing less than legendary.
Source: Garrett Martin and Paste Staff
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