Beatles News

For his new album, James McCartney – son of Beatle Paul McCartney – was looking for the songs to be “eclectic” and “a bit more raw.” He ended up turning to renowned engineer Steve Albini, whom James admired for his work with PJ Harvey, Pixies and Nirvana. The end result was “The Blackberry Train,” out May 6 on Kobalt Label Services.

Things don’t get more raw than a song called “Waterfall,” which was inspired by memories of the singer-songwriter’s mother, photographer and animal-rights activist Linda McCartney, who died of cancer in 1998. “It’s just a song that was trying to summarize that time after she died, so that kind of grieving process,” says James.

James cites bands like Nirvana, the Cure and the Stone Roses as influences for “The Blackberry Train,” but prefers to emphasize the fact that he’s “trying to be unique and just myself, really.”

The musician will be touring the U.S. this summer in support of “The Blackberry Train,” kicking things off in San Juan Capistrano, California, May 10, and wrapping the shows up in Lincoln, Nebraska, on June 27.

By: Sarene Lee details

Taking a sneak peek at the setup inside Rogers Arena on Tuesday ahead of McCartney’s double date with Vancouver Tuesday and Wednesday evenings (April 19-20), it was obvious the legendary Beatle is going all out for his One On One tour.

State-of-the-art projections were being rotated on massive floor-to-ceiling LED screens while the PA blasted Michael Jackson’s Billie Jean to test out the sound. The stage was packed with instruments, including a grand piano where one can expect Macca will be tickling the ivories. Some of the visuals on display during the stage setup included a kaleidoscopic, multi-coloured animation for The Beatles’ Magical Mystery Tour and black-and-white footage of McCartney with Wings.

In total, 175,000 pounds of gear were hauled into the arena by 21 trucks, requiring more than 250 crew members. “It’s a good size mob come to put this up,” Spring said. Spring, who has been working with McCartney since 2002, promised an entirely different show than the one that set BC Place ablaze (almost quite literally thanks to all that pyro bouncing off the roof) in 2012.

“It’s completely different — it’s another monster,” assistant st details

A mysterious white label of a Paul McCartney & Wings classic has captured the imagination of music fans over the past couple weeks. On March 30, a crop of 12" records materialized on Phonica Records' website featuring a chugging house remix of the ex-Beatle's Band on the Run finale 'Nineteen Hundred and Eighty Five.' The limited vinyl run swiftly sold out amid a frenzied demand that found copies fetching upwards of $400 on eBay

The authenticity of the remix's multitrack recordings and McCartney's recent announcement of a 67-song greatest hits package prompted iD to speculate "whether it was officially sanctioned by the man himself." Social media support from McCartney's camp on April 8 only thickened the plot.

Billboard Dance can now exclusively reveal that German veteran Timo Maas and Canadian producer James Teej are responsible for the release (and acted with Sir Paul's blessing). We caught up with the artists to flesh out the story behind the unlikely rework.

By: Matt Medved

Source: Billboard

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Liverpool is no stranger to shows about John Lennon, from Bob Eaton’s benchmark titular musical production to Scott Murphy’s ‘lost weekend’ play Walls and Bridges. And Liverpool audiences generally have a better working knowledge of the ex-Beatle than perhaps some others might. So it’s a brave man, or men, who present another telling of the Lennon life story here in his home city. But while the subject matter of Lennon Through a Glass Onion is nothing new, it comes with an international pedigree, and – critically – with the blessing of Yoko Ono herself. Added to which, it’s not really a play at all. In fact, it’s a slippery customer to pin down. Part-concert, part-monologue, it’s I suppose what one might term aural storytelling, but narrated from somewhere inside the contrary musician’s head.

It’s December 8, 1980, and John – just turned 40 and finally comfortable and contented in his own skin – is returning home to the Dakota Building after a recording session. Idly noticing a fan who has been waiting hours to see him (Chapman klaxon), Lennon (Liverpool’s Daniel Taylor) starts musing on his life, the nature of fame and fandom, fri details

A massive new biography of Paul McCartney casts a sly eye on the revered rock star’s love life.

“Paul McCartney,” by Philip Norman, the author of the best-selling “Mick Jagger,” comes in at 818 pages. While most of it is concerned with the icon’s musical career, it also peers closely at the women at McCartney’s side through the decades.

First off, doe-eyed McCartney was never the “nice” Beatle, the one even parents could embrace, though that’s how he played it in the early throes of Beatlemania. According to Norman, McCartney hit it off with so many ardent young fans the numbers were legendary. McCartney once bragged to a cousin about a foursome he’d particularly enjoyed as the only male. Eventually, the lad from Liverpool settled into a fairy-tale romance with the upper-crust doctor’s daughter, Jane Asher, even living with her family for a few years.

First off, doe-eyed McCartney was never the “nice” Beatle, the one even parents could embrace, though that’s how he played it in the early throes of Beatlemania. According to Norman, McCartney hit it off with so many ardent young fans the numbers were legendary. McCart details

It was 46 years ago today (April 17th, 1970) that Paul McCartney released his first solo album apart from the Beatles. Although McCartney, John Lennon, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr had all produced and released solo projects before, the McCartney album was the first solo mainstream record released in the aftermath of the group's breakup.

McCartney featured an assortment of tracks recorded at home and in the studio, featuring McCartney on all instruments, with the help of his wife Linda McCartney on harmonies. Several of the songs were Beatles-era rejects, such as "Junk," which was originally intended for the band's 1968 self-titled double set commonly known as "The White Album." Early versions of "Every Night," "Teddy Boy," and a snippet of "Maybe I'm Amazed" were also rehearsed by various members of the band during the next year's Let It Be sessions. The instrumental track "Hot As Sun," also performed during the January 1969 sessions, dated as far back as 1960.

Although Lennon had quietly quit the band the previous September, none of the Beatles said anything about the split publicly until McCartney issued a self-penned interview included in the press copies of album.

Sadly, 28 years to the date of details

It could rank as the classic rock concert of the century — six bands and performers who revolutionized popular music in the 1960s gathering in the Southern California desert over a single weekend in October. The company that stages the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival is planning a three-night event featuring Bob Dylan, Paul McCartney, the Rolling Stones, the Who, Neil Young and Pink Floyd's Roger Waters — all Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees — Oct. 7-9 at the Empire Polo Field in Indio, The Times has learned.

The six acts have never shared a billing before, and it also would be the first time that Dylan and ex-Beatle McCartney — representing what are widely considered the two most important rock acts of the 1960s — have played on the same bill, albeit on different nights.

The concert is being organized by Goldenvoice, the Los Angeles-based promoter that is a unit of AEG Live, according to people with knowledge of the plans. They could not speak publicly because negotiations with the performers were being finalized.

“It will be their full stage productions, with full sets,” said one person close to the project. That would be in contrast to most festiv details

The birthplace of the modern American documentary is Wisconsin, where Robert Drew brought a crew in early 1960 to film the campaigns of John F. Kennedy and Hubert Humphrey in that state’s Democratic Presidential primary. Albert Maysles was the cinematographer of its most iconic sequence, a long hand-held tracking shot following Kennedy from backstage to a lectern. There, Maysles caught Kennedy in the magic moment—the transformation from private to public, from casual manner to stage manner. Yet Drew’s fundamental insight is the unified field of cinematic activity—in a word, the filmmakers are present and are an inextricable part of the proceedings that they film. Everything that takes place in front of the camera—and, for that matter, behind it—is a performance, even the ordinary activities of ordinary people.

For Maysles and his brother, David Maysles, who worked together to make documentaries for decades to come, performance became their fundamental subject. Their first feature was “Showman,” about the producer and distributor Joseph E. Levine, and its very title bears a paradox: Levine was a man who put on shows, but he himself was, in the film, a man who became a show. details

This week, 50 years ago, the Beach Boys concluded the sessions in Los Angeles that produced Pet Sounds. They wrapped up on April 13, to be precise, by which time Brian Wilson, never the cheeriest soul, was a gibbering wreck. The same day, at Abbey Road, the Beatles recorded Paperback Writer, and rushed it out as a single before Revolver sprang, fully armed from the head of Zeus, in August.

You can argue until you are blue in the face but, by any reasonable standards, Pet Sounds and Revolver must be considered the two finest pop music records ever made. This was also, as we shall be reminded once again this summer, the year that England’s footballers, wearing strawberry jam shirts, won the World Cup. Yes, 1966 was a great time to be young. Half a century later, with a retro movement gaining ground day by day, a younger generation may enjoy the fruits that Paul McCartney, John Lennon and Wilson (in that order) dropped from the tree in the traditional manner. In case you hadn’t heard, vinyl is back, fortissimo.

Yesterday was Record Store Day, the annual event intended to entice a new audience into the joys of vinyl. And it seems to be working. LPs are being eagerly sought – even by those who don&r details

A young girl’s remarkable tale of how she took a day trip-per out of school to Meet The Beatles will grace the small screen in a BBC documentary.

Vivien Stevenette was pulled out of class aged 10 - with a little help from her mother - to meet ‘the Fab Four’ at the height of Beatlemania. 

Vivien - now a retired schoolteacher from Baron Court in Werrington - will tell her story on BBC 4 show The People’s History Of Pop tomorrow night at 9pm.

Vivien said: “It was 1964, and like most girls I loved The Beatles. “My mum worked at the Old England Hotel in Sutton on Trent. She was at the bank when she got a call from the owner, who said ‘The Beatles are here, you have to come back.’ “She came into school - which she never did, and told some sort of fib and took me out of the class. When we got into the car, she sort of exploded, and said The Beatles were there. 

“It took 10 minutes to get to the hotel. I remember my mum driving fast.” When they arrived, they found John Lennon, George Harrison, Ringo Starr and Paul McCartney sitting in the dining room tucking into poacher’s soup, ham and eggs and trifle. 

Source details

An exhibition of celebrity portraits including David Bowie and the Beatles is set to go on show in Liverpool next week. The Wall to Wall Gallery in the Metquarter is staging the show of work by artist Ron Chadwick who is renowned for his canvasses featuring high-profile subjects. The exhibition, running from April 23 to May 7, will be the artist’s debut show in the North of England, and he will make a personal appearance at the gallery on the opening day.

At the centre of the exhibition will be a series of paintings and limited edition works of the Beatles, including a painting of the Fab Four in Hamburg, entitled Four Lads Who Changed My World. Other work features legendary boxer Muhammad Ali, Alfred Hitchcock and Miles Davis. Wall to Wall’s Zoe Ayre says: “Four Lads Who Changed My World holds particular relevance to him, since it was the Beatles who first inspired the young Ron to pick up his biro and begin sketching and painting the kind of icons through which he has forged his name as an artist.

“These works are now sold in galleries and feature in collections.” The Kent-based artist’s style is heavily influenced by the pop cultural revolution of the 1960s, both by the pio details

The Beatles are known as the greatest band to ever exist – and many argue ever will exist. But the way in which we view this is in a limited way, we haven’t got the ability to time travel so our generation doesn’t know of the highs and lows the band had – Unless of course, we take the time to read about them.

For me, I regularly read about the Beatles and I can tell you – There wasn’t a stranger year for the Beatles than 1966. This time 50 years ago the worlds greatest ever band was experiencing their low point. The band had went to the Philippines and had accidentally snubbed a party invite from the first lady. Brian Epstein, the Beatles manager had simply declined a formal invite from what he seen as political PR and thought nothing of it. However the nation took this as a huge insult, and literally chased the Beatles out of the country. The police withdrew all help meaning the Beatles had to defend themselves from attacks from the locals who had suddenly began to hate them. Lennon got home and said that “He wouldn’t visit Manilla ever again unless it was with an H-Bomb.”

As we know from that comment, Lennon was prone to say comments that people may find of details

The Beatles legend gave the crowd in Fresno, California, everything they had hoped for and more as he kicked off his world tour. And it wasn't just the thousands of fans who were having the time of their lives. "This is cool," McCartney told them. "I just want to take a little minute to drink it in for myself." One of the highlights was a rousing rendition of A Hard Day's Night.

Admittedly, the man has a pretty extensive back catalogue upon which to draw, but it still seems incredible that he hasn't performed this iconic crowd-pleaser live since the Beatles' heyday. The last time the band played the track live was way back in 1965, a whopping 51 years ago. McCartney also performed other Beatles classic during the show including Eleanor Rigby and 1962's Love Me Do, the Fab Four's first No1 single. The 73-year-old left far younger artists in the shade with a stggering three-hour show in which he delivered a remarkable 38 songs.

The One on One show spanned McCartney's entire career right up to 2015’s global hit single FourFiveSeconds, his collaboration with Kanye West and Rihanna. The set-list also included a rare outing for some of his pre-Beatles material, with the inclusion of The Quarrymen’s In Spit details

Ringo Starr has followed Bruce Springsteen in canceling a forthcoming concert in North Carolina in protest over the state’s newly minted anti-LGBT law.

The former Beatles drummer said in a statement: “I’m sorry to disappoint my fans in the area, but we need to take a stand against this hatred. Spread peace and love.”

The law, known as HB2, prevents transgender people from using the public restrooms that correspond with their gender identity, decreeing that all public institutions must post signs saying that bathrooms and locker rooms are to be used only based on biological sex. It also prevents municipal governments from passing anti-discrimination laws.

Describing the law as bigotry, Starr said of the legislators: “How sad that they feel this group of people cannot be defended.” He concluded his statement quoting the titles of two songs: Canned Heat’s Let’s Work Together and the Beatles’ All You Need is Love.

Starr and Springsteen are not the only performers to have canceled gigs in response to anti-LGBT legislation in the south. On Sunday, Bryan Adams pulled a show in Biloxi, Mississippi, over a new law that allows religious groups and some details

The oldest and arguably most famous purpose-built recording studio in the world, London’s Abbey Road has been at the forefront of the music business for close to 85 years. Synonymous with The Beatles, the Grade II listed complex has also played home to everyone from Pink Floyd to Kanye West to Adele, with a host of famous film scores and classical works recorded within the building’s iconic white walls.

Owned by Universal Music Group since 2012 following its acquisition of EMI, the facility has recently begun a program of significant expansion, building three new and more competitively priced recording spaces and launching a number of tech and brand partnerships, including a VR tour courtesy of Google. Billboard spoke to managing director Isabel Garvey. who formerly held senior executive posts at Warner Music International and EMI, to discuss the changing role of recording studios, appealing to new artists and breaking into the tech sector. “We’re not just a museum to The Beatles,” says Garvey. “We’re a living, breathing studio making future music history.”

Billboard: You became MD of Abbey Road in 2014. What's your remit on developing and growing the business?