Beatles News

One of the earliest photos of The Beatles in Liverpool’s Cavern Club is being auctioned later this month along with a series of other recently unearthed snaps taken of the the band at the beginning of their career. The picture, taken in 1961, features Paul McCartney at the front of the stage and Pete Best on drums – a year before he was replaced by Ringo Starr. Stephen Bailey – the manager of The Beatles Shop, in Liverpool – said the forthcoming memorabilia sale includes a series of negatives brought into the Mathew Street store by a man who casually told him: “My father was a professional photographer and these might be of interest to you.” Mr Bailey said the man then handed over a series of envelopes of transparencies which all turned out to be in perfect condition. Another shot which stands out features George Harrison, John Lennon, McCartney and Best posing with six girls.

Mr Bailey said he did some detective work on this photograph and found out it was taken on June 14, 1961, at St John’s Hall details

FitzPro Ltd, which supplies audio-visual solutions to help businesses save time, money and the environment, has opened its new premises on Tiverton’s Business Park. Managing Director Rich Denham has more than 25 years’ experience in electronic engineering. Mr Denham, who was also sound engineer and logistics manager for the Exeter-based tribute band The Fab Beatles, set up the new company and recruited a team of experts to help run and build the business, which specialises in helping firms use the latest audio-visual and video-conferencing technology to the best advantage. He said: “We already have blue chip clients in London, such as TSB, Best Western and infrastructure investment company John Laing, but now we want to offer the same quality service and equipment to companies in Devon. “We specialise in helping firms save time and money by keeping their staff connected wherever they may be, on the road, working from different offices or from home, so people spend less time travelling and more time doing what is most profitable.

“Cutting down o details

Hulu has exclusive U.S. streaming rights to the pic under its recently renewed licensing agreement with the Criterion Collection. A selection of the distributor’s 800-plus arthouse films are available exclusively to subscribers of Hulu Plus, priced at $7.99 per month. “Hard Day’s Night” stars John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr, with Wilfrid Brambell portraying McCartney’s grandfather. The comedic romp takes a satirical look at several days in the lives of the Fab Four and features eight Beatles songs, including “Can’t Buy Me Love” and title track “A Hard Day’s Night.” It’s available to Hulu Plus subscribers here, as well as on mobile devices and connected-TV platforms.

The movie last month was released theatrically in 50 U.S. cities, after it was digitally restored in 4K resolution from the original camera negative by Criterion Collection’s restoration team and approved by director Richard Lester. In addition details

Sir Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr have been invited to perform at 'Alien Woodstock' in a bid to make extra-terrestrials reveal themselves to the planet. The two musicians - who were joined in The Fab Four by the late John Lennon and George Harrison - are wanted by UFO expert Michael C. Luckman to play at the proposed event in Malibu, California. Luckman - who is director of the New York Center for Extraterrestrial Research - has a theory there is a huge underwater alien base located six miles off of Malibu's Point Dume in the Pacific Ocean and he wants to use a host of pop stars who believe in alien life to coax them out of their base. As well as Paul and Ringo, Luckman also wants Yoko Ono - the widow of late Beatle John Lennon - her son Sean Lennon and Dahni Harrison, the son of deceased fourth band member George Harrison, to take part in the concert. Among the other alleged alien admiring stars invited to take part in Luckman's out-of-this-world Woodstock are Rihanna, Robbie Williams, Sir Mick Jagger, David Bowie, Alicia Keys, Sting, Blondie frontwoman details

Chart act The Killers have triumphed in the baffle of the bands - after their hit Human was judged to have the most bewildering song lyric. The track - which reached number three in the singles chart in 2008 - was judged to have the perplex factor for the impenetrable line "Are we human or are we dancer?" Second in the poll for online streaming service Blinkbox Music was the surreal nonsense lyric for I Am The Walrus by The Beatles, from Magical Mystery Tour. The chorus of "I am the eggman, they are the eggmen, I am the walrus, goo goo g'joob" was the line which left music fans scratching their heads. The top 10 also included Wham!'s Club Tropicana which says "Drinks are free, fun and sunshine, there's enough for everyone, all that's missing is the sea" - despite later referring to watching "the waves break on the bay". The explanation for the apparent inconsistency is that it is said to have been written about a spot in Ibiza set high in the hills. Killers frontman Brandon Flowers has explained that his lyric was based on a quote from the author Hunter S Thompson, "we're raising a ge details

On a recent night in San Diego, Tom Petty was doing what he's been doing for close to 40 years: leading his band The Heartbreakers on stage, playing the old hits and inaugurating new ones. He's just started touring behind Hypnotic Eye, the band's latest album in a prolific career — and if you ask Petty how it feels to still be kicking after all this time, you'll get an uncharacteristically bashful response. "It's actually kind of embarrassing now; it's such a love fest," the 63-year-old rocker says. "I don't think any of us pictured doing it at this level, at this age. "How could you?" Musically, Hypnotic Eye is a throwback to early Heartbreakers albums; it's driving rock with a bluesy vibe. But lyrically, Petty says, it's very much about what's going on in America today. Petty recently spoke with NPR's Melissa Block about his long friendship with a late Beatle and why it pays to hear one's own music on a bad car stereo. Hear the radio version at the audio link an details

Paul McCartney is getting back to Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles on Sunday for the first time since he played there with The Beatles 48 years ago. This time around, let’s hope he has a better escape route planned. Back in 1966, his exit from Chavez Ravine went anything but smoothly. He and the rest of the Beatles — John Lennon, George Harrison and Ringo Starr — ended up trapped in a Lincoln Continental that was smothered fender-to-fender by a frenzied blanket of screaming, crying, pawing, clawing fans who desperately wanted to touch their idols. It was Sunday night, Aug. 28, 1966, and The Beatles were trying to make a break for it after playing for 45,000 people at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles. It was the first concert booked at the 4-year old ballpark and, though no one knew it at the time, the second-to-last show The Beatles would ever perform. After another stadium gig the following night at San Francisco’s Candlestick Park, their concert career was over. Westlake Village’s Bob Eubanks, who cut his teeth in radio at Oxnard’ details

Inspiration, passion, enthusiasm, motivation, engagement. Call it whatever you want, but in business you need it. Without it your team or organization is roadkill. As mentioned in a previous post, the lack of employee engagement in the workplace is astounding. Gallup, which tracks this on a regular basis, reports that only 13% of global workers are engaged in their work. Even worse, 24% of workers are “actively disengaged”—who are “liable to spread negativity to coworkers.” (We’ll discuss the costs of this in a moment.) The “engagement factor” is something the top rock bands have understood and consciously applied. I have previously written about the night that Pete Townshend and The Who discovered the secret in a London tavern in 1964. Subsequently their passionate performances drew young fans by the busload to their early gigs. But how John Lennon and The Beatles discovered the power of engagement is an even better story.

Lennon, when performing with the Quarry Men i details

Hindu leaders have joined fans of late Beatles starGeorge Harrison in calling for Los Angeles City officials to replant a tree tribute to the singer/songwriter after learning the pine that bore his name has died. The George Harrison Memorial Tree was planted in Griffith Park in 2004 in memory of Harrison, who was a follower of Hinduism, but the pine mysteriously died in June (14). U.S. Hindu leader Rajan Zed has urged Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti to investigate the reasons of the death of the tree and plant another immediately. Zed, who is President of Universal Society of Hinduism, tells Wenn, "I wonder why the City is taking so much time to replant a replacement tree in memory of such a well-known humanitarian and avid gardener, who lived in Los Angeles in his later years and died there.

"Insect infestation and California's ongoing drought are being given as the causes of death of this tree, which grew about 12 feet near Griffith Observatory." The plaque at the base of The George Harrison Memorial T details

The inaugural Sir Paul McCartney Day coincided with the former Beatles member's live show at the Target Field venue yesterday. The gig was only McCartney's fourth appearance in the state since 1965 and his first since a gig at the Metrodome in 1993. The Beatles first played Minnesota in 1965 at the Metropolitan Stadium. Governor of Minnesota, Mark Dayton, made the day official and an official proclamation of the occasion states that August 2 will see the state "come together to honour one of the most influential and inspiring musicians in history." In July McCartney resumed his Out There tour, after taking off almost two months following a virus.

The former Beatle played Times Union Centre in Albany, New York on July 5, telling the crowd "It's great to be back," and opening his three-hour long set with 'Eight Days A Week'. In May, McCartney was taken ill and hospitalised in Tokyo, Japan. He subsequently postponed a series of shows in Lubbock, Dallas, New Orleans, Atlanta, Jacks details

It might not be made of Norwegian Wood, but Beatles fans are expected to pay out thousands of pounds for the chance to own this old front door from Sir Paul McCartney's childhood home. The door, from the former Beatle's home in Forthlin Road, Liverpool, is up for auction as part of Christie's Out of the Ordinary sale on September 3 and is expected to fetch around £8,000. McCartney's family moved to the council house in 1956 and it is where the band first rehearsed and where early hits including Love Me Do and I Saw Her Standing There were written. The door was removed when the house was refurbished in 1978 and has passed through several hands before being offered for sale.

 The Forthlin Road house, which was bought by The National Trust in 1995, is included on a tour of Beatle's boyhood homes along with the house where Lennon lived with his Aunt Mimi. Other items in the sale include a sword reportedly used at the Battle of Hastings and a silver replica of Harrods that was made as a result of a bet between the store's managing directo details

An extra 300 seats have opened up for Paul McCartney’s much-anticipated performance at Washington-Grizzly Stadium. The newly available tickets are part of a block reserved by the former Beatle’s “Out There” tour that weren’t filled, said Brad Murphy, executive director of the Adams Center at the University of Montana. Most of the tickets are in the floor or bowl areas and cost $150 to $250, with a limited number of tickets still available at $49.50. Nearly 25,000 tickets sold the first day of availability, May 9. “We were down to just a few,” Adams Center executive director Brad Murphy said about ticket availability before. About half the tickets sold went to Missoulians, Murphy said, adding that everyone who stood in line at the Adams Center Box Office May 9 received a ticket. “Given the magnitude of this sale, we’ve had very few issues and I think that’s a real testament to our ticketing system and our staff,” he said.

While most of the tickets through GrizTix and vendors have been snapped up, t details

The team behind a new rock musical about John Lennon and Yoko Ono called Rock & Roll's Greatest Lovers are seeking funding for a concept album, a bigger stage production and a film version. A sold-out condensed version of the show ran at the 2014 Hollywood Fringe Festival. The show's IndieGoGo page explains: "Many people have asked, 'Dear John, Why Yoko?' This musical answers that question while taking you through their psychedelic, swinging, Romeo and Juliet romance." Rock & Roll's Greatest Lovers was conceived and written by former J-pop star Anzu Lawson, with music by Lawson and Joerg Stoeffel. The score includes "everything from groovy 60s sounds to rock ballads to anthems." Half-finished recording the concept album, the team aims next to cast and produce a short film Rock & Roll's Greatest Lovers was conceived and written by former J-pop star Anzu Lawson, with music by Lawson and Joerg Stoeffel. The score includes "everything from groovy 60s sounds to rock ballads to anthems." Half- details

AVALON, CATALINA ISLAND - Beatlemania swept the nation in 1964 after the Beatles appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show. Those crazed and hysterical fans - now in their sixties - continue to be as passionate about the Beatles today as they were in their teenage years. Two friends from Virginia recently proved how far they would go to view A Hard Day's Night and meet Pattie Boyd, former wife of George Harrison, when they traveled to Avalon for the Catalina Island Museum’s 50th anniversary screening of the film. For the record, the distance from Yorktown, VA to Catalina Island is approximately 2,357 miles. Linda Rody and her friend Billie spoke with Michael De Marsche, Executive Director of the Catalina Island Museum, during the book signing with Pattie Boyd that occurred after the screening of the film. The following is their story. "This past February my high school friend, Billie, reminded me of the fifty-year celebration of the Beatles arrival to the U.S.A. As I searched the Internet for news of the Beatles, I included Pattie Boyd in my search. I thought she might be interviewed somewhe details

Star Wars actor Mark Hamill enjoyed a Magical Mystery Tour while he was in Liverpool as he visited a series of The Beatles' landmarks. The actor, who plays Luke Skywalker, visited the city while he is in the UK and Ireland filming for the new Star Wars film. Sporting a Jedi Knight beard, he was seen in the Cavern Club and the Beatles museum at the Albert Dock, with several surprised fans sharing photos of the star on social media. Bill Irwin, Cavern Club General Manager, said: "Mark arrived at the Cavern Club around 10pm last night and seemed really happy to be in the Cavern , he and his his wife and two children and his friend seemed to really enjoy the atmosphere. "His son took real interest in the Merseybeatles who were playing because I later found out he is a real keen guitarist himself!

"Mark and I chatted for about an hour about the history of the Cavern and of course about the Beatles. He told me stories of when he met George Harrison and Ringo Starr. "His knowledge of the Beatles was to say the least amazing , dates , gigs , meetings, there wasn't much he didn't know, a r details