Beatles News

An ink sketch by Beatle John Lennon - drawn in a 'light-bulb moment' - is expected to sell for thousands of pounds in an online auction next month. The drawing has officially been valued at between £6,000 and £10,000, but an expert has said previous artistic works by Lennon have sold for £100,000 and that this offering could 'go through the roof'.

The double-sided doodle, which features surreal characters in red ink on both sides of a piece of paper, measuring five inches by ten, was hand-drawn by the late musician in 1964. Music memorabilia expert Ted Owen said: ‘What’s lovely about it is he’s obviously been sitting down at the dinner table or out to dinner somewhere, picked up a piece of paper and had an idea. ‘It’s the lightbulb moment. This took him into a whole different genre of being an artist.’ The front of the paper features three characters, including one smoking a cigarette. The reverse side has varying forms of head and face shapes. Similar characters appeared in Lenno details

“Valiant Paul McCartney, I presume?” said John Lennon. “Sir Jasper Lennon, I presume,” responded Paul McCartney. Such was the manner in which the two former Beatles greeted one another when McCartney showed up, unexpectedly, at a recording session Lennon was conducting on March 28, 1974.

In the throes of his “Lost Weekend” period, Lennon was in a Los Angeles studio overseeing production of Harry Nilsson’s Pussy Cats album. Present were a number of players – including Stevie Wonder, guitarist Jesse Ed Davis, saxophonist Bobby Keys and Nilsson himself. McCartney was accompanied by his wife, Linda. Lennon’s then-girlfriend, May Pang, was there as well. “We had no clue he was coming,” said Pang, referring to McCartney’s visit in Peter Ames Carlin’s recent McCartney biography, McCartney: A Life. “All of a sudden we turned around, and Paul was there.” So began the only instance in which, post-Beatles, Lennon and McCartney ever joined forces in t details

When Gordon McIntosh and his wife honeymooned in Torquay, little did they know that they would come face to face with The Beatles. 
Gordon's wife had seen The Beatles when they appeared in Hull in 1963.

During their stay in Torquay, they were near a hotel situated on a cliff top, and became aware of a brightly painted single decker bus. It turned out to be The Magical Mystery Tour bus that was being used in filming, with the Beatles on board. Gordon decided to find out where they were filming, determined to meet them and obtain their autographs for his wife. This turned out to be a Magical Mystery Tour for Gordon. He found the location was a large field. The set looked like a large tent from the front but there was no back to it and he watched as hundreds of film extras filed into the small tent. The bus came trundling into view and Gordon saw John Lennon on board looking out of the window. He rushed across and tapped on the window, mouthing to John, "Can I have your autograph?” 

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For more than four decades, a canister of film lay in a damp London garage, unopened and forgotten. Stacked among 64 other unmarked cans, it sat for decades gathering dust, without anyone suspecting the nine minutes of music gold that rested inside.

Then, after a chance look at a faded, scribbled label buried within the can, a long-lost interview with The Beatles was found. First broadcast on Scottish Television in April1964, the film footage captured the Fab Four being interviewed on ‘Roundup’, an hour-long children's current affairs programme on Scottish television network STV. Now, the Scottish public are being invited to view it in its entirety for the first time at theEdinburgh Filmhouse this weekend. “We think it may be the longest surviving television interview of the Beatles on record,” said John McVie, Media Coordinator for STV. “We have so little footage left of the 1960s, this is a rare chance for people to see this valuable interview.”

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George Harrison didn’t write ‘Something’ for his former wife Patti,learn where to freeze frame Monty Python’s Life of Brian to see him and who ended up winning the My Sweet Lord case? George Harrison answered all of those questions when I takes to him in 1993.

The highlight of my media career was definitely having the chance to interview George. He was funny, informative and up for a chat. Today November 29 marks the 12th anniversary of the death of the one we all called `the Quiet Beatle`. Here is a candid chat with Beatle George. Paul Cashmere: I’m going to start off by talking about movies. I don’t know how many times I’ve see “Monty Python’s Life of Brian,” in which you have a cameo. I’ve searched for your part, even on freeze frame. The problem with that movie is that everyone in it looks like George Harrison. Put me out of my misery. Where are you in it? George Harrison: Well if you’re looking for me, then everybody’s going to look like that. There’s just one little shot details

If your vibe is psychedelic free-jazz grooves set to experimental live movie projections, Sean Ono Lennon has your ticket to boogie with a limited-edition record from his new project called Mystical Weapons.

Teaming up with fellow multi-instrumentalist Shahzad Ismaily, drummer Greg Saunier (Deerhoof), and projection artist Martha Colburn, Mystical Weapons will release their new record on November 29th for Record Store Day. Entitled Crotesque, the 20-min one-sided album includes a live broadcast on WNYC's Spinning On Air from last January, with Side Two sporting an original screen-printed illustration by Sean Lennon. The record is a one-time pressing by Northern Spy Records and is limited to 1,500 units. Spy Music Festival here. WNYC's Garland wrote "Both Sean and Shahzad share electric guitars, basses, and keyboards. Martha Colburn handles her films the way a performing DJ handles records: using the projectors like turntables, the images are mixed and manipulated live, with visuals forming an essential component of the Mysti details

Mike Mitchell's photographs of the Beatles 1964 first U.S. concert in an exhibition entitled "Heading for the Light," are now on view and on sale in Taos, New Mexico, throughout 2014. These photos represent a defining moment in American pop culture and are a medium that enables art lovers an accessible way to collect art.

Mike Mitchell's photographs of the Beatles 1964 inaugural United States concert in an exhibition entitled “Heading for the Light,” will remain on view and on sale at David Anthony Fine Art in Taos throughout 2014. February 2014 marks the 50th anniversary of the Beatles first concert in America, which took place on February 11, 1964, at the Washington Coliseum. Mitchell, then 18-years-old, had been granted a press pass to the concert but had no flash available for his camera and therefore was forced to use existing light. Some of the resulting negatives, taken with low ambient light, were barely readable until the advancement of technology allowed their full realization. Today, Mitchell's dynamically nuanced images are appreci details

Most famous for her relationship with John Lennon, Yoko Ono has a considerable—if unusual—oeuvre of her own. In 1964, she performed Cut Piece, in which she appeared on stage draped with fabric that she invited audiences to snip away, leaving her nude.

Later, she made experimental films centered on human buttocks, and installed Wish Tree in the sculpture garden at the Museum of Modern Art. Maintaining an empty multimillion-dollar apartment in a Manhattan co-op building would seem a not-unlikely avant garde maneuver for Ms. Ono, and for years she did just that. Ms. Ono’s son Sean occupied the penthouse at 49 Downing Street, which Ms. Ono purchased in 1995, only briefly, but an October lawsuit against the co-op boardsuggested that the unit’s vacancy was not a performance art piece. (Ms. Ono claimed that the board arbitrarily blocked potential buyers because they preferred the penthouse empty, rather than occupied by a family with ch details

The Beatles archive collection On Air - Live at the BBC Volume 2 is just out. But there may be even more Fabs music in the vaults. “There are no plans at the moment,” says Kevin Howlett of Apple Corps. He tells Billboard , “I think these two albums [inc Volume 1] are wonderful from the point of view of presenting the real highlights of the Beatles' BBC sessions.”

The new BBC volume also contains a pair of songs The Beatles never recorded for release during their regular sessions for the E.M.I label - covers of Chuck Berry's “I’m Talking About You” and a revved-up version of the pop standard “Beautiful Dreamer.” You think The Beatles’ well must be dry by now? Maybe not. There are more Beatles archives being worked on, says Howlett. “There is something, but I don’t think we’re allowed to talk about it yet. If you’re involved in these Beatles projects, you have to be very discreet. It’s all top secret.”

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England got a lot more of The Beatles  than Americans did during the group's formative years. Between 1962 and 1965, The Beatles were featured on 53 BBC radio programs, including their own series, Pop Go the Beatles. They performed originals and covers and chatted with BBC hosts.

The Beatles: On Air-Live at the BBC Volume 2 has just been released. Kevin Howlett produced both that and the newly remastered reissue of the first volume, which was originally released in 1994. For reasons he explains to Fresh Air host Terry Gross , Howlett had to search for many of these recordings, and they weren't easy to find. Howlett has written a new companion book called The Beatles: The BBC Archives,which includes transcriptions of the band's BBC radio and TV interviews as well as fascinating internal memos about the Beatles and their music. My quest to restore the BBC archive [of the Beatles] goes way back to 1981 when I joined the national pop network in this country, BBC Radio 1, as a young rooki details

George Harrison was worth more than $300 million when he died in 2001, but the music legend's 82-year-old sister Louise Harrison now struggles to get by - living in a pre-fabricated home in small-town near Branson, Missouri.

Louise Harrison says she has been cut off from the family. While George left his widow Olivia and son Dhani the lavish Friar Park, a 120-room Victorian mansion in Henley-On-Thames just outside London, Louise is unable to support herself without working - managing a touring Beatles tribute band. However, displaying the quiet stoicism her family is famous for, Louise says she 'doesn't mind not living in a castle because she would rather be broke than live rich and heartless.' Gifted a $2,000-a-month pension by her brother for tax reasons in 1980 to help her get by, Louise found herself unceremoniously cut off by her brother's estate almost a year to the day after he died of complications from lung cancer in November 2001.

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FORMER newspaper editor Rebekah Brooks confessed to hacking Sir Paul McCartney's phone, the Old Bailey was told yesterday. The ex-boss of The Sun and now defunct News Of The World made the admission to the former wife of golf ace Colin Montgomerie, it was said.

She told Eimear Cook it was "easy" to illegally intercept the voicemails of celebrities, jurors heard. Mrs Cook, wed to former Ryder Cup captain Monty, 50, between 1990 and 2006, said she met Brooks for lunch in Knightsbridge, central London, in 2005. The engagement was arranged after she became the target of a "hatchet job" by papers including The Sun, she said. Mrs Cook, who has since remarried, added: "The bit I remember the most was her saying how easy it was to listen to people's voicemails. "She couldn't believe that famous people, that have all these advisors, that they don't know to change their PIN code to make their phone secure."

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Five Beatles fans who were photographed by Ringo Starr during the band's first US tour, finally met their idol almost 50 years later last weekend in Las Vegas. The friends were reunited last month, after answering Ringo's appeal for information on the teenagers he captured in a snapshot he took in New York City in February 1964.