Beatles News

The modern day's most popular psychedelic surrealists, the Flaming Lips, covered the Sixties' most popular psychedelic song, "Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds," as part of The Late Show With David Letterman's Beatles Week last night. Moreover, they did it with a little help from their friend Sean Lennon.

The Lips had previously shared their own, six-minute audio rendition of the song via frontman Wayne Coyne's Instagram, but, as with every Flaming Lips song, the visual element makes it so much better. On Letterman, Coyne wore a frilly silver coat and stood atop a road case, waving his arms like a born-again prophet, with ribbons colored with pastel pink and green lights flowed from him. Lennon, sporting the same hat and beard his dad wore on the album sleeve for Hey Jude, stood to Coyne's left and swayed as he sang of "cellophane flowers." When the chorus finally hit, so did the glitter, as thousands of tiny silver particles (diamonds?) rained over the musicians and Coyne's ribbon ligh details

A new exhibit at the New York Public Library shows how Beatle mania swept the country when the Fab Four stepped off a plane at JFK and onto the stage of the Ed Sullivan Show. It's hard to believe but Ed Sullivan famously said, "Ladies and gentleman, The Beatles" a half century ago. They're also the name of a new exhibit at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. It was organized by the Grammy museum to show the impact of the Beatles on American culture.

"It's a trip back for some people back in time 50 years ago when they were teenagers but it's also meant to show teenagers today how the Beatles continue to impact us because they do," says The Grammy Museum Executive Director Bob Santelli. "You can really learn a lot here and you can just remember and you can remember how wonderful it was for yourself," says New York Public Library for the Performing Arts Executive Director Jaqueline Davis. And for fans who thinks they've seen it all? "They didn't. Because what we did for this exhibit was find a photographer who has never befo details

Of course there were the thousands of screaming teenage girls who loved them — yeah, yeah, yeah. But when the four Beatles first landed in New York in early February 1964 — here for “The Ed Sullivan Show” and a few other performances — they each got some more personal attention from some ladies.

John Lennon was traveling with his then-wife, Cynthia. Paul McCartney had the company of Jane Asher. And Ringo Starr seemed to meet a pretty young dancer during a night out at one of New York City’s hottest clubs, the Peppermint Lounge. George Harrison? Just a couple weeks shy of his 21st birthday, he had his older sister, Louise, along. And, as it turned out, he was lucky he did. The band had just been in Paris, prior to flying to New York from England, and when they got in, Louise tells The Post, “George had a temperature of 104 degrees and a really, really bad strep throat.” The house doctor at the Plaza, where The Beatles were staying, was consulted and, recalls Louise, he said: “We need to put this guy in the hospital. He&r details

A section of stage wall from the Beatles' February 9, 1964 appearance on the Ed Sullivan Show is valued at $800,000-1m ahead of a sale at Heritage Auctions in Dallas on April 26.

The band's appearance on the show marked their introduction to American audiences and the response was frenzied. The 16 x 48 inch fibreglass piece was signed by all four members prior to the show, with each drawing a caricature of themselves next to their autograph, and was later presented to a young fan. Garry Shrum, consignment director of music memorabilia at Heritage Auctions, is left in no doubt as to the significance of the piece, commenting: "There is no more important band in rock and roll than The Beatles and there was no moment more important in solidifying their worldwide popularity than the moment they played Ed Sullivan on Feb. 9, 1964. "Now, almost 50 years to the day since it was signed, this piece has emerged from private hands and is looking to take its rightful place as the single-most important piece of Beatles memorabilia in existence. "Holy details

If it hadn’t been for Johnny Depp, Paul McCartney might never have won a Grammy for Best Rock Song with the surviving members of Nirvana. That’s precisely what happened a little over a week ago at the 56th Annual Grammy Awards, when the former Beatle ended up onstage with Dave Grohl, Krist Novoselic and Pat Smear to accept the hardware for their collaboration, “Cut Me Some Slack.”

“I blame Johnny Depp,” McCartney explained to a group of reporters gathered at the Staples Center’s media room. “Because he’d just given me this little cigar box guitar, which I was wildly excited about, so I took it along [to the studio].” McCartney’s instrument selection wasn’t the only aspect of the recording session that traces back to the film industry. The idea for the entire collaboration grew out of Sound City, a 2013 documentary on the California recording studio of the same name. Sound City Studios, founded in 1969 and shuttered in 2011, was played host to some of the top musical acts details

Feb. 5, 2014 - Candice “Candy” Leonard is a first-generation Beatle fan with a PhD in Sociology.  So not only does she still carry the Beatles in her heart, but she can explain what she calls the ‘joyful trauma’ experienced by millions of other Fab Four fans in her forthcoming book, Beatleness: How the Beatles and Their Fans Remade the World.

Beatleness tells how the Beatles’ constant presence throughout 1960s transformed the childhood and adolescence of millions of American kids and how, through these kids, the Beatles “changed everything.”  Based on hundreds of hours of in-depth fan interviews, the book offers a thoroughly fresh approach to the Beatles’ impact on the fans and the culture, and explains the unique feeling of connection first-generation fans still feel toward the band. Candy Leonard received her BA in Communications from Queens College, MA in Developmental Psychology from Teachers College, Columbia, and PhD from University of NH.  She has taught sociology details

As the District prepares for the 50th anniversary celebration of the Beatles’ first concert in the United States, which happened to be right up the street from CQ Roll Call HQ at Uline Arena, chairs from the venue are being raffled off to benefit the DC Preservation League.

On Feb. 11, the league and Douglas Development, which owns the arena, will present a tribute concert to the Fab Four’s Feb. 11, 1964, show at the arena. The tribute band Beatlemania will play the Beatles’ set list from that night, as well as other favorites. Five pairs of the arena’s wooden bleacher-style chairs will be raffled off at the concert. Raffle tickets are $20 each and can be purchased online. To buy tickets to the event, The arena, located at Third and M streets Northeast, was built in 1941 and is a designated DC landmark that has been listed in the National Register of Historic Places. On a normal day, it’s used primarily as a parking lot.

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The Beatles were photographed by National Geographic photographer Fred Ward during their first U.S. concert on Feb. 11, 1964, at the Washington Coliseum in D.C. Ward's Beatles photos, including rare color performance shots like this one, will be on display Feb. 9 in Camarillo. 

Beatles fans who want to go the extra mile -- literally -- to mark the 50th anniversary of the Fab Four’s storming of America can hop on the 101 Freeway on Sunday and head to Camarillo for an exhibition of some rare and in some cases previously unpublished photos of the group’s first U.S. concert in Washington, D.C., on Feb. 11, 1964. Fred Ward, a National Geographic photographer and writer, was on freelance assignment and covered the Beatles’ arrival by train in Washington two days after their barnstorming debut performance Feb. 9, 1964, on “The Ed Sullivan Show.” Previously, Ward had been photographing high level political figures including President Kennedy, First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy and Cuban details

On Thursday, the Morrison Hotel Gallery on Prince Street in SoHo will open a photography show celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Beatles coming to the U.S. What separates this exhibit from other events of its ilk? It was curated by Julian Lennon, the son of John Lennon and Cynthia Powell and a photographer in his own right. (He is also represented by the Morrison Hotel Gallery, who put on his first exhibition in New York.)

The 50th anniversary had come up several times with Mr. Lennon but "it was all seeming too much of a muchness, you know?" he said the other day in a phone conversation from Europe before a several-day trip to Kenya and Ethiopia as part of his White Feather Foundation. "It was not only impossible to figure out who was doing this, that and the other, but I just decided to take a backseat and send my best wishes and love that way." Then Timothy White, a photographer and a partner at the Morrison Hotel Gallery, came to Mr. Lennon with an idea to peruse a few hundred photos of his dad with the Beatles, pick out 25 or maybe 50, beca details

50 years after the Beatles first came to America John still appears to be the most Popular Beatle, an online survey over the past 3 years of real Beatles Fans at eCommerce site Fan Four Store has the standings as they have been for many decades John, Paul, George, and Ringo in this poll with nearly 9999 votes counted.

John is in first spot (3534 vote(s) - 35.8%) , followed very closely by Paul (3427 vote(s) - 34.7%) with George 3rd (2005 vote(s) - 20.3%) and of course Ringo in 4th place(906 vote(s) - 9.2%) when this story was posted www.fabfourstore.com had registered 9872 vote(s)... they are hoping for 9999 votes by this Friday the 7th Feb 50 years after the Beatles first landed in America , vote today on the home page at this Exclusively Beatles Store on the web.

BEATLES POLL