The Beatles' Marathon 'Please Please Me' Session, Hour by Hour

The last notes of "Please Please Me" still hung in the stale air of EMI's Studio Two on November 26th, 1962, when George Martin's disembodied voice crackled over the talkback from the control room above. "Gentlemen," he addressed his young moptopped charges, "I think you've made your first Number One." The veteran producer had a finely tuned ear for hits, but it would be several months before the Beatles rode their second single to the top of the charts. Released on January 11th, the song received an unexpected boost from Mother Nature the following week. The winter of 1963 was one of the most brutal in England's history, and the record-breaking cold forced many to spend their Saturday night at home in front of the television, just in time to catch the band making one of their earliest national broadcast appearances on ITV's pop-music program Thank Your Lucky Stars.

Source: Jordan Runtagh/rollingstone.com

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