Beatles News
The world's largest and longest-running Beatles festival returns to Liverpool this month.
International Beatleweek will see Fab Four fans from around 40 countries worldwide, including Brazil, Russia, the US, Spain, and the Netherlands, converge on Merseyside for the seven-day event, organised by Cavern City Tours.
Live music will be on all day everyday at the historic Cavern Club and Cavern Pub with 70 bands from over 20 countries taking the stage. The festival will run from August 23 to 29.
International Beatleweek is an annual celebration in Liverpool of John, Paul, George, and Ringo and their rise to being the world's most commercially successful band. Events will be staged across the city including at the Philharmonic Hall, Adelphi Hotel, and the Yoko Ono Lennon Centre.
Highlights include the annual Beatles Convention which has taken place since 1981 and will be at the Adelphi Hotel Hotel on Sunday, August 27. On Monday, there will be an 80th birthday tribute to George Harrison and a celebration of fifty years of Paul McCartney's classic album, Band On The Run.
While you can buy individual tickets to events, packages are also available that include accommodation in hotels across the city. Packages range from £290 to £550 and include access to different concerts and shows. If you already have somewhere to stay in the city you can buy the 'Just the Tickets' package ranges from £135 to £245.
Source: James McNeill/liverpoolecho.co.uk
The Beatles are one of the biggest bands in the world, and whether you’re young or old, you’ve probably heard multiple songs of theirs such as Hey Jude. We’re going to test your knowledge and tell you some of The Beatles facts: do you really know the iconic band? When you think of The Beatles, you don’t think of failure or rejection, but they had quite a bit of that in the early days. In particular, Decca Records, a British label, had rejected them in 1962 saying that the guitars that they were using weren’t going to be popular for much longer. Decca passed on them and chose to sign Brian Poole featuring the Tremeloes instead.
Source: Florence Howard/musicgrotto.com
Frank Sinatra called 'Something, The Beatles' iconic ballad, "one of the best love songs I believe to be written in the past fifty or a hundred years.". It's widely regarded as one of The Beatles' most beautiful songs.
'Something' featured on The Beatles' 1969 penultimate album Abbey Road, and has captured the imaginations of listeners ever since.
Famously written by George Harrison, he usually had to tussle with John Lennon and Paul McCartney to get his songs included in the band's albums.
Outstanding songs like 'While My Guitar Gently Weeps' and 'Something' couldn't be ignored, because of their sheer quality, becoming fan favourites and instant classics.
Given its romantic nature, it was often thought that Harrison wrote the song about his then-wife Pattie Boyd.
Source: Thomas Curtis-Horsfall/goldradiouk.com
The Beatles sparked public outrage when they received MBEs. Here's what former recipients had to say about it when they sent theirs back.
In 1965, all four members of The Beatles received MBEs, or Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire medals. The honor surprised them, but it outraged some members of the public. People were sharply divided on whether The Beatles deserved the award. Former MBE recipients didn’t know what to make of it, either. Some were so upset that they sent their MBEs back in disgust.
When The Beatles received MBEs, people couldn’t believe the musicians got the honor. Papers and media outlets debated whether or not they deserved them, with many outlets covering the story with scorn. Many previous MBE recipients felt the same way. George Read, a member of the Coast Guard, wrote a letter to the palace.
Source: Emma McKee/cheatsheet.com
In The Beatles' early career, George Harrison didn't think about writing songs. His bandmates Paul McCartney and John Lennon had that covered. However, eventually, George felt he could write hits that were just as good. He didn't get much encouragement from his bandmates, but once he started writing tunes, he couldn't stop. Whether George could get his songs on The Beatles' albums was a different story.
22. 'Don't Bother Me' – With The Beatles
After realizing he could write songs like John and Paul, George wrote "Don't Bother Me" as an experiment to see if he actually could. It was his first song, so it wasn't the best. George even said it wasn't, but at least he proved he could be just as good as his bandmates.
21. 'You Like Me Too Much' – Help!
"You Like Me Too Much" is one of George's most forgotten Beatles songs. The verses seem like one long run-on sentence and sound as if it's a mouthful to sing. It's melodyless until the brief chorus, which sounds much like the first verse of "I Don't Want To Spoil The Party."
20. 'I Need You' – Help!
"I Need You" is an unimaginative love song. In the mountain of Beatles love songs, it's indistinguishable and unoriginal. George wrote it for his then-girlfriend, Pattie Boyd. It has a catchy melody, but in terms of lyrics and subject, it's pretty simple.
Source: msn.com
The Beatles have a back catalogue like no other. Their biggest hits have become part of our collective DNA, while many of their lesser-known have influenced countless musicians from every genre down the decades.
Yet even The Beatles have songs that have been overlooked, dismissed or just overshadowed by their more famous counterparts. Some of those date from their earlier days, when the speed of their rise tended to obscure the majesty of some of the tracks that only appeared on their album. Others date from the period after they stopped touring to pour every ounce of their creative energy into the studio.
These under-appreciated gems range from bristling rockers to downbeat ballads, shapeshifting rock operas to pure pop gems. Here they are, the 20 Beatles songs that deserve way more love than they get.
Source: Rob Hughes/loudersound.com
John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr are four of the most famous musicians to ever live. But how did these Beatles members ever come together in the first place?
The Beatles were one of the most iconic rock bands of all time. They created chaos at their shows because their fans were so obsessed. They sold millions of records, quickly becoming the most famous band in the world during their decade-long stint in the 1960s. And, like many other rock stars, they had their share of falling outs with one another.
These days, only two Beatles remain alive: Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr. But the legacy the The Beatles as a group have left behind is one that modern music will never forget. With that said, how did these ultra-famous Beatles members ever come together in the first place?
Source: Julia Mullaney/cheatsheet.com
The latest title in a notable series on The Beatles’ recorded output is coming from author Bruce Spizer. The Beatles Please Please Me to With The Beatles, the author’s 15th title on the band, arrives October 17, 2023, via 498 Productions. The 9″ x 9″ hardcover book, matching the other books in Spizer’s acclaimed Beatles album series, is 272 pages and contains over 290 color and original black and white images. It’s available to pre-order in the U.S. here and the U.K. here, or via the Amazon links below.
From the announcement: Please Please Me and With The Beatles, along with their associated singles, introduced the Beatles first to England and then to several countries across the world, including Canada and the United States. Although often overlooked due to the excellence of the group’s later albums, these early albums contain the exciting songs that fueled Beatlemania. These albums showcased the songwriting talents of John Lennon and Paul McCartney, as well as incredible cover versions of songs from the group’s stage show. Had the Beatles not evolved and matured, the group would still be well respected for the quality of the recordings on these two albums. In addition to the usual chapters on the British, American and Canadian perspectives, the book contains chapters on the Decca audition and the EMI artists test session. There are also chapters on the recording sessions and album covers, as well as on the news, music and films of the era to place these albums in their proper context.
Source: Best Classic Bands Staff/bestclassicbands.com
Paul McCartney and John Lennon held a great deal of respect for one another. This didn't extend to everyone else who worked with The Beatles.
Paul McCartney and John Lennon worked closely together for years. While they had two other bandmates, multiple sound engineers, a manager, and a producer to assist them, they primarily relied on one another. While producer George Martin had a say over how their albums sounded, they reportedly never treated him with the same respect they showed one another. According to a Beatles audio engineer.
In the early 1960s, Lennon and McCartney had a close working relationship. As the decade wore on, they wrote songs separately, but they were one another’s primary ally for years.
“During playbacks, John and Paul would often huddle together and discuss whether a take was good enough; they’d talk about what they were hearing and what they wanted to fix or do differently,” engineer Geoff Emerick recalled in his book Here, There and Everywhere: My Life Recording the Music of the Beatles. “John wasn’t casual about making records, not in the early years, anyway. Still, it was Paul who was always striving to get things the best that they could possibly be.”
Source: Emma McKee/cheatsheet.com
John Lennon said working with The Beatles was torturous. He shared what it was like to be a member of the famous band.
John Lennon was vocally frustrated with The Beatles, decrying his bandmates and the albums they made together. At the start of the 1960s, they worked closely and excitedly together. By the second half of the decade, though, the four Beatles were no longer as eager to collaborate. According to Lennon, working on albums became torturous.
Shortly after The Beatles finished recording Let It Be, Lennon spoke about the slog of working with his bandmates.
“We were going through hell,” he told The Village Voice (via Gold Radio UK). “We often do. It’s torture every time we produce anything.”
While they were the most popular band of the era, Lennon said that there was no magic in what they did. It was all hard, painful work, particularly as they worked on their final albums.
Source: Emma McKee/cheatsheet.com
