Category Archives: Beatles

Beatles, Bob Dylan, Music et al, Music of the 60s

1964 Bob Dylan Introduced Beatles

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1964 Bob Dylan Introduced Beatles

The narrator above refers to August 30, but it was…

August 28, 1964

1964 Bob Dylan Introduced Beatles

1964 Bob Dylan Introduced Beatles

She Loves You

The Beatles initial successes were great pop songs that many youth fell in love with at the same time they themselves were looking to fall in love. She Loves You, I Want to Hold Your Hand, Please Please Me, I Feel Fine, She’s a Woman, and We Can Work It Out are all loves songs. Some happier than others.

Someone once told me, if it’s a happy Beatle song, Paul wrote it; a sad one, John. While a generalization, it’s more often true than not.

1964 Bob Dylan Introduced Beatles

Maggie’s Farm

When I first heard Bob Dylan’s “I Ain’t Gonna’ Work on Maggie’s Farm No More” I was only a touch less confused about its lyrics than “Gates of Eden,” a song I had no idea what was happening other than Dylan was trying to harmonize with songs the lonesome sparrow sang.

Maggie’s Farm? Well there’s a guy obviously praying for rain, getting terribly underpaid, and whose boss is putting out his cigar on the guy’s face. I’d quit too.

Of course, that’s not what Dylan was saying. He was saying he wasn’t going to be the acoustic-folk-protest song-singer too many expected him to permanently be. Quitting. He was going  electric. And on July 25, 1965 he did just that at the Newport Folk Festival.

Many were displeased.

1964 Bob Dylan Introduced Beatles

August 28, 1964

The Beatles had begun their first full American tour on August 18 at the San Francisco Cow Palace. Ten days later they played for 16,000 fans at the Forest Hills Stadium in Queens, New York City. They would do the same the next night.

It was what happened in between that changed history.

1964 Bob Dylan Introduced Beatles

Al Aronowitz

Al Aronowitz was a writer who knew Bob Dylan and arranged for him to meet the Beatles at their hotel the night after that first concert.

Aronowitz later wrote: “The Beatles’ magic was in their sound,…Bob’s magic was in his words. After they met, the Beatles’ words got grittier, and Bob invented folk-rock.”

Cannabis may have been the source of all that musical cross pollination at that meeting. Beatles supposed unfamiliarity with the herb apparently surprised the already familiar Mr Dylan. [The four had tried it in Germany, but it did not impress them.]

Evidently, Ringo was unfamiliar with the not-Bogarting-that-joint protocol and kept things to himself. John, Paul, and George soon learned the etiquette.

1964 Bob Dylan Introduced Beatles

1965

  • March 27,  Dylan released Bringing It All Back Home on which “Maggie’s Farm” appears.
  • The Byrds’ covering of Dylan, particularly “Mr Tambourine Man” opened the door for folk-rock.
  • July 25, 1965 Dylan played Newport Folk Festival. Many in audience booed his performance for playing electric set with The Paul Butterfield Blues Band.
  • August 30, 1965,  Dylan released Highway 61 Revisited. More electric.
  • August 28, 1965 Dylan played at NYC’s Forest Hills Tennis Stadium. More boos during his electric set.
  • December 3, 1965 the Beatles released Rubber Soul. The course of pop music changed.
1964 Bob Dylan Introduced Beatles
1964 Bob Dylan Introduced Beatles
Beatles

Beatles Brian Epstein Dies

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Beatles Brian Epstein Dies

August 27, 1967

As a teenage Beatle fan, the name Brian Epstein seemed to hover around the band’s news, but who he was, what he was, what he did was not nearly as important as waiting for their next song or album and hearing about them.

Beatles Brian Epstein Dies

The Beginning of Brian

Brian Samuel Epstein was born on September 19, 1934. The Epstein family owned a furniture store and next to it was The North End Road Music Store [NEMS]. The Epsteins later expanded and took over NEMS.

Brian started to work at the family furniture store when he was 16 and became a good salesman. He wanted to be an actor, though, and convinced his parents to let him join the Royal Academy for Dramatic Arts to learn acting.

His aspirations did not meet the skills necessary and he returned to the family business.

Beatles Brian Epstein Dies

Brian Meets the Beatles

Epstein’s father put Brian in charge of a new NEMS store. The store carried pianos, radios AND it had records. The store’s record department was so successful that another NEMS store opened again with Brian in charge.

Epstein’s store also sold Mersey Beat, a magazine that covered the local music scene. He himself became interested in that scene and began to contribute a column to it in August 1961.

Fortune smiled on this scene as Epstein’s latest store was just around the corner from a local venue called The Cavern. He heard that a band called the Beatles were very popular and played there regularly.

On November 9, 1961 he decided to see what all their fans’ and the band’s youthful ruckus was all about.

From Epstein’s autobiography: “I was immediately struck by their music, their beat, and their sense of humour on stage – and, even afterwards, when I met them, I was struck again by their personal charm. And it was there that, really, it all started.”

Beatles Brian Epstein Dies

Brian Beatles Come Together

Beatles and Epstein agreed in principle that he would manage them a month later and on January 24, 1962 the five of them signed a contract. Well, technically, all but Brian signed. He reportedly said later he did not sign because, “…if they ever want to tear it up, they can hold me but I can’t hold them.”

Beatles Brian Epstein Dies 1967

Beatles Brian Epstein Dies

Brian + Beatles = Beatlemania

During 1962, Epstein’s guidance, perseverance, and unwavering belief in their talent pushed the Beatles through the media’s gauntlet toward success.

  • They signed a record contract on June 4.
  • Ringo replaced Pete Best on August 18
  • The four recorded together for the first time on September 4.
  • They released their first single (“Love Me Do”) on October 5.
  • January 11, 1963 they released “Please Please Me”
  • “Please Please Me”#1 in the UK on February 22, 1963
  • In November the newspapers used the word Beatlemania.
Beatles Brian Epstein Dies

Brian Epstein Dies

From the Epstein site: During the time Brian managed the Beatles…their career trajectory was meteoric. There was not a single reversal of fortune in the entire 5 3/4 years. Once he died the Beatles became embroiled in a tangle of conflicts, money squabbles and personal jealousies. They had lost the one man who united them and who was capable of resolving their differences.

…Brian [had taken]…care of every aspect of the Beatles’ career. When he died the difference was immediately felt. While the Beatles continued to make magnificent music, their business affairs rapidly crumbled. Within two years of Brian’s death the end of the Beatles was clearly in sight. By 1970 it was all over.

Beatles Brian Epstein Dies
Beatles, Music et al, Music of the 60s

Paul McCartney Hey Jude

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Paul McCartney Hey Jude

Released August 26, 1968

Paul McCartney Hey Jude

The Smile Orchestra playing ukulele, melodika (pianica), piano and e-bass.
Paul McCartney Hey Jude

Iconic notes

Some song’s first notes are so embedded in our lives that hearing them immediately transport us to a place, a time, a person, an era.

For me, the Beatles “Hey Jude” is one of those songs. It is late August 1968, just before going away to college for the first time and leaving behind the tanned friendship-ringed beautiful girlfriend whose September letters will only made me make more homesick. “Don’t make it bad.”

Paul McCartney Hey Jude

John and Cynthia on the verge

Just a year before in August 1967 the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi had enchanted the Beatles. On their group trip to see him, John had left behind Cynthia struggling with luggage to keep up at the station. She missed the train and  had to get a car ride to the site.

John Lennon had met Yoko Ono in November 1966 and they began a friendship that blossomed into a close relationship when the two recorded Two Virgins on May 19, 1968 while Cynthia was away on a vacation.

Cynthia Lennon had discovered the two of them together after coming home early from that vacation.  They separated that month and John sued for divorce accusing Cynthia of adultery, an accusation she denied.

On August 22, 1968, Cynthia counter-sued. Lennon did not contest the divorce. It became official on November 8, 1968.

Paul McCartney Hey Jude

Hey Jules

In June Paul McCartney  visited Cynthia and Julian Lennon. Though she was now separated, Paul and she had been friends since 1957 when Paul joined the Quarrymen and she was already John’s girlfriend.  Paul thought of Julian and in the car on his way out wrote the lines, “Hey Jules [Julian], don’t make it bad, take a sad song and make it better.”

Paul would later change the name to Jude.

A month later, on July 26, Paul played it for the first time to John. John loved it from the beginning.

Paul McCartney Hey Jude

Hey Jude

The Beatles recorded the song over four days: July 29 – 31 July and 1 August.

According to the Beatles Bible site the personnel were:

  • Paul McCartney: vocals, piano, bass
  • John Lennon: backing vocals, acoustic guitar
  • George Harrison: backing vocals, electric guitar
  • Ringo Starr: backing vocals, drums, tambourine
  • Uncredited: 10 violins, 3 violas, 3 cellos, 2 double basses, 2 flutes, 2 clarinets, 1 bass clarinet, 1 bassoon, 1 contrabassoon, 4 trumpets, 2 horns, 4 trombones, 1 percussion
Paul McCartney Hey Jude

August 26, 1968

Apple released “Hey Jude” August  26 in the US [Aug 20 in the UK].  “Revolution” was the B-side.

It reached number one on September 28 and stayed there for nine weeks, the longest time a Beatles single was at number one. It was also the longest-playing single to reach number one.

“Hey Jude” was the 16th number-one hit for Beatles in America, They would eventually have 20, the most of any group.

Paul McCartney Hey Jude

4 September 1968

The Beatles asked Michael Lindsay-Hogg to film a promotion for the song. He had done the same for “Paperback Writer” in 1966. The idea was to film it in front of a live audience, albeit, a selected one.

David Frost played the part of an MC and introduced the band as ““the greatest tea-room orchestra in the world”.” The audience is not seen at first and the two-tiered  orchestra, seen during the playful introductions during which the Beatles also briefly play Elvis’s “It’s Now or Never.”  Frost plays it straight and doesn’t crack a smile.

After the last chorus, the cameras pan back and suddenly the Beatles are surrounded by that unheard audience. Now, though, they clap along and sing the famous “Naa naa naa na na na naaa….”

They settled on the idea of filming with a live, albeit controlled audience. In the film, the Beatles are first seen by themselves, performing the initial chorus and verses, and then are joined by the audience who appear as the last chorus concludes and coda begins; the audience sings and claps along with the Beatles through the song’s conclusion. Hogg shot the film at Twickenham Film Studios on 4 September 1968,

Paul McCartney Hey Jude