Beatles FAQ

Worldwide sales of physical singles are difficult estimate accurately but we can say the following.

In 1962 Brian Epstein was the best man hastily arranged wedding of John Lennon and Cynthia Powell in Liverpool. 

The 'Paul is Dead' rumour began in early 1967. The Abbey Road cover photo provided new 'clues.' 

  The most famous photo in the history of pop music was what artists call a 'happy accident'. 

"Nobody wanted to play bass in those days."

  We were first introduced in about 1974 by Elizabeth Taylor. 

Wedding photo

  "one of the Beatles most dispensable items". [8] Run for Your Life’ I always hated ... John Lennon Lennon Remembers (1971

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  “We’ve just come across... the most weird song.  I’ve no recollection of ever recording it.” George Harrison Anthology

For a drummer who supposedly could not sing, Ringo was frequently called upon to carry a tune.

None of The Beatles were keen linguists. Though they did learn some very basic, functional German while in Hamburg, they were resolutely English in their approach to pronunciation, intonation and attempting to mimic accent.  

Four years after his recording debut, David Bowie had still made little progress. Despite a name change and several changes of musical style he remained a fringe figure. Convinced that Deram (Decca) was mismanaging his career, Bowie was looking for a new label. In the spring of  1968 The Beatles returned from India and and announced the formation of Apple Records, a new label for ‘creatives’. Bowie immediately instructed his then manager, Kenneth Pitt, to submit an audition tape. As a signed artist with a major label, he might have expected his offering to advance to the top of the pile. Unfortunately, however Apple's offer had backfired. The new label was besieged by aspiring musicians, managers, agents, artists, and hucksters. All were clamouring for an audition.    A further complication was that the new label would only recruit new talent with the agreement of all four (endlessly squabbling) Beatles. The office filled with a  mountain of demo tapes. From ...

When he was thirteen, George was admitted to hospital with what turned out to be a minor kidney problem. As with Ringo, a spell on the children’s ward was the catalyst for obtaining his first musical instrument.  To cheer up his sick son, Harry Harrison agreed to buy a classmate’s Dutch Egmond flat-top acoustic guitar. Dutch Egmond Acoustic — George Harrison’s first guitar What George would later describe as a ‘cheapo, a horrible little guitar’ had a selling price of £3 ($4). This was a large sum for a poorly paid bus driver, though it would prove an inspired long-term investment.  In 2003 it was sold for $800,000 at auction. Progression The 'cheapo' Egmond proved very difficult to master. Louise Harrison observed her son's painful struggle with it. George tried to teach himself [the guitar]. But he wasn’t making much headway. ‘I’ll never learn this,’ he used to say. I said, ‘You will, son, you will. Just keep at it.’ Early progress was also hampered by an ill advised exper...

  A special Christmas present

I wrote that in my front parlour in Forthlin Road. I was about 16. 

 The Beatles' record sales dwarfed those of Bob Dylan. In terms of musical influence the relationship was inverse. Paul McCartney has descrbeded the guru master relationship:  “He was our idol... I could feel myself climbing a spiral walkway as I was talking to Dylan. I felt like  I was figuring it all out, the meaning of life.” Despite this adulation, Paul was clear-sighted about incorporating elements of Dylan's approach into his own songwriting. These included  expanding the guitar band template.   the invention of different personas to narrate songs (e.g Sergeant Pepper, She's Leaving Hom)  combining musical styles (country rock etc) ambiguous narration (Hey Jude, She's Leaving Home) inventing new folk tales (Eleanor Rigby, Penny Lane) expanding the range of vocabulary McCartney did not, however, abandon his general adherence to the American songbook AABA format. Nor did he adopt the more acerbic tone associated with songs like Positively Fourth St...

  In Glass Onion John Lennon writes 'Here's another clue for you all/The Walrus was Paul'. What did he mean?

By the late summer of 1964, the Lennon & McCartney song factory was running low on stock for the new album due before Christmas. Trapped in an exhausting touring and recording schedule, they lacked the time and the energy to create high quality new material.

Of all the women who married a Beatle, Maureen Starkey came closest to fulfilling the job description as seen my the average fan. Not mildly posh (Cynthia, Patty) or intimidatingly foreign (Linda and Yoko) she seemed to have risen from the ranks of the fans.  While the future Mrs Ono-Lennon claimed to have somehow missed Beatlemania, Maureen had been there from the outset - and had the bruised shins from rivals to prove it. If the dream was to to be serenaded by a Fab -then she was living it. Only that was never the deal Chez Starkey. Though well suited in fundamental respects, their record collections were mutually exclusive. Ringo was rock and roll man - with a long standing sideline in country and western. Maureen was much more old school - a lover of crooners  swept both her homeland and her adopted one. Her story is that she arrived in  It is true that her modernist musical set - John Cage and company - were not believed to be first first in line at Shea Stadium. It'...

Designer Robin Cruikshank was doing work for Apple in 1969 at a time when the Starkeys were abandoning the suburbs for north London. Ringo was impressed by Cruikshank's steel and glass work and invited him to designing some pieces for hiss new Hampstead/Highgate home.  The two men got on so well that they formed a company ROH — with Starr/Starkey owning 51% to Cruickshank’s 49%. Admittedly, Ringo’s investment was in relative terms small change dropped down his soon to be discarded old school sofa but it was another indication of the depth of his new interest. Blue Peter Ringo’s design contribution is unclear — he had no formal training but seems to have provided conceptual ideas — one being inspired by a visit to his local car showroom. Why not set the grille of a Rolls Royce into a stainless steel table? In addition to his investment and ideas, Ringo was an enthusiastic front man for the company in its early years. In 1971 he made a famous appearance on Blue Peter, in an unlikely ...

George Harrison and Paul McCartney first met while at secondary school.

  The first two Beatles albums included around 40% of songs covered from other artists. These were mostly taken directly from their live act. 

First Ed Sullivan appearance - public domain The Beatles fly from London Heathrow to New York on 7 February, 1964 More than 10,000 girls are waiting - a major news event.

In late September 1963 George Harrison becomes the first Beatle to visit America. Map artwork by Jane Samson

  None of The Beatles had a background in classical music. 

Always intensely competitive, The Beatles monitored the output of their rivals closely. None came close to matching their commercial success. Why Dylan loomed large For The Beatles record sales this was not the only criteria that mattered. Above all, they wanted to impress their peers: especially those young people in Liverpool and London who were also avid readers of the music press, buyers of imported records and habitues of the coolest clubs.   Of their direct competitors, Bob Dylan loomed largest. Lennon later conceded that their British rivals never felt like too much of a threat. They liked The  Stones, The Who and the Kinks and would sometimes borrow their innovations - the guitar sound on You Really Got Me for, for example. But they never doubted that they would lose their top spot in the NME poll. Dylan was different. For a start, he was American and this automatically gave his status an uplift. They believed him to be authentic In some respects he represented mu...

The first meeting of The Beatles and Bob Dylan was in a room at the Delmonico Hotel in New York on Friday 28 August 1964.

John Lennon was very short-sighted but in his teens refused to wear spectacles in public.

 John Lennon was later embarrassed about the source of one of his contributions to the Abbey Road medley. It was based on a newspaper story he read early in 1967.