Beatles FAQ

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 an early stage

  None of The Beatles had a background in classical music. 

Even at the height of his fame, Paul McCartney enjoyed writing songs for other artists, especially female singers. Often, he did this unbidden, offering Cilla Black Step Inside Love for her first TV show, for example. He was also the most musically adventurous of The Beatles - and eclectic in his taste.  He first heard Those Were the Days in The Blue Angel club in London. The singer was Gene Raskin, a New York-based folk singer with Russian roots. McCartney liked the song and offered to produce a recording by Mary Hopkins, a young Welsh folk singer recently signed by the new Apple label.  Copyright McCartney assumed that  Those Were the Days  had been written by Raskin. In fact, the copyright situation was complex and would become the subject of a legal battle.  The tune is that of the  Russian romance song "Dorogoi dlinnoyu" [ ru ]("Дорогой длинною" Tr: "By the long road").  This may be considered tradtional, though it is sometimes credited to Boris Fom

Photo by  Serena Repice Lentini  on  Unsplash I'd like to be under the sea In an octopus's garden in the shade Abbey Road was not a happy working environment during the recording sessions for The White Album. Ringo, the least involved in the squabbling and backbiting, suffered the most from the emotional fall out: I couldn't take it any more. There was no magic and the relationships were terrible. I'd come to a bad spot in life. It could have been paranoia, but I just didn't feel good – I felt like an outsider. Ringo, Anthology Things came to a head during  a recording session for  Back in the USSR on the 22nd of August, 1968. The precise trigger point is unknown but at some point Ringo snapped. After telling John and Paul he was leaving the group, he walked out of the studio. At first, Ringo's departure seemed to confirm the underlying reason for it. The others assumed that their drummer's 'resignation' was not seriously intended. The