Background information
Origin
Liverpool,
England
Genre(s)
Rock/Pop
Years active
1960–1970
Label(s)
Parlophone, Capitol,
Apple
Vee-Jay,
Polydor,
Swan,
Tollie
Associated
acts
Tony
Sheridan, The Quarrymen, The
Plastic Ono Band, The Dirty Mac, Wings,
Traveling Wilburys, Rory Storm and the
Hurricanes, Ringo Starr All-Starr
Band, Billy
Preston
Website
www.beatles.com
Members
John
Lennon
Paul
McCartney
George Harrison
Ringo
Starr
Former members
Stuart Sutcliffe
Pete
Best
The Beatles were an English musical
group from Liverpool
whose members were John Lennon, Paul
McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo
Starr. They are one of the most commercially successful and
critically acclaimed bands in the history
of popular music.
The Beatles are the best-selling musical
act of all time in the United States of America,
according to the Recording
Industry Association of America, which certified them as the highest
selling band of all time based on American sales of singles and albums.
In the United Kingdom, The Beatles released
more than 40 different singles, albums, and EPs that reached number
one. This commercial success was repeated in many other countries:
their record company, EMI,
estimated that by 1985 they had sold over one billion discs and tapes
worldwide.
In 2004, Rolling Stone
magazine ranked The Beatles #1 on its list of 100 Greatest Artists of
All Time.
According to that same magazine, their innovative music and cultural
impact helped define the 1960s,
and their influence on pop culture can still be felt today.
The Beatles led the mid-1960s musical "British
Invasion" into the United States. Although their initial musical style
was rooted in 1950s rock and roll and homegrown skiffle, the
group explored genres ranging from Tin
Pan Alley to psychedelic rock. Their clothes,
styles, and statements made them trend-setters, while their growing
social awareness saw their influence extend into the social and
cultural revolutions of the 1960s. Many people today still see them as
the "best band there ever was."
|
Contents
- 1 1957–1960:
Formation
- 2 Musical
influences
- 3 1960–1970:
The Beatles
- 3.1 Hamburg
- 3.2 Record
contract
- 3.3 America
- 3.4 Beatlemania
crosses the Atlantic
- 3.5 Backlash
and controversy
- 3.6 The
studio years
- 3.7 Breakup
- 4 1970–present:
After The Beatles
- 5 Musical
evolution
- 6 Achievements
- 7 Influence
on popular culture
- 7.1 Lifestyle
- 7.2 Recreational
drug use
- 7.3 Meditation
- 8 Discography
- 8.1 Official
CD catalogue
- 8.2 Song
catalogue
- 9 On
film
- 10 Other
projects
- 11 Instrumentation
- 12 Notes
- 13 References
- 14 Further
reading
- 15 See
also
- 16 External
links
|
1957–1960: Formation
-
In March 1957, while attending Quarry Bank Grammar School in Liverpool,
John Lennon formed a skiffle group called The
Quarrymen.
Lennon and the Quarrymen met guitarist Paul McCartney at the Woolton Garden
Fête held at St. Peter's Church on 6 July 1957.
On 6
February 1958,
the young guitarist George Harrison was invited to watch the group (who
played under a variety of names) at Wilson Hall, Garston, Liverpool.
McCartney had become acquainted with Harrison on the morning school bus
ride to the Liverpool Institute, as they
both lived in Speke.
At McCartney's insistence, Harrison joined the Quarrymen as lead
guitarist
after a rehearsal in March 1958, overcoming Lennon's initial reluctance
because of Harrison's young age.
Members continually joined and left the lineup during that period, and
in January 1960 Lennon's art school friend Stuart
Sutcliffe joined on bass.
Lennon and McCartney both played rhythm guitar and the group had a high
turnover of drummers.
The Quarrymen went through a progression of names — "Johnny
and the Moondogs", "Long John and the Beatles", "the Silver Beetles"
(derived from Larry Parnes' suggestion of "Long John
and the Silver Beetles") — before settling on "The Beatles". There are
many theories as to the origin of the name and its unusual spelling. It
is usually credited to Lennon, who said that the name was a combination
word-play on the insects "beetles" (as a reference to Buddy
Holly's band, the Crickets) and the word "beat". Cynthia
Lennon suggests that Lennon came up with the name Beatles at a
"brainstorming session over a beer-soaked table in the Renshaw Hall
bar."
Lennon, who was well known for giving multiple versions of the same
story joked in a 1961 Mersey Beat
magazine article that "It came in a vision — a man appeared on a
flaming pie and said unto them, 'From this day on you are Beatles with
an A'".
During an interview in 2001, Paul McCartney took credit for the
peculiar spelling of the name, saying that "John had the idea of
calling us the Beetles, I said, 'how about the Beatles;
you know, like the beat of the drum?' At the time, everyone was stoned
enough to find it hilarious. It's funny how history is made."
In May 1960 The Beatles toured northeast Scotland as a back-up
band with singer Johnny Gentle.
They met Gentle an hour before their first gig, and McCartney referred
to the tour as a great experience for the band.
For the tour the often drummerless group secured the services of Tommy
Moore, who was considerably older than the others.
Soon after the tour, however, feeling the age gap was too great, Moore
left the band and went back to work in a bottling factory as a fork-lift
truck driver.
Norman Chapman was the band's next drummer, but was called up for National
Service in a few weeks. His departure posed a significant problem as
the group's unofficial manager, Allan Williams, had arranged for them
to perform in clubs on the Reeperbahn in Hamburg, Germany.
Musical influences
John Lennon has said: "It was Elvis who really got me buying records. I
thought that early stuff of his was great. The Bill Haley
era passed me by, in a way. When his records came on the wireless, my
mother used to hear them, but they didn’t do anything for me. It was
Elvis who got me hooked on beat music. When I heard Heartbreak
Hotel, I thought ‘this is it’ and I started to grow sideboards and all
that gear... "
He also commented: "Nothing really affected me until I heard Elvis. If
there hadn't been an Elvis, there wouldn't have been a Beatles."
Other acts acknowledged by the Beatles include Chuck
Berry, Carl
Perkins, Little Richard, Buddy
Holly and Gene Vincent.
1960–1970: The Beatles
Hamburg
On 12 August 1960, the group invited Pete Best to
become their permanent drummer. Best had played with The
Blackjacks
in the Casbah Club, owned by Pete's mother, Mona Best. This was a
cellar club in West Derby, Liverpool, where The Beatles
had played and often visited.
In the documentary The Compleat Beatles,
Williams said that Best "played not too cleverly, but passable."
Four days after hiring Best the group left for Hamburg. The
Beatles began playing in Hamburg at the Indra Club and moved on 4
October to the Kaiserkeller. They were required to
play six or seven hours a night, seven nights a week. On 21 November,
Harrison was deported for having lied to the German authorities about
his age.
A week later, having started a small fire at their living quarters
while vacating it for more luxurious rooms, McCartney and Best were
arrested, charged with arson, and deported.
Lennon followed the others to Liverpool in mid-December. Sutcliffe
stayed behind in Hamburg with his new German fiancée Astrid
Kirchherr. The reunited group played their first engagement on 17
December 1960
at the Casbah Club (with Chas Newby substituting for Sutcliffe).
The Beatles returned to Hamburg in April 1961, performing at
the "Top Ten Club".
Whilst playing at the Top Ten Club they were recruited by singer Tony
Sheridan to act as his backing band on a series of recordings
for the German Polydor Records label,
produced by famed bandleader Bert Kaempfert.
Kaempfert signed the group to its own Polydor contract at the first
session on 22
June 1961.
On 31
October Polydor released the recording "My Bonnie (Mein Herz ist bei dir nur)",
which appeared on the German charts under the name "Tony Sheridan and
the Beat Brothers", a generic name used for whoever happened to be in
Sheridan's backup band.
In addition to the legend that this record led to the group's eventual
meeting with Brian Epstein, it also resulted in
their first mention in the American press. Around the beginning of
1962, Cashbox
mentioned "My Bonnie" as the debut of a "new rock and roll team, Tony
Sheridan and the Beat Brothers". A few copies were also pressed under
the Decca label for U.S. disc jockeys, as American Decca had a
distribution deal with Polydor parent Deutsche
Grammophon.
(This was ironic, considering that by this time the then-unaffiliated
British Decca had turned down the group's attempt to gain a recording
contract.) When the group returned to Liverpool, Sutcliffe stayed on in
Hamburg with Kirchherr.
By then McCartney had taken over bass duties.
Their third stay in Hamburg was from 13 April to 31 May 1962, when they opened
The Star
Club.
Upon their arrival they were informed of Sutcliffe's death from a brain
haemorrhage.
Epstein took over as the group's manager in January 1962 and
led The Beatles' quest for a British recording
contract. Epstein had been manager of the record department at North
End Music Store (NEMS), an offshoot of his family's furniture store. He
played on the status of NEMS as a major record dealer to gain access to
producers and recording company executives. In a now-famous exchange, Decca
Records A&R executive Dick Rowe turned Epstein down flat,
informing him that "Guitar groups are on the way out,
Mr. Epstein."
While Epstein was negotiating with Decca, he also approached EMI
marketing executive Ron White.
White (who was not himself a record producer) in turn contacted EMI
producers Norrie Paramor, Walter
Ridley, and Norman Newell, all of whom declined to record The Beatles.
White did not approach EMI's fourth staff producer — George
Martin — who was on holiday at the time.
Record contract
After failing to impress Decca Records, Epstein went to the HMV store on Oxford
Street in London
to transfer the Decca tapes to discs. There, recording engineer Jim Foy
referred him to Sid Coleman, who ran EMI's publishing arm. When Coleman
heard the demo tapes he suggested taking the tapes to George Martin,
who, Coleman explained, "does comedy records" and headed the Parlophone
label at EMI. Epstein eventually met with Martin, who signed the group
to EMI on a one-year renewable contract and scheduled their first
recording session on 6 June at EMI's Abbey
Road studios in north London.
Martin had not been particularly impressed by the band's demo
recordings,
but he instantly liked them as people when he met them. He concluded
that they had raw musical talent, but said (in later interviews) that
what made the difference for him was their wit and humour.
Martin did have a problem with Pete Best,
whom he criticised for not being able to keep time. He privately
suggested to Epstein that the band use another drummer in the studio.
There was speculation by some that Best's popularity
with fans was another source of friction. In addition, Epstein had
become exasperated with his refusal to adopt the distinctive hairstyle
as part of their unified look. Best also had missed a number of
engagements because of illness. The three founding members enlisted
Epstein to dismiss Best - which he did on 16 August 1962.
They asked Ringo Starr (born Richard
Starkey), the drummer for one of the top Merseybeat
groups, Rory Storm and the
Hurricanes, to join the band, as Starr had performed occasionally with
The Beatles in Hamburg.
The first recordings of Lennon, McCartney, Harrison, and Starr together
were made as early as 15 October 1960, in a series of demonstration records
privately recorded in Hamburg while acting as the backing group for
singer Lu Walters.
Starr played on The Beatles' second EMI recording session on 4
September 1962,
but Martin hired session drummer Andy White for their next session on 11
September.
Their recording contract paid them one penny for each
single sold, which was split amongst the four Beatles — one farthing
per group member.
This royalty rate was further reduced for singles sold outside the UK,
on which they received half of one penny (again split between the whole
band) per single. Martin said later that it was a "pretty awful"
contract..
The Beatles' first EMI session on 6 June did not
yield any recordings considered worthy of release, but the September
sessions produced a minor UK hit, "Love Me Do", which peaked on the charts
at number 17.
("Love Me Do" reached the top of the U.S. singles chart over 18 months
later in May 1964.) On 26 November they recorded their second single "Please Please Me", which
reached no. 2 in the official UK charts and no. 1 in the NME chart. Three months
later they recorded their first album (also titled Please
Please Me). The band's first televised
performance was on the People and Places programme
transmitted live from Manchester by Granada
Television on 17 October 1962.
As The Beatles' fame spread, the frenzied adulation of the group,
predominantly from teenage female fans, was dubbed 'Beatlemania'.
At this time, the band began getting noticed by serious music
critics. On December 23, 1963, The Times music critic William Mann
published an essay extolling the Beatles compositions, their "fresh and
euphonious" guitars in "Till There Was You", their
"submediant switches from C major into A flat major", and the "actave
ascent" in "I Want to Hold Your Hand"
for example. The Beatles themselves were perplexed by this anlysis by
Mann: "...one gets the impression that they think simultaneously of
harmony and melody, so firmly are the major tonic sevenths and ninths
built into their tunes, and the flat submediant key switches, so
natural is the Aeolian cadence at the end of "Not
a Second Time" (the chord progression which ends Mahler's Song of the
Earth)."
America
Although the band experienced huge popularity in the UK record
charts from early 1963, EMI's American operation, Capitol
Records, declined to issue the singles "Please Please Me" and "From
Me to You (their first official no. 1 hit in the UK)".
Vee-Jay
Records, a small Chicago
label, issued the singles as part of a deal for the rights to another
performer's masters. Art Roberts, music director of Chicago powerhouse
radio station WLS,
placed "Please Please Me" into radio rotation in late February 1963,
making it the first time a Beatles record was heard on American radio.
Vee-Jay's rights to The Beatles were later cancelled for non-payment of
royalties.
In August 1963, Philadelphia-based Swan
Records released "She Loves You", which also failed to
receive airplay. A testing of the song on Dick
Clark's TV show American Bandstand
produced laughter from American teenagers when they saw the group's distinctive
hairstyles. New York disc jockey Murray the K featured "She Loves You"
on his '1010 WINS record revue' show in January.
In early November 1963, Brian Epstein persuaded Ed
Sullivan to present The Beatles on three editions of his show in
February, and parlayed this guaranteed exposure into a record deal with
Capitol Records. Capitol committed to a mid-January release for "I Want to Hold Your Hand",
On 7
December 1963
a clip of The Beatles was shown on the CBS
Evening News (the story originally had been scheduled to air on 22
November and was aired on the CBS Morning News but was pre-empted
by the assassination of John F. Kennedy). The clip inspired
a teenage girl in Washington, D.C. to request a
Beatles song on a local radio station. The station secured an imported
copy of "I Want to Hold Your Hand" — forcing Capitol Records to release
the song ahead of schedule on 26 December.
Several New York radio stations — first WMCA, then WINS (AM)
and WABC
— began playing "I Want to Hold Your Hand" on its release day. The Beatlemania
that had started in Washington was duplicated in New York and quickly
spread to other markets. The record sold one million copies in just ten
days, and by 16 January, Cashbox
magazine had certified the record number one (in the edition marked 23
January). On 3
January 1964
a film of The Beatles performing "She Loves You" was aired on the
late-night Jack Paar Show.
Beatlemania crosses
the Atlantic
On 7
February 1964,
a crowd of four thousand fans at Heathrow
Airport waved to The Beatles as they took off for their first trip to America
as a group.
They were accompanied by photographers, journalists (including Maureen
Cleave) and Phil Spector, who had booked himself on
the same flight.
The pilot had radioed ahead, and as they prepared to land said, "Tell
the boys there's a big crowd waiting for them." Kennedy International
Airport had never experienced such a crowd, estimated at about 3,000
screaming fans.
After a press conference (where they first
met Murray
the K) they were put into limousines and driven to New York. On
the way McCartney turned on a radio and listened to a running
commentary: "They [The Beatles] have just left the airport and are
coming to New York City..."
After reaching the Plaza Hotel, they were besieged by fans and
reporters. Harrison had a temperature of 102 the next day and was
ordered to stay in bed, so Neil Aspinall replaced him for the
first television rehearsal.
Their first live American television appearance was on the The
Ed Sullivan Show on 9 February
1964. The
next morning practically every newspaper wrote that The Beatles were
nothing more than a "fad", and "could not carry a tune across the Atlantic".
Their first American concert appearance was at Washington
Coliseum in Washington, D.C. on 11 February.
After The Beatles' huge success in 1964, Vee-Jay
Records and Swan Records took advantage of their
previously secured rights to The Beatles' early recordings and reissued
the songs, all of which reached the top ten the second time around.
(MGM and Atco also secured rights to The Beatles' early Tony
Sheridan-era recordings and had minor hits with "My Bonnie" and "Ain't
She Sweet", the latter featuring John Lennon on lead vocal.) In
addition to Introducing... The Beatles,
which was essentially The Beatles' debut British album with some minor
alterations, Vee-Jay also issued an unusual LP called The
Beatles Vs The Four Seasons. This 2-LP set paired Introducing...
The Beatles and The Golden Hits Of The Four Seasons,
another successful act that Vee-Jay had under contract, in a 'contest'
(the back cover featured a 'score card'). Another unusual release was
the Hear The Beatles Tell All album, which
consisted of two lengthy interviews with Los Angeles radio disc jockeys
(side one was titled "Dave Hull interviews John Lennon," while side two
was titled "Jim Steck interviews John, Paul, George, Ringo"). No
Beatles music was included on this interview album, which turned out to
be the only Vee Jay Beatles album Capitol Records could not reclaim.
The Vee-Jay/Swan-issued recordings eventually ended up with
Capitol, who issued most of the Vee-Jay material on the American-only
Capitol release The Early Beatles,
with three songs left off this final US version of the album. ("I Saw
Her Standing There" was issued as the American B-side of "I Want to
Hold Your Hand," and also appeared on the Capitol Records album Meet
The Beatles. "Misery" and "There's a Place" were issued as a
Capitol "Starline" reissue single in 1964, and reappeared on the 1980 Rarities
compilation album.) The early Vee-Jay and Swan Beatles records command
a high price on the record collectors' market, and all have been
copiously bootlegged.
The Swan tracks ("She Loves You" and "I'll Get You") were issued on the
Capitol LP The Beatles' Second Album.
(Swan also issued the German-language version of "She Loves You,"
called "Sie Liebt Dich." This song later appeared (in stereo) on
Capitol's US version of the Rarities
compilation album.)
In mid-1964 the band undertook their first appearances outside
of Europe
and North
America. They toured Australia without Ringo
Starr, who was suffering from tonsillitis and was temporarily
replaced by session drummer Jimmy Nicol. In Adelaide they
were greeted by over 300,000 people who turned out at Adelaide
Town Hall..
Ringo had rejoined by the time they got to New
Zealand on 21 June.
In June 1965, Her Majesty Queen
Elizabeth II appointed the four Beatles Members of the Order of the
British Empire, MBE. The
band members were nominated by Prime Minister Harold
Wilson (who also was the M.P. for Huyton, Liverpool).
The appointment — at that time primarily bestowed upon military
veterans and civic leaders — sparked some conservative MBE recipients
to return their insignia in protest.
The first two were returned on 14 June, before The Beatles received
theirs on 26
October 1965.
On 15 August that year, the Beatles performed the first major stadium
concert in the history of rock at Shea Stadium in New York to a crowd of
55,600.
Their sixth album, Rubber Soul, was
released in early December 1965. It was hailed as a major leap forward
in the maturity and complexity of the band's music.
Backlash and
controversy
In July 1966, when The Beatles toured the Philippines,
they unintentionally snubbed the nation's first lady, Imelda
Marcos, who had expected the group to attend a breakfast reception at
the Presidential Palace.
When presented with the invitation, Brian
Epstein politely declined on behalf of the group, as it had never been
the group's policy to accept such "official" invitations.
The group soon found that the Marcos regime was unaccustomed to
accepting "no" for an answer. After the 'snub' was broadcast on
Philippine television and radio, all of The Beatles' police protection
disappeared. The group and their entourage had to make their way to
Manila airport on their own. At the airport, road manager Mal Evans
was beaten and kicked, and the band members were pushed and jostled
about by a hostile crowd.
Once the group boarded the plane, Epstein and Evans were ordered off,
and Evans said, "Tell my wife that I love her."
Epstein was forced to give back all the money that the band had earned
while they were there before being allowed back on the plane.
Almost as soon as they returned from the Philippines, an
earlier comment by Lennon made in March that year launched a backlash
against The Beatles from religious and social conservatives in the
United States. In an interview with British reporter Maureen
Cleave,
Lennon had offered his opinion that Christianity was dying and that The
Beatles were "more popular than Jesus now."
Afterwards, a radio station in Birmingham,
Alabama, ran a story on burning Beatles records, in what was considered
to be a joke. However, many people affiliated with rural churches in
the American
South started taking the suggestion seriously. Towns across the United
States and South Africa started to burn Beatles
records in protest. Attempting to make light of the incident, McCartney
said, "They've got to buy them before they can burn them." Under
tremendous pressure from the American media, Lennon apologised for his
remarks at a press conference in Chicago on August 11, the eve of the first
performance of what turned out to be their final tour.
The group's two-year series of Capitol compilations also took
a strange twist in the United States when one of their publicity shots,
used for a Yesterday and Today
album and a poster promoting the UK release of "Paperback Writer",
created an uproar, as it featured the band draped in meat and plastic
dolls. Thousands of these copies had to be withdrawn. Years later, the
cover shot was linked with the group's interest in German expressionism.
Elvis Presley disapproved of The
Beatles's anti-war activism and open use of drugs, later asking President
Nixon to ban all four members of the group from entering the United
States. Peter Guralnick writes, "The
Beatles, Elvis said, [...] had been a focal point for anti-Americanism.
They had come to this country, made their money, then gone back to
England where they fomented anti-American feeling."
Guralnick adds, "Presley indicated that he is of the opinion that The
Beatles laid the groundwork for many of the problems we are having with
young people by their filthy unkempt appearances and suggestive music
while entertaining in this country during the early and middle 1960s."
Despite Elvis' remarks, Lennon still had some positive feeling towards
him: "Before Elvis, there was nothing."
In stark contrast, Bob Dylan recognised the Beatles'
contribution, stating: "America should put up statues to The Beatles.
They helped give this country's pride back to it."
The studio years
In April 1966, the group began recording what would be their
most ambitious album to date, Revolver.
During the recording sessions for the album, tape looping and early
sampling were introduced in a complex mix of ballad, R&B, soul
and world music.
The Beatles performed their last concert before paying fans at
Candlestick
Park in San Francisco on 29 August 1966.
McCartney asked Tony Barrow to tape the event, but the
30-minute tape he used ran out halfway through the last song. The
concert lasted a little under 35 minutes.
From then on, The Beatles concentrated on recording. Less than
seven months after recording Revolver, The Beatles
returned to Abbey Road Studios on 24
November 1966
to begin the 129-day recording sessions for their eighth album, Sgt. Pepper's
Lonely Hearts Club Band, released on 1 June 1967.
On 25
June 1967, The Beatles became the first band globally transmitted on
television—before an estimated 400 million people worldwide. The band
appeared in a segment within the first-ever worldwide TV satellite
hook-up, a show titled Our World. The
Beatles were transmitted live from Abbey Road Studios, and their new
song "All You Need Is Love" was
recorded live during the show.
The band's business affairs began to unravel after manager Brian
Epstein died of an accidental prescription drug
overdose on 27
August 1967 at the age of 32. At the end of 1967, they received their
first major negative press in the UK with disparaging reviews of their
surrealistic TV film Magical Mystery Tour.
Part of the criticism arose because colour was an integral part of the
film, but in 1967 few viewers in the UK had colour televisions. The film's soundtrack,
which features one of The Beatles' few instrumental tracks ("Flying"),
was released in the United Kingdom as a double EP,
and in the United States as a full LP (the LP is now the official
version).
The group spent the early part of 1968 in Rishikesh, Uttar
Pradesh, India,
studying transcendental meditation
with the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.
Upon their return, Lennon and McCartney went to New York to announce
the formation of Apple Corps. The middle of 1968 saw the
band busy recording the double album The
Beatles, popularly known as The White
Album because of its plain white cover. These sessions saw
deep divisions opening within the band, with Starr temporarily walking
out. The band carried on, with McCartney recording the drums on the
songs "Martha My Dear", "Wild
Honey Pie", "Dear Prudence" and "Back
in the USSR". Among the other causes of dissension were that Lennon's
new girlfriend, Yoko
Ono, was at his side through almost all of the sessions, and that the
others felt that McCartney was becoming too dominating.
Internal divisions within the band had been a small but growing problem
during their early years; most notably, this was reflected in the
difficulty that George Harrison
experienced in getting his own songs onto Beatles albums.
On the business side, McCartney wanted Lee
Eastman, the father of his then-girlfriend Linda
Eastman, to manage The Beatles, but the other members wanted New York
manager Allen
Klein. All past Beatles' decisions had been unanimous, but this time
the four could not agree. Lennon, Harrison and Starr felt the Eastmans
would put McCartney's interests before those of the group. In 1971 it
was discovered that Klein, who had been appointed manager, had stolen
£5 million from The Beatles' holdings. Years later, during the Anthology
interviews, McCartney said of this time, "Looking back, I can
understand why they would feel that he [Lee Eastman] was biased against
them."
Their final live performance was on the rooftop of the Apple
building in Savile
Row, London, on 30 January 1969, the next-to-last day of the difficult Get
Back sessions. Most of the performance was filmed and later
included in the film Let It Be.
While the band was playing, the local police were called because of
complaints about the noise. Although the group was simply asked to end
their performance, the band members later remarked in the Anthology
video that they were disappointed they were not arrested — pointing out
that the police hauling the band members off in handcuffs
would have been "an appropriate ending" for the film.
The Beatles recorded their final album, Abbey
Road, in the summer of 1969. The completion of
the song "I Want You (She's So
Heavy)" for the album on 20 August was the last time all four
Beatles were together in the same studio.
Their final new song was Harrison's "I Me Mine",
recorded 3
January 1970
and released on the Let It Be album.
It was recorded without Lennon, who was in Denmark when the song was
recorded.
Breakup
-
John Lennon announced his departure to the rest of the group
on 20
September 1969
but agreed that no announcement was to be publicly made until a number
of legal matters were resolved.
In March 1970 the Get Back session tapes
were given to American producer Phil Spector, who had produced Lennon's
solo single "Instant Karma!". Spector's "Wall
of Sound" production values went against the original intent of the
record, which had been to record a stripped-down live performance.
McCartney was deeply dissatisfied with Spector's treatment of "The Long and Winding
Road", and unsuccessfully attempted to halt release of Spector's
version of the song. McCartney publicly announced the break-up on 10 April 1970, a week before
releasing his first solo album, McCartney.
Pre-release copies included a press release with a self-written
interview explaining the end of The Beatles and his hopes for the
future.
On 8 May 1970, the
Spector-produced version of Get Back was released
as Let It Be,
followed by the documentary film of the same name.
The Beatles' partnership was finally dissolved in 1975.
1970–present: After
The Beatles
Shortly before and after the official dissolution of the
group, all four Beatles released solo albums, including Lennon's John Lennon/Plastic Ono
Band, McCartney's McCartney,
Starr's Sentimental
Journey, and Harrison's All
Things Must Pass. Some of their albums featured
contributions by other former Beatles; Starr's Ringo
(1973) was the only one to include compositions and performances by all
four, albeit on separate songs.
Other than an unreleased jam session in 1974 (later bootlegged
as A Toot and a Snore in '74),
Lennon and McCartney never recorded together again.
In the wake of the expiration in 1975 of The Beatles' contract
with EMI-Capitol, the American Capitol label, rushing to cash in on its
vast Beatles holdings and freed from the group's creative control,
released five LPs: Rock 'n' Roll Music
(a compilation of their more uptempo numbers), The Beatles at the
Hollywood Bowl (containing portions of two
unreleased shows at the Hollywood Bowl), Love Songs
(a compilation of their slower numbers), Rarities
(a compilation of tracks that either had never been released in the
U.S. or had gone out of print), and Reel Music
(a compilation of songs from their films). There was also a
non-Capitol-EMI release of a show from the group's early days at the
Star Club in Hamburg captured on a poor-quality tape. Of all these
post-breakup LPs, only the Hollywood Bowl LP had the approval of the
group members. Upon the American release of the original British CDs in
1986, these post-breakup Capitol American compilation LPs were deleted
from the Capitol catalogue.
John Lennon was shot and killed by Mark
David Chapman on 8 December 1980 in New York City. Shortly afterward, in
1981, the three surviving Beatles reunited to record "All
Those Years Ago", released as a George Harrison solo single. Its
original lyrics had been rewritten as a tribute to Lennon.
The BBC
has a large collection of Beatles recordings, mostly comprising
original studio sessions from 1963 to 1968. Much of this material
formed the basis for a 1988 radio documentary series The Beeb's Lost
Beatles Tapes. In 1989, many outtakes from The
Beatles sessions appeared on the radio series The Lost Lennon
Tapes. Later, in 1994, the best of the BBC sessions were
given an official EMI release on Live at the BBC.
In 1988, The Beatles were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall
of Fame as a group (not as individual performers) during their first
year of eligibility.
On the night of their induction, Harrison and Starr appeared to accept
their award along with Lennon's widow Yoko Ono and his two sons.
McCartney stayed away, issuing a press release citing "unresolved
difficulties" with Harrison, Starr, and Lennon's estate. Solo Beatles
later inducted were Lennon in 1994, McCartney in 1999 and Harrison in
2004.
Collage of the various covers of the Anthology
series
In February 1994, the three surviving Beatles reunited to
produce and record additional music for a few of Lennon's home
recordings. "Free as a Bird" premiered as part of The
Beatles Anthology series of television
documentaries and was released as a single
in December 1995, with "Real Love" following in
March 1996. These songs were also included in the three Anthology
collections of CDs released in 1995 and 1996, each of which consisted
of two CDs of never-before-released Beatles material. Klaus
Voormann, who had known The Beatles since their Hamburg days and had
previously illustrated the Revolver
album cover, directed the Anthology cover concept.
450,000 copies of Anthology 1 were
sold on its first day of release. In 2000, the compilation album 1
was released, containing almost every number-one single released by the
band from 1962 to 1970. The collection sold 3.6 million copies in its
first week (selling 3 copies a second) and more than 12 million in
three weeks worldwide. The collection also reached number one in the
United States and 33 other countries, and had sold 25 million copies by
2005 (about the ninth best selling album of all time).
George Harrison during this time showed his socio-political
consciousness and earned respect for his contribution for arranging the
Concert For Bangladesh in New
York in August 1971 along with sitar maestro Ravi
Shankar. Harrison died of lung cancer on 29
November 2001.
In 2006, George Martin and his son Giles
Martin remixed original Beatles recordings to create a soundtrack to accompany Cirque
du Soleil's theatrical production Love.
In 2007, McCartney and Starr reunited for an interview on Larry
King Live to discuss their thoughts on the
show. Yoko Ono (John Lennon's wife) and Olivia Harrison (George
Harrison's wife) also appeared with McCartney and Starr in Las Vegas
for the one year anniversary of Love.
Musical evolution
The Beatles, by Richard Avedon. By 1967, the band had
delved into psychedelic music.
- See also: The
Beatles' influence on music recording
The Beatles' constant demands to create new sounds on every
new recording, combined with George Martin's arranging abilities and
the studio expertise of EMI staff engineers such as Norman
Smith, Ken Townshend and Geoff
Emerick, all played significant parts in the innovative sounds of the
albums Rubber Soul
(1965), Revolver
(1966) and Sgt. Pepper's
Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967).
The Beatles continued to absorb influences long after their
initial success, often finding new musical and lyrical avenues by
listening to their contemporaries. Among those influences were Bob Dylan,
who influenced songs such as "You've Got to Hide
Your Love Away" and "Norwegian Wood
(This Bird Has Flown)".
Other contemporary influences included the Byrds and the
Beach Boys, whose album Pet Sounds was a
favourite of McCartney's.
Along with studio tricks such as sound
effects, unconventional microphone placements, tape loops, double
tracking and vari-speed recording, The Beatles began
to augment their recordings with instruments that were unconventional
for rock music at the time. These included string and brass ensembles
as well as Indian instruments such as the sitar as in "Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has
Flown)" and the swarmandel as in "Strawberry Fields
Forever". They also used early electronic instruments such as the Mellotron,
with which McCartney supplied the flute voices on the intro to "Strawberry
Fields Forever", and the ondioline, an electronic keyboard that
created the unusual oboe-like sound on "Baby You're a Rich Man".
Beginning with the use of a string quartet (arranged by George
Martin with input from McCartney) on "Yesterday"
in 1965, The Beatles pioneered a modern form of art song,
exemplified by the double-quartet string arrangement on "Eleanor
Rigby" (1966), "Here, There and
Everywhere" (1966) and "She's Leaving Home" (1967). A
televised performance of Bach's Brandenburg Concerto No. 2
directly inspired McCartney's use of a piccolo
trumpet on the arrangement of "Penny Lane". The Beatles moved towards psychedelia
with "Rain" and "Tomorrow
Never Knows" from 1966, and "Lucy in the Sky with
Diamonds", "Strawberry Fields Forever"
and "I Am the Walrus" from 1967.
Achievements
Throughout their relatively short career, the Beatles set a
number of world records — most of which have yet to be broken. The
following is a partial list:
- The Beatles are the best-selling musical group of all time,
estimated by EMI
to have over one billion discs and tapes sold worldwide.
- The Beatles have notched up the most multi-platinum selling
albums for any artist or musical group (thirteen in the U.S. alone).
- The Beatles have a record six diamond-selling albums (10
million copies): Sgt. Pepper's
Lonely Hearts Club Band, The Beatles, Abbey
Road, The
Beatles: 1962-1966 (The Red Album), The Beatles: 1967-1970 (The Blue Album), The
Beatles 1
- The Beatles have had more number one singles than any other
musical group (23 in Australia, 23 in The Netherlands, 22 in Canada, 21
in Norway, 20 in the U.S., and 18 in Sweden). Ironically, the Beatles
could easily have had even more number ones, because they were often
competing with their own singles. For example, the Beatles' "Penny
Lane" and "Strawberry Fields Forever"
were released as a "double A"-sided single, which caused sales and
airplay to be divided between the two songs instead of being counted
collectively. Even so, they reached number two with the singles. They
even managed to hold separate releases by themselves off the top of the
British chart in 1967 with Hello Goodbye at number 1 and Magical
Mystery Tour E.P at number 2.
- The Beatles have had more number one albums than any other
group (19 in the U.S. and 15 in the United
Kingdom).
- The Beatles spent the highest number of weeks at number one
in the albums chart (174 in the UK and 132 in the U.S.).
- The most successful first week of sales for a double
album (The Beatles Anthology
Volume 1, which sold 855,473 copies in the U.S. from 21
November to 28 November 1995).
- In terms of charting positions, Lennon and McCartney are
the most successful songwriters in history, with 32 number one singles
in the U.S. for McCartney, and 26 for Lennon (23 of which were written
together). Lennon was responsible for 29 Number One singles in the UK,
and McCartney was responsible for 28 (25 of which were written
together).
- During the week of 4 April 1964, The Beatles held the top five positions
on the Billboard
singles chart. No one had ever done anything like this before, and it
is doubtful that the conditions will ever exist for anyone to do it
again. The songs were "Can't Buy Me Love", "Twist
and Shout", "She Loves You", "I Want to Hold Your Hand",
and "Please Please Me".
- The next week, 11 April 1964, the Beatles held fourteen positions on
the Billboard Hot 100. Before the Beatles, the highest number of
concurrent singles by one artist on the Hot 100 was nine (by Elvis
Presley, 19
December 1956).
- The Beatles are the only artist to have
'back-to-back-to-back' number one singles on Billboard's
Hot 100 in the modern chart era. Their "Can't Buy Me Love" single
supplanted "She Loves You," which had in turn taken the #1 spot from "I
Want to Hold Your Hand." Boyz II Men, Nelly and Outkast have
directly succeeded themselves atop the chart, but the Beatles are the
only artist to 'three-peat'. (In 2004, Usher came within a week of matching this
feat, with three of his singles ("Yeah!" "Burn" and "Confessions")
holding the top spot for 21 of 22 weeks; only a one-week interruption
between "Burn"s 7th and 8th weeks atop the chart by American
Idol singer Fantasia broke the streak. Billboard's current version of
the "Hot 100" chart is considered to have begun in August 1958; before that,
artists such as Elvis Presley, Glenn
Miller, Jimmy
Dorsey, and Bing Crosby had also had three
consecutive #1 hits, but on earlier Billboard charts that preceded the
"Hot 100.")
- The Beatles' "Yesterday" is the most covered
song in history, appearing in the Guinness Book of Records
with over three thousand recorded versions. It is also the most played
song in the history of international radio.
- The Beatles had the fastest selling single of all time with
"I Want To Hold Your Hand".
The song sold 250,000 units within three days in the U.S., one million
in 2 weeks. (Additionally, it sold 10,000 copies per hour in New
York City alone for the first 20 days.)
- The Beatles have the fastest selling CD of all time with 1.
It sold over 13 million copies in four weeks.
- The largest number of advance orders for a single, at 2.1
million copies in the U.S. for "Can't Buy Me Love" (it sold 940,225
copies on its first day of release in the U.S. alone).
- Sgt. Pepper's
Lonely Hearts Club Band is the best selling
album of all time in the UK (over 4.5 million copies sold).
- With their performance at Shea
Stadium in 1965, The Beatles set new world records for concert
attendance (55,600+) and revenue. This was the first time in the
history of popular music anyone had played in a proper stadium as
opposed to a theatre or concert hall.
- The Beatles were the youngest group to top the UK album
charts with their debut album; however, McFly has since topped this record with their
debut album in 2004.
- The Beatles broke television ratings records in the U.S.
with their first appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show
with over 70 million people viewing. Crime reportedly fell by a third
during the duration of the transmission, although this eventually
turned out to be false.
- The Beatles were made Members of the Order of the British
Empire(MBE) by the Queen on 12 June 1965.
- On 30
June 1966,
the Beatles became the first musical group to perform at the Nippon
Budokan Hall in Tokyo.
They performed five times in three days gathering audiences of about
10,000 per performance.
- The Beatles appear five times in the top 100
best-selling singles in the UK. No other group appears more than twice.
Influence on popular
culture
-
Main article: The
Beatles' influence on popular culture
Lifestyle
The Beatles' lifestyles were greatly altered by their success
and the income they earned. The availability of the first oral
contraceptive and illegal drugs changed many people's opinions —
including The Beatles' — about life, marriage, and sexual relationships.
Recreational drug use
In Hamburg, The Beatles used "prellies" (Preludin) both
recreationally and to maintain their energy through all-night
performances.
McCartney would usually take one, but Lennon would often take four or
five.
Bob
Dylan introduced them to cannabis during a 1964 visit to New York.
McCartney remembered them all getting "very high" and giggling.
The Beatles occasionally smoked a spliff in the car on the way to the studio
during the filming of Help!, which
often made them forget their lines.
In April 1965, Lennon and Harrison were introduced to LSD by an acquaintance,
dentist John Riley.
Lennon in particular became an avid "tripper", claiming in a 1970
interview in Rolling Stone to have taken LSD
hundreds of times. McCartney was more reluctant to try the drug, but
finally did so in 1966 and was the first Beatle to talk about it in the
press.
The Beatles added their names to an advertisement
in The
Times, on 24 July 1967, which asked for the legalisation of
cannabis, the release of all prisoners imprisoned because of
possession, and research into marijuana's medical uses. The
advertisement was sponsored by a group called Soma, and was signed by
65 people, including Brian Epstein, Graham
Greene, R.D. Laing, 15 doctors, and two MPs.
Meditation
On 24
August 1967,
The Beatles met the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi at the
London Hilton. A few days later they went to Bangor,
in North Wales,
to attend a weekend 'initiation' conference.
There, the Maharishi gave each of them a mantra.
The Beatles learned of the death of Brian
Epstein while in Bangor with the Maharishi. Their time in early 1968 at
the Maharishi's ashram
in India
was highly productive from a musical standpoint, as practically all of
the songs that would later be recorded for The
White Album and Abbey
Road were composed there by Lennon, McCartney,
and Harrison.
Discography
-
Main article: The Beatles discography
- Further information: List of Beatles
songs by singer, The
Beatles record sales, worldwide charts, and The
Beatles bootlegs
Official CD catalogue
In 1987, EMI released all 12 of The Beatles' studio albums — as
originally released in the UK — on CD worldwide. (North American releases were on
EMI's American subsidiary Capitol Records). It was a
considered decision by Apple Corps to standardise The Beatles catalogue
throughout the world. Because there were tracks that had been released
in the UK on singles and EPs that had not been released on the original
UK albums, in order for all their recordings to be available on CD it
was necessary to create three further CDs that would contain the
missing tracks.
One CD was of a 1967 US compilation album that featured the
6-track 1967 UK EP Magical Mystery Tour and the
various singles released in that year. The other two CDs were new
compilations that gathered together all the other singles, EP tracks
and recordings from 1962–1970 that had not been issued on the original
British studio albums.
- Magical Mystery Tour
- 8
August 1987
- Past Masters, Volume One
- 7
March 1988
- Past Masters, Volume Two
- 7
March 1988
According to EMI and the Guinness Book of Records,
The Beatles have sold in excess of one billion units (1,010,000,000,
including cassettes, records, CDs and bootlegs).
Beginning in 2004, the US album configurations were released
as a series of box sets from Capitol Records (The Capitol
Albums, Volume 1 & Volume 2);
these included both stereo and mono versions based on the mixes that
were prepared for vinyl at the time of their original 1960s releases.
Song catalogue
-
Main article: Northern
Songs
In 1963 Lennon and McCartney agreed to assign their song
publishing rights to Northern Songs, a company created by
music publisher Dick James. The company was administered
by James' own company Dick James Music. Northern Songs
went public in 1965, with Lennon and McCartney each holding 15% of the
company's shares whilst Dick James and the company's chairman, Charles
Silver, held a controlling 37.5%. In 1969, following a failed attempt
by Lennon and McCartney to buy the company, James and Silver sold
Northern Songs to British TV company Associated
TeleVision (ATV), from which Lennon and McCartney received stock.
In 1985, after a short period in which the parent company was
owned by Australian business magnate Robert
Holmes à Court, ATV Music was sold to Michael
Jackson for a reported $47 million (trumping a joint bid by McCartney
and Yoko
Ono), including the publishing rights to over 200 songs composed by
Lennon and McCartney.
A decade later Jackson and Sony merged its music publishing businesses.
Since 1995, Jackson and