The Beatles

[Gina Marie]

I love this site: http://www.thefest.com/

[Gina Marie]

[Gina Marie]

[Gina Marie]

Wishing a happy and peaceful 87th Birthday to the greatest record producer of all time, Sir George Henry Martin, CBE!

http://members.pcug.org.au/~jhenry/biography.html

[Gina Marie]

Rare color photos of The Beatles to go up for sale!

LONDON (AP) — Unpublished early color photographs of The Beatles' first U.S. tour will be sold at a U.K. auction.

The photos were taken during the rock band's 1964 visit to the U.S., when color film was expensive and most images of the group were in black and white.
Story here:

http://news.yahoo.com/rare-color-photos-beatles-sale-114956273.html

HUGE PHOTO!

[Gina Marie]

[Gina Marie]

[Gina Marie]

ON THIS DATE (43 YEARS AGO)
January 13, 1969 – The Beatles: Yellow Submarine is released.

Yellow Submarine is a soundtrack album to the movie of the same name, released in the US on January 13, 1969 (January 17 in the US). It reached #2 on the Billboard 200 Top LP's chart, kept from the top by The Beatles (White Album), which had been released two months before.

Only one side of the album contains songs performed by The Beatles; of the six, four were previously unissued. "Yellow Submarine" had been simultaneously issued in 1966 as a single and on the album Revolver, and "All You Need Is Love" had been issued as a single in 1967. The second side features the symphonic film score composed by George Martin, in versions recorded specifically for the album.

Only four new Beatles songs appeared on the album, and two were recorded specifically for the film, "All Together Now" and "Hey Bulldog". "Only a Northern Song" had been recorded during the sessions for Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, but was set aside from the final running order. "It's All Too Much," like similar numbers recorded immediately following the Sgt. Pepper sessions, was not intended for a specific project. "Hey Bulldog", recorded on 11 February 1968, evolved from an initial intent to shoot a promotional film for the "Lady Madonna" single. "Baby, You're a Rich Man" was also originally intended for the film soundtrack, but was released as the B-side to "All You Need Is Love" instead and was not included in the Yellow Submarine album.

Starting out as a sing-a-long vehicle for Ringo Starr on Revolver, "Yellow Submarine" became the inspiration for the 1968 animated feature film of the same name. Most of the soundtrack was composed and orchestrated by George Martin, but the remaining six songs were far from being Beatle cast-offs. George Harrison's two contributions, "Only A Northern Song" and "It's All Too Much" mark the adventurously experimental phase the Beatles were in at that time and dabble in woozy psychedelic shadings laced with orchestrations that continued to influence cutting-edge pop artists for decades to come. Along with the aforementioned "Yellow Submarine," other Lennon/McCartney compositions include the good-time, skiffle-flavored "All Together Now," the Lennon-driven rocker "Hey Bulldog," and "All You Need Is Love"--the unofficial flower-power anthem.

REVIEW
by Richie Unterberger & Bruce Eder, allmusic
The only Beatles album that could really be classified as inessential, mostly because it wasn't really a proper album at all, but a soundtrack that only utilized four new Beatles songs. (The rest of the album was filled out with "Yellow Submarine," "All You Need Is Love," and a George Martin score.) What's more, two of the four new tracks were little more than pleasant throwaways that had been recorded during 1967 and early 1968. These aren't all that bad; "All Together Now" is a cute, kiddieish McCartney singalong, while "Hey Bulldog" has some mild Lennon nastiness and a great beat and central piano riff, with some fine playing all around -- each is memorable in its way, and the inclusion of the Lennon song here was all the more important, as the sequence from the movie itself in which it was used was deleted from the original U.S. release of the movie (which had no success whatever in the U.K. and quickly disappeared, thus making the U.S. version the established cut of the film for decades, until the late-'90s restoration and DVD re-release of the movie). George Harrison's two contributions were the more striking of the new entries -- "Only a Northern Song," a leftover from the Sgt. Pepper's sessions, generated from a period in which the guitarist became increasingly fascinated with keyboards, especially the organ and the Mellotron (and, later, the synthesizer), and is an odd piece of psychedelic ersatz, mixing trippiness and some personal comments; its lyrics (and title) on the one hand express the guitarist/singer/composer's displeasure at being tied in his publishing to Northern Songs, a company in which John Lennon and Paul McCartney were the majority shareholders; and, on the other, they present Harrison's vision of how music and recording sounded, from the inside out and the outside in, during the psychedelic era -- the song thus provided a rare glimpse inside the doors of perception of being a Beatle (or, at least, one aspect of being this particular Beatle) circa 1967. And then there was the jewel of the new songs, "It's All Too Much"; coming from the second half of 1967, the song -- resplendent in swirling Mellotron, larger-than-life percussion, and tidal waves of feedback guitar -- was a virtuoso excursion into otherwise hazy psychedelia, that was actually superior in some respects to "Blue Jay Way," Harrison's songwriting contribution of The Magical Mystery Tour; the song also later rated a dazzling cover by Steve Hillage in the middle of the following decade. The very fact that George Harrison was afforded two song slots and a relatively uncompetitive canvas for his music shows how little the project meant to Lennon and McCartney -- as did the cutting of the "Hey Bulldog" sequence from the movie, apparently with no resistance from Lennon, who had other, more important artistic fish to fry in 1968. What is here, however, is a good enough reason for owning the record, though nothing rates it as anything near a high-priority purchase.

The album would have been far better value if it had been released as a four-song EP (an idea the Beatles even considered at one point, with the addition of a bonus track in "Across the Universe" but ultimately discarded). And the original soundtrack was partly supplanted by the release at the end of the 1990s of the Yellow Submarine (Songtrack), which marked the first of the remastered Beatles albums, thus reducing the appeal of the original. No one would argue that there's a huge amount more than meets the eye (or ear) there, but listening to the original album anew 40 years on, one is still struck by how mostly second-rate, and recycled and rejected Beatles material still sounds so good. And while George Martin's instrumental music from the film wasn't what a lot of Beatles fans were looking for, it was relegated safely to side two if one wished to ignore it. And even that material offered a pleasant surprise or two. First, over how much more enjoyable it was than the Ken Thorne arranged background music for Help! (could one imagine a full side of that on an album?); and, second, the fun that Martin has as an orchestrator with some of George Harrison's recent Hindustanti music excursions on "Sea of Time"; the latter is doubly interesting, as Martin in later years, in his autobiography All You Need Is Ears, admitted to regretting some of the antipathy he showed to Harrison and his music and songwriting during their time together with the Beatles. And, finally, as a Beatles-lite release, Yellow Submarine does have its moments of welcome on the turntable or the CD player -- it's not every time that calls for listening as ambitious and demanding as The White Album, Abbey Road, or Sgt. Pepper's.

TRACKS:
All songs written and composed by Lennon–McCartney, except where noted.
Side one
1 Yellow Submarine - 2:40
2 Only a Northern Song (George Harrison) - 3:24
3 All Together Now - 2:11
4 Hey Bulldog - 3:11
5 It's All Too Much (Harrison) - 6:25
6 All You Need Is Love - 3:51

All songs written and composed by George Martin, except where noted.
Side two
1 Pepperland - 2:21
2 Sea of Time - 3:00
3 Sea of Holes - 2:17
4 Sea of Monsters - 3:37
5 March of the Meanies - 2:22
6 Pepperland Laid Waste - 2:19
7 Yellow Submarine in Pepperland (arranged by Martin) - 2:13

[Gina Marie]

I Love this...

[Gina Marie]

49 years ago, today...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SuOnPAFnyIE

www.youtube.com/watch?v=zgYvLRhvnKs

[watcher1]

Isn't it more like 49 years ago?   

[Gina Marie]

Isn't it more like 49 years ago?   

Yes, darling Watcher... a simple typo... thanks for catching it!

[Gina Marie]

[Gina Marie]

ON THIS DATE (46 YEARS AGO)
February 17, 1967 - The Beatles: "Strawberry Fields Forever" b/w "Penny Lane" 45 single is released in the UK.

[watcher1]

Gia - wish you would have been around when the Beatles first started.  But your posting all these little tidbits does bring back memories.  A big WOO to KBs resident Beatle expert.

[Gina Marie]

Thanks Watcher!!! 

[Gina Marie]

Happy Birthday George Harrison!
Born: 25 February 1943 - Liverpool, England
Died:   29 November 2001 (aged 58) - Los Angeles, California, US

[Gina Marie]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_M9US-cXJMo

[Gina Marie]

Beatles History Today in 1964 was a busy day...in the US, release of "Twist And Shout"/"There's A Place" single. "A Hard Day's Night" film was beginning with a shoot on board a train leaving Paddington Station. And on this March 2nd, 1964, George met Pattie. ♥

[MissBarbara]

Did the Beatles Get Screwed?

By Eli Attie

Monday, March 4, 2013



Brow Beat is following the Beatles in “real time,” 50 years later, from their first chart-topper to their final rooftop concert. All last month we looked back at Please Please Me, which the Beatles recorded 50 years ago in February. It was toward the end of that same month that they started their own publishing company, Northern Songs.

On Feb. 22, 1963, the Beatles made what many consider the biggest business blunder of their career: They signed away a majority interest in their songwriting, to a struggling music publisher with no track record, for absolutely nothing.

Decades later, McCartney would refer to the agreement that created their publishing company, Northern Songs, as a “slave contract.” Harrison would mock its terms in an outtake from Sgt. Pepper’s, singing “it doesn’t really matter what chords I play… as it’s only a Northern Song.” Lennon would say with some bitterness that the bald and bespectacled man who proposed the deal, Dick James, had “carved Brian [Epstein] up.”

In fact, by the standards of the day, Dick James made the Beatles—a band with one hit record and zero leverage in the industry—a pretty good deal.

Keep in mind that when Chuck Berry recorded his first 45 for Chess Records in the mid-’50s, the Chess brothers made him share songwriting credit—right on the label—with a prominent disk jockey, as well as with the company’s landlord. The publishing rights to Little Richard’s “Tutti Frutti” were purchased by his label bosses for all of 50 dollars. This kind of wholesale theft was commonplace; in the early rock era, the ethics of the average music publisher could make a mob capo blanch.

But Epstein knew that the right music publisher could make a difference. Publishers were, in effect, hustlers. They promoted new songs by their artists, and even more important in the pre-Beatles era, when most artists didn’t write their own songs, they hawked the songs to other artists.

“Love Me Do” had been published by EMI’s in-house publishing arm, Ardmore & Beechwood, which did nothing to promote it. As a result, it stalled at No. 17 on the charts, even though Epstein allegedly ordered 10,000 copies, nearly two-thirds of the record’s initial sales, as his own effort at “promotion.” When the much more promising “Please Please Me” was on the verge of release, Epstein set out to find his hustler.

This is where the London music scene’s old boys’ network came into play. James had been a modestly successful dance-hall singer, produced by none other than a young George Martin. His 1956 recording of “Robin Hood,” the theme to a British TV series, hit No. 14 on the charts—the biggest success either had ever had. This won James a regular spot on Radio Luxembourg, produced by a man named Philip Jones. (This connection would soon prove fateful, as I’ll explain below.) When James’s musical career sputtered to a halt, he got into music publishing. It was James who brought Martin and the Beatles “How Do You Do It,” which the Beatles hated but recorded anyway.

At this point, Epstein wanted to approach Hill & Range, the U.S. publisher that handled Elvis Presley’s catalog, about taking over from Ardmore & Beechwood. Martin, perhaps out of loyalty to his pal James, urged Epstein to go with a smaller, “hungrier” company. He in fact gave three names to Epstein, but added a special plug for James. When one of the other contenders was 20 minutes late for his appointment with Epstein, the Fabs’ manager simply left and showed up at James’ office early. James ushered him right in. Epstein played him an acetate of “Please Please Me” and told him that if he could help turn it into a hit, he could handle their publishing. 

In the eyes of some contemporaries, James may have literally been hungry at this point; Epstein was reportedly alarmed by the shabbiness of his office. But right in front of Epstein, James called his former producer Philip Jones, who had fortuitously taken over one of Britain’s most important pop TV shows, Thank Your Lucky Stars. He played “Please Please Me” into the phone, got the Beatles their first national TV appearance, and—seeming much better connected than he was—sealed the deal that made him wealthy beyond comprehension within 18 months.

After “Please Please Me” became a hit, it was James who suggested the Beatles form their own publishing company. While this wasn’t completely without precedent—Irving Berlin had owned his own songs—it was hardly the norm. The idea was, by making Lennon, McCartney, and Epstein partners in the venture with James, they could have some control over their creative rights, in addition to receiving royalties. George Martin saw it as “a very clever deal” because its generosity ensured the Beatles would sign with James for the long haul—ten years, initially.

The deal was signed in Epstein’s Liverpool home; it’s believed that Lennon and McCartney didn’t even read the contract. British record sales would be split nearly 50-50—about the same as the Ardmore deal—with James taking a 10 percent administration charge from the artists’ share. For overseas sales, James’ administration charge was 50 percent—also standard for the time, though it meant the songwriting Beatles and Epstein would share just 25 percent of, say, a huge American hit. Overall, James and his business partner managed to retain 51 percent of the company—a majority stake that caused a lot of headaches for the Beatles down the road.

Did the Beatles get screwed by the very creation of Northern Songs? It’s hard to see how. They’d released just two 45s—one of them barely a hit—and yet they formed their own company, a move that did give them some say in their creative lives, and would soon be imitated a thousand-fold. James not only helped to launch “Please Please Me” with a prime TV spot, he worked to see that their songs were covered by everyone from Herb Alpert to Petula Clark to Ella Fitzgerald—which was the business Lennon and McCartney hoped to be in once their performing careers fizzled out. After all, in 1963, no one could have predicted the value or longevity of the Beatles’ canon. Lennon would tell Gloria Steinem in 1964, “I know this thing can’t last. I’m saving the money.” And as late as 1965, McCartney would say, “We’ve got people we trust—our manager, our recording manager, our publisher, and our accountant—they’re all trustworthy people, I think. So we leave it to them and I don’t have to worry.”

Knowing what we all know today, could the Beatles have kept 75 percent of their publishing, which is standard today? Could they have owned and managed their publishing outright, like Berlin, and hired cheap flaks to do the hustling? Of course they could have. But back in February 1963, not even the Beatles knew that they’d become the Beatles.


http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2013/03/04/the_beatles_start_northern_songs_was_it_really_a_slave_contract.html