Quote
frankotero
treacle, I like you and enjoy reading your posts. Think we're not going to completely agree on this, I'm okay with your opinion/thoughts. Hope you are good with mine. You raise some good points for sure. Again, I think it's impossible to completely know the truth. But we got to make a stand somewhere/sometime.

Thank you, like-wise!

I completely agree (ironically) that we won't all agree and that's what makes these conversations interesting.

I think my 'defense' of my original post came after the condescending comment (not you) questioning whether we'd even READ (the original article). The article itself isn't any clearer as words on a page can sometimes be. So in reading it, I certainly didn't come to the conclusion Lennon's words were VERY respectful.

Just John, being John...and again, I didn't have a problem with it, and actually like that he said it.

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treaclefingers

Quote
frankotero
treacle, I like you and enjoy reading your posts. Think we're not going to completely agree on this, I'm okay with your opinion/thoughts. Hope you are good with mine. You raise some good points for sure. Again, I think it's impossible to completely know the truth. But we got to make a stand somewhere/sometime.

Thank you, like-wise!

I completely agree (ironically) that we won't all agree and that's what makes these conversations interesting.

I think my 'defense' of my original post came after the condescending comment (not you) questioning whether we'd even READ (the original article). The article itself isn't any clearer as words on a page can sometimes be. So in reading it, I certainly didn't come to the conclusion Lennon's words were VERY respectful.

Just John, being John...and again, I didn't have a problem with it, and actually like that he said it.

I like John's words too. But it seems to start like he was wrong: Christianity will outlive rock'n'roll, after all. For god's sake!

- Doxa

Quote
Doxa

Quote
treaclefingers

Quote
frankotero
treacle, I like you and enjoy reading your posts. Think we're not going to completely agree on this, I'm okay with your opinion/thoughts. Hope you are good with mine. You raise some good points for sure. Again, I think it's impossible to completely know the truth. But we got to make a stand somewhere/sometime.

Thank you, like-wise!

I completely agree (ironically) that we won't all agree and that's what makes these conversations interesting.

I think my 'defense' of my original post came after the condescending comment (not you) questioning whether we'd even READ (the original article). The article itself isn't any clearer as words on a page can sometimes be. So in reading it, I certainly didn't come to the conclusion Lennon's words were VERY respectful.

Just John, being John...and again, I didn't have a problem with it, and actually like that he said it.

I like John's words too. But it seems to start like he was wrong: Christianity will outlive rock'n'roll, after all. For god's sake!

- Doxa

Rock'n'Roll didn't even outlive Hip Hop!

But it was a very "rock'n'roll" thing to say!

Indeed, Treacle, the spirit and attitude of rock'n'roll. Like Mick once said "I'm, along with the Queen, you know, one of the best things England got - me and the Queen".

For poor old England, thankfully Mick's still left...

- Doxa

Quote
Doxa
I like John's words too. But it seems to start like he was wrong: Christianity will outlive rock'n'roll, after all. For god's sake!

This kills me!

Hi,

George Harrison's youth home is now rentable on airbnb,
wouldn't it be grat if someone would buy edith grove,
and then we could sleep there 1 night and imagine to be there with the boys ... ?

airbnb:
[www.airbnb.de]


articles:
[www.youtube.com]
[www.frommers.com]

Nice interview with Klaus Voorman from Goldmine Magazine:

Klaus Voormann on the story behind the cover art of Beatles' 'Revolver'
Goldmine talks with artist/musician Klaus Voormann about the production of the album cover that became iconic for Beatles fans and even the pop culture at large.
Ken Sharp, Apr 28, 2023

BEATLES REVOLVER



While the Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper album has reaped reams of critical acclaim as a milestone in the group’s recording career, the album that preceded it, Revolver, for many, is deemed the watermark recording in their history. It’s a trailblazing album that changed everything marking a pivotal moment when The Beatles’ sound transformed from black and white into vibrant wide-screen technicolor. John Lennon and Paul McCartney were peaking as songwriters during this time — “Here, There and Everywhere,” “Tomorrow Never Knows” and “Eleanor Rigby” for starters — and George Harrison truly blossomed as a songwriter “in his own write” with “Taxman,” “I Want To Tell You” and “Love You To.” As latter day Beatle albums, Sgt. Pepper, The White Album, Let It Be and Abbey Road, have been given the super deluxe-edition treatment, thanks to radical de-mixing technology spearheaded by Emile de la Rey at Peter Jackson’s WingNut Films Productions Ltd., the band’s spectacular 1966 long player Revolver is the next set replete with a new stereo mix and revelatory outtakes of most of the songs on the record. Goldmine spoke with Klaus Voormann who did the groundbreaking artwork and design for the lowdown.

GOLDMINE: It’s late June 1966, and the phone rings. Who is it?

KLAUS VOORMANN: John called me and said, “It’s John,” and at first I was thinking, “John who?” I didn’t know who it was. Well, it’s John Lennon ,and he said, “Do you have an idea for our next album cover? We don’t know what we want on there, so if you have any ideas, let’s see it.” Then he invited me to come down to the studio and I listened to the tracks for what would become the Revolver album. At first, my impressions of the music they played me was that it was just incredible. It was just really hard to explain. It was so far ahead of whatever any pop group had done before. This was going into Stockhausen and other kinds of avant-garde music, and suddenly you had the Beatle fans from the early days and now you had this new music. I didn’t know if they’re going to accept it or not. It was really a big step into the future.

GM: And you were scared after hearing “Tomorrow Never Knows.” What scared you about it?

KV: It was just so fantastic, and at the same time scary, because I was always thinking of those little kids that love “Love Me Do.” I thought, how are they going to accept this music? So my job was now to find a way to show the new idea, the new experimental stuff that’s on that record, to the public. It couldn’t be another cover with lots of color and their faces. It had to be something completely different and that’s the hard job, which I had to get into.

GM: So the next step was you went home and you worked up some drawings and sketches, and then you went back to EMI Studios, right?

KV: Yeah, right. I came up with a few things. I came to the conclusion that there had to be lots of photos on there because those kids always love to see photos of The Beatles, as many as possible. I didn’t even know if I was going to do it as a design with their hair. I tried different ideas like with an air balloon, and one was in a boat, and then I came to this idea with the hair. I said, “Hair, that’s really important.” So I did sketches on one big piece of paper; a two-sided, really large sort of sketch block, which artists use. I had the first magic marker that came out and I did those scribbles, and scribbled them down, all on that one big piece of paper, and folded up that piece of paper. When I was finished I took it down to EMI and into the canteen. That’s where the boys were sitting. Many years later I did this graphic novel where I explained as much as possible what the feeling of what it looked like and what they looked like and what I did. When people get the box set, there is a book in there, and there are excerpts from the book, seven pages from the graphic novel, so people can see what it’s about. The full graphic novel is in a book that’s called Revolver 50: Birth of an Icon.

GM: So you walk into the canteen and The Beatles are there and you lay down your sketches.

KV: As a matter of fact, I don’t know who said anything first, but they all kind of pointed and said, “This is the one, the one here with the hair. That’s fantastic. It’s great, the little figures in the hair,” and then I was happy because I liked the idea, too. But in truth, I already knew they would go for that one. All the other ones, we didn’t even talk about. None of them said, “This other one could be nice.” They went for the one with the hair and lots of figures.

GM: Characterize the inspiration behind the hair, which is so beautifully rendered. It’s not just hair, it’s a work of art.

KV: Well, the thing was at the time, which is very hard for people to sort of imagine today, it was sensational that people were actually wearing long hair like that. That was just not known before. It was a very important part of The Beatles collective look. I did this sort of style of drawing it with a pen and ink and making it something that glues the whole thing together, and it worked fine. It was good.

GM: Was there any particular artist or artwork that you had in your mind to inspire you? Was Aubrey Beardsley an influence?

KV: He certainly was, but he’s not the only one. When you think of a collage, I was thinking of (Kurt) Schwitters. There’s lots of artists I was thinking of, but not in particular one person. Some people say, “Oh, you must have gone to that exhibition of Bearsdley, but I didn’t even go there. I love Beardsley. He’s fantastic. But he was not the inspiration for me with that style.

GM: Let’s talk about the actual technical process. You lived in an apartment in Parliament Hill, Hampstead, where you worked on it. It’s not just a drawing but a collage of various elements.

KV: Well, I had this in mind all the way from the very start, and I even told the boys, “Look, I want to do it in black and white.” They said, “Yeah, great, black and white.” I said, “Look, everything is in color. All the covers have faces on them, mostly smiling faces of the band. Now people are going crazy with the psychedelic look, whatever you call it, ‘flower power,’ but let’s do it different this time, we’ll do it black and white.” Then I said, “You don’t need to have the name Beatles on that because people will know that it’s The Beatles.” And they said, “Yes, you’re right, no Beatles on that.” At that time we didn’t know what the album was going to be called, so I just set off working on it.

GM: And you were working with pen and ink for the drawings, and for the collage employing scissors, scalpel and glue.

KV: Well, first I tried everything. I tried with charcoal, or I did it with a pen and a little bit of brushes. Because I did a few record covers for companies and for myself where I used that sort of style, I felt very comfortable using pen and ink and doing that type of drawing. So I tried it and said, “Oh yeah, that works fine,” so I used that technique.

GM: For the collage, you utilized photographs from Robert Freeman and you also went to The Beatles themselves for personal photos.

KV: Right. Robert Whitaker took the photo on the back cover, and he took some great photos, too, but the main photographer for the boys was always Bob Freeman. He was a lovely guy. I really like him a lot. He’s beautiful, man.

GM: So you went to Bob and you picked out photos he had?

KV: Yes, I had those photos, which EMI got me, and then I got some from NEMS Enterprises, Brian Epstein’s company. Then I called the boys and said, “Look, get together all the photos you can think of, it doesn’t matter what quality. I’m going to choose whatever I think is right, and if you don’t like it, you’ve got the last say. You can say, ‘No, I don’t like it,’ but just leave it to me. Grab all the photos. If you’re on skis or if you are in the country or if you’re laughing, or whatever, just send me all the pictures and I’ll pick the ones which might fit into the collage.” The next day I got an envelope and there are all these photos in there from the boys, and so I took those.

GM: You put yourself on the cover as well.

KV: (laughs) Yeah, that was more or less after that. It’s right at the corner doing George’s hair. I thought, “Oh, why not? Let me put myself on there?” I just put my little name on there and then I said, “Ok, stick a photo on there,” so I did.

GM: And The Beatles caught that immediately?

KV: Yeah, John, immediately, of course. He said, “You cheeky bugger, you put yourself on there!” (laughs)

GM: How long did the actual work take?

KV: I think it must have been just about two weeks.

GM: Once it was done, what was the next step? Where did you bring it to show the band?

KV: I think The Beatles just came back from a little tour in Germany, that “Blitz” tour, and I was finished and made an appointment to come not to the studio but to the EMI House, to the office of George Martin. I went up there and put it up on the cabinet, which was about the height that people can really see it. The Beatles were there, of course, along with Brian Epstein, George Martin and others.

GM: What was the immediate reaction?

KV: The immediate reaction was silence, and that was terrible for me, just terrible. I guess nobody wanted to say anything at first. I felt terrible, then Paul went up to the piece of artwork and said, “Hey, he put me on there,” and he pointed at the photo in the top left corner, and there was Paul sitting on the toilet. Then George Martin came up and said, “Oh ,Klaus, you can’t have that.” Paul said, “Oh sure, that’s great, why not? Keep it on there.” And George Martin came up to me again and said, “Can’t you exchange that for another picture?” So I took that photo off. But after that all happened, then people really got into talking about little details and looked at it and said, “Yeah, that’s me with a helmet on,” or they said, “Oh, what’s this? That’s John!” By that point I was relieved because it was clear then that they liked the cover. They thought it was really good and that was wonderful.

GM: This might be difficult to answer, but being the artist, what are the strongest characteristics of the cover for which you’re most proud?

KV: There’s one photo that’s taken from a fan magazine or something where one of the boys is wearing a striped suit, and it’s not straight, it’s crooked. And there’s another photo taken with a fisheye lens, which was in Stern magazine. I like the combination of those things, which are little strange and surrealistic; that combination of that surrealistic touch with the fun, the jokey bits where people laugh. It was that combination, which made me very happy that I actually did it. And of course, the face of John really makes me happy, with his nose and those almond-shaped eyes.

GM: Who was the hardest one out of The Beatles to draw?

KV: The hardest one to draw would have been George. George is a beautiful boy, but he does not have any specific mark or characteristic where you say “That’s a George face.” He doesn’t have that. So I had a hard time. I tried to draw him lots of times and I couldn’t do it justice, so in the end, I took those photos from a magazine and put them on there, and I was very happy with that solution. I didn’t draw it, I just stuck them on that photo; the mouth and the eyes of George are photos from a magazine.

GM: Not only is Revolver such an incredible cover, but I think the smartest thing you did was go against the burst of color “flower power” zeitgeist of the period with your art, which would have been the obvious way to go. But you chose to go in the opposite direction, and I think that makes it timeless.

KV: Yeah, but the good thing about it is that whatever I said, I had complete freedom. I asked them, “Is it OK if I do it black and white?” and they agreed. I guess they knew that I can do something like that because they saw my work before. John saw it, Paul saw it and George saw it — not sure about Ringo. So all the others knew what I was capable of and said, “Oh, he’s going to do something good,” so that made me feel so good and that made it so easy for me to do the cover in the end.

GM: What was the feeling like when you first got a copy of the album in your hands?

KV: Wonderful…but there was another thing, which I haven’t talked to anybody about yet. I got a proof from the printer and they actually printed in a sort of sepia color. I was like, “What are you doing?” I called them and said, “This is ridiculous. This is no good. This is terrible.” If that’s how it was going to look I felt, I’m going to die. And they said, “OK.” I drove down to the printer to talk and tell them exactly what I wanted, and then, of course, there it was in black and white, and everything was fine. Holding the album in my hands for the first time was a good feeling. Of course, I knew what it was going to look like as it’s my cover, but I was happy to have the record and put the record on immediately and listen to the tracks. That the cover was good and right, I was confident about; I knew what it looked like. I was more interested in putting the record on the turntable and listening to the tracks. That was more important when I got the record. I’m very proud of the Revolver cover, and I’m very proud that the boys, the most famous band in the world, came and asked me to do a cover for them. Of course, if they wouldn’t have done that, I couldn’t have done it. I could only do it if they asked me, and of course, I tried my best. It’s logical. I love it myself. I think it’s a very good job I did.

_____________________________________________________________
Rip this joint, gonna save your soul, round and round and round we go......

I was going to start a brand new thread, The Beatles vs. The Led Zeppelin, but thought maybe I could just post this under this existing thread.

It seems that 'The Led Zeppelin' have finally knocked 'The Beatles' off their perch as "TOP WORLD GROUP"...let's listen in:

Undisputable fact: If it wasn't for "The Beatles" the most overrated band of all time would be "The Led Zeppelin".

Great version:



_____________________________________________________________
Rip this joint, gonna save your soul, round and round and round we go......

Quote
Hairball
Great version:

sensational...great find HB.

BY JOVE I THINK WE'VE GOT IT!

Son of Beatles MEETS The Rolling Stones...stand back everyone, gimme shelter!

The Beatles had 2 Xmas residencies in London in early 60'a.

One compered by Jimmy Saville, the other by Rolf Harris. Both later found d to be child sex offenders. Rolf's death in the last few days means that both are history.

Unfortunatel coincidence.

--
Captain Corella
60 Years a Fan

Ken Dodd Show with The Beatles recovered
Tuesday 30th May 2023, 5:32pm

BEATLES

-A missing edition of The Ken Dodd Show from 1963 has been found
-Aired in November, it features a performance by The Beatles in their break-out year
-The episode airs this week on Radio 4 Extra and is available now on BBC Sounds



A lost episode of The Ken Dodd Show has been recovered and aired by BBC Radio 4 Extra. Originally aired on the Light Programme on 3rd November 1963, it is particularly notable for featuring a guest appearance by The Beatles just weeks before the release of their second album and on the cusp of international super-stardom. The final episode of the first series, it was recorded on John Lennon's 23rd birthday - 9th October - and hasn't been heard since a repeat in mid-November, almost 60 years ago. The comedy, a mix of music, sketches and stand-up fronted by legendary Liverpool comic Ken Dodd, would eventually run for more than 50 episodes over six series, concluding in 1968, before the title was used again in 1970 and 1973.

In the recovered episode, The Beatles perform She Loves You. Dodd is also joined by future Dad's Army star, actor John Laurie; comic actress Patricia Hayes; and Judith Chalmers, amongst others. Recorded at the time of transmission by late BBC sound engineer and archivist Peter Copeland, it was discovered amidst and digitised from his collection of tapes by their current owner, Ted Kendall. The programme will be repeated this coming Sunday, 4th June, on Radio 4 Extra at 9am, 2pm and 8pm, and is available now on BBC Sounds.

Do you have any recordings of The Ken Dodd Show or any other old radio or TV series? They may be lost, incomplete, or only surviving in inferior quality. Contact the BBC via its website, or Kaleidoscope regarding material from other television broadcasters.

_____________________________________________________________
Rip this joint, gonna save your soul, round and round and round we go......

News of another book from Paul McCartney

No point me describing it, read Paul's extract here... [www.theguardian.com]

--
Captain Corella
60 Years a Fan

Quote
CaptainCorella
News of another book from Paul McCartney

No point me describing it, read Paul's extract here... [www.theguardian.com]

Love to see this pictures from the other side.............................

__________________________

13-Jun-2023: Paul McCartney said on BBC Radio 4 that 'new technology' has enabled a 'final' Beatles song which will be released in 2023.

The technology had been used to 'extricate' John Lennon's voice from an old demo so he could complete the song. "We just finished it up and it'll be released this year," he explained. Paul did not name the song, but it's likely to be a 1978 Lennon composition called 'Now And Then' which had already been considered as a possible 'reunion song' for the Beatles in 1995, as they were compiling their Anthology series - [www.BBC.com] .

Quote
Irix
13-Jun-2023: Paul McCartney said on BBC Radio 4 that 'new technology' has enabled a 'final' Beatles song which will be released in 2023.

The technology had been used to 'extricate' John Lennon's voice from an old demo so he could complete the song. "We just finished it up and it'll be released this year," he explained. Paul did not name the song, but it's likely to be a 1978 Lennon composition called 'Now And Then' which had already been considered as a possible 'reunion song' for the Beatles in 1995, as they were compiling their Anthology series - [www.BBC.com] .

Although I'm a bit skeptical about this new new "technology" I'm still curious

__________________________

Oh, even The Beatles are releasing a new song... Hey, usual suspects: you have now new good material for the new Stones album thread!

- Doxa

Quote
Irix
13-Jun-2023: Paul McCartney said on BBC Radio 4 that 'new technology' has enabled a 'final' Beatles song which will be released in 2023.

The technology had been used to 'extricate' John Lennon's voice from an old demo so he could complete the song. "We just finished it up and it'll be released this year," he explained. Paul did not name the song, but it's likely to be a 1978 Lennon composition called 'Now And Then' which had already been considered as a possible 'reunion song' for the Beatles in 1995, as they were compiling their Anthology series - [www.BBC.com] .

Great news!!!

_____________________________________________________________
Rip this joint, gonna save your soul, round and round and round we go......

Quote
Hairball

Quote
Irix
13-Jun-2023: Paul McCartney said on BBC Radio 4 that 'new technology' has enabled a 'final' Beatles song which will be released in 2023.

The technology had been used to 'extricate' John Lennon's voice from an old demo so he could complete the song. "We just finished it up and it'll be released this year," he explained. Paul did not name the song, but it's likely to be a 1978 Lennon composition called 'Now And Then' which had already been considered as a possible 'reunion song' for the Beatles in 1995, as they were compiling their Anthology series - [www.BBC.com] .

Great news!!!

Possibly.

But only if Paul uses (perhaps) AI to change his voice back from its 80yr old rather worn out version, to the clearer and cleaner version he had back in the 1980s before John was murdered on the street in New York

--
Captain Corella
60 Years a Fan

I wonder if they'll find a way to incorporate some of George's vocals and/or tasty guitar playing?
And wondering if Jeff Lynne will be involved again as he was with Free as a Bird and Real Love back in 1995, and maybe even Dhani Harrison will lend a voice (or guitar) to the new tune in place of his father?
Lots of possibilities to ponder............

*Edit: Evidently the possibility of George being included on this tune is quite real - at least minimally on the backing track.

According to Jeff Lynne from the BBC article:

The band also attempted to record Now And Then, an apologetic love song that was fairly typical of Lennon's later career, but the session was quickly abandoned.
"It was one day - one afternoon, really - messing with it," Lynne recalled. "The song had a chorus but is almost totally lacking in verses.
We did the backing track, a rough go that we really didn't finish."

_____________________________________________________________
Rip this joint, gonna save your soul, round and round and round we go......



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 2023-06-14 04:57 by Hairball.

Today we learned that a new Beatles song will be “unearthed” with the help of AI. Maybe AI can get this “new” album to the finish line too!

Who is Al?

Allen Iverson

Yeah better read the posting policy

The posting policy: [iorr.org] .

I think it’s allowed to discuss AI, as long as we’re reasonable about it. Isn’t it already a big part of the music business after all.

From BBC:

Paul McCartney's unseen photographs revealed
By Deborah Nicholls-Lee
13th June 2023

As the "final Beatles record" is announced, personal photos of the band are revealed, chronicling an extraordinary time,
as witnessed through the eyes of one man at the heart of it, writes Deborah Nicholls-Lee.

BEATLES

In the 60s, youth culture exploded, spawning pop music, short hemlines and screaming fans. One witness saw this exciting time closer up than almost anyone else. "Millions of eyes were suddenly upon us, creating a picture I will never forget for the rest of my life," he recalls. Sir Paul McCartney was centre stage in some of the most iconic images of the era, as Beatlemania gripped Britain and beyond. Until now, the period described by McCartney as "bedlam", "pandemonium" and "mass hysteria" has largely been recorded from the outside looking in. But what did McCartney see as he looked out? Now, a new exhibition, Paul McCartney, Photographs 1963-64: Eyes of the Storm at London's newly reopened National Portrait Gallery, and a new book, 1964: Eyes of the Storm, feature more than 200 images taken by McCartney, rediscovered by the singer-songwriter in his production company archives in 2020. The images track his time in The Beatles from 1963 to 1964 when the band were taking off, moving from the dingy picture houses of their home city of Liverpool, to the capital cities of London and Paris, and culminating in their electrifying debut in the US, which took place in New York, Washington DC and Miami.

Younger Beatles fans, who missed the fun and furore the first time round, can soon experience the launch of what McCartney described to BBC Radio 4 yesterday as "the final Beatles record", created thanks to AI technology extracting John Lennon's voice from an unused track on an old demo tape. With The Beatles enjoying a resurgence on platforms such as TikTok and YouTube, the unnamed song, to be released later this year, will delight a flourishing fan base of Gen Z enthusiasts. We know that the band's frenzied fans have always been enthralled by the four young men, but McCartney's photos show this fascination to be mutual. As well as off-guard moments of the band relaxing between gigs, they include snaps of the crowds they attracted, taken from a rear windscreen or hotel window ? unseen images chronicling an extraordinary time as witnessed through the eyes of one man at the heart of it. Eyes of the Storm takes its name from the eyes that were everywhere. "Who is looking at who?" writes McCartney in the book's foreword. "The camera always seems to be shifting, with me photographing them, the press photographing us, and those thousands and thousands of people out there wanting to capture this storm."

Photography is to play a greater part in the refurbished National Portrait Gallery, which launches with two major photography exhibitions, starting on 22 June with Yevonde's colour photographs of the 1930s, and followed by Eyes of the Storm on 28 June. The gallery's internationally recognised photographic collection will be "much more integrated" into displays, Eyes of the Storm curator Rosie Broadley tells BBC Culture. "This enables us to tell a much more nuanced and layered narrative because the people who sit for photographs are often much more diverse." The gallery's archives include photographs of The Beatles taken by big names such as David Bailey and Don McCullin, but these new images, where the camera has been passed back to the subject, offer a unique insight. "The essential difference is that it’s his perspective on the band and what’s happening. They were never meant to be publicised or shared. They're private," explains Broadley. "It's about what he was interested in, who he wanted to remember, and it’s not really so much about The Beatles – it's about Paul and the experience that he was having with his friends, who happened to be The Beatles." In Liverpool, we meet a fresh-faced Cilla Black, while in Paris, McCartney seems very taken with the French actress and pin-up Sophie Hardy. Intimate pictures of the band also provide rare through-the-keyhole glimpses as John towels himself off after a swim, for example, or George puts on sunscreen. And we are introduced to the offstage players that helped make the madness happen: the roadie, the driver, the manager, the bodyguard… captured smoking, reading or napping, or fooling about with the boys during downtime. "We messed around. It kept us sane," McCartney writes. There are surprising discoveries, too. Behind the scenes, the US tour was not always rock 'n' roll. We learn that John's wife Cynthia travelled alongside him, for example. And we meet Paul's Miami date, a modestly-dressed wide-eyed teenager who he collected, in a gentlemanly manner, from her father's office.

McCartney, a working-class lad who previously had holidayed in budget resorts in the UK, was just 21 in 1963, and the photographs reflect his unworldliness and his curiosity about the new worlds he was discovering. The novelty of travel is clear from the many photographs taken from planes and his touristy snaps of the Arc de Triomphe and the White House; while shots of posters and billboards with the band’s name on them suggest a baffled pride at their celebrity so far from home. "Looking at these photos now, decades later, I find that there is a sort of innocence about them," writes McCartney. "Everything was new to us at this point." For McCartney, the United States was synonymous with success. "Everything we listened to was from America," he writes, describing touring the US as "the big time" and "the big prize". In many ways it lived up to the band’s expectations. Their performance on the Ed Sullivan Show on 9 February 1963 attracted a record 73m viewers and McCartney drank in the US culture, photographing the skyscrapers and flashing lights of New York and going to a drive-in movie for the first time. After the monochrome snow scenes of Washington DC, sun-kissed Miami radiates warmth as McCartney reaches for the colour reel, and we get bright green palms, blue skies and canary-yellow beach wear. Described by McCartney as "Wonderland", Miami was a tropical paradise for the boys, who had the time of their life nipping around in convertibles loaned by MG and lounging by their private pool. But the US revealed a darker side, too. Kennedy had been assassinated just months before on 22 November 1963 – the band arrived in the US on 7 February 1964 – and a close-up of a gun slung about a police officer's waist suggests McCartney's unease. It was, he writes, "the first time I had ever seen something like that". The band were also shocked by the racial inequality and became part of the ground shift when they refused to play to segregated audiences. "The Beatles were not the first white band to speak out against racial segregation. But no one had a platform the size of theirs," historian Jill Lepore, who wrote the introduction to 1964: Eyes of the Storm, tells BBC Culture.

The photographs have significant historical merit. They document a pivotal time in politics, animated, says Lepore, by a "far more purposeful spirit of rebellion". "Huge structural changes" were taking place, she says, pointing to the end of the draft in the UK and the lowering of the voting age to 18 in the US. The US Civil Rights Act was being passed just as colonies around the world were gaining independence; while the advent of the contraceptive pill coincided with the first steps towards equal pay legislation. "Reporters were always asking them [The Beatles] to make sense of that world, and all its changes, and I just love how they refused to participate in that," says Lepore. "There's this one moment, when The Beatles are in Washington, DC, and a reporter asks, 'What place do you think this story of The Beatles is going to have in the history of Western culture?' And Paul says, 'You must be kidding.' It's just so beautiful. The irreverence right back." For photographers, however, McCartney had great respect and curiosity. "I often took pictures of them, not so much for revenge, but because they were interesting people," he writes. The band selected exceptional photographers to tour with them. Harry Benson, Dezo Hoffman and Robert Freeman all feature in McCartney's photographs, and when they were behind the lens, McCartney would watch them at work, eager to learn from their artistry.

The images in Eyes of the Storm were taken with a 35mm Pentax, and include modern prints made from negatives and enlarged images taken from contact sheets. Several bear the scratchy cross of McCartney's chinagraph pencil, where he has marked out his favourite shots. Some pictures, such as a grinning Ringo Starr and a self-portrait in the mirror, are blurred. Sometimes this was deliberate and sometimes it was because there was simply no time. "We were moving at such speed that you just had to grab, grab, grab!" he writes. Though an amateur, McCartney's aptitude is noteworthy. "Not only has he absorbed the ideas around photojournalism… the Cartier-Bresson idea of capturing that decisive moment, he's already looking to frame shots, looking for interesting angles," says Broadley, who helped select the photos for the exhibition from a pool of almost 1,000. "He understands what makes a good portrait, he’s quite good at placing a figure in space, [and] he's interested in architecture and the interesting perspectives you can get." Occasionally, he hands his camera to someone – a manager, roadie or bandmate – and there he is, McCartney himself, performing on stage or posing for press shots, the familiar doe-like eyes peeping out from the mop-top haircut. "We were just wisecracking guys, and we had fun with each other whatever we did and wherever we went. I think this comes across in my photos," writes McCartney in the book's closing chapter. "Words cannot describe what happened to us, but imagine every dream you’ve had coming true, and you might get close."

Paul McCartney, Photographs 1963-64: Eyes of the Storm is at the National Portrait Gallery from 28 June to 1 October 2023. The book, 1964: Eyes of the Storm, is out now, published by Penguin.

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Rip this joint, gonna save your soul, round and round and round we go......



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2023-06-14 19:45 by Hairball.

I'm watching The Beatles "Get Back" DVD, must say they all love their cups of tea

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ColonialstoneNZ
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