BEATLES FORUM

[Benny25]

Just chime in whenever you find an interesting tidbit Steve. The more, the merrier.

[John_fromNY]

John and Benny,

Thanks to both of you for the great posts about the Fab 4. I've been a Beatles fan ever since John Lennon's tragic death and the huge media coverage of that. I was too young in the 60's to remember them as a group.

I became a fan after listening to songs such as "A Day In The Life" (my favourite Beatles song) and bought the Beatles box set on cassette in the early 80's. I have a number of Beatles books including the A-Z of the Beatles and a book with the lyrics of all the songs they wrote (excluding the early cover versions they recorded). I'll be posting stuff from time to time here. Also, if anyone has any questions about the Beatles or the individual members, ask away and I'll try to answer them.

This is a great thread!!

Excellent Steve!! Please bring in any new material, as it would be appreciated by all of us.

And speaking of my bootleg Beatles albums, I do have one from Australia. Or maybe it is from New Zealand? Not quite sure. Anyway, this album is called, F U C K! Yes, a take off on Help! whereby they are naked on the front cover (not really - trick photography!!), of course, they are all covered up by that very long red and white scarf that shows up in the film. Hehe. Remember that from the movie. The side markings list "SAPCOR33" - On the back cover, all four of them - are shown in a photo from the Help! movie in their black coats, and cloaks, leaning over the piano. Here is the best I could do. As it comes the closest to the album photo. From the Google images folder for Beatles_help.

Side 1 has:

Help, Ticket to Ride, Act Naturally, Yesterday, Dizzy Miss Lizzie, That Means a Lot

Side 2 has

I Feel Fine, She's A Woman, I'm Down, Yes It Is (stereo vers.), A Medley (Love Me Do/Please Please Me/From Me to You/She Loves You/I Want to Hold Your Hand/Can't Buy Me Love), This Boy (stereo vers.)

Side 3 has

I Got a Woman, Johnny B Goode, Honey Don't (John singing), Twist and Shout, Hippy Hippy Shake, I Forgot to Remember to Forget

Side 4 has

Beatle Views (complete unedited press coverage Aust./NZ tour) part two


It says it's "Manufactured and Distributed by Apple Records (New Zealand Ltd) copywrited 1964-1965."

Really neat.

[John_fromNY]

Aw c'mon HT. You don't recognize the Abbey Road Beatles?

Abbey Road is a classic Beatles album. Next to Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, it is probably their best.

A bearded John Lennon, wearing his spectacles, and in the white suit represents the God figure. This spiritual view is what the West accepts, especially in Europe and in America. Although in the Far East and Asia, the classic burial garb for a dead person is in white.

A bearded Richard Starkey, wearing the black suit represents God's representative on Earth. A clergyman. Or take it to another extreme, the undertaker.

A clean shaven Paul McCartney, smoking a cigarette and not wearing any shoes represents the dead person. Most people in England are buried that way without shoes. Also as the corpse is cut in half at the torso, the legs are usually separated from the body, thus there is no need to put shoes on a pair of legs.

And lastly, a bearded George Harrison, wearing the working class denim shirt and jeans, represents the gravedigger. He finishes up at a burial.

Notice: The Volkswagen Beetle parked on the side of the road behind where they are walking. The license plate says "28IF" this represents Paul's age at the time. The Beatles were capitalizing on all the theories that Paul was dead. These clues were listed in prior songs... for example,

1. Play it backward on a reel to reel tape player, "Revolution # 9" and John is thought to have said, "He is a dead man" it sounds very clear...

2. Also John says, "I buried Paul" (or I'm very bored) at the end of "Strawberry Fields"...Paul seems to say, "Bury my body"...

3. Paul was thought to have died in a bloody car crash, In "A Day in the Life" where John says,

He blew his mind out in a car
He didn't notice that the lights had changed
A crowd of people stood and stared
They'd seen his face before
Nobody was really sure if he was from the House of Lords

4. And an imposter - with plastic surgery - looking exactly like Paul took over for him in the band unbeknownst to the public and the world. His name, of course, is Billy Sheers.

On Sgt Pepper, the opening song, "Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" is sung by both John and Paul. On the next song, Paul was supposed to sing this second song off the album, doing it solo. However, because he was dead, and to throw the death clue seekers off, a "nervous" Ringo actually sings the song as Billy Sheers,

What would you do if I sang out of tune
Would you stand up and walk out on me?
Lend me your ears and I'll sing you a song
And I'll try not to sing out of key

A reference to Billy's first attempt at singing. Wouldn't you be nervous in your first try? And wouldn't you sing it out of tune? Yes to both.

5. More death clues are in the Magical Mystery Tour album - in the picture when they as a group come down the staircase, who has the black rose? Well, that's Paul. The others, John, George and Ringo all have colored roses. I haven't seen it in awhile, so they all could be red roses.

6. And on The Beatles White Album... reference is made to "Happiness is a Warm Gun," and "Revolution # 9 - Number Nine" among others...

[Benny25]

My signature song from "Abbey Road". Golden Slumbers/Carry That Weight/The End.

[John_fromNY]

Very nice video here Benny. The compiler Liisatra did an excellent and awesome job.

So Paul will be in Flushing, Queens next month, July 17 and 18th to perform at Citi-Field. The new home of the Mets.

He also was at Billy Joel's finale at Shea Stadium last year, as were a few others, Steven Tyler, Roger Daultry and Garth Brooks.

So just like the Beatles he gives the first concert there.

[AussieSteve]

Today (June 18) is Paul McCartney's 67th Birthday. "Birthday" is also the title of one of the great Lennon/McCartney songs on the double White Album from 1968.

[John_fromNY]

Thank you Steve. I stand corrected. Sir Paul is in England today celebrating his birthday. It's next month July 17th and 18th when he performs his concerts at Citifield.

I went ahead and changed the post above.

[Benny25]

Check this guy out. He's fantastic!

"While My Guitar Gently Weeps" on a ukelele, no less.

[John_fromNY]

Yes Benny so very true. George Harrison was a big ukelele fan. When he lived here in southern California on Blue Jay Way, he and Patti decided to have a house Christmas party and so she invited her sister, Jenny and Mick Fleetwood, her boyfriend at the time, along with twenty other guests to this very private party.

George had a ukelele duet with Tiny Tim, another guest there as well. Later, Tiny sang his solo "Nowhere Man" which made it onto part of the 1968 Beatles fan message.

Paul recently did a some dedications and tributes to Linda and to both John and George at the recent Citifield concerts...

On piano, he dedicated "My Love" to Linda.

I heard that Paul played a twelve string acoustic guitar on a "Day In the Life" and he sang "Give Peace A Chance" - his dedication to John - the concert goers sang the chorus. Mind you, he doesn't normally sing any of John's solo songs. He last time he did so was for the Prince's Trusts Concerts way back in the late 80's (was it 1989? Not sure) where he sang six of John's songs ....

And lastly, Paul played a ukelele version of "Something" - his dedication to George.

[rokkerr]

Maybe time for another Beatles show?

[AussieSteve]

Maybe time for another Beatles show?

For sure, another Beatles show would be awesome! I bet many new members of the VNA are fans of the Fab 4 as well.

[rokkerr]

Acoustic version of Day Tripper....

[John_fromNY]

Good One Rokkerr Dave.

A Good show!!

When Lars stands up... he goes into "Lady Madonna" as well....

He shows good form. And he has good finger and thumb picking too.

[Benny25]

Here's another one of Sir George Martin's mixed Beatles tracks from the "Love" album. A medley of Octopus's Garden and Goodnight and Sun King with a lot of sound bytes from Yellow Submarine. He did a superb job of mixing this one.

[AussieSteve]

Lots of media coverage down under regarding 14 UK Beatles albums being digitally re-mastered. Gyles Martin (Sir George's son) and some Abbey Road engineers have been working on this project for 4 years.

Music industry predictions say that all 14 albums will be in the UK Top 20 album chart this week at the same time. Simply incredible!!

The albums are the Past Masters compilation, the Magical Mystery Tour soundtrack and 12 studio LP's as follows:-

Please Please Me
With The Beatles
A Hard Day's Night
Beatles For Sale
Help!
Rubber Soul
Revolver
Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
The Beatles (White Album)
Yellow Submarine
Abbey Road
Let It Be

The original master reels were re-mastered with creaky chairs, electrical clicks and other sounds erased with music quality enhanced now.

[LauraJebAndSue]

Ok we are music chicks and love the Beatles!

But this 9/ 9/ 9 all over the World is a marketing ploy!

Follow the money? Who makes most? This is all

We are NOT Suckers

[h0rnytoad1]

The new Beattles Rockband came out yesterday

the instruments are sold together, not separatelly (yet) , so its a bit more expensive but looking cool always costs more.

http://www.thebeatlesrockband.com/

i saw a preview on tv of the instruments, more to come i'm sure.

the guitars look really nice in the kit, they have 3 very nice ones and 1 drum just like the originals, if a bit smaller.

Maybe John would love to tell us more about the beattles and their musical intruments in particular ?

It looks like there's a Les Paul guitar, dunno much about the intruments, but i do like the all black one. looks like the one B B King uses too. Great sound !

[John_fromNY]

Ok we are music chicks and love the Beatles!

But this 9/ 9/ 9 all over the World is a marketing ploy!

Follow the money? Who makes most? This is all

We are NOT Suckers

Yeah, a ploy for "Revolution # 9" ... Number Nine, Number Nine (which is actually George Martin's voice mainly, played backwards, it's sounds like, "Turn me on dead man"

Who makes the most money? ... that's simple.... The Estate of John Lennon, Paul McCartney, the Estate of George Harrison, Richard Starkey, Yoko Ono and Olivia Harrison. All reflected as increased royalty income.

Example, when they did the Anthology albums, their whole royalty valuations with Apple Records/EMI and Northern Songs Publishing needed to be redone over to accomodate Yoko's rent payments at the Dakota Apartments and John's vast amount of artwork displayed there. Paintings, lithographs and etchings done by himself. Then his art collection. He had a few of Picasso, Renvoir, Dali, Van Gogh and/or stored elsewhere thoughout Manhattan, and in his summer mansions in England and Monserrat. The insurance premiums on the artwork is quite extensive as well as expensive. True story.

Next Sony Music and the Estate of Michael Jackson. As yes, they get their cut too.

[LauraJebAndSue]

Johnnie Boy NY,

lil jebby just told us he was at a play in NYC the night John got shot and went to the Dakota Apt. upon hearing of the news and what a Zoo. We have met Yoko a few times and she is (excuse us) a turd!

Just wish we could get a bit of this rip off. We don't like Paul anymore either. His "True Colors" showed up on how he shafted Heater! Saw a recent concert and Paul sucked! All legend and NO talent now.

So kill us Beatles fans,

Laura and Sue the Dead broke singers

[John_fromNY]

Maybe John would love to tell us more about the beatles and their musical intruments in particular ?

John mainly played a Rickenbacker 325. In your picture it is shown under Paul's bass.

For the Let It Be sessions, it was mainly a yellow Gibson Les Paul Junior F shaped hole guitar. John's accoustic guitars were Epiphones. Different models. Except when he was in Toronto, when he played a Gibson model. He also played a Steinway grand piano.

Paul played a Hofner bass guitar. His acoustic guitar was an Epiphone. Different models. He also played a Steinway grand piano, an organ and a harpsichord.

George played a Gretsch "Chet Atkins Country Gentleman" guitar made by Fender. This guitar is not shown. Since George's actual guitar had a red face - your picture shows a poor illustration of it above Paul's bass guitar, with a black face. (At the time, most film and pictures were in b&w thus this is why it is incorrect). George also played a Telecaster made by Fender. He used it for the Let It Be and the Abbey Road sessions and apparently gave it away to Delany Bramlett.

Richard Starkey played a Ludwig drum kit.

Anything else?