Beatlemania

It was time to choose a song for the important second record. George Martin didn’t like any of John and Paul’s songs at the time, so he chose a new song. The group said no. They wanted to do one of their songs. Today many bands write their own songs, but at the time this was a brave decision for a new band.

Finally, Martin agreed to record one of John’s songs, ‘Please Please Me’. At first it was a slow song, but the producer asked them to play it faster. After they recorded it, Martin told them, ‘You have just recorded your first number one.’

The Beatles worked hard to make this true. They drove all over Britain to concerts. Sometimes they stopped the van to listen to their own song on the radio. Once the van was freezing after the front window broke. The Beatles lay together in the back to keep warm!
In March 1963, ‘Please Please Me’ reached number one. George Martin was right. After that, number one followed number one. Their singles in 1963 were ‘From Me to You’, ‘She Loves You’ and ‘I Want to Hold Your Hand’.

Suddenly, everybody loved the Beatles. When the band played in concert, police had to hold back crowds of screaming fans – mainly girls. One newspaper thought of a new word to describe the country’s love of the boys from Liverpool – ‘Beatlemania’! Every Beatles single reached number one until 1967.

The band also recorded their first album early in 1963. George Martin asked them to come to the studio and play all the songs from their live show. They did this… in one long day! The album Please Please Me was recorded in about twelve hours. It went to number one, too.

‘America was ours!’

The Beatles were selling millions of records in Britain. The Sunday Times newspaper compared Lennon and McCartney with Beethoven. But many of the group’s fans had other things on their minds. A lot of young fans dreamt about their favorite Beatle:
Paul was the sweet, romantic one.
George was the quiet one.
Ringo was the happy, funny one.
John was the intelligent one. He often made jokes, but they weren’t always kind.
Follow the leader

In the very early days, John was the band’s leader. When the band became successful, his position wasn’t so clear. Both he and Paul wrote songs and sang for the band. In front of the cameras, Paul often spoke for the band, but John usually had the last word. To George, John was always the strongest person in the group. Years after John’s death, he said, ‘I think he is still the leader now, probably.’

At the beginning of 1964, the Beatles were the most popular band in Britain. They were famous in Europe, but they were still a little nervous about the United States. Many English stars looked for success across the Atlantic before the Beatles, but failed.
The Beatles’ first singles in the US didn’t do very well. But interest grew, and finally ‘I Want to Hold Your Hand’ reached number one. The band flew there in February 1964. They all knew how important this trip was. In Ringo’s words, America was all that they dreamt about years earlier.

The trip was a big success. When the band played on TV’s The Ed Sullivan Show, they were watched by an American TV audience of almost seventy-three million people. It was one of the most important shows in the history of popular music. The Beatles played in Washington and Miami, and went home happy. As Ringo said, ‘America was ours now.’ The band were world stars.

The Beatles returned to the United States later in 1964, as part of a big world tour. This trip was as successful as the last one. Ringo remembers that ‘it was just so much fun. As usual, nobody could hear the music at the concerts because of the screams of the fans. At this time it wasn’t a big problem for the band, but it became more and more important later. George’s memory of this tour was less happy than Ringo’s. President Kennedy was killed only a year before, and George didn’t want anyone to shoot one of the Beatles.

Up and Up

After the first American tour, the Beatles turned to another world – films. They made A Hard Day’s Night in the spring of 1964. The title of the film and the song of the same name was something that Ringo said. The rest of the band often laughed at the drummer’s unusual way of saying things.

The film’s writer, Alan Owen, spent a few days with the band. The Beatles were funny, and the film showed this. Owen also understood the band’s daily life. For much of the film, they were running away from screaming fans. The band liked making the film, but George probably enjoyed it most. He fell in love with one of the actresses, Patti Boyd. They were married in 1966.

The black-and-white film was first shown in London and Liverpool. It was a big success. (The album was, too. This time, all the songs were by Lennon and McCartney.) Many people really liked Ringo’s acting in the film. Some even called him ‘the new Charlie Chaplin’. But Ringo remembers that he came straight from a club for one very funny part. He says that he wasn’t acting much!
John and Paul’s musical ideas were growing all the time. Each new song was different and exciting.

A different sound

John and Paul were both big fans of Bob Dylan’s music. The subjects and language in the young American’s songs were always unusual and interesting. The song ‘I’m a Loser’ on the album Beatles for Sale, at the end of 1964, sounded a little like a Dylan song. The same was true of the following year’s ‘You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away’.

John even found time to write a book in 1964. John Lennon In His Own Write was full of funny short stories and pictures. It didn’t have any serious meaning. In the introduction Paul wrote, ‘If it seems funny, then that’s enough.’ John wrote another book the next year.
In early 1965, the Beatles made their second film. After the success of A Hard Day’s Night, there was more money. But the band just wanted to travel and have a good time. ‘We started saying, “We’ve never been to the Bahamas. Could you write that in?”‘ Paul remembers. As George said later, ‘We had fun in those days.’ But John remembered it differently. This wasn’t a happy time for him. ‘You can’t see it but I’m singing “Help!”‘ he said.

‘Here to stay’

Later in 1965, Paul wrote one of the most popular songs of all time. Yesterday was a beautiful, sad song about lost love.

STORY BEHIND THE SONG

The music for Yesterday’ came to Paul in a dream. He ‘just woke up one morning’ with the song in his head. At first, he thought it was an old song. But none of his friends knew it. The first words to the song were about eggs!
George Martin loved the song immediately. But, in his opinion, it needed something different. Paul recorded it without the rest of the band. He played the guitar alone, while a small group of musicians played strings.
The song is one of the band’s most famous – it has been recorded by many different singers and groups and in many different ways. Paul was sometimes angry when people called it their favorite Beatles song.

The King and the Queen

In August, the Beatles were back in the United States. Fifty-six thousand fans saw them at a concert in New York. At the time, it was the biggest concert crowd ever. The concert was exciting, but Ringo’s memories of it weren’t good. At times John was joking too much on stage, in Ringo’s opinion.

Also, not many people at the concert really heard the band. Like most Beatles concerts, the sound of the crowd was louder than the music. The Beatles couldn’t hear much of the music either. So, of course, it was difficult to play well.

‘I always wanted to play with good players,’ remembers Ringo. But now the band was playing badly on stage, and nobody was listening.

On the same tour, the Beatles met one of their favourite singers – Elvis Presley. ‘It was one of the great meetings of my life,’ Paul has said.

The boys and the ‘King’ had a good time. But years later the band discovered that Elvis was worried about the Beatles’ success in his country. He asked the American government to send them home.

Back in Britain, the government gave all the Beatles the MBE. This award was often given to successful businesspeople or to people who fought bravely for their country. Many Britons were angry. How could the government give this award to a pop group? But the usual crowd of screaming fans were outside Buckingham Palace when the Queen gave them the award in October 1965. The Beatles were nervous – George later remembered that they rested and had a cigarette in the toilets in Buckingham Palace!

Rubber Soul

The next album, Rubber Soul, came out in December 1965. It was another big step for the band. They were exploring different kinds of music and different subjects. ‘In My Life’ was a beautiful song about places and people in the past. Even the album’s love songs weren’t the simple love songs of the band’s early days.

One of the most interesting songs on the album was John’s ‘Norwegian Wood’. Many people wanted to know what the song meant. It was about a girl, but he didn’t want his wife Cynthia to know this. George played the Indian musical instrument the sitar on ‘Norwegian Wood’. He first noticed the instrument in an Indian restaurant in the film Help! This was the start of George’s long interest in Indian music and ideas.

STORY BEHIND THE SONG

Around the time of Rubber Soul, the single ‘Day Tripper’ ‘We Can Work It Out’ reached number one. Paul wrote most of ‘We Can Work It Out’ and John wrote the middle part. This song showed the differences between the two men clearly. The main part was more hopeful, as Paul sang, ‘Try to see it my way…’ John’s part of the song was less hopeful: ‘Life is very short and there’s no time…’

The band’s success continued with Paul’s ‘Paperback Writer’ in 1966. It was their first single that wasn’t about love. The music was becoming less and less simple, too. But now the Beatles faced a new problem – how could they play the songs in concert?

Beatles go home!’

In June 1966, the Beatles were in Hamburg again to begin a new tour. Then they flew to Tokyo and the tour began to go wrong. There were many Beatles fans in Japan. But some people there thought the group was a bad example to young people. The band had to stay in their hotel. They only came out to play in concert.

Things became worse in the Philippines. In George’s words, it was ‘bad news’ from the beginning. The real problem came after the concert in Manila. Imelda Marcos, the wife of the country’s leader, invited the band to a party. The band’s answer was a polite no. (Some of them can’t even remember the invitation.)

The next day, something was clearly wrong. Nobody at the hotel brought breakfast for the band. Then they turned on the television and suddenly they understood: they saw Imelda Marcos in tears! The camera showed crying children and the empty dinner table. In George’s words, ‘We watched ourselves not arriving.’
The people of the Philippines were very angry. As the band drove to the airport, crowds shouted, Beatles go home! The band was pushed around at the airport and their road manager was knocked over. Before they could leave, Brian Epstein was called off the airplane. He had to give back all the money from the band’s concert there. Years later, Paul knew more about Marcos’s government. Then he was happy about missing the garden party. Ringo has said about the country, ‘I’ve never been back.

The Sound of the Future

The 1966 tour wasn’t a happy one, but in the studio that year the band were going into exciting new areas. George Martin had to find newer and newer sounds to record the band’s ideas. The album Revolver was his favorite. The album was important for all the Beatles in different ways:

George was growing as a song writer. At first, it was difficult for the guitarist. His very early songs weren’t strong, and he was in a band with two of the most famous songwriters in the world. In Revolvers ‘Love You To’, he showed his continuing interest in Indian music. His best song on the album was probably ‘Taxman’.

The band liked Ringo to sing a song on every album. Paul decided to give the drummer a song that wasn’t very serious. He thought of ‘Yellow Submarine’ one night in bed.
Paul continued to write about new subjects and to explore new kinds of music. ‘Eleanor Rigby’ was a sad song about the lives of lonely people in a big city. Again, strings were used, and McCartney recorded the song without the other Beatles. ‘We were just drinking tea,’ said George.

John was exploring, too. With the songs ‘She Said She Said’ and Tomorrow Never Knows’, he went into strange new musical areas. Tomorrow Never Knows’ was like a promise of the wild music at the end of the 1960s. Listen to this song and compare it to any song from the Beatles’ first two or three albums. A lot changed in those few years!

Burning Records

In 1966, John spoke to a reporter in London. They were talking about the modern church, and he said, ‘We’re more popular than Jesus now.’ When John’s words were reported in the US a few months later, many people were angry. There were newspaper stories like ‘Lennon Says that the Beatles are Bigger than Jesus’. This wasn’t what John meant. But some shops refused to sell their records. Some radio stations refused to play them. A few radio stations asked listeners to burn their Beatles records. Years later, Ringo joked, ‘It was OK for us, because then they bought them again!’ But at the time, the band and their manager were worried.

So what did John mean? He tried to explain his words to the American people before the band toured the country again. ‘I was just saying it as a fact,’ he explained. ‘It is true – more for England than here. I’m not saying that we’re better or greater… I’m sorry that I opened my mouth.’
It was a bad start to the Beatles last tour.

The End of Touring

The tour continued, but it wasn’t a happy time. Some newspapers in the United States were against the band now. For the first time, there were a few empty seats at some concerts. But it was still impossible to hear the music because of the screams. As George said, touring wasn’t ‘fun’ now. Also, their lives were different. Only one Beatle – Paul – wasn’t married. It was time to stop travelling.
At first, Paul wanted to tour more, but finally he agreed with the others. On 29 August 1966, they played at Candlestick Park in San Francisco. They played eleven songs, finishing with ‘I’m Down’. It was the Beatles’ last concert.

The band faced a new question: what now? In his heart, John thought, ‘This is the end, really.’
For some time the Beatles all did different things:
George spent a few weeks in India.
Paul worked with George Martin on the music for a film, The Family Way. The music won an award.
John went to Spain to act in a film, How I Won the War. It wasn’t a good film, and John wasn’t a good actor. But he did come back wearing the famous small, round ‘John Lennon glasses’!
Ringo spent a few weeks in Spain with John, and he enjoyed time at home with his wife and child.
Back in the studio, the band felt more free. Now they didn’t have to play any new songs on stage. They could do anything, and they did – with George Martin’s help. The next songs were another big step into new musical areas. But they also looked back, as both John and Paul turned to their Liverpool past for ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’ and ‘Penny Lane’.

STORY BEHIND THE SONGS

When he was a child, John lived near a children’s home. The home was called Strawberry Field. John’s song ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’ wasn’t really about that place; it just took the home’s name. The line ‘Nothing is real’ perfectly described this strange, beautiful song.

Paul then wrote a song about Liverpool, too. ‘Penny Lane’ was a much happier song, describing people and places from the old days in Liverpool. The band was still using instruments that were unusual in pop records. A trumpet played on the song.

There were many differences between Paul and John. Paul was very interested in studio recording. He worked carefully with George Martin. John had little time for this. He just told the producer what he wanted. In fact, the band played Strawberry Fields Forever’ in two very different ways. John couldn’t choose his favorite. Finally, the producer joined the two. (Years later, John wasn’t happy about this recording of his song.)

Together, ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’ and ‘Penny Lane’ became the Beatles’ next single. It was a great record, but for the first time in years the band didn’t reach number one.

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