What John said
“ ‘I Dig a Pygmy,’ by Charles Hawtrey and the Deaf Aids”: after all these years, I discovered by chance who Charles Hawtrey was.
The Beatles with Morecambe and Wise
The complete show is at YT.
Ringo as broccoli
“I’m 99 percent broccoli,” Ringo Starr tells AARP.
A “Now and Then” surprise
A surprise: liner notes inside the sleeve, by the music writer John Harris. They explain, among other things, what’s up with the assemblage on the back cover.
“Now and Then,” the music video
This one really got to me, and it made me not miss the song’s middle section, at least while it played. Some laughter, many tears.
Beatles now!
I’m disappointed: they dropped the middle section of the song (“I don’t wanna lose you”), its most distinctive part, with unusual chord changes, and the part that, to my ears, makes the shift to the closing section (“Now and then”) so poignant.
A last Beatles song
You know there’s a last new Beatles song coming this Thursday, yes?
The last Beatles song?
Paul and Ringo are finishing “Now and Then.”
Jack White, Beatles savant
“Jack White showcases his hidden talent of being able to recognize any Beatles song instantly.”
Onomastics
A toddler of my acquaintance calls them “The Get Back Guys.”
The Beatles: Get Back thoughts
I have several.
Let It Be at the Internet Archive
Listen: do you want to know a secret? Do you promise not to tell?
Modern mondegreen
“Sweet Loretta Modern.”
Paul McCartney and relativity
”George Martin was like our teacher, just because of the age. He was a little bit older. It wasn’t much. I mean, I think we always thought of him as an old man. I think he was like probably thirty when he started with us, which I certainly don’t think of as old now.”
Astrid Kirchherr (1938–2020)
Photographer of the Beatles in the pre-Fab Hamburg days.
And then there were five
The Fab Five?
Geoff Emerick (1945-2018)
The recording engineer Geoff Emerick, best known for his work with the Beatles, has died at the age of seventy-two.
Synchronicity
You can guess what Beatles song started.
“Sgt. Petsound’s”
“Tributes, covers, deconstructions, mashups, samples, nods, and more in response to two of the most influential albums of all time.”
Word of the day: any road
“The next song we’d like to sing is our latest record, or our latest electronic noise, depending on whose side you’re on. Any road, we’d like to carry on with it.”
Ringo Starr, Canned Heat, LGBT discrimination
Ringo Starr has canceled a concert in North Carolina to protest state-sponsored discrimination against LGBT people. I am a bit thrilled to see that he has cited Canned Heat in doing so.
George Martin (1926–2016)
Paul McCartney: “If anyone earned the title of the fifth Beatle it was George.”
Fun, fun, fun
The greatest Downfall spoof of all time.
Georges, Formby and Harrison
The chords at the end of “Free as a Bird” mean more than I knew.
Beatlemania, flagged
Change Find Next? Ignore? The spellchecker flagged “Beatlemania.”
John Lennon’s letters
The Los Angeles Times reports that in 2012 Little, Brown will publish a book of John Lennon’s letters, edited by Beatles biographer Hunter Davies.
"A Day in the Life" lyrics at auction
Like it says
Paul McCartney's handwriting
From 1953
Brian Wilson on "Norwegian Wood"
"Is he setting her house on fire? I didn't know. I still don't know."
Ukulele Beatles Fun!
Uke chords for Beatles songs