Beatles - Dreaming the Beatles: the love story of one band and the whole world

ROB SHEFFIELD is a columnist for Rolling Stone , where he has been writing about music, TV, and pop culture since 1997. He is the author of the national bestsellers Love Is a Mix Tape: Love and Loss, One Song at a Time , and Talking to Girls About Duran Duran: One Young Mans Quest for True Love and a Cooler Haircut. His most recent books are Turn Around Bright Eyes: A Karaoke Journey of Starting Over, Falling in Love, and Finding Your Voice and On Bowie .

Discover great authors, exclusive offers, and more at hc.com .

On Bowie

Turn Around Bright Eyes:

A Karaoke Journey of Starting Over,

Falling in Love, and Finding Your Voice

Talking to Girls About Duran Duran:

One Young Mans Quest for True Love and a Cooler Haircut

Love Is a Mix Tape: Life and Loss, One Song at a Time

DREAMING THE BEATLES . Copyright 2017 by Rob Sheffield. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

FIRST EDITION

Cover design by Steve Attardo/NINETYNORTH Design

ISBN 978-0-06-220765-4

EPub Edition April 2017 ISBN 9780062207678

For Gavin Edwards

CONTENTS

All the people around were very worried about the girl, because she was going insane. So we sang to her.

JOHN LENNON, 1968 DEMO OF DEAR PRUDENCE

THE BEATLES: John played guitar. Paul played bass. George played lead guitar, and Ringo drummed. They all sang. John and Paul wrote the songs; soon George wrote, too. Ringo wrote a couple. Formed in Liverpool, late 1950s; broke up in London, 1970.

JOHN LENNON: The Smart One. Born in 1940, raised by his Aunt Mimi after his parents split. Mother Julia died in 1958. Married Cynthia Powell in 1962, son Julian born in 1963. Wrote two books of poetry. Explored LSD, primal scream therapy, mantra, gita, yoga, etc. Married Yoko Ono in 1969, moved to New York City. Imagined. Son Sean born in 1975. Left music for a few years in the Seventies to be a house-husband. Murdered with a handgun, December 1980, in front of home. Best songs: Strawberry Fields Forever, Julia, And Your Bird Can Sing, God, A Day in the Life, Oh Yoko!, New York City, Girl, Ticket to Ride, Im So Tired, Tomorrow Never Knows. Worst song: Its Only Love.

PAUL MCCARTNEY: The Cute One. Born in 1942, started playing guitar when his mother, Mary, died in 1956. Met John in 1957 and joined the band. Married Linda Eastman in 1969. Rumored to be dead later that year. Had success with Wings all through the 1970s and solo thereafter. Still the greatest live performer on earth. Married Nancy Chavell in 2011. Father of five, including designer Stella. Best songs: Here There & Everywhere, For No One, Martha My Dear, Hey Jude, Blackbird, Im Looking Through You, Two of Us, Jet, Friends to Go, Ive Just Seen a Face, Queenie Eye. Worst song: My Love.

GEORGE HARRISON: The Quiet One. Born in 1943, the youngest of the group. Married Patti Boyd in 1966. Studied the sitar, went to India, grew beard, sought truth. Had solo success with triple-album All Things Must Pass in 1970. Organized the Concert for Bangladesh in 1971. Friends with Bob Dylan and Monty Python. Married Olivia Arias in 1978, son Dhani born the same year. Joined the Traveling Wilburys in 1988. Survived attempted murder with knife, 1999, in England. Died of cancer, 2001. Best songs: Here Comes the Sun, I Want to Tell You, Something, Apple Scruffs, Give Me Love, Dont Bother Me, Pure Smokey, Its All Too Much, Isnt It a Pity. Worst song: Piggies.

RINGO STARR: The Drummer. Born Richard Starkey in 1940, grew up poor and sickly. Joined the band in 1962, after they dumped original drummer Pete Best; John made Ringo shave his beard. Married Maureen Cox in 1964. Became actor. Married Bond girl Barbara Bach in 1981, still together. Father of three. Best songs: It Dont Come Easy, Octopus Garden, Dont Pass Me By, Early 1970, Photograph, Rory and the Hurricanes, his playing on Rain and Drive My Car, his vocals on Yellow Submarine and Good Night. Worst song: Cookin (In the Kitchen of Love).

LIVERPOOL: The city where they grew up and started performing together. Tough Northern industrial port, Scouse, heavily Irish, previously most famous for comedians. Site of Penny Lane, Strawberry Field, etc.

BRIAN EPSTEIN: The manager. Loved the band. Posh rich kid, went to acting school, closeted gay man, Jewish, tormented. Harassed by police for homosexuality. Wrote autobiography A Cellarful of Noise in 1964. Made terrible business decisions that cost the band fortunes, but his devotion made their whole story possible. Died of accidental drug overdose in August 1967. Lou Reed, 1970: In his mansion Brian Epstein kept Spanish servants, none of whom could speak English. Let that be a lesson to us all in discretion.

GEORGE MARTIN: The producer. Mr. Martin to the band. Trained oboe player, background in classical music and comedy. Made heroic decision to let them play their own songs. Became the most renowned of music producers. His second-most-famous discovery: America (the band). Died in 2016.

ABBEY ROAD: The EMI studios in London. Formal place where engineers wore lab coats and ties; the Beatles turned it into a creative den of round-the-clock experimentation. Famously depicted on 1969 album cover.

PRELUDE:
THANKS, MO

J anuary 30, 1969: Paul utters the words, Thanks, Mo, which turn out to be his last words on the final Beatle album. His comment is easy to miss, like so many other details in the tumult of the Beatles career, but its there at the end of the song Get Back, closing out Let It Be , released just a few weeks after he announced the band was breaking up. After the electric-piano coda of Get Back, you hear scattered applause from their famous rooftop concert in London. John makes a quip: I hope we passed the audition. The film crew laughs politely at the bosss joke, as theyve had to do way too many times in the past month. Its an awkward moment.

Get Back isnt a favorite of mine, so its not one I ever play on purpose, but its not like I leave the room if it comes on. I can take it or leave it. Id probably heard Get Back a few thousand times before I ever noticed Paul mumbling Thanks, Mo, right before Johns joke. Hes thanking Maureen Cox Starr, Ringos wife, for applauding and cheering through their little rooftop concert. No doubt she was freezing her ass off, with nobody noticing her. Mo Starr might have been the only person there having a sincerely good time. Maybe she was grateful to be invited.

What a quintessential Beatle moment. Theyre staging this self-conscious historic occasion for the cameras, Johns going into a bit of trusty banter, but Paul gets distracted by the sight of a girl clapping. Drop Paul in any situation, no matter how momentous or formal, and hell find the clapping girl. He zeros in on her enthusiasm. She makes the song worth playing. He doesnt thank guest keyboardist Billy Preston, the boys in the band, or anyone else.

Mos a Beatle fan, always has been. She was one of the original screaming Beatle girls in Liverpoolsaw them regularly at the Cavern Club in 1962. She was the fan who crossed the sacred line and married one of the band. (She kissed Paul before she dated Ringo, but they worked that out.) The first time she met Ringo she was tapping on his car window to ask for an autograph. In later years, after the divorce, she sadly became the first Beatle spouse to die, shortly before Linda, inspiring Pauls tribute Little Willow. Shes an easily overlooked but beloved figure in their lore, the teenage hairdresser who lived out the fantasy of countless fans, yet remained down-to-earth, avoiding the media spotlight. She worshipped Frank Sinatra, so for her twenty-second birthday in 1968, Ringo got Frank to record a private tribute record, changing the lyrics of The Lady Is a Tramp to Maureen Is a Champ. Old Blue Eyes croons, Theres no one like her, no one at all / As for charm, hers is like wall to wall / She married Ringo when she could have had Paul. Frank couldnt resist slipping in a little dig: Im just F.S., but to me shes Big M / Mainly because she prefers me to them.