RINGO AND ALL STARR BAND IN CALIFORNIA

Ringo Starr and his All-Starr Band: 8 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 1. ar The Masonic, 1111 California St., S.F.

and headlining set at the Sonoma Music Festival on Saturday, Oct. 3.

 

Ringo started touring with the All-Starr band in 1989, shortly after he and his second wife, Barbara Bach (whom he’d met on the set of the 1981 film “Caveman”), successfully entered rehab together.

The original lineup — featuring Eagles guitarist Joe Walsh, E Street Band saxophonist Clarence Clemons and guitarist Nils Lofgren, keyboardist Billy Preston, former Band bassist Rick Danko and drummer Levon Helm, piano great Dr. John, and drummer Jim Keltner — was significantly more impressive than the ones that have followed over the years, but the format remains the same.

Starr, flashing his signature peace-and-love signs, performs a handful of Beatles classics, songs from his recent albums, and a selection of his solo hits from his unexpectedly fruitful chart run between 1971 and 1975. He then backs his band members on three of their groups’ respective hits.

“I get to be an entertainer and a musician,” Starr says.

He’s currently touring with his longest running incarnation of the All-Starr Band, which includes Todd Rundgren, Journey’s Gregg Rolie, Toto’s Steve Lukather and Mr. Mister’s Richard Page. They’ve been together for three years, which is roughly two years longer than usual.

“I fire them every year,” Starr says. “And they browbeat me and I take them back.”

Starr keeps touring — regularly playing casinos, resorts, county fairs, anywhere — because it’s what he does.“I love to play,” he says. And he means it.

In December, Starr and Bach will auction off 800 of their personal items, including rare Beatles memorabilia like his first 1963 Ludwig Oyster black pearl three-piece drum kit and a Rickenbacker guitar that Lennon gave him, with proceeds going to the couple’s Lotus Children Foundation.

They also recently sold their country house in England and closed down their apartment in Monte Carlo. Like going through the storage units that yielded the negatives, it’s all part of a larger effort to pare down his life.

So what gets Ringo Starr out of the bed in the morning these days?

“Nothing I’m auctioning off,” he says. “I get up at 7:30 every morning because I love to be in the light. We’re in L.A., so there’s a lot of light. I have a trainer. We’re in L.A. I am a vegetarian. We’re in L.A. I keep myself together. I eat well. I stay fit. I go for walks. Any advice I can give is, keep moving.”

PAUL TALKS 1983 ‘PIPES OF PEACE’ WITH JAMES DEAN BRADFILED

In an exclusive interview, Paul discusses his classic solo LP in conversation with the Manic Street Preachers’ frontman.

Back when Manic Street Preachers supported Paul at Cardiff’s Millennium Stadium in 2010, James Dean Bradfield went up to the Beatle and “made a complete arse” of himself. He told McCartney he had bought a copy of his solo album ‘Pipes of Peace’ from the Record Club mail-order service the year it came out, in 1983, and that he wished he had brought it with him to be autographed. Paul responded with raised eyebrows, and a fairly to the point “you taking the piss, lad?” 

Now, five years on from that fateful first exchange, Paul is re-issuing James Dean Bradfield’s favourite album as part of his on-going archive series, and naturally the Manics frontman was first in line to chat to Paul about his experiences working on the now-iconic solo record. Arriving in the aftermath of Beatlemania, and shortly after Paul disbanded his band Wings to focus on his own material, it’s also fair to say that ‘Pipes of Peace’ didn’t originally blow critics away in quite the same way as ‘Tug of War’; the troubled, violent, and openly political Paul solo record that came before it. Answering all of that previous anger in the only way he saw fit, Paul McCartney responded to ‘Tug of War’ by doing the opposite; celebrating peace and love. Since its release in 1983, ‘Pipes of Peace’ has gradually evolved from a collection of ‘Tug of War’ outtakes, into a classic in its own right. 

As well as delving into Paul’s songwriting process, his post-Beatles mindset, and his experiences writing together with a then pre-‘Thriller’ Michael Jackson on ‘Say Say Say,’ during this exclusive interview, James Dean Bradfield also, finally, managed to get his copy of ‘Pipes of Peace’ signed.

James Dean Bradfield: I bought ‘Pipes of Peace’ when I was 14, and by then I was already obsessed with music, and melody. I won’t talk about me for the rest of the interview - I’m just giving you a frame of reference! I was obviously the runt of the litter, I was very short, with big National Health specs, and the only thing that was medicine for my soul was melody.
I suppose what I’m trying to ask you is this; there are so many songs on the first side of ‘Pipes of Peace’ that seem to deal with darkness, the whole record seems to be dealing with emotionally fragile and vulnerable issues. Did it feel like a fraught personal time for you? The first side of that record feels like it, lyrically.

Paul McCartney: I never know what I’m going to write about, so I think there is a psychological aspect; just what mood you’re in. Early on, when we started writing, we used to say, it’s like a psychiatrist - you know, you talk into your guitar, you’re telling your problems to your guitar, and it comes out as a song. Sometimes it gets disguised along the way, with melody, or some optimism along with the pessimism. To tell you the truth, though, I never think about it now. It’s sort of just the mood I’m in that day. [With ‘Tug of War’ track,] ‘The Pound Is Sinking’ - god, I’ve just read that there’s a recession or something. I’d start with a joke, “the pound is sinking/ the peso’s failing,” you know, whatever. I don’t actually start by thinking, ok, this is going to address a dark mood or subject. I find myself just putting what’s in me into the song. Often, sometimes, I don’t know what I’ve written.

JDB: And you don’t even dare call it a sub-conscious reaction?

PM: It probably is. What happens is, then, people will listen to a song, and they’ll tell me what they got from it. That’s often when I find out! I will have done it very spontaneously, following whatever the words seem to be suggesting, or what my mood is, what the melody feels like, where to go. The end result isn’t something I’ve thought of before.
I mean, I wrote the song ‘Yesterday,’ and years later someone said to me, that’s probably about your mum dying ten years before. “Why she had to go/ I don’t know she didn’t say.” I never thought that, but now, I think, it might be. All this psychological stuff finds its way into your songs. Because I don’t think them out too much, I let them just fall out, sometimes this stuff is in there without me knowing.

“I figured, in the end, when you’re done with all the cynicism, people go back to loving each other.”

Paul McCartney

JDB: There’s another song on the first side called ‘The Other Me’ which is an apology for making a mistake, for being you - the dark, negative version of yourself. The time I got into this record, aged 14, I had a lot of confidence issues. I was bullied and everything, and of course, I latched onto this record; melody was like medicine.
Whether it was Electric Light Orchestra, Frank Sinatra, or Motown stuff, and then you - especially Wings stuff - it was like a balm for my soul from 9 to 14. That first side of ‘Pipes of Peace,’ it was comforting for me. You know that you come with a very loaded image when people meet you. It was very soothing for me to know that someone who achieved so much was actually being so open and vulnerable. How does that make you feel, that somebody reads it like that?

PM: I like that. I like that someone sees that, because that’s the truth about me. When you’re successful - I mean, especially Beatles success - everyone assumes you just have a great life, you’re totally confident about everything you do, the success must make you like that. At the end of the day, though, you’re still a guy, with daily problems.

JDB: What I was trying to angle at, is - compared to other records - the first side of [‘Pipes of Peace’] seems to be working through something. I was thinking, this guy’s really thinking his way through life; he’s still vulnerable.

PM: I’m glad. You throw your baby out, and people make something of it. I just thought recently, at a concert for 40,000 people, every single one of them’s got a different perception of this show. I used to think, make a record, do a concert, everyone thinks pretty much the same thing. They like that song, they’ll clap along. But they’re not, they’re all going, “oh, that line!” or “when I was 9 I remember thinking this.” I really like that about human experience, and the experience of being a writer. Whatever I do, someone’s going to see it their own way.

JDB: By this age [when I’d picked up ‘Pipes of Peace’] I was thinking of buying my first guitar, etcetera, and I was so desperate to write melodies, actually; I didn’t even care about songs at that point. I think the first thing I hooked upon was this; I was trying to understand in my head if you and Michael Jackson actually wrote together, face to face, on ‘Say Say Say’ and ‘The Man’. How did you actually write those songs?

PM: It was actually upstairs, here. In this office. Michael originally rang me, and said ‘do you want to make some hits?’ I didn’t know who it was, I didn’t recognise his voice at first, but I dug into it, and then I said ‘yeah, sure.’ He came along, we agreed to meet in here, at the piano upstairs. We just sat around with a guitar, at the piano, and we just sort of went ‘what shall we do?’. We just started, and it came very easily. I was quite excited to write with him, he was excited to write with me, so we were just popping off each other. We just did it, it was a very short session, and we were in the same room.

JDB: I’m surprised. I thought it was going to be a correspondence thing.

PM: No, no, it was live. Michael and I just wrote the lyrics down, and said, that’s it.

“You know that you come with a very loaded image when people meet you. It was very soothing, for me, to know that someone who achieved so much was so open and vulnerable.”

James Dean Bradfield

JDB: This [‘Pipes of Peace’] is my gateway into you as solo artist. I loved [title-track] ‘Pipes of Peace’ and ‘Say Say Say,’ so I bought the record. What surprised me was this. The session players, apart from yourself, would be thinking, ‘Paul McCartney’s making a record’. In the studio control room, he’s going to be a very dominant force. But what’s really encouraging is, in the record, I can hear that you’re open to collaborators. On songs like ‘Hey Hey’ and ‘Tug of Peace’ you can hear Steve Gadd’s drum chops - jazz-fusion rock chops - and Stanley Clarke’s chops coming through. On ‘Hey Hey’ I can almost hear an echo of [long-time Beatles collaborator, and ‘Pipes of Peace’ producer] George Martin’s production work with Jeff Beck on ‘Blow by Blow’. And [former 10cc member] Eric Stewart, as a guitarist, he’s got that rock n’ roll playfulness to him. It’s remarkable to see that you will take cue from them.

PM: I think people assume that when I’m making a record with someone, that I’m going to have all the pre-formed ideas. Sometimes I do, but if I’m going to collaborate with someone like Stevie Wonder - and for instance, Stevie sort of just says he’s going to play drums - I’m not going to say no. So I say, ok. If it turns out he’s a terrible drummer, then I’ll have to work out a way to tell him, eh, Stevie, look…

JDB: I love his drumming, it’s so four on the floor.

PM: Stevie’s a great drummer. Similarly with Stanley [Clarke], he’s a great bass player - no point having him unless I use his style. Same with Steve Gadd, this great distinctive style. And you can identify the tracks that Steve played, as opposed to the tracks that Ringo [Starr] played, yet it meshes together. Steve started off as a military drummer, and you can kind of see that, once you know. He’s got a military precision, and he does all the [makes drum roll noise] all that stuff. His style, and the way he sets up his kit - a low, to the ground kit - he’s very individual. Working with him, I didn’t know what to expect, too much. I’d heard these people, and I just knew I liked their work. So, we were in the studio together, and I said, here’s the song, let’s sit down, start it off, and see what we come up with. They’ve got free reign, and George Martin’s there to oversee it.

JDB: I love what George Martin did with Jeff Beck, and I can hear him imposing just a bit of his style upon it. It still sounds like you, but you can hear the experience coming through.

PM: That’s something I like. If you’re going to work with people, I like to not close them down. I like to open them up. In The Beatles, the way that we worked was, if it was my song, I was kind of the boss. If it was George [Harrison’s] song, he was the boss, John [Lennon’s] song, he was the boss…

JDB: I think that’s why people make the assumption. Because obviously there are so many stories about how you’d build a track up from the bottom if Ringo wasn’t in the studio. It does feel open though, but you’re still in control.

PM: Yeah, these were pretty live, these tracks. 

“Anything any of us did post-Beatles wasn’t the same. We felt that keenly.”

Paul McCartney

JDB: There’s a beautifully placed and well-chosen quote [“I light a candle to our love, in love our problems disappear,” in the introduction to opening track ‘Pipes of Peace’] from you, referencing [Indian poet] Rabindranath Tagore. Obviously, he wrote some amazing poems, and there’s always an edge of reconciliation; he always talked about love. I just thought that the quote on the record actually seems like it informed the lyrics of ‘Through Our Love,’ too. That is unbelievable, it’s like conducting open heart surgery with feathers instead of scalpels. Is it hard to write like that when you have no bounds of cynicism? It’s so open, it becomes an easy target in itself, the lyric. Do you know what I mean?

PM: My stuff is an easy target. I always have to make a decision - am I going to try to be clever, or am I just going to write from my heart? I nearly always make the decision to write from the heart, because a lot of the music I like is from the heart. I figured, in the end, when you’re done with all the cynicism, people go back to loving each other. You can have all the cleverness in the world, but people go home at night. If they’re married, they go home to their wife, they go home to their kids. I think that’s a very central point. I’m not shy to write about it. As you say, I’d been reading a lot of Tagore, and there’s a line, “I light a candle to our love,” - something similar to that - and I’ve never been able to find the quote. I talk to people about this, and they say, oh I’ll look it up’. They get back to me and they can’t find it.

JDB: There’s a Rabindranath Tagore poem, ‘My Country Awake,’ that the actor Martin Sheen quotes, and it’s obviously talking about his country and what it can be. It’s a beautiful poem. I actually feel shy about saying go and look it up, but you actually should.

PM: You know, it’s one of those things. You have a choice between being clever stroke cynical - which is a great option, and I like people who write like that - or, just being more what I see as me. Writing about my feelings from the heart. Writing with John [Lennon] that was always a good thing because we balanced each other. I would write “it’s getting better all the time,” and he would say “it couldn’t get no worse” [on ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Heart’s Club’ track ‘Getting Better’]. We had that balance. On my own, I do tend to just blurt out things I feel about love. It can be a bit of an easy target, I feel. People go, love, schmuve, you know?

JDB: It works amazingly, though, on ‘Through Our Love’. It really does.

PM: I’m always glad, particularly listening to them years later, thinking, I’m glad I stuck to it. I’m glad I did that, cos it works, it feels relevant.

JDB: You talked recently about rehabilitating the reputation of George Martin. Does it feel like serendipity that you started working with him again at this point, on songs like ‘Through Our Love’?

PM: It’s always good to work with George, but it was really good on this album to get back together again.

JDB: It almost sounds like he’s there telling you, don’t be scared to be you. Sometimes, it’s very reminiscent of The Beatles…
PM: At the end of The Beatles, it was all a bit sticky. George got a bit sidelined. I think John said a few things about him he didn’t mean, and I remember John saying ‘I didn’t mean that, I was just mouthing off’. But it got out in print, that George Martin was maybe not as good as he had cracked up to be. We all knew he was. When I got back together with him it was just a delight, to see the old mate who I thought was so clever, and so skilled, and the great personality to have in the room. If you’re making a song, and you want the decision, I did - I don’t know what, countless vocals - and he’d go ‘this is good’. That was it.

“I always have to make a decision - am I going to try to be clever, or am I just going to write from my heart?”

Paul McCartney

JDB: That’s one of my other questions - it’s an amazing vocal performance on the entire record, but did it shock you, texturally, how close your voice was to Jacko’s voice. Did you have problems trying to separate them?
PM: Yeah, and on the new mix, you can’t tell, I think. When we were writing it, we were in this [launches into Michael Jackson impression] “oooh, yeah,” thing, that’s kind of how he sings anyway. I was just going along with that, I didn’t want to suddenly go [adopts deep, operatic voice] “say, say, say” while he’s doing this little voice. So I like doing that little voice as well, and we were very similar. I must agree, on the new mix we’re going to have to say “Michael, Paul, Michael.” Once you know, you know, but it’s very similar. Our voices match very well, that’s one of the great things about working with him.

JDB: How do you feel about the critical reaction to ‘Pipes of Peace’?

PM: Do you know, I don’t remember what it was. From the way you’re saying it, it doesn’t sound good.

JDB: No, but at the time, in my head, I was getting ready to be a musician. I remember thinking, jesus, these guys..

PM: I think a lot of what happened, post-Beatles, is that The Beatles had so much success - recognised success - that anything any of us did post-Beatles, wasn’t the same, wasn’t as good. We felt that keenly. It was like, ahh, we’re never going to get a good review round here, no matter how much you sell, no matter how many fan letters you get. Round about that time, I just stopped reading them. You just think, I’ll do my best, I’ll sing it as good as I can, make the best record I can, and once it flies away like a little bird out of a cage, I’m not going to monitor its flight. To answer your question, I hate it.

JDB: I remember thinking, if that guy can still be a fan of music, it really does show - if he hasn’t been encumbered by the arrogance of his success, that’s my bag. I’ve been reading a lot into this record!

PM: You were, when you were 14. But listen, man, that reminds me of listening to Elvis when I was 14, it was a great time to listen to music.

JDB: Can I ask you a silly question at the end? This is more for me than anyone else. I’m a gigantic fan of Badfinger, so you know what I’m going to ask. You obviously wrote ‘Come And Get It’ for them, and you played a lot of the song, let’s face facts here. Did you feel that they were going to get confidence, after you gave them that initial step up?

PM: Yeah, we’d just started Apple Records, and we’d signed them. They were great guys, Pete Ham and Joey and some of the other boys, we hung out, and listened to some of the stuff they were writing. I thought, this is really good, but to get them introduced, they’re going to need a big hit - particularly in America. It’s a difficult place to break. I was in bed one night, twilighty thinking - you know, if you’re a musician it’s always going round in your head. I just got this whole idea of ‘Come And Get It’. I ran downstairs, quietly, so as not to disturb anyone, and started doing this little thing, and did it. The next day we had a Beatles session. It was right round the corner from Abbey Road, where I lived. I knew everyone was coming in at, whatever it was, 2 o’clock, so I’d gone in at half 1, because I knew the engineer would be in, Phil McDonald. Phil was there, and I did one demo. Stuck everything on, sang it, did the harmonies, finished it, The Beatles came in, and that was it, thank you. So then I played this to the guys, and they said, ok, we’ll vary this, we’ll change that, and I said no. I really don’t want you to. Listen, one track, you’ve got to do exactly the way I laid it down. The rest of the album, b-sides, everything, you do what you like.

JDB: This is your foot in the door, sort of thing?

PM: This is the thing. So they were cool, they did it, and they played it exactly.

JDB: I read, I think, that they took it later, with a bit more grace, than they did initially. And 
Badfinger had an amazing songwriter in Pete Ham, too.

PM: Yeah, such a tragedy, old Pete. To write ‘Without You’ and nobody knew. To this day. Everyone thinks Harry Nilsson wrote it.

JDB: Well, that’s me done. Sorry I yabbered on a bit.

PM: It’s alright. You’re Welsh. 

Photos: Charlie Gray / MPL Communications.

CONTRACT SIGNED IN 1962 BETWEEN THE BEATLES AND BRIAN EPSTEIN SHORTLY BEFORE THE BAND LAUNCHED THEIR FIRST SINGLE SELLS AT AUCTION FOR £365,000

The contract that launched the Beatles, binding together John, George, Paul and Ringo with manager Brian Epstein, sold for £365,000

The contract that launched the Beatles as one of the most successful bands of all time has been sold for £365,000 at auction in London.

Signed almost 53 years ago to the day, just before the release of their first single Love Me Do, it was the only contract signed between manager Brian Epstein and the final line-up of John Lennon, George Harrison, Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr.

An anonymous buyer bought the contract at Sotheby's auction house, which was drawn up on October 1, 1962 in Epstein's Whitechapel office at North Ends Music Stores. 

Specialist at Sotheby's Gabriel Heaton, said: 'Without this contract, and the relationship it represents, it seems inconceivable that the Beatles could have achieved all that they did: it took more than inspired musicianship and song-writing to remake popular music.

'The presentation, direction, and internal harmony of the Beatles all owed a huge amount to Brian Epstein. He was, as Paul McCartney has acknowledged, the fifth Beatle,' added Heaton. 

The contract is between Brian Epstein and The Beatles, signed by John Winston Lennon, George Harrison, James Paul McCartney, and Richard Starkey (Ringo Starr).

As Paul and George were under 21, their fathers, Harold Hargreaves Harrison and James McCartney, were also summoned to co-sign the contract.

The contract states that The Beatles agree to 'appoint the Manager to act as such Manager throughout the world ... for a period of 5 years from the 1st day of October 1962', signed by Brian Epstein as company Director and Clive Epstein as company Secretary, then signed by all other parties including all four Beatles.

 

The contract is signed by John, George, Paul and Ringo,just days before they released the single Love Me Do

Fathers' support:As Paul and George were under 21,their fathers,Harold Hargreaves Harrison and James McCartney, were also summoned to co-sign the contract

The contract was part of with the Sotheby's 'Rock & Pop sale' in London today, and was expected to fetch as much as £500,000.

Highlights of the sale included the 'ABBA Grand' piano, used in almost all of ABBA's studio recordings 1973-1977, as well as instruments, clothing and manuscripts from the collection of the legendary bassist Jack Bruce and Eric Clapton's Fender Stratocaster in Daphne blue.

The sale also featured a strong selection of Bob Dylan material, including the revised typescript lyrics for 'It's a Hard Rain's Gonna Fall', a highly important working draft (lot 71).

This follows the success of our New York A Rock and Roll History sale last year, where Bob Dylan's autograph manuscript for 'Like a Rolling Stone' set a new record for not just material by Dylan but for any popular music lyrics sold at auction. 

LISTEN NEW DEMO

ORDER YOUR COPY NOW!... HERE


Listen: NEW DEMO: Simple As That  (‘Pipes of Peace’ Reissue 2015- Disc 2: Bonus Audio unreleased)

BEAUTIFUL CRIME PRESENTS RUSSELL MARSHALL'S LENNON 1974

Beautiful Crime Gallery is holding a bed in event in London to celebrate the launch of international artist Russell Marshall’s latest work 'Lennon ’74’. 

 

Courtesy: Beautiful Crime

The print has been endorsed by Yoko Ono Lennon and legendary rock n roll photographer Bob Gruen and produced to commemorate the 75th anniversary of the former Beatle's birth (October 9th). 

Here’s the film about John Lennon, Russell Marshall and the story behind the world famous Gruen image:

Beautiful Crime Presents Russell Marshall's Lennon 1974 from DSFL on Vimeo.
 

( Thank you Tina Campanella /Press Beautiful Crime ). 

 

JOHN AND GEORGE TALK ABOUT TRANSCENDENTAL MEDITATION

On this day in 1967, John and George made appearances on the David Frost Show.  It was recorded before a studio audience between 6pm and 7pm at Studio One at Wembley Studios in London.

The David Frost Programme, John and George talk about Transcendental Meditation

 On October 4, 1967, gave a second interview to The Frost Programme, when once again they duiscussed Transcendental Meditation, the popular British TV talk show The Frost Programme featured a 58-minute interview with John and George.

At that point, the Beatles members had already met Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, and were about six weeks into daily practice of Transcendental Meditation.

Despite their relatively short experience with meditation, John Lennon and George Harrison gave wonderfully clear and poignant answers to the host’s inquiries. To witness this immensely interesting dialogue, you can either listen to the recording online (with unfortunately quite poor sound quality), or read a transcript of the questions and answers here below.

Host David Frost: There were two things that Maharishi said this morning were the result for people meditating, following his system of meditation. The two things he claimed were serenity and energy. Have you found them?

JOHN LENNON: I’ve got a lot more energy. It’s the same energy but I don’t have to tap it, you know.

How do you mean exactly?

JOHN LENNON: The energy that I’ve found doing meditation, you know, has been there before – only that I could access it only during good days when everything was going well. With meditation I find that it could well be pouring down rain; it is still the same amount.

Is it true that any day of meditation then is equally good?

JOHN LENNON: The worst days of meditation I have are better than the worst days I had before.

George, is it true for you as well?

GEORGE HARRISON: The energy is latently there every day, anyways. So meditation is just a natural process of contacting it. So by doing it each day you give yourself a chance of contacting this energy and giving it to yourself a little more. Consequently you’re able to do whatever you normally do – just with a little bit more happiness, maybe.

 

How do you reach this state in meditation? Maharishi was very clear about how he – or some teacher – gave everyone a specific sound and how each person had a sound that was trying to be in rhythm with that person.

GEORGE HARRISON: Each individual life state has its own rhythm. So they give you a word or sound – mantra – and by using this the whole idea is to transcend to the subtlest level of thought. And the mantra becomes more subtle and more subtle until finally you transcend even the mantra. Then you find yourself at this level of pure consciousness.

Is there actually anything you use to get back to the subject if you find earthly or irrelevant thoughts intruding?

JOHN LENNON: Yes, you just sort of sit there and you let your mind go wherever it goes. Whatever you’re thinking about, you just let it go.

At the moment you realize you’ve been thinking, you introduce the mantra or the vibration again, just to take over from the thought. You don’t limit it or use your willpower; you replace the thought with the mantra.

GEORGE HARRISON: Sometimes you can go on and find that you even haven’t had the mantra any more. When you reach that point, it’s deep down there beyond normal experience and that level is timeless, spaceless, without identity. So you even don’t know how long you have been there. You just have the contact and then you go back up to the gross level, to this level. That is it.

So the aim, as opposed to just sitting and thinking, is to reach a state where you have no thought?

JOHN LENNON: You are not even conscious of that sometimes. The only time you’re conscious of being awake is when you have been asleep before. So sometimes you come out and it’s been 20 minutes sitting there. Now at other times you come out and it seems like no time has gone by at all.

And can you look back at the end of that period of meditation and see what happened during the last 20 minutes?

JOHN LENNON: It’s different for different people.

GEORGE HARRISON: It’s difficult to tell anyone what is happening because the teaching is based on the individual experience.

  

You’re doing very well in experiencing something which probably is inexpressible. But the thing is, I mean, at the end of it – do you feel more relaxed, do you know more about yourself? Do you feel you know something more about something else?

GEORGE HARRISON: You don’t feel like you have more knowledge or anything. You might, but it doesn’t feel that way exactly. You just feel more energetic. You just come out of it and it’s been refreshing.

JOHN LENNON: It takes a lot of practice to remain in this state. We’ve been doing meditation for a matter of about six weeks, maybe. I definitely feel that it takes a long practice to be able to hold that level of consciousness, to be able to bring that level of consciousness into this grosser level.

So the aim is to carry on the state you are in during meditation when you’re here?

JOHN LENNON: In fact, Maharishi said that one of the analogies, you know, is that meditation is like dipping a cloth into gold. So you dip it in and you bring it out. If you leave it in, then it gets soggy. If you sit in a cave for the whole of your life, then you’ll get a bit soggy. So meditation is like going in and coming out, in and out – for however many years.

One of you – I think Paul McCartney – said that, in fact, this feeling that meditation gives is what drugs can give temporarily. Is that so?

GEORGE HARRISON: With drugs, you are still on the relative level. Just waiting and dreaming – all this is relative, only on this grosser level. Whereas when you meditate, it is all on a subtler level. So really you cannot compare them. With drugs you do have a glimpse of a few things, they heighten your experience. But if you take a drug and hope that it will bring the subtlety out of this grosser level – well, it will never work.

You’ve experimented with drugs, right?

JOHN LENNON: It was long ago. There was no going further. What it does is mainly finding out about your self, your ego. With acid it is all about yourself. /—/ The thing is that your true self is at a deeper level. And the way to approach it is through meditation or some other form of yoga – I’m not saying that this form of meditation is the only form that is out there. It is obviously not; yoga incorporates many different techniques. But the whole point is that each soul is divine and meditation is the technique of manifesting this, of arriving at that state which is divine.

You have had six weeks of this and it obviously has already had a tremendous impact on you. Do you find that this concern with meditation is now starting to impose – perhaps not necessarily rules but a sort of conduct for the rest of your day?

JOHN LENNON: It is just added to your routine. You are still the same. You don’t have to change your religion or anything, you know. Whatever you are, you just carry on with it.

GEORGE HARRISON: If we had Maharishi as the model to live by, it would be the same thing as Christianity. It is the answer as well, to the same thing, you know. 

The words – like ’God’, for instance – do they mean anything different to you now than it did before you met Maharishi?

GEORGE HARRISON: It means all kinds of things to me – the first context was ’a man in the stars’. And I’ve gone back to it now. I think it is a man in the stars as well, if you like! Divine is in everything. Every aspect of creation is a part of God, an expression of it.

I’m still concerned with the outgoing part. Is meditation solely concerned about the self or does it in any way make one more responsible for other people?

GEORGE HARRISON: Your actions – whatever they are – are your actions. It’s all about your attitude toward other people. If you treat them good, they’ll do the same; if you hit them in the face, they’ll probably do the same thing. And that’s not much to do with religion. Action and reaction, that’s the thing Christ was saying. Whatever you do, you get it back.

JOHN LENNON: It’s the same in the whole universe, in all religions. It’s just opening your mind to see that. Buddha was groovy, you know. And Jesus was all right. It’s exactly the same thing.

What differences were there, would you say, between Jesus and Maharishi, for instance?

JOHN LENNON: Well, Maharishi didn’t do miracles, you know. The giggle – I can’t say how divine or superhuman that is.

GEORGE HARRISON: Jesus was one of the divine incarnations. You know, some people like Jesus or Krishna because they were the divine the moment they were born. They chose to reincarnate, to come back in order to try to save a few more people. Whereas others manage to be born just ordinary and attain divinity in that particular incarnation.

JOHN LENNON: So Maharishi is probably one of them, you know. He is quite ordinary, but working at it. (laughter from audience)

How do you think Maharishi, his meditation could help solve the worlds problems?

JOHN LENNON: It’s only by doing it – going home and realizing the deeper levels of consciousness. The real problem is lack of wisdom in the world. So each person, each individual has something to do.

George Harrison and John Lennon with Maharishi, 1967.

So as each person goes deeper and deeper within themselves, is each person going to find good thoughts?

JOHN LENNON: You’ll find all kinds of thoughts. The point, however, is not to think anything, but to get down there. We don’t know what would happen to a killer who did it – maybe meditation would change his mind, you know. We don’t know about that, you should ask Maharishi about that. But it’s the proper good. And it’s simple.

MOJO 264 WITH FREE CD: SONGS THE BEATLES TAUGHT US

The new issue of MOJO is on sale in the UK from Tuesday, September 29. Check out the cover and contents including The Beatles, Bowie, Jean-Michel Jarre, Georgie Fame, Chrissie Hynde, King Crimson, Dischord Records, Joanna Newsom, Harmonia, Bob Johnston, U2 and Songhoy Blues. 

MOJO 264 / November 2015

It’s The Beatles! This month, as Apple prepare to reissue them with extraordinary restored video elements, MOJO celebrates all of the Fabs’ 27 Number 1 singles: unearthing the stories behind the songs that rocked the world. Plus! John Vs Paul: The Truth! Paul McCartney tells Paul Du Noyer what really went on inside the world’s greatest hit-making team, while the FREE covermount CD presents 15 killer Songs The Beatles Taught Us: Beatle faves from The Isleys to Barrett Strong. Also in the issue: Jean-Michel Jarre, Georgie Fame, Chrissie Hynde, David Bowie, Songhoy Blues, Bob Johnston, Dischord Records, King Crimson, Joanna Newsom, John Peel and U2. Yeah, yeah, and thrice yeah!

CONTENTS / MOJO 264

FREE CD! Songs The Beatles Taught Us MOJO presents the original versions of 15 tracks covered by John, Paul, George and Ringo, including Shout, Money, Please Mr. Postman and more by the likes of Buddy Holly, Ray Charles, The Isley Brothers and The Marvelettes!

The Beatles Number 1s! As Apple (the Fab one, not the computer one) unleash all 27 chart-toppers in an exciting new package, MOJO salutes the songs that changed the world forever, with a year-by-year examination of Fab Four chart-topping from 1963-1970, packed with feedback, freakitude and Na-Na-Na-Nas.

Plus! Paul On John Inside the ultimate hit-making team! Macca unburdens to Paul Du Noyer in an exclusive extra from the MOJO writer’s new book.

AND! Fabs On Film The Beatles’ promo clips unpacked with their cinematic collaborator Michael Lindsay-Hogg.

THE BEATLES AND KEN DODD

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ken Dodd with The Beatles November 1963

It's 50 years since Tears - the biggest-selling single of 1965 - reached number one

It was released at the start of September 1965 and hit the top of the national charts on September 30, staying there for five weeks.
That was impressive enough, but even more so is the fact that it was the best-selling single of that year – and, while the Fab Four had four of the top five best-selling singles of the 1960s, our Ken’s Tears was the other one.
Tears (written by Frank Capano and Billy Uhr and first recorded by Rudy Vallee in 1929) was the third best-selling single of the decade – She Loves You (1963) claimed the top spot, I Want To Hold Your Hand (1963) number two, Can’t Buy Me Love (1964) number four and I Feel Fine (1964) five.

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BEATLES MAGAZINE

JULIAN IS CO-WRITING HIS FIRST CHILDREN’s BOOK SERIES

Julian Lennon is co-writing his first children’s book series, about making the world a better place, with author Bart Davis.

New York literary agency Trident Media Group is looking after the series and is currently looking to sell international and domestic rights to the first title, Touch The Earth.

Trident Media said Touch The Earth is an “interactive concept – one part story, one part journey, and one part pledge to make the world a better, cleaner place”. It features musical lyrics throughout and “readers feel like they are flying across the global as they greet their final challenge to make a once arid landscape verdant again”.

Trident chairman Robert Gottlieb, who will co-agent Lennon and Davis along with group vice president Alyssa Eisner Henkin, likened the book to Press Here, the interactive picture book by French artist Herve Tullet.

“It’s an honour to be working with Julian on his first children’s title,” he said. “We’re excited to share his vision with the world.”

LIVERPOOL's HARD DAYS NIGHT HOTEL UNITES JULIA BAIRD WITH CITY CHOIRS TO SPREAD LOVE FOR NEW OWNERS

Hard Days Night Hotel teamed up with John Lennon’s sister Julia Baird and a duo of Liverpool choirs in a bid to show the love for the hotel’s new owners, Millennium Hotels and Resorts.
 

Julia, together with The Choir With No Name and twenty members of The Liverpool Signing Choir, descended on the grand entrance of the iconic North John Street building to perform a special rendition of the Beatles classic ‘All You Need is Love'.

As the heartfelt occasion aimed to ‘rejoice Liverpool’s community spirit’, the choirs were also accompanied by a number of the hotel’s team members and Millennium Hotels and Resorts’ CEO Aloysius Lee, who helped to ‘spread the love’, as 75 red roses were handed out to the public.

General Manager of Hard Days Night Hotel Mike Dewey said: “The hotel team and I thought that both of these altruistic singing groups would offer the warmest of welcomes. Together with what was a show stopping performance by The Choir with No Name, we were delighted to be joined by inspirational people, who add a refreshing twist to musical sign language.
“Following their moving rendition, the choirs were then treated to a celebratory lunch here at our in-house restaurant, Blakes. The day was a fun and inimitable way of welcoming our new partners and increased global visitors to our wonderful city in classic Beatles style.”

Established in January 2014, The Choir with No Name runs choirs for those experiencing homelessness and disadvantaged people, with the aim of building confidence, morale and support amongst its members. The Liverpool based choir, conducted by Meike Holzmann, meets once a week to rehearse all genres of music and is based on the feel-good factor that singing creates.

 
Conducted by Catherine Hegarty, The Liverpool Signing Choir was founded on the basis of encouraging social inclusion for deaf people through the performance of musical sign language. Notable acts include a rendition of John Lennon’s Imagine at the closing ceremony for the London 2012 Olympic Games, as well as a surprise performance in honour of Julia at Liverpool Town Hall in 2011.

Mike added: “Not only is the song a favourite amongst many members of both the choir and our hotel staff, its original message also sits well with what we were trying to project on the day – this being the coming together of partnerships from across the world and showcasing what Liverpool has to offer."

“It was wonderful to be joined by Julia, Millennium Hotels and Resorts’ CEO Aloysius Lee and the two inspirational choirs – the day certainly made a lasting impression.”