Beatles News
As Paul McCartney and Wings performed in the early ‘70s, a family of mice got on with their lives underneath the stage. At least that was the concept behind The Bruce McMouse Show, a part-animated concert movie that was completed but never released.
It’s been so well hidden, in fact, that little else besides a handful of still drawings from the production had ever escaped from the McCartney vaults. Then the title appeared today as part of an upcoming expanded reissue of Wings' 1973 album Red Rose Speedway. That had many asking, "What was The Bruce McMouse Show?"
In the original hour-long presentation, Wings interacted with the pipe-smoking Bruce McMouse and his family, which included wife Yvonne and their children Soily, Swooney and Swat. Also featured was a blue walrus, harking back to the Beatles track “I Am the Walrus” and the assertion “the walrus was Paul” in “Glass Onion.”
Source: ultimateclassicrock.com
With the release of studio album Egypt Station via Capitol Records on Sept. 7, Paul McCartney reached his first number one debut in over 36 years. The number one spot was earned with 153,000 equivalent album units earned in the week ending Sept. 13 according to Nielsen Music.
The former Beatle was able to move a larger than expected 147,000 records through traditional album sales, which stands as an impressive feat in the era of streaming. Egypt Station also marks the Liverpool-native’s first solo album to debut at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart.
In addition to the artist and the music itself, McCartney’s highest selling debut record in more than ten years stems from a galvanized team that hit all the right notes for the star’s marketing campaign.
Source: Taylor Mims/Billboard
Universal Music Group (UMG) has appointed Grammy-winning producer, composer and arranger Giles Martin – son of legendary Beatles producer Sir George Martin – to a new global role as head of audio and sound.
Based at Abbey Road Studios in London, his new role will be to lead UMG’s work with new audio formats and consumer technology to encourage UMG artists to experiment in the company’s studios, including Abbey Road and Capitol Studios in Los Angeles.
His career, which began working with Sir George as a runner at his AIR studios, has followed his father’s approach to new sounds and experimenting in the studio.
Martin said: “The landscape of the way people listen to music has changed dramatically. This is an exciting time.
Source: Velvet Winter/themusicnetwork.com
If we told you that The Beatles scored a top 20 single in 1964—the year that they broke in America—that’s been all but forgotten, you’d rightfully be skeptical. All of the Beatles’ hits are still loved and known inside out and upside down, you’d say to yourself. How could one have been “lost” to time?
But it’s true. A #19 hit in America, this song fared better on the Billboard singles chart than such memorable tunes as “From Me to You” and “I’ll Cry Instead,” yet it has received virtually no radio airplay in decades and is almost never mentioned in accounts of the band’s early days.
The tune in question was a cover, recorded in Germany all the way back in 1961, when Pete Best was still the band’s drummer. It hit the U.S. chart the very same day as the title song from A Hard Day’s Night, which of course rocketed to #1, but this particular song was considered a curiosity even as it climbed the charts.
Source: Jeff Tamarkin/bestclassicbands.com
The Beatles’ multi-million revival machine is set for another boost from the White Album’s 50th anniversary. Before the package is released on November 9, its new producer Giles Martin has revealed more discoveries he made while he worked on the remixed, remastered and expanded box set.
The album, which has the formal title The Beatles but is most commonly referred to by its minimalist white cover by the artist Richard Hamilton, is the successor to Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, which was last year’s best-selling reissue and revived a form of lucrative Beatlemania. Martin, the son of the original producer, the late Sir George Martin, spoke about the new discoveries at a listening event in London.
Source: Mark Beech/
This list started when Alastair Campbell tried, via Twitter, to persuade Abba to object to Theresa May jiving on to the stage at the Conservative Party conference to “Dancing Queen”. The band had objected to the anti-immigration Danish People’s Party when it played “Mamma Mia” at rallies (changing the “Mia” to “Pia” after their leader, Pia Kjaersgaard, Robert Boston told me). But Björn Ulvaeus, asked by journalists, refused to comment on the British prime minister’s homage.
1. Abba: The band’s publishers also served John McCain with a cease and desist letter for using “Take a Chance on Me” in 2008. A somewhat un-reassuring political message, I thought, nominated by No Ordinary Cat.
Source: John Rentoul/independent.co.uk
He was the Dundee photographer who took the iconic image of one of music’s most famous albums.
Paul McCartney chose Iain MacMillan’s shot for the Abbey Road cover in 1969.
The street would eventually become as famous as the music itself thanks to the photograph Iain produced.
Mr MacMillan’s work with John Lennon and Yoko Ono also included working on record sleeves for Live Peace in Toronto, Give Peace a Chance and Happy Xmas (War is Over).
He also shot the album cover for Something’s Burning by Kenny Rogers and took portraits of various celebrities from the world of sport, acting and pop music including Stevie Wonder, Twiggy, Floyd Paterson and Maggie Smith.
Mr MacMillan’s rich legacy in print is now being fondly remembered by those who knew him best to mark what would have been his 80th birthday.
Source: thecourier.co.uk
Paul McCartney announced the latest installments of his ongoing Archive Collection, a pair of deluxe reissues dedicated to the Wings-era LPs 1971’s Wild Life and 1973’s Red Rose Speedway. Both reissues arrive December 7th.
For the 3CD/1DVD limited deluxe edition of Wild Life, the newly remastered original album will be paired with two discs worth of rough mixes, home recordings, b-sides, single edits and other unreleased material, including a minute-long home recording of “Indeed I Do.” The DVD for the set boasts rare footage of acoustic home videos, rehearsals and more.
“The Wild Life deluxe package includes a 128-page book written by David Fricke telling the story behind the album
Source: Daniel Kreps/Rolling Stones
It seems fitting that, when you read about the creation of The Travelling Wilburys in 1988, it's hard to sort out which stories are true and which are apocryphal. After all, the five megastars who made up the supergroup went by pseudonyms and claimed to be half-brothers: Nelson (George Harrison), Otis (Jeff Lynne), Lefty (Roy Orbison), Charlie T., Jr. (Tom Petty) and Lucky (Bob Dylan). Other legends abound: Did the name “Wilbury” come from Lynne telling George Harrison, during sessions for the former Beatle's comeback record Cloud Nine, that “we'll bury mistakes in the mix”? Did the four other members ask Orbison to join the band right before he went on stage? Did George Harrison announce the project for the first time during a radio interview? The answers are no, kind of and maybe — at least according to Jeff Lynne, who recalls the group’s formation as quick and simple. While working on Cloud Nine, he and Harrison started throwing out names of people with whom they’d love to be in a band. “Whenever we asked somebody, they would join immediately, so the group was formed in about 15 minutes,” he tells Billboard.
Source: Joel Keller/billboard.com
Having played nearly 3,000 shows with Elton John since 1972, Davey Johnstone — the Rocket Man’s trusted musical director and guitarist — says it’s tough to pick favorites. Maybe Thursday’s or Friday’s stop at Madison Square Garden as part of Elton’s long farewell tour will end up on his list. But there is one 1974 concert at the Garden that stands out from all the rest they have done in New York.
That’s when John Lennon joined them onstage on Thanksgiving Day as part of a deal he’d made when Elton played piano on the Beatle legend’s single “Whatever Gets You Thru the Night.”
“I was at the studio at the time,” says Johnstone, “and Elton said, ‘Well, I’ll play on it, but if it gets to No. 1, you have to come onstage with us at Madison Square Garden.’ And John went, ‘Yeah, OK’ because he never expected it to be a No. 1 hit, which it was. So John had to make good on his promise.”
Source: By Chuck Arnold/nypost.com
