Ringo puts up a Beatles reunion

Unless somebody gets the permission from the members and their families to produce a show with hologram versions of The Beatles, then I believe that this instance will be the closest we will ever get to a reunion of the Fabulous Four all of our lives.

The man responsible is no other but the Beatles’ drummer himself, Ringo Starr. Like the other surviving member of the group, Paul McCartney, Ringo remains active in concerts and recordings. Now he has a new album coming up next month titled What’s My Name and in one of the cuts is the very first time that the Liverpool lads have reunited in a song recording after they separated 50 years ago.

Here is how it happened. One of the cuts included in Ringo’s latest is a composition by the late John Lennon titled Grow Old With Me. The song was written shortly before Lennon was tragically killed on Dec. 8, 1980. It was later released in the posthumous album Milk and Honey that also features Lennon’s widow Yoko Ono. Ringo remembered those Lennon songs and decided to include one of them in What’s My Name.

He narrates how the accidental reunion happened in a statement sent to the Rolling Stone magazine. “I sang it the best that I could. I do well up when I think of John this deeply. And I’ve done my best. We’ve done our best. The other good thing is that I really wanted Paul to play on it, and he said yes. Paul came over and he played bass and sings a little bit on this with me. So John’s on it in a way. I’m on it and Paul’s on it. It’s not a publicity stunt. This is just what I wanted. And the strings that Jack arranged for this track, if you really listen, they do one line from Here Comes The Sun. So in a way, it’s the four of us.” Here Comes The Sun is a George Harrison song.

So there you have it. A Lennon song, McCartney on bass, Ringo on vocals and a bit of Harrison in the music. I can already imagine die-hard Beatles fans downloading Grow Old With Me the moment it drops come Oct. 25 and then listening closely to hear McCartney’s guitar and that little bit of Harrison. And then the thought returns, couldn’t these boys have stayed together longer? Then things might have turned out different.


What’s My Name is Ringo’s follow-up to his Give More Love album from two years ago. It also features collabs with Joe Walsh, Edgar Winter, Dave Stewart, Sam Hollander, Gary Nicholson, Steve Lukather and others. Ringo, who was recently on tour with his All-Star Band, is set to launch a new book, Another Day in the Life soon.

More Beatles news. Tourists can now visit the Strawberry Fields Orphanage in Liverpool. This was formerly a Salvation Army Children’s Home located beside the house of Lennon’s aunt. As a kid, he would often go over the fence to play with the children and those memories inspired him to write Strawberry Fields. The place is now a quiet sanctuary where young people with learning disabilities are taught skills to help them find employment.

Speaking of Here Comes The Sun, Harrison’s beautiful composition, has a new stereo mix that was released along with a new video last week. The video sees the sun rising behind the Abbey Road Studios where the song was recorded 50 years ago. It includes previously unseen photos and footage shot by the late Linda McCartney. The release is part of the 50th anniversary commemoration of the landmark album, Abbey Road.


Also part of the celebration is a new, truly grand mix of Something, another timeless and most affecting Harrison song, that is now available on Spotify.

As for McCartney, he is at present on the North American leg of his Freshen Up Tour for the album Egypt Station that has already taken him around the world. Did you know that he performed for free for over 400,000 people in Mexico? Well, only the likes of McCartney, one of the greatest entertainers of today can do that. He is also working on his first musical.

Happily for their fans, there is no end in sight for the Beatles.

source: philstar.com

The Beatles' great rock bromance

The Beatles rooftop concert in ‘Let It Be’ is a template for every great band reunion moment — and possibly every romcom — to come.

Forty-five years ago, the Beatles were kaput, having called it quits in a flurry of torts and acrimony. A final studio album, “Abbey Road,” meant to show them as a functioning unit in 1969, was overtaken by “Let It Be,” recorded earlier but released later as a documentary and album, awash in Phil Spector strings and choirs. (It still won an Oscar for Best Song.)

The documentary is one of life’s painful reminders that people — even Beatles — grow tired of one another. Directed by Michael Lindsay-Hogg, Let It Be takes us behind the scenes as John, Paul, George and Ringo — but mostly Paul — try to pull an album together out of general ennui.

At this point in time, after the death of manager Brian Epstein, the end of touring, John’s recent infatuation with Yoko Ono and George’s commitment to spiritual detachment, there were few cheerleaders left in the Beatles. Paul, the task-driven Gemini, still fit the bill, and he is the one that takes up the reins on this project.

Lindsay-Hogg’s camera dotes on Paul. He’s there in the opening in a tight shot, vamping some Bach-like inventions on piano (just so you know he’s the “serious” musical Beatle); Paul also gets loving close-ups singing Let It Be and The Long and Winding Road, the kind of close-ups where he’s much too aware of the camera, trying to win it (us) over.

Underneath the surface, though, the rest of the Beatles are wary, weary, disaffected. Ringo sits next to Paul as he improvises on piano, looking miles away, but also appropriately supportive; George sits and previews a new song, I Me Mine, for Ringo and others, with this caveat: “I don’t care if don’t want it.” (After all, he was amassing enough solo songs to release a triple solo album, “All Things Must Pass,” a year later.) John abruptly stops a rough run-through of I Dig a Pony and sighs: “Has anybody got a fast one?”


Only Paul comes to the party prepared, full of esprit de corps for a group that is now more corpse than corps. His songs are meticulously detailed, and he’s determined that the band hammer them into shape — literally, in the case of Maxwell’s Silver Hammer (which ended up instead on “Abbey Road”).

There is no narrative behind Let It Be, save for the narrative Paul tries to insert through short interview bits — telling Lindsay-Hogg that he and John wrote “hundreds of songs” back in Liverpool before becoming famous, and how some of these unrecorded gems were “brilliant.” It’s this urge to “get back” to those innocent days that is constantly at odds with the other musicians.

Tensions mount, and it’s fair to say the first half of “Let It Be” is a discordant bummer. There’s Paul “instructing” the band how to play the guitar break in I’ve Got A Feeling over and over again, as though he’s orchestrating the Wrecking Crew. There’s George getting sulky with Paul, then Paul lowering his voice as though to escape the cameras: “I’m trying to help you, but I always hear myself annoying you.” And George shrugging back, getting on with it: “I’ll play whatever it is you want me to play, or I won’t play at all if you don’t want me to play; whatever it is that pleases you, I’ll do it.”

Almost by design, the first half of the film proceeds without shape or form; the Beatles play raggedly, warts and all. In their nascent form, the songs fail to inspire, despite Paul’s loud declarations that this is all just another day in showbiz. Clearly, these are four men weary of one another.

Yet moments of light still shine through. It’s when the music catches fire, or sets them free, that you can actually believe these were the men that inspired Beatlemania. It’s there when John starts dancing with Yoko during a run-through of the waltz-like I Me Mine; it’s there when Linda Eastman’s little girl Heather (not Stella McCartney, as some believe) shows up to watch the band and laughs as John runs through a riotous Dig It with Billy Preston on keyboards; it’s there when Ringo does a comical reaction take as another child hits a nearby cymbal.

These unscripted bits are what remind us of the Beatles’ natural chemistry with one another, and with the camera’s eye. (They were movie stars, after all, in A Hard Day’s Night and Help.) It’s when they forget they’re on film that the film comes alive. Moments such as when John and Paul share a mic on a rock version of Two of Us (intriguing in itself); or when Paul and Ringo serve up a Jerry Lee Lewis duet on piano.

Other moments reveal a nurturing spirit: George is shown helping Ringo work out the chords for Octopus’s Garden on piano. And always — though not as intrusive as some remember — there is the figure of Yoko, quietly sitting by, listening to the band, but mostly to John.

But a shift occurs in the second half: in the classic rock bromance fashion, John and Paul resolve their differences; they come together through the power of music. When the movie really clicks is the final 20 minutes: a rooftop concert is staged at Apple headquarters, 3 Savile Row, and it provides a perfect antidote to the chaos that had been brewing earlier. Having worked out a rough “set,” the Beatles begin playing for the neighborhood passersby, and it’s as though the cool London air ignites them: crowds take to adjacent rooftops to hear the band run through Don’t Let Me Down, I’ve Got A Feeling, Get Back and One After 909. Magically, they find the connection that has eluded them in the studio setting; they are a band once again.

And it’s a moment that serves as a template for every great band reunion movie (and possibly every romcom) to come: that final scene from This Is Spinal Tap — where Nigel and David reunite onstage after bitter estrangement — takes its heart and soul from this moment in Let It Be. The only difference is, Spinal Tap went on to tour Japan shortly after reuniting (and even became an actual touring band in real life). The Beatles simply dissolved and went their separate, adult ways, their own reality show suddenly cancelled.

source: philstar.com

Ringo Starr, Lou Reed among 2015 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame class

NEW YORK | Former Beatles drummer Ringo Starr, the late rocker Lou Reed, punk group Green Day and singer Bill Withers are among the 2015 inductees named on Tuesday to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

The Paul Butterfield Blues Band, rockers Joan Jett & The Blackhearts, rhythm and blues band the “5″ Royales, the late blues guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughan and the band Double Trouble will also be inducted into the Hall of Fame at a ceremony in Cleveland on April 18.

“These inductees epitomize rock and roll’s impact over the past 50 years and continuing through today,” Joel Peresman, the president of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation, said in a statement.

He added that this year will mark 30 years of Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductions.

Starr was selected in the music excellence category. He was inducted as a member of The Beatles in 1988. His bandmates have since entered the Hall of Fame as solo artists: John Lennon in 1994, Paul McCartney in 1999 and George Harrison in 2004.

Reed, whose work with The Velvet Underground made them one of the most influential groups in rock; Green Day and “Ain’t No Sunshine” singer Withers were selected in the performer category, along with the Paul Butterfield Blues Band.

Joan Jett & The Blackhearts, whose biggest hit “I Love Rock ‘n Roll” became a rock classic, were cited for their fresh sound. The “5″ Royales were credited for creating some of rock’s first standards while performing from 1945 to 1965.

More than 700 artists, music industry professionals and historians help to decide who is inducted. The public also cast their votes in a “fans ballot.”

Artists are eligible 25 years after the release of their first record for induction into the Hall of Fame, which was established in 1983.

source: interaksyon.com