The Beatles: News, History & Updates

The Beatles Biography by Greg Prato

Excerpts from Greg’s books for Alternative Nation

BUN E. CARLOS [ex-Cheap Trick drummer]: I saw a picture of them in Life Magazine in November of ‘63. I was just amazed by these guys with long haircuts and big noses. [Laughs] Because Ringo and John were in the picture, and I was like, “Wow. These guys have got big noses…but sure have long, cool hair.” Then I started hearing about them, and that day came when you first heard a Beatles tune on the radio.

CURT KIRKWOOD [Meat Puppets singer/guitarist]: I was pretty young, and I couldn’t avoid it. I don’t know if I saw them on Ed Sullivan. It just seems like they were always around – like Mickey Mouse or something. I just grew up with it. By the time I was five, I was well aware of A Hard Day’s Night – and Help! would have been somewhere around there.

FRANK BLACK [Pixies singer/guitarist]: I heard them probably like a lot of people my age – when they were little kids. Because they were “the band.” They were the big supergroup. They defined what rock music was. They are probably my #1 influence. I’m not saying I sound like them – I’m saying in terms of what music affects me more than anyone, I would say the Beatles. I had the John Lennon record, Some Time in New York City, when I was pretty young. I really love that record a lot. When John Lennon did more kind of arty, abrasive, dissonance – which you hear on some Plastic Ono records – I think it scared me a little bit. I didn’t quite understand it. Honestly, I’ve turned into a middle-aged dad, with my daughter saying, “Are you going to play the Beatles again? Really?”

PAUL LEARY [Butthole Surfers guitarist]: Every once in a while, we would cover songs that we liked. And “Come Together” was one of them [covered by the Butthole Surfers live in 1985, with Paul on vocals]. We did everything from the Beatles’ “Come Together,” and we did Freddie King, Blue Öyster Cult – we did a wide assortment of cover songs over the years. “Come Together” is so much fun.

EAST BAY RAY [Dead Kennedys guitarist]: On [the Dead Kennedys’] Live at the Deaf Club, we did “Back in the USSR.” We did a Rolling Stones song, too – “The Last Time.” A lot of people throw in a cover tune, but the ones we put on record had to be a little bit whacky. Doing the Beatles and Stones is too straight ahead – we ended up doing “Take This Job and Shove It” [on 1986’s Bedtime for Democracy].

CURT KIRKWOOD: It was pretty funny [William Shatner’s cover of “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds”]. As serious as a guy like that is, I imagine that he’s always laughing up his sleeve, too. Even in Star Trek – just a little out there.

BRIAN KEHEW [co-author of the book Recording the Beatles]: One of the things that we found in writing the book [2009’s Recording the Beatles] – and this was definitely a subtext not even brought out to the readers, but was unexpected to me, but yet, a huge point that you could make – the Beatles had very limited equipment, as far as studio gear. Now, at the time, that was fairly standard. It was a big studio they had – given eight microphones, two kinds of equalizers, one kind of microphone preamp. And it was the same as the classical sessions would use, and the same as the jazz people, or pop songs. There weren’t a lot of choices, and yet, if you listen to the first Beatles record all the way through to the last one – done at Abbey Road – they sound different. They are different. And even things as close together like Magical Mystery Tour and The White Album, within a year of each other, sound completely different.

CHAD CHANNING [ex-Nirvana drummer]: Yeah, actually I would agree with it [that the Beatles helped trailblaze punk rock], because when the Beatles started out, they were really going against the grain. They donned leather jackets, and cut their hair in a certain way, and made it non-conventional – they were “the bad boys of music,” so to speak. They had this thing, like, “There’s this band from Liverpool, and they’re doing what they want to do, and not conforming.” There was a very “punk rock attitude” in that – that shows some similarities to punk rock itself. It’s just a way in the idea and the attitude – “I’m not going to just follow everybody else.” I think that’s where I draw some similarities and the Beatles having an influence on punk rock.

MIKE PORTNOY [Dream Theater drummer]: Ringo is one of my biggest heroes of all-time. He’s a big reason why I play the drums, and I think it’s always undeserving how underrated he is, and how a lot of people take pokes at him. There’s the famous quote, “Is Ringo the best drummer in the world?” And I think John has been quoted as saying, “He’s not even the best drummer in the Beatles!” Which is a very funny quote, but it’s a little unfair, because I don’t judge drummers from their technical ability – I base drummers on what they do for their band and what they do for the song that they’re playing on. And Ringo was the king of that.

RUFUS WAINWRIGHT: I think it’s one of these moments in history where all of the elements conspired together to create a perfect entity. And now I believe in it because it’s so under threat – if you think of…I don’t know, the Constitution of the United States, or the Declaration of Independence – that was kind of an interesting moment. And the Beatles is another one. And I would say maybe the Ballet Russes in Paris in the 1920’s – with Stravinsky. There are just these times when everything comes together and the perfect “object” is formed. And the Beatles are definitely right up there…with the French Revolution or whatever. [Laughs]

QUOTE SOURCES (CLICK LINK FOR ORDER INFO):
All quotes are from John Winston Ono Lennon