British rock and pop music group, the most admired and popular of the 1960s and one of the most influential in the history of modern music. If the great Elvis Presley dominated the 50s as king of rock and roll, it corresponded to The Beatles, a group also rocker in its roots, to exercise the hegemony in the following decade with a very sophisticated and sophisticated amalgam of styles that would take the pop music to All public and preluded later genres.
As a reference of the youth of the 60s, whose manifestations were phenomena such as the hippie movement or May 1968, and also as a product of consumption in a decade of fashions and prosperity, it could have been expected that the fervor aroused by That rich musical whirlwind slowly faded after the dissolution of the group. Half a century later, however, the best songs of The Beatles still do not seem "old": they retain their freshness intact and seem to have entered a kind of timeless heritage, as if their music no longer belonged to an era, but to all Generations.
Training
From 1962, when it was established in a stable way, and until its official separation in 1970, the members of The Beatles were John Lennon (Liverpool, 1940-New York, 1980), Paul McCartney (Liverpool, 1942), George Harrison (Liverpool, 1943-Los Angeles, 2001) and Ringo Starr (Liverpool, 1940). However, it is difficult to give an exact date when the Beatles were formed. In the second half of the 1950s, John Lennon and his friend Peter Shotton (who would leave soon after) formed a group of music called The Quarrymen, which in 1957 was added Paul McCartney, followed shortly by George Harrison.
The Quarrymen began playing in various venues in Liverpool, when they were joined by bassist Stuart Sutcliffe. By then the need to incorporate a battery was evident. The name of the group would undergo new variations, from Johnny and the Moondogs to The Silver Beatles and The Beatles (1960), that in the end would be the definitive one; Such denomination arose from the fashion of putting names of animals to the musical groups (beetle means "beetle") and of the play of words with the style that then practiced (the music beat, "blow").
They finally incorporated a drummer, Peter Best, and got a contract to play in Hamburg, in a place of dubious fame called Kaiserkeller. His first German adventure ended prematurely with the expulsion of George Harrison of the country due to its minority of age; The same luck followed Paul McCartney and Peter Best,
In 1961 they would return again to Germany, to return again to the United Kingdom without pain or glory. Peter Best left the group for deep disagreements with the rest of its members and was replaced by Ringo Starr (stage name of Richard Starkey). Shortly after, Stuart Sutcliffe died in Germany, victim of a stroke; The Beatles' list of John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr was finally closed.
The composition of the songs would almost always be in charge of the tandem formed by John Lennon (rhythm guitar) and Paul McCartney (bass). In general they are due to Lennon, who must be considered the leader and the creative soul of the group, the most innovative songs and the artistic and intellectual exigency; The brilliant musical talent of McCartney was easily carried away by the commercial, but equally the songs ended up being the result of the balance between both. In a more advanced phase, the ever restless George Harrison (guitar solo) contributed to the repertoire of the group with valuable contributions; Very few, however, are due to the light-hearted drummer Ringo Starr.
The Beatlemania
In spite of the lack of repercussion, the experience in Germany had given consistency to the group, although at the beginning of the 60 it seemed more than another of the numerous bands that, from the triumph of the American rock and roll in the middle of the 50, cultivated with passion This genre in the United Kingdom, interpreting or versionando subjects of Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry and other great American rockers. The Beatles, however, had begun to compose and interpret their own songs, and they already enjoyed a certain fame; Played in small clubs in Liverpool, such as The Cavern, and were known in the Liverpool area, but still no record label had knocked on its doors.
At the end of 1961, after listening to them in a performance, Brian Epstein was enthusiastic and became his artistic representative; The role of this record store owner with no experience as a manager was so decisive that he would be called "the fifth Beatle." Epstein modeled a new look for the group (which went from wearing jeans and rocker leathers to elegant jackets and helmet combs) and introduced them to producer George Martin, who hired them to record a single. This first work titled Love me do (1962) and managed to place in the lists of successes of the United Kingdom. Already in 1963, Please, please me and soon after From me to you and She loves you would accede again to positions of honor in the British lists. That year can be considered the birth of the "beatlemania", a phenomenon of idolatry towards the group whose maximum expression were the hysteria that the female audience suffered in the concerts of the formation.
The "beatlemania" spread to the United States in 1964, where themes like Love me do, She loves you or I want to hold your hand, wrapped up by their first tour in this country, reached the first place in the lists of successes. The Guinness Book of Records is a revealing fact: in the same month, two albums and five singles of The Beatles led the respective American charts. Instead of, as was traditional, radiate its musical influence throughout the world, the United States suffered the so-called "British Invasion", with the Liverpool group as the bridgehead for a series of bands (The Animals, The Who or Rolling Stones) who would also land on the new continent, dethroning the supremacy of American rock and roll.
Simultaneously, and taking advantage of its popularity, The Beatles filmed several films, among which it is possible to emphasize What a night of that day! (A Hard Day's Night, 1964), a promotional vehicle that recounted three days in the life of the Beatles and reflected the phenomena of rapacious paroxysm that the group unleashed wherever it happened. The director, Richard Lester, gave the film a tone of surreal humor, destroying with the montage the notions of space and time, as evidenced in the scene in which the Beatles are both inside the train and running to take it. The same filmmaker would direct them in Help! (1965). The release of the homonymous albums accompanied both premieres; Also at that time the Beatles For Sale (1964) and Rubber Soul (1965) were released.
In fact, until 1965, the group continued to string discs to an average of two or more per year, most of whose songs were written by themselves, which gives an idea of their extraordinary fecundity. During these early years, The Beatles toured all over the world, but their concerts were progressively spaced, in part because of the growing irritation of the group over that exacerbated idolatry, more oriented to their people than to their music. After certain incidents as they passed through the Philippines and the southern United States and the controversy unleashed by a phrase by Lennon ("we are more popular than Jesus"), they gave their last concert in San Francisco in August of 1966. With his retirement, The "Beatlemania" was fading only in its sense of collective frenzy; Continued to be the reference group of their time and having enthusiastic followers.
Maturity and dissolution
From then on they would limit themselves to making recordings in studio. Thus began a new stage in his career, with a new image and a new style, more serious and profound. Experiencing with advanced techniques to create innovative musical effects, the records of his music were amplified and introduced to the blues, the country, parodies of the twenties, oriental influences and social criticism, elements that were harmonically integrated into a sound of their own And unmistakable.
The first album of this second stage, Revolver (1966), contained already a handful of excellent songs musically novel and far away in its lyrics of the amorous stereotypes to the use (Taxman, Eleanor Rigby, Tomorrow never knows). The following year he intensified his contact with psychedelic drugs (especially LSD), with the hippie movement and Eastern mysticism, embodied in the figure of the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, whom they accompanied to India.
All this came together in the release of his most revolutionary work, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967), an elepé that would mark the birth of psychedelic music and was a resounding worldwide success for the British group, which reached the number One simultaneously on the British and US charts. An eminent example, especially on its A-face, of what has been called "conceptual album" (that is, conceived as a unitary work that goes beyond the mere juxtaposition of songs), the album is a celebration of music, solidarity , Freedom and fantasy expressed in a sophisticated and harmonious mix of styles; At the height of his creative capacity and functioning as a single man, the group was able to choose, among the many musical traditions, the most appropriate to accompany each letter, until obtaining the final brilliant result.
But 1967 was also the year of the death of the one who had taken them to stardom, Brian Epstein, surely the only one able to maintain united personalities so disparate. John Lennon would always claim that Epstein's death meant the end of the Beatles. Official separation would be delayed, and preceded by clamorous clues, such as the release of John Lennon's solo albums (three albums produced with Yoko Ono, his wife since 1968) and George Harrison. It probably did not take place earlier because of the interest of its components to edit the pending joint works before starting a personal trajectory.
Thus came the light of the compositions of Magical Mystery Tour (1967), a failed film for television; The double elepé The White Album (1968); The soundtrack to his delightful animated film Yellow Submarine (1969), and Abbey Road (1969). After the publication of Let it be (1970), which despite its musical quality meant, for Lennon and for many, the end of nonconformity and the return to the fold in subjects like the one that gives title to the album, the disagreements within The formation finished with the dissolution of the same and each member continued, with diverse fortune, its musical race in solitary, without fructifying none of the attempts to reunite them again. The death of John Lennon in 1980 at the hands of a disturbed had a great impact around the world, and ended with any dream of his fans in this regard.
The influence of The Beatles' work over the ensuing decades has been immense. To cite just a few examples, the psychedelia of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band kicks off a stream that reaches groups like Pink Floyd or Emerson, Lake & Palmer and gave rise to so-called symphonic rock; His influence would still be felt powerfully in the brit pop, one of the most significant musical phenomena of the nineties. Apart from its unquestionable artistic importance, The Beatles remained forever the symbol of a lifestyle that perfectly matched the deep youthful concerns of the 1960s.
No doubt is the band that more history has marked, I could not see complete but at least I have seen two of its members Ringo Star and Sir Paul Mccartney in his tour out there, promoting his last disc NEW in Quito Ecuador 2014.