Beatles

Currently, I am reading a recently published book about The Beatles. It is titled, "John and Paul - A Love Story in Songs" and I like the approach that the writer takes. Each of the forty three short chapters focuses upon a different song from the Lennon and McCartney catalogue. Ian Leslie, the writer, is knowledgeable about the mechanics of music but he is also passionately interested in how The Beatles developed and how the selected songs reflected their evolution.

I was ten years old when The Beatles began to filter into Britain's consciousness - before they took America by storm. Though very young, I was already very much into popular music. Under the bed covers, I would listen to Radio Luxembourg on my transistor radio. The very first single that my brothers and I bought was "Return to Sender" by Elvis Presley. That came out in October 1962 and soon went to top spot in the charts. Another record that came out that month was "Love Me Do" by The Fab Four.

And that was when I started recording the British hit parade in a red exercise book. Every week I would write down the details of the top number and so I noted The Beatles' meteoric rise. "Please Please Me" hit number one in March 1963 and then they were off like a rocket ship.

Nothing before could compare with The Beatles. They had found their own provincial style, honed in Hamburg, Germany and they emerged into the light writing their own songs, making up their own musical rules as they went along. And of course at the heart of it all were two young men - John and Paul. They were both very aware of popular music trends in America.

Both of them had lost their mothers when they were far too young and John hardly knew his wayward father. They had grown up in post-war Britain, a country finding itself again. Old habits and certainties were being replaced and it was as if our nation's youth were ready to find their own music, their own heroes, leaving the past behind. You could rightfully claim that the circumstances were right for The Beatles and maybe The Rolling Stones too - along with several other lesser recording artists. Together they were breaking the mould.

This afternoon, I read the chapter titled "In My Life". Driven mostly by John, Paul helped to process it and give it its wings. However, at its core, you can still hear John, plaintively reaching out in his search for love and belonging. "In My Life" was recorded and first released in the last three months of 1965...