Two Beatles, Sean Lennon mourn Prince; see his stunning George Harrison tribute

Beatles Examiner

April 21, 2016

Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr and members of the Beatles family reacted today to the shocking news of the death of Prince. On his Twitter account, Paul McCartney recalled his personal friendship with the singer.

Saddened by Prince's death. Proud to have seen in the New Year with him. He seemed fine and played brilliantly funky music.

God bless this creative giant. Thanks Prince. Love X Paul

Ringo Starr also tweeted out some personal thoughts.

God bless prince we will all miss him I still have my Purple  whistle. I will blow it tonight peace and love 

Paul McCartney's daughter Stella also said on Twitter Prince was an “inspiration.”

Rest in peace... a true lifelong inspiration. I am so blessed to have witnessed your musicality in person! X Stella

In a series of posts on Twitter, Sean said,

One time I was having dinner randomly at house of blues and suddenly they announced Prince was gonna jam. He shredded blues covers for 3 hrs

One time I saw D'Angelo play Dorothy Parker w Prince at an after show gig at Tramps in NYC.

I got to see Prince at MSG when Purple Rain came out. Sheila E. was opening. I learned a lot about sex and music that day.

I was at a club in NYC and I told Prince he was the best bass player and he looked at me and said, 'better than Larry Graham?' I felt stupid

He continued.

 Prince also told me all artists should self publish w no label, and that I should stop smoking. I took his advise in both cases.

I'm just really shocked. Prince seemed so fit and healthy. It's hard to process. He was a super nova of talent.

I've got a vinyl 10" of Pop Life that's a club mix that goes on forever. It's so dope. Also have Raspberry Beret.

The Rolling Stones' Mick Jagger also expressed his condolences in three Twitter posts. (1) “I am so saddened to hear of Prince's passing. Prince was a revolutionary artist, a wonderful musician and composer. (2) Prince was an original lyricist and a startling guitar player. His talent was limitless. (3) Prince was one of the most unique and exciting artists of the last 30 years.”

If there any lasting memory of Prince for Beatles fans, however, it was in 2004 when he played an incredible guitar solo on "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" in a group with Dhani Harrison, Tom Petty, Jeff Lynne, Steve Winwood and others to help induct George Harrison into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. According to Rolling Stone, it almost didn't happen because George's widow, Olivia Harrison, only wanted those who knew George. But in the end, she allowed it.

As Paul Shaffer, who led the band that night, said, "Prince kept a little something in reserve for the actual performance itself. He really did show what a great guitarist he was. He just killed it that night." 

That he did. 

 

Thatst killed it that night." That he did.

Photos from Los Angeles and Beatlefest in 1996

From top to bottom: The John Lennon star next to the Capitol Tower in L.A., the two parts of a Beatles mural in the Capitol Records parking lot, Joey Molland and Denny Laine, Denny Laine.

 

The Pete Best Band Live -- a review

 7/23/03 at the King's Head, Campbell, CA.

From left, Phil Melia, Dave Deevey, Chris Cavanaugh and Mark Hay. Right, Pete Best on drums. (Photos by Steve Marinucci.)

By Steve Marinucci

Pete Best was there at the beginning. And those early Beatle days must have good memories for him because he's reliving them through the Pete Best Band, which played the San Jose, CA., suburb of Campbell July 23 in a British-themed pub called the King's Head. It was an appropriate place to play and the Best Band made the most of it in two shows that night.

Roag Best, Pete's brother, is the band's second drummer.

We saw the second show, which was opened by a neat local surf band, the Submersians. They played a half-hour set of some great surf tunes, highlighted by a surf version of "The Munsters" theme. Very clever.

After a short break, the Pete Best Band came to the stage. Best was introduced by show producer Keith Putney as "the man who put the 'beat' in the Beatles." The crowd was enthusiastic and loud as the band broke into "Slow Down." The tempo was a shade under where it should have been, but the band rocked through it quite hard, giving a taste of what was to come -- an evening of the Beatles, even though it wasn't the Beatles.

Pete signs autographs after the show.

It's unfair to call the Pete Best Band a Beatle tribute, even though they play songs done by the Beatles and one of the members is a former member. The Pete Best Band is a throwback to the Fabs' Hamburg days.

And the Pete Best Band is a joy to hear. While various members of the group take vocals during the show, animated singer Chris Cavanagh is an enthusiastic front man. The rhythm section -- Mark Hay, Dave Deevey and Phil Melia, playing Rickenbacker, Epiphone and Hofner bass guitars, and drummers Roag and Pete Best are a solid combination providing the backbeat and kept the crowd going.

A couple of the songs deserve special mention. "My Bonnie" included both the slow intro and the faster version and it was fun to hear both again, as we've all heard so many times on record. On the other hand, "Sweet Georgia Brown" included the Beatle lyrics version. To be really authentic and avoid Beatle tribute labels, guys, drop the Beatle lyrics and do the original ones. "Some Other Guy," always one of our favorite songs, sounded crisp and sharp, as did "One After 909."

The biggest surprise of the set, however, was "Besame Mucho." Unlike the Beatles' Decca version, the Best Band's version emphasized the lead guitar that was pretty much buried in the Decca audition version. The result was a much more rocking version than we've heard before. Did the Beatles ever do it that way live? It's a question we'd like to know.

We strongly suggest you don't miss the Pete Best Band if you have a chance to see them. Few of us got to hear the Beatles before Beatlemania, but the Pete Best Band gives fans an idea of what those days were like. It's a nice reflection on the Beatles that the Best Band's set reveals that maybe more of the Beatles' talents were evident in those days than had been previously believed.

And it's a nice compliment that the Pete Best Band manages to evoke both the Beatles' spirit while adding a bit of their own -- and the audience comes out the winner. They're the Best of both worlds.

(An end note: The Pete Best Band would have played an encore, but didn't because local police were called to the venue because of noise complaints. That tells you they were really rockin' the house!)

Here's the show's set list:

• Slow Down
• What I'd Say
• One After 909
• Please Mr. Postman
• P.S. I Love You
• My Bonnie (with both slow and fast versions)
• Besame Mucho
• Sweet Georgia Brown
• Long Tall Sally
• Some Other Guy
• I Saw Her Standing There
• Twist & Shout
  
  
  
  

Paul McCartney turning his life's work into a massive digital library

Paul McCartney (Photo By Rich007)

By Steve Marinucci
Published 5/26/2011

 Paul McCartney and Hewlett-Packard rolled out their plans Thursday for the former Beatle's digital cloud archive to be maintained by Hewlett-Packard. The deal, first announced last September, will allow McCartney to archive pictures, films, videos and music and direct access for use in archival projects.  

In a phone interview Wednesday, Scott Anderson, Vice President of Customer Communications for HP Enterprise Business, explained that HP's cloud archive agreement with McCartney and MPL Communications will enable him to organize his huge collection of films, videos, photos and documents he's built up over the years. HP says McCartney’s collection currently includes more than 1 million items, including photos, video footage from live concerts, film, videotapes, recordings,  paintings and memorabilia. 

"What he wanted to do and the reason his media company, MPL Communications Ltd., found HP was that he has all these assets. Here's the most photographed, filmed, videoed and recorded guy on the face of the planet. The idea was if you can take all those photos -- there's over half a million photos and hours and hours of videos -- digitize them and while you're doing so, catalog them, so you know the date, project, location. If you can store all that stuff in a private cloud that he has access to at his fingertips, the benefits for him and MPL is that they're preserved."

"He can have those things at his fingertips, for his business, he can license them out," he says. "He can use them for press engagements or if he wants to, he can make his assets that haven't been seen before available to his fans. So the option is his. We're putting them in a secured environment available for him  to access anywhere or anytime in a very orchestrated format."

“It’s really exciting because even if I’m out on tour anywhere in the world, I will be able to say, okay, ‘Wings 1976 tour’ and instantly, it will come up," McCartney said in a statement. "You’ve got all the information, all the photos from it. And you’ll have written accounts – personal accounts and critical accounts – of what happened.” . 

Anderson says the archive is limited to what McCartney and MPL Communications own and it doesn't include anything owned by Apple Corps, the Beatles company. And he says McCartney is looking ahead to the future.

"(McCartney) is not only designing for today, but he's recognizing the music industry is changing significantly. So as we build this digital library, it allows MPL to be quite flexible with how Paul can connect with fans. It's very innovative and forward looking," he says, "and HP has been very excited to work with him to build this." 

Anderson says McCartney has already received the digital archive, but new items will be added as McCartney continues to record, perform live concerts and do other projects.

"It's probably a neverending process before everything gets into it," he said. 

Attendees at the upcoming HP Discover America client conference the week of June 6 in Las Vegas will get a preview of the McCartney-Hewlett-Packard agreement from McCartney staff members. McCartney will also perform a show for attendees at the event's closing ceremonies.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Friends remember Gordon Waller of Peter and Gordon

                                                 Peter and Gordon performing

                                                       "World Without Love"

Published 6/5/2011

 Gordon Waller would have been 66 years old on Saturday. His longtime musical partner, Peter Asher, and some of his friends, recalled Waller and his music in quotes we've gathered here.  

"All of us who played and sang used to stand in front of the mirror and pretend to be Elvis," Asher says about the early days. "But Gordon actually did a good job of it. He was incredibly handsome and could sing those songs with his big, Elvis-y voice…"

Asher said the original idea of Norman Newell, who discovered Peter and Gordon, and EMI about how to use them changed. "They were thinking of us as an English answer to Peter, Paul and Mary or the Kingston Trio," he says. "Of course, after 'World Without Love' came out, by far the best at the session, all this English equivalent of the U.S. folk boom went out the window. We were just going to be a pop group."

Denny Laine, who was in the Moody Blues around that time (and later Wings with Paul McCartney), said their influences had a lot in common: "We were into Elvis, and Buddy Holly, and Eddie Cochran, all those people. The down home rockers."

And he says even though they were competitors, "we were all friends in that era. There was a lot of friendly competition, let’s put it that way. But everybody was happy in their own skin. They were doing what they were doing. We kind of admired each other."

He got to know Peter and Gordon from the television work they did together. "It sort of branched from the fact that we were all doing television together. We actually went to New York with them to do the Murray the K show, and we spent that time being ‘the Brit Bands’, mixed with the American bands…that’s how we got a little bit closer."

Spencer Davis of the Spencer Davis group, recalled Waller's driving. "The vehicle of choice I used to use to drive around in Britain was a Mini Cooper S. And we all know that Gordon was a huge fan of Mini Coopers. In fact, years later, when Gordon came to stay with me in Avalon, on Catalina Island-He said, “Can I take the Mini out?” Now it’s a small island, like a mile across, the speed limit is 15 miles an hour…I said, knowing Gordon, 'Yeah, you can take it out, but DON’T GO OVER 15 MILES AN HOUR…' ”

Denny Laine says he was impressed by Peter & Gordon's reunion performance at BB King's in 2005. "I said to Peter, ‘You sound great. Why don’t you do some more shows?’ He said, 'I’ve got a day job.' I’d worked with Gordon as a solo artist -- I know he liked to do the solo stuff. But at the same time, I remembered them from the old days, and thought, it would be great if they went out and did a few shows."

Denny Laine: "I love anyone who’s got their own thing. "I know, of course, it’s a little bit based on the Everly Brothers, but Peter & Gordon had their own niche, their own sound, People loved them."

Keith Putney, manager of Peter & Gordon from 2006-2009, remembers a night when the conversation was about Waller. "Late one night, after a show in Stuart, Florida, Peter Asher, Jeff Ross and I were sitting at a little plastic table next to the tiki bar in our hotel. Everyone else had retired to their rooms; the bar had already closed down, but we were still talking, and as it so often did, the conversation turned to Gordon. Peter said that in the intervening years -- the 37 year break -- he had seen so many singers, so many people who wanted to perform, be it with a band, in a play, as a singer-songwriter-people who would do anything to make it.   People would give anything, do anything, to have what Gordon had, but what Gordon had was completely his own. It couldn't be taught, it couldn't be bought. He had an incomparable voice and a transfixing presence on stage, and an instinctive way of dealing with an audience. By then, they had known each other for over 45 years, but Peter still marveled at Gordon's gift."

Denny Laine recalled playing a show with Peter & Gordon in 2009.  "That night something happened . It just jelled. Gordon still sounded great. He had the voice. Something magical happens when you are doing a show with people you know. It’s more of an occasion, you’re not with strangers, and it was a great night. We talked after. We went to the restaurant and it was great to see Gordon all happy and jumping around. He’d had a good gig, you know.
"One of the last shows we did was the one on the Santa Monica Pier, which was one of the last times I got to sing with Gordon," Peter Asher recalls. “'500 Miles'" is one, in particular, that makes me miss him. That night on the Santa Monica Pier, Joan Baez, who is an old friend, got up and sang with us. We were practically back to being the Peter, Paul, and Mary thing all over again. It was Peter, Gordon and Joan”