Tag Archives: Ringo Starr

A New Beatle Book – ‘The Beatles’ Liverpool’

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Now that international travel is slowly becoming more feasible for many of us again, a visit to Liverpool – the city where it all began for The Beatles – might just be back on your travel “must do” list.

If so, it’d be nice to have a guide to point you in the right direction when you get there.

Liverpool, on the banks of the River Mersey always looms large in any discussion about the formation of the band and their influences. Many of the physical places they lived or frequented have become key parts of the Beatle story. It is of course the city where John, Paul, Ringo and George were born, grew up in, and knew well.

Now a new guide book The Beatles’ Liverpool – just released – takes you there by gathering more than fifty Liverpudlian localities. The fully illustrated guide then explains why those particular places played such a key role in the band’s development and success.

Of course there are the obligatory entries for the childhood homes (Menlove Avenue for John, Arnold Grove for George, Forthlin Road for Paul, and Admiral Grove for Ringo); there’s the background to Penny Lane and Strawberry Fields; The Cavern Club; and the well-known St Peter’s Church, Woolton where John first met Paul.

But there are many more obscure listings too. Like Hulme Hall in Port Sunlight; the Neston Institute in Wirral; and 4 Rodney Street, birthplace of Beatle manager Brian Epstein.

There’s also a handy two-page guide map pinpointing the location of all the places mentioned in the guide.

If you’re planning a Liverpool visit, this book would be an essential to take with you – and it won’t cost you any excess luggage fees. At just over 44 pages The Beatles’ Liverpool is compact and light enough to easily slip into a travel bag or backpack to have with you as you walk the streets of the historic city.

Even if you’re still a way off physically getting to Liverpool, you can dive into The Beatles’ Liverpool and pay a visit vicariously. It’s the perfect armchair alternative to actually being there.

Author Mike Haskins was himself born and raised in Merseyside – and he still lives there! He’s worked as a scriptwriter and researcher for TV, radio and the stage, and has published over fifty books.

WIN A COPY OF THE BEATLES’ LIVERPOOL (NOW CLOSED)

Courtesy of Pitkin Publishing and Batsford Books in the UK, we’ve have two copies of The Beatles’ Liverpool to give away to two lucky readers.

All you need to do is provide your name, email address and have a go at answering two easy Beatle Liverpool-related questions. Just click on the link below to enter:

Good luck!

UPDATE:
Thank you to everyone who entered. And congratulations to the two readers who were first in with the correct answers!

They are Fred, from Ontario, Canada; and Diane from New York, USA. They will receive a copy of The Beatles’ Liverpool book, courtesy of Pitkin Publishing and Batsford Books.

The correct answers to our questions were:

  1. In their early career band members purchased many of their instruments from which famous Liverpool music store? Hessy’s Music Centre
  2. Ringo’s family hails from Liverpool’s Dingle area. His Mum worked at pub called The Empress there. In what way did Ringo put that building on the map? It’s on the front cover of his Sentimental Journey LP

Ringo Starr Announces New EP

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Los Angeles ­­­– July 29, 2022 – Today, UMe announces the release of EP3 featuring four brand new tracks from Ringo Starr, to be released on September 16. These four new tracks were all recorded at Starr’s Roccabella West studio just as he did for his Change The World and Zoom In eps, featuring longtime collaborators Steve Lukather, Linda Perry, Dave Koz, José Antonio Rodriguez, and Bruce Sugar. Ringo’s instantly recognizable vocals, feel-good lyrics, easy-breezy melodies, and frequent and new collaborators created songs that span the spectrum of pop, country, reggae and rock and roll. 

EP3 will be available September 16th digitally and on CD, and on 10” vinyl and as a limited edition translucent royal blue cassette on November 18.

“I am in my studio writing and recording every chance I get. It’s what I have always done and will continue to do, and releasing ep’s more frequently allows me to continue to be creative and give each song a little more love.” – RINGO

The four new tracks are:

  1. World Go Round
  2. Everyone and Everything
  3. Let’s Be Friends
  4. Free Your Soul (feat. Dave Koz and José Antonio Rodriguez)

More Beatle/Peter Jackson Projects + McCartney’s ‘Get Back’ to be Re-issued

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Looks like New Zealand film director Peter Jackson could have at least two other Beatle projects brewing.

He’s told the online magazine Deadline that he is cooking up another film – or films plural – with involvement from Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr.

Jackson revealed that one of the new projects is taking a different approach.

“I’m talking to The Beatles about another project, something very, very different than Get Back,” Jackson said. “We’re seeing what the possibilities are, but it’s another project with them. It’s not really a documentary … and that’s all I can really say. We are never in a position where we have to do anything, but we’ve got a few things percolating.”

Jackson said there is also a big narrative film on the cards, and like his Middle-Earth films, his ambitions will test existing technology. Which means part of his task is to develop the tools to make his vision a reality.

“One of them could be big scale, but it’s so technically complicated I’m trying to work how exactly I’ll do it,” he said. “It’s a live-action movie, but it needs technology that doesn’t quite exist at the moment, so we’re in the middle of developing the technology to allow it to happen. I’m trying to anticipate what I might be able to do, before it even exists. They’re not fantasy epics, but they’re pretty interesting.”

Jackson was tight-lipped about any further details, but fans have already started the guessing game and speculation is rife over the possibility of McCartney and Starr’s direct involvement. 

Meanwhile, long-time Beatle collaborator Richard Lester (he directed them in the movies A Hard Day’s Night and Help!) will have a film he made of Paul McCartney’s 1989/1990 Get Back world tour re-issued on Blu-ray and DVD next month:

Apparently Lester came out of retirement to document that Get Back tour, and his film features highlights from concerts across the globe. The band is Paul, Linda McCartney, Hamish Stewart, Robbie McIntosh, Paul ‘Wix’ Wickens and Chris Whitten.

It’s not really clear just why this is being re-issued now. Perhaps it’s because of the success of the whole Peter Jackson Get Back documentary? Or maybe it is trying to ride on the coat tails of Paul’s current Got Back tour…..?

Reviews of the film when it was first released back in 1991 weren’t kind: “Under the best of circumstances, Get Back will never be a very good concert film. The movie fails to offer a clear and compelling rendition of Paul McCartney’s live shows as it features too much extraneous material. The performances of the songs themselves are fairly solid but they lack much life, and McCartney’s weak vocals don’t help. Add to that a high level of visual gimmickry imposed by the filmmakers and you have a flawed representation of the concert experience.”

ViaVison Entertainment says Paul McCartney’s Get Back will be released on Blu-ray and DVD on August 17.

To give you taste here’s an advertisement from when it was originally released back in 1991:

Ringo’s New Book – ‘Lifted’

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Ringo Starr has a new book out. It is called Lifted – Fab Images and Memories From My Life and Across the Universe.

Speaking about the book Ringo said: “I am not writing this book as a Beatle historian. I’m writing this book as a Beatle — and there’s only a couple of us who can do that.”

Asked about it’s origins, Starr explains: “I didn’t keep all these photos. These fantastic images came back to me in recent years from here, there and everywhere — online and off — and have somehow helped me get back to seeing my life with The Fab Four through fresh eyes. A lot of the photos in this book I spotted on my phone and on my computer and “lifted” them because they brought back so many fabulous memories.”

“So this a book full of Beatle images that many people haven’t seen and stories that I’m sharing with a little help from my longtime writer friend David Wild. We’ve all been through a pretty tough time for a lot of people who’ve been locked down, and this book has really lifted my spirits and took me back to where I once belonged in a whole new way. And in the end, that’s why this new book is called Lifted. The Beatles changed my life forever. So it’s about getting back and giving back.”

Lifted is only available online from the Julien’s Auction House site, and there are two editions to choose from.

The standard ‘Collectors Edition’ costs US$59.00. It is a handsome-looking coffee table style hardback. It seems to have a been popular seller as it’s already in a 2nd Edition print run on the Julien’s site.

There is also a ‘Signature Edition’ that costs US$495.00 and is limited to 1000 copies. The same ‘Collectors Edition’ book comes presented in a velvet outer bag and the book – each one signed and numbered by Ringo – is contained in a custom box.

Proceeds from the sale of Lifted will go to the charity The Lotus Foundation, which does good work across a range of worthy causes.

Ringo has been out and about promoting the book, especially on social media. Here’s a photo we lifted from Instagram:

If the name Julien’s Auctions sounds familiar, it is the company that managed the 2015 once-in-a-lifetime auction, curated by Ringo and his wife Barbara Bach, featuring thousands of items from their London estate, and their Beverly Hills and Monaco residences.

There were artworks, clothing and jewelry, furniture, memorabilia, musical instruments (including seven drum kits owned and played by Ringo), gold records, cars, and much, much more. There was even Ringo’s personal UK 1st mono pressing of The Beatles White Album, No: 0000001. It sold for US$790,000!

You can get an overview of what was on offer here. And the full list of all lots is here. They are fun to look through. Interestingly, a portion of the proceeds from this auction also went to The Lotus Foundation.

The Ages of Everyone in Get Back

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These are the ages of all the key players in Peter Jackson’s Get Back documentary, set in January, 1969:

Paul McCartney – 26, John Lennon – 28, Ringo Starr – 28, George Harrison – 25.

Producer/Engineer Glyn Johns is 26, Director Michael Lindsay-Hogg – 28, and Producer George Martin – 43.

Yoko Ono is 35, Linda Eastman – 27. Her daughter Heather is 6.

Roadie Mal Evans is 33, Keyboard Player Billy Preston – 22, Photographer Ethan Russell – 23, and Tape Operator Alan Parsons – 20 (wouldn’t be 21 until December).

It is a fascinating glimpse into the world of The Beatles at that time. Catch it on Disney+ if you can.

Ringo Starr Announces New EP

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Ringo Starr has taken a somewhat unusual route to annouce the forthcoming release of his new EP, Change The World.

He appeared live yesterday on the US online marketing channel, talkshoplive®.

talkshoplive® is the first live streaming, social buying and selling platform that allows anyone, anywhere to sell and buy products – from mops to mopeds, frying pans to pearls. And, it seems, records, CDs and cassette tapes from former Beatles (the platform carried a pre-recorded plug from Paul McCartney at the time of the release of his McCartney III album late last year).

The difference here was that Ringo chatted to talkshoplive’s Steve Harkins for just over 45 minutes before throwing to a YouTube clip that debuted the title track of the new EP, ‘Let’s Change the World’.

True to his word last year when announcing the EP Zoom In, Ringo confirmed he’d only ever be releasing extended plays (or EP’s) from now on. Change The World contains just 4 new tracks – recorded in lockdown.

There’s the lead single ‘Let’s Change The World’, written by Joseph Williams and Steve Lukather; ‘Just That Way’, written by Ringo and Bruce Sugar; ‘Coming Undone’, written by Linda Perry and featuring Trombone Shorty; and Ringo’s version of the blues-rock track ‘Rock Around The Clock’. 

Change The World arrives in full on September 24th in CD form:

It’ll also be available on that same date in cassette form:

If you are after the 10″ vinyl you’ll have to wait until November 19:

New Ringo Starr EP Coming

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Universal Music has announced overnight pre-orders for a new 5-song EP from Ringo Starr called Zoom In, available on March 19, 2021.

At the launch of last year’s What’s My Name LP (his 20th solo effort), Ringo intimated he was done with putting out full albums of songs and in future would turn to the more limited tracklists of the EP, or ‘extended play’. He’d just issue an EP here and there when he felt he had enough decent material to justify it.

Looks like that wish is coming true because this next release is definitely being marketed as an EP.

Zoom In will be issued on traditional black vinyl:

The now de rigueur coloured vinyl:

And of course on CD and digital download.

Zoom In tracklist:
1. Zoom in, Zoom Out
2. Here’s to the Nights
3. Waiting for the Tide to Turn
4. Not Enough Love in the World
5. Teach Me to Tango

To mark the occasion, Ringo has today released Track 2 from the EP, ‘Here’s To The Nights’. It’s an all-star affair with vocal contributions from Paul McCartney, Joe Walsh, Corinne Bailey Rae, Eric Burton (Black Pumas), Sheryl Crow, Finneas, Dave Grohl, Ben Harper, Lenny Kravitz, Jenny Lewis, Steve Lukather, Chris Stapleton and Yola:

UPDATE: And here’s the official video for ‘Here’s To The Nights’:

Two Books, Two CD Variations, and One DVD – Beatle Finds

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We attended the quarterly fundraiser for a Sydney community radio station last week. About every three months the classical music station Fine Music 102.5 set up a hall full of tables loaded with donated books, CDs, DVDs, sheet music and a small number of vinyl records.

In the book section there was a very interesting Beatle-related book and a John Lennon book too. In the CD section we found two CD’s – both variations of titles already in the collection – by The Beatles and Paul McCartney. And amongst the DVDs a fun item featuring one Ringo Starr…..

First up, the Beatle-related book:Derek Taylor front

It Was Twenty Years Ago Today came out thirty years ago as part of what was then the 20th anniversary of the 1967 Summer of Love. It uses the release of The Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band LP as a stepping off point to build an historical appreciation of what was a fairly wild and crazy year in music, art, fashion, politics, religion, relationships and generational change.

Written by a genuine Beatle insider (former Apple press officer Derek Taylor), this book is also associated with a television program of the same name released that year.

Derek Taylor is witty, erudite and clever at pulling together a massive amount of information to give a detailed impression of what was going on around the world in a year of countercutural change. The book includes lots of archive interviews, observations, and photographs as well as extensive transcripts from the Granada TV documentary. Really interesting.

Jump ahead about twenty-five years and you have the second book we discovered. It’s also a reminiscence of times past, evident in the title: Days That I’ll Remeber -Spending Time with John Lennon and Yoko Ono. Author Jonathan Cott has been a contributing editor at Rolling Stone and has written for The New York Times and The New Yorker. He is the author of 19 books on a wide range of topics, including works on Bob Dylan, classical music, children’s literature, and poetry – but especially music. Cott’s relationship with John Lennon and Yoko Ono dates back to 1968 when he went to interview them in their London flat. 

During that meeting a friendship was born that lasted for the rest of Lennon’s life, and continues today between Cott and Yoko Ono. It was Jonathan Cott who conducted what was to become the final Lennon print interview before his death. In Days That I’ll Remember Cott is presenting – for the first time – complete versions of all his significant interviews with the pair, and as such this is an important and significant work to have in the collection.The other finds are probably of lesser importance or interest, but we’ll detail them here for you anyway!

First up a CD version of The Beatles’ compilation album from 2000. Simply called 1 it contains (as the hype sticker on the front states) “27 No.1 singles on 1 CD”. Millions of these were sold around the world. So what’s new/different here? Only that this copy comes from South Africa, and there are a few distinguishing differences, namely the words “Made in the RSA” near the bar code on the rear:

There’s also a different, country-specific catalogue number there (CDPCSJ (WE) 7213), and it is also printed on the CD inside:

Plus there’s a really small logo on the left at the bottom. It has a musical note in it’s design, with some lettering that is tiny and difficult to read, but it says “A.S.A.M.I. Seal of Approval”. We’re guessing that is (or was) some sort of South African recording industry association that vouched for the autheticity of the pressing:

Otherwise all other presentation and content will be very familiar if you already have this CD:

Also on the CD tables was Paul McCartney’s 1997 large-scale classical recording, Standing Stone:

Above is the front and back of the outer cardboard slipcase which holds the CD jewel case and thick booklet with lyrics, photos, reproduced artworks, and an essay about the compostion and performance of the work. The one we found here is the UK pressing (we already have US and Canadian pressings of this which both have small variations on what you see here):

Here are the front and rear covers of the booklet:

The beautiful cover images are by Linda McCartney, and here is a peek inside. This artwork is by Paul:Finally, to end on a lighter note, a little kid’s DVD called Thomas & Friends:

If you look closely at the credits you can see listed there as Storyteller – Ringo Starr:

It’s great to have an example of Ringo’s work narrating this classic kids animation series. He did the voice-overs for the first two series only.

(As usual, click on images to see larger versions)

Ringo Starr – Playing For Change

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We must have been living under a rock because we totally missed this one when it first came out in September last year.

It’s Ringo Starr guesting on a terrific Playing For Change 50th anniversary version of The Band’s classic, ‘The Weight’:

It really works, don’t you think? Composer Robbie Robertson and Playing For Change producer Mark Johnson talk about the making of the track here and, like Robbie says, “It gives it a very special soul to me, seeing music come together like that.”:

Playing For Change have also recorded and filmed (in 2011) a version of John Lennon’s ‘Imagine’:

Playing for Change grew from a dream to make the world a little brighter, and now supports musicians all over the world. For $5 a month you can become a member and enjoy the entire PFC music catalogue (with exclusive content), receive a 25% discount in their shop, and know that 20% of your membership is donated directly to the Playing for Change Foundation. Just click on the Become A Member button on the site.

New Album for Ringo Starr – ‘What’s My Name’

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Official details are slowly emerging about the new album from Ringo Starr.

It is to be called What’s My Name, and it will feature Paul McCartney on one track (the John Lennon penned Grow Old With Me). Universal Music this morning leaked the title track onto YouTube:

There is now a full press release about the album on Ringo’s official site, detailing the background to the recording, the track list, and musician credits.

For those of us who still like their music in physical form it looks like there’ll be a CD and black vinyl, plus there’ll also be a limited edition blue vinyl as well – available through Ringo’s own store, plus a few selected retailers.

What’s My Name is due to hit record stores on October 25th.