Beatles Interviews

Beatles: First Radio Interview, 10/28/62

2009-02-12T10:49:00.002-08:00

MONTY: It's a very great pleasure for us this evening to say hello to an up-and-coming Merseyside group, The Beatles. I know their names, and I'm going to try and put faces to them. Now, you're John Lennon, aren't you?"

JOHN: "Yes, that's right."

MONTY: "What do you do in the group, John?"

JOHN: "I play harmonica, rhythm guitar, and vocal. That's what they call it."

MONTY: "Then, there's Paul McCartney. That's you?"

PAUL: "Yeah, that's me. Yeah."

MONTY: "And what do you do?"

PAUL: "Play bass guitar and uhh, sing? ...I think! That's what they say."

MONTY: "That's quite apart from being vocal?"

PAUL: "Well... yes, yes."

MONTY: "Then there's George Harrison."

GEORGE: "How d'you do."

MONTY: "How d'you do. What's your job?"

GEORGE: "Uhh, lead guitar and sort of singing."

MONTY: "By playing lead guitar does that mean that you're sort of leader of the group or are you...?"

GEORGE: "No, no. Just... Well you see, the other guitar is the rhythm. Ching, ching, ching, you see."

PAUL: "He's solo guitar, you see. John is in fact the leader of the group."

MONTY: "And over in the background, here, and also in the background of the group making alot of noise is Ringo Starr."

RINGO: "Hello."

MONTY: "You're new to the group, aren't you Ringo?"

RINGO: "Yes, umm, nine weeks now."

MONTY: "Were you in on the act when the recording was made of 'Love Me Do'?"

RINGO: "Yes, I'm on the record. I'm on the disc."

(the group giggles)

RINGO: (comic voice) "It's down on record, you know?"

MONTY: "Now, umm..."

RINGO: "I'm the drummer!"

(laughter)

MONTY: "What's that offensive weapon you've got there? Those are your drumsticks?"

RINGO: "Well, it's umm... just a pair of sticks I found. I just bought 'em, you know, 'cuz we're going away."

MONTY: "When you say you're going away, that leads us on to another question now. Where are you going?"

RINGO: "Germany. Hamburg. For two weeks."

MONTY: "You have standing and great engagements over there, haven't you?"

RINGO: "Well, the boys have been there quite alot, you know. And I've been there with other groups, but this is the first time I've been there with the Beatles."

MONTY: "Paul, tell us. How do you get in on the act in Germany?"

PAUL: "Well, it was all through an old agent."

(laughter)

PAUL: (chuckles) "We first went there for a fella who used to manage us, and Mr. Allan Williams of the Jacaranda Club in Liverpool. And he found the engagements so we sort of went there, and then went under our own..."

JOHN: "Steam."

PAUL: "Steam... (laughs)

JOHN: "...as they say."

PAUL: "As they say, afterwards, you know. And we've just been going backwards and forwards and backwards and forwards."

MONTY: (surprised) "You're not busy at all?"

PAUL: "Well yes, actually. Yes. It's been left-leg in all the war."

(laughter)

MONTY: "George, were you brought up in Liverpool?"

GEORGE: "Yes. So far, yes."

MONTY: "Whereabouts?"

GEORGE: "Well, born in Wavertree, and bred in Wavertree and Speke-- where the airplanes are, you know."

MONTY: "Are you all 'Liverpool types,' then?"

RINGO: "Yes."

JOHN: "Uhh... types, yes."

PAUL: "Oh yeah."

RINGO: "Liverpool-typed Paul, there."

MONTY: "Now, I'm told that you were actually in the same form as young Ron Wycherley..."

RINGO: "Ronald. Yes."

MONTY: "...now Billy Fury."

RINGO: "In Saint Sylus."

MONTY: "In which?"

RINGO: "Saint Sylus."

JOHN: "Really?"

RINGO: "It wasn't Dingle Bay like you said in the Musical Express."

PAUL: "No, that was wrong. Saint Sylus school."

MONTY: "Now I'd like to introduce a young disc jockey. His name is Malcolm Threadgill, he's 16-years old, and I'm sure he'd like to ask some questions from the teenage point of view."

MALCOLM: "I understand you've made other recordings before on a German label."

PAUL: "Yeah."

MALCOLM: "What ones were they?"

PAUL: "Well, we didn't make... First of all we made a recording with a fella called Tony Sheridan. We were working in a club called 'The Top Ten Club' in Hamburg. And we made a recording with him called, 'My Bonnie,' which got to number five in the German Hit Parade."

JOHN: "Ach tung!"

PAUL: (giggles) "But it didn't do a thing over here, you know. It wasn't a very good record, but the Germans must've liked it a bit. And we did an instrumental which was released in France on an EP of Tony Sheridan's, which George and John wrote themselves. That wasn't released here. It got one copy. That's all, you know. It didn't do anything."

MALCOLM: "You composed 'P.S. I Love You' and 'Love Me Do' yourself, didn't you? Who does the composing between you?"

PAUL: "Well, it's John and I. We write the songs between us. It's, you know... We've sort of signed contracts and things to say, that now if we..."

JOHN: "It's equal shares."

PAUL: "Yeah, equal shares and royalties and things, so that really we just both write most of the stuff. George did write this instrumental, as we say. But mainly it's John and I. We've written over about a hundred songs but we don't use half of them, you know. We just happened to sort of rearrange 'Love Me Do' and played it to the recording people, and 'P.S. I Love You,' and uhh, they seemed to quite like it. So that's what we recorded."

MALCOLM: "Is there anymore of your own compositions you intend to record?"

JOHN: "Well, we did record another song of our own when we were down there, but it wasn't finished enough. So, you know, we'll take it back next time and see how they like it then."

(long pause)

JOHN: (jokingly) "Well... that's all from MY end!"

(laughter)

MONTY: "I would like to just ask you-- and we're recording this at Hume Hall, Port Sunlight-- Did any of you come over to this side before you became famous, as it were? Do you know this district?"

PAUL: "Well, we played here, uhh... I don't know what you mean by famous, you know.

(laughter)

PAUL: "If being famous is being in the Hit Parade, we've been over here-- we were here about two months ago. Been here twice, haven't we?"

JOHN: "I've got relations here. Rock Ferry."

MONTY: "Have you?"

JOHN: "Yes. Oh, all sides of the water, you know."

PAUL: "Yeah, I've got a relation in Claughton Village-- Upton Road."

RINGO: (jokingly) "I've got a friend in Birkenhead!"

(laughter)

MONTY: "I wish I had."

GEORGE: (jokingly) "I know a man in Chester!"

(laughter)

MONTY: "Now, that's a very dangerous thing to say. There's a mental home there, mate. Peter Smethurst is here as well, and he looks like he is bursting with a question."

PETER: "There is just one question I'd like to ask. I'm sure it's the question everyone's asking. I'd like your impressions on your first appearence on television."

PAUL: "Well, strangely enough, we thought we were gonna be dead nervous. And everyone said, 'You suddenly, when you see the cameras, you realize that there are two million people watching,' because there were two million watching that 'People And Places' that we did... we heard afterwards. But, strangely enough, it didn't come to us. We didn't think at all about that. And it was much easier doing the television than it was doing the (live musical performance) radio. It's still nerve-wracking, but it was a bit easier than doing radio because there was a full audience for the radio broadcast."

MONTY: "Do you find it nerve-wracking doing this now?"

(laughter)

PAUL: (jokingly) "Yeah, yeah."

MONTY: "Over at Cleaver Hospital, a certain record on Parlophone-- the top side has been requested. So perhaps the Beatles themselves would like to tell them what it's going to be."

PAUL: "Yeah. Well, I think it's gonna be 'Love Me Do.'"

JOHN: "Parlophone R4949."

(laughter)

PAUL: "'Love Me Do.'"

MONTY: "And I'm sure, for them, the answer is P.S. I love you!"

PAUL: "Yeah."

Beatles Interview: Pop Chat 7/30/63

2009-02-12T10:49:00.001-08:00

Q: "Our guests this week on 'Pop Chat' are The Beatles-- John, Paul, George and Ringo. Let's start off with you, Ringo. Everybody knows that the Beatles are a Liverpool group, but were you all actually born in Liverpool?"

RINGO: "Yes, every one of us."

Q: "Are you keeping your homes in Liverpool, or do you plan to move into London, or anything like that?"

RINGO: "I don't think any of us are moving. We must have a base in London, you know, because we're there more than we are in Liverpool at the moment. But we're not moving our houses."

Q: "John, over to you for a minute. You do alot of songwriting of late. Do you always work as a team?"

JOHN: "Well, mainly. All the better songs that we have written-- the ones that anybody wants to hear-- those were co-written."

Q: "Do you write the words and music together, or does one of you write the words?"

JOHN: "Yeah, well... Sometimes half the words are written by me and he'll finish them off. We go along a word each, practically."

Q: "Did you write your new record release?"

JOHN: "Uhh... 'She Loves You'? Yeah."

PAUL: "Yeah."

JOHN: "We wrote that two days before we recorded it, actually."

PAUL: "We wrote it in a hotel room in Newcastle."

Q: "This brings me to a question from one of your fans. How did the distinctive hairstyle come about?"

GEORGE: "Well, umm... I don't think any of us had been bothered with having haircuts, and it was always long. Paul and John went to Paris and came back with it-- something like this. And I went to the baths and came out with it like this."

Q: "Another fan was anxious to know how you manage to get any private life. I mean-- If you take a girl out, how do you avoid being recognized, Paul?"

PAUL: "Uhh, I don't know... just sort of run."

Q: "Now, John, I know you have very little time for anything but music at the moment. But if you had spare time-- What sort of hobbies and sports do you enjoy?"

JOHN: "Well, none of us are very sporty, you know. The only sport we do bother with is swimming. We don't count it as a sport, but... And hobbies are just writing songs."

Beatles Interview: Klas Burling, Bournemouth 8/23/63

2009-02-12T10:48:00.000-08:00

KLAS: "On my left is a boy... sounding like what?"

RINGO: "Uhh, Ringo. That's me. You know me. (imitates drums) Ting-cha, bump bah-bump!"

KLAS: "This would be the drums."

RINGO: "Yeah, that's... Well..."

KLAS: "Well.."

(Beatles giggle)

KLAS: "And after that we've got..?"

GEORGE: "George Harrison."

KLAS: "Playing..?"

GEORGE: "Guitar."

KLAS: "Solo guitar."

GEORGE: "Yes. (imitates guitar) Dee deena-lee, deena-lee dee dee."

(laughter)

KLAS: "Next in line is..?"

JOHN: (imitates guitar) "Ja-jing jing jing, ja-ja jing jing."

(laughter)

JOHN: "John."

RINGO: "Lennon."

JOHN: "Rhythmus."

(Beatles giggle)

KLAS: "And on my right side is..?"

PAUL: (imitates bass) "boom bah-boom boom, bah-boom boom. Paul McCartney."

KLAS: "All from Liverpool, known as..?"

PAUL & JOHN: "The Beatles."

KLAS: "Yeah, that's right. You've had some hits in Sweden, and have you ever thought about coming to Sweden?"

RINGO: "Well, we'd like to, you know. But we're so busy at the moment. I don't think we'll get there until sometime next year, if we go at all."

PAUL: "Actually, you know, we want to come because we've heard about the girls in Sweden. All gorgous blondes. you know."

GEORGE & JOHN: "Yeah."

KLAS: "That's Paul, and he's supposed to be the sweet boy in this family, no?"

PAUL: (jokingly) "Aww, shuttup."

(laughter)

JOHN: "His dad was a Mars bar."

PAUL: (laughs)

KLAS: "And George, you would like to go..."

GEORGE: "I would like to go to Sweden, yes."

KLAS: "By the side, by the way, is Michael Cox. An old fried of yours..."

RINGO: "Yeah...!"

JOHN: (loudly) "Hello, Michael Cox!"

PAUL: "He's from Liverpool, too."

GEORGE: "How is he?"

MICHAEL COX: "Fine, fine."

KLAS: "And he has told you a lot about Sweden, and so on."

GEORGE: "Yes."

KLAS: "You're still interested?"

BEATLES: "Yeah!"

RINGO: "More than ever."

KLAS: "After this we'll get to your recording of 'Twist And Shout.' I watched you, and John you are singing..."

JOHN: "Shouting it."

KLAS: "Yeah, you're shouting it, really. How do you feel from that... the throat?"

JOHN: "Well, ehm, at first it was hard. But when I do it twice a night, it's easy." (imitates dog barking)

(laughter)

JOHN: (giggling) "It's quite easy now. Practice, you know, if I keep shouting every night. But a year ago I couldn't sing it."

KLAS: "And another thing in your stage act, John, is all that SICK humor. You've got funny hands, and..."

JOHN: "Well, I thought it was quite healthy."

KLAS: (laughs)

RINGO: "It's not sick. He's just a cripple."

(laughter)

JOHN: (giggling) "I'm not, I'm not!"

(laughter)

JOHN: "I'm quite normal, my Swedish friends."

(laughter, the Beatles recording of 'Twist And Shout' is played)

KLAS: "The songwriters in the Beatles, they are John Lennon and Paul McCartney."

JOHN: (monotone) "Hurray."

KLAS: "Tell us something about how you find a song... how you get the idea about a song, to write it down."

JOHN: "Well, sometimes it's the words first, and then the music after."

KLAS: "Very often you've got a title, you know... Me and you, and everything like that?"

PAUL: "Yeah. We try to do that, to make it personal so it's... so we really mean it. When we sing a thing about 'I love you,' it's easier."

JOHN: (singing) "'And don't you forget it!'"

JOHN & PAUL: (singing together, jokingly) "'I love you and don't you forget it!'"

PAUL: "Well, you see, it's easier than singing something about the cat that lives on the hill, man."

(laughter)

PAUL: "It's a lot easier just to sing about what you feel yourself."

KLAS: "And you've given a lot of nice numbers to Billy J. Kramer."

JOHN: (loudly) "Well, he's our good friend and mate... buddy... pal... friend."

PAUL: "Yeah. Listen to 'Bad To Me,' folks."

KLAS: "Your latest recording is called..?

PAUL: "It's called 'She Loves You.' And there's story to this one, how we wrote it. We were on tour with Roy Orbison, and Gerry and the Pacemakers. And we were in Newcastle, up north of England, and we were in a hotel room. We had about three days left in which to write a song. We had a recording date set for three days from this date. So we went to the hotel and we booked in a room, and we just decided that we have to write a song very quickly. So we sat down, no ideas came for a bit. But eventually we got an idea. 'She Loves You' came, you know. It was just lucky."

KLAS: "But from the start that was supposed to be the B-side, John?"

JOHN: "The B-side of 'She Loves You' was meant to be the A-side. And the same for 'From Me To you.' The B-Side of 'From Me To You' was the A-side, and then we wrote another song after."

KLAS: "Well, it..."

JOHN: "Came out better."

PAUL: "Yeah, see, we write one song, then we can get going then after that and get more ideas after having written one song. So we wrote 'I'll Get You' which is the B-side, first. And then 'She Loves You' came after that, you know. We got ideas from that, and we recorded it."

KLAS: "Yes."

PAUL: "And there ya go."

KLAS: "It sounds very easy, all of it."

JOHN: "Sometimes it's easy. Sometimes it's hard."

RINGO: (jokingly) "We find it difficult sometimes!"

(laughter)

KLAS: (jokingly) "Thanks Ringo."

(John and Paul giggle)

KLAS: "Well, singing too. All of you. You're singing, actually."

PAUL: "Yeah, we all sing."

JOHN: "The Singing Dogs."

RINGO: "You know me... 'Boys.'"

(Beatles laugh)

PAUL: "We've written a new song for Ringo which we are gonna do on our new LP."

KLAS: "Yes, what about that new LP? When?"

JOHN: "It's September, isn't it?"

PAUL: "No, it's November."

JOHN: (jokingly perturbed at being corrected) "Okay, okay!"

(laughter)

PAUL: "Don't know when it'll get to Sweden, though, but we hope it'll get there in November. (nasal voice) And we hope it sells!"

KLAS: "Alright."

PAUL: "That's all I can say."

KLAS: "Alright. RIght now, we'll listen to 'She Loves You.'"

(Beatles yell 'Hurray!' and applaud)

PAUL: "More!"

RINGO: "Play it twice."

('She Loves You' is played)

Beatles Interview: Manchester Dressing Room 8/28/63

2009-02-12T10:47:00.000-08:00

JOHN: "The best thing was (Love Me Do) came to the charts in two days. And everybody thought it was a fiddle because our manager's stores send in these... what is it... record things."

GEORGE: "Returns."

JOHN: "Returns. And everybody down south thought 'Oh, aha! He's buying them himself or he's just fiddlin' the charts,' you know, but he wasn't."

GEORGE: "Actually we'd been at it a long time before that. We'd been to Hamburg. I think that's where we found our style... we developed our style because of this fella. He used to say, 'You've got to make a show for the people.' And he used to come up every night, shouting 'Mach schau! Mach schau!' So we used to mach schau, and John used to dance around like a gorilla, and we'd all, you know, knock our heads together and things like that. Anyway, we got back to Liverpool and all the groups there were doing 'Shadows' type of stuff. And we came back with leather jackets and jeans and funny hair-- maching schau-- which went down quite well."

JOHN: "We just wore leather jackets. Not for the group-- one person wore one, I can't remember-- and then we all liked them so it ended up we were all on stage with them. And we'd always worn jeans 'cuz we didn't have anything else at the time, you know. And then we went back to Liverpool and got quite a few bookings. They all thought we were German. You know, we were billed as 'From Hamburg' and they all said, 'You speak good English.' (smiles) So we went back to Germany and we had a bit more money the second time, so we wore leather pants-- and we looked like four Gene Vincents, only a bit younger, I think. (smiles) And that was it, you know. We just kept the leather gear till Brian (Epstein) came along."

PAUL: "It was a bit, sort of, old hat anyway-- all wearing leather gear-- and we decided we didn't want to look ridiculous going home. Because more often than not too many people would laugh. It was just stupid. We didn't want to appear as a gang of idiots. And Brian suggested that we just, sort of, wore ordinary suits. So we just got what we thought were quite good suits, and got rid of the leather gear. That was all."

(Next, the topic of discussion turned to the present fame of the group, and the sudden glare of media attention.)

GEORGE: "We do like the fans and enjoy reading the publicity about us, but sometimes you don't realize that it's about yourself. You see your pictures and read articles about George Harrison, Ringo Starr, Paul and John-- but you don't actually think 'Oh, that's me. There I am in the paper.' (smiles) It's funny. It's just as though it's a different person."

RINGO: "When we go home, we go in early in the morning when we've finished a job, and the kids don't know you're at home. But if they find out, where I live, they get the drums out and beat it out! (laughs) 'Cuz it's a play street and, you know, there's no traffic or nothing bothering them. Once when the boys came for me-- they popped in to see me Mum and me Dad, you know-- we had to go out the back 'cuz there were twenty or thirty outside. And they wouldn't believe me mother, you know, knocking and saying 'Can we have their autographs.' So it built up so much. There was about two hundred kids all around the door, peeping through the window and knocking."

(Beatles giggling)

RINGO: (laughs) "In the end, me mother was ill, you know-- terrified out of her life-- with just all these kids and boys and girls, you know."

GEORGE: "They send us alot of Jellybabies and chocolates and things like that, just because somebody wrote in one of the papers about presents and things that we'd had given to us. And John said he'd got some Jellybabies and I ate them. But ever since that we've been inundated. We get about two-ton a night. (smiles) But the main trouble is they tend to throw them at us when were on stage. (laughs) And, uhh, once I got one in my eye which wasn't very nice. (holds finger to eye) In fact I haven't been the same since."

JOHN: "It all sounds complaining, but you know, we're not. We're just putting the point that it affects your home more than it does yourself, you know, because you know what to expect but your parents and family don't know what's happening."

(The Beatles were then asked what they saw in their own future, and how long their fame might last.)

JOHN: "'How long are you gonna last?' Well, you can't say, you know. You can be big-headed and say, 'Yeah, we're gonna last ten years.' But as soon as you've said that you think, 'We're lucky if we last three months,' you know."

PAUL: "Well, obviously we can't keep playing the same sort of music until we're about forty-- sort of, old men playing 'From Me To You'-- nobody is going to want to know at all about that sort of thing. You know, we've thought about it, and probably the thing that John and I will do, uhh, will be write songs-- as we have been doing as a sort of sideline now-- we'll probably develop that a bit more we hope. Who knows. At forty, we may not know how to write songs anymore."

GEORGE: "I hope to have enough money to go into a business of my own by the time we, umm, do 'flop.' (laughs) And we don't know-- it may be next week, it may be two or three years. But I think we'll be in the business, either up there or down there, for at least another four years."

RINGO: "I've always fancied having a ladies hairdressing salon."

(Beatles giggling)

RINGO: (undeterred) "You know, a string of them, in fact! Strut 'round in me stripes and tails, you know. 'Like a cup of tea, Madam?'"

Beatles Interview: The Public Ear 10/3/63

2009-02-12T10:44:00.000-08:00

PAUL: "It wasn't so much that we forsaw a big success. We just never thought that anything particularly bad would happen to us. We never felt... never sat down at one particular point at all and, sort of, worried about anything. We've always thought that something would turn up sometime."

GEORGE: "We have been misquoted -- people saying we make 7,000 a week, and all that."

PAUL: "I wish we did."

GEORGE: "We probably do make quite a bit but we don't actually see it, because record royalties, things like that, take months before they come in. And anyway..."

JOHN: "Hotel cost a fortune."

GEORGE: "Yeah, my mother cost a fortune."

(Beatles laugh)

GEORGE: "But we've also got an accountant and a company, Beatles Limited. They see the money. The thing is, indirectly, we are and we aren't doing it for the money, really, because don't forget -- We played for about three or four years or maybe longer just earning hardly anything. Well, we wouldn't have lived on that. If we were doing it for the money, we wouldn't have lasted out all those years. But the money does help, let's face it. Yeah, we all love being on-stage and..."

JOHN: "I haven't got the patience to practice to become a 'perfect' guitarist, you know. I'm more interested in the combination of my voice and the guitar I know, and to write songs, than I am in the instrument. So I never go through a day hardly without playing it whether I'm performing or not, you know."

PAUL: "George is the one of us who is interested in the instrument.

GEORGE: "Well, I don't PRACTICE."

PAUL: "But the other three of us are more interested in the sound of the group."

GEORGE: "To be a guitarist, you're supposed to practice a couple of hours a day. But, I mean, I don't do that."

RINGO: "To be ANYTHING, you're supposed to practice a couple of hours a day."

PAUL: "Yeah."

GEORGE: "Well you know, I mean, the thing is... Individually we're all... (pause) I suppose we're all crummy musicians, really."

Beatles Interview: With Dusty Springfield 10/4/63

2009-02-12T10:43:00.000-08:00

DUSTY: "Paul, I've got some questions to ask you here. Please could you tell me the name of your racing greyhound?"

PAUL: "Uhh, I haven't got one, actually."

DUSTY: "You haven't?"

PAUL: "No. Well, a girl sent in a letter to me, and she said, 'Would you like a gra... a gracing rayhound!' And I said 'Yeah!' but she hasn't sent it yet."

DUSTY: "She hasn't? Awww."

CROWD: (in exaggerated sympathy) "Awwww!!"

DUSTY: "I'm sure she loves you."

PAUL: "She hasnt sent it yet, but I hope she does though."

DUSTY: "Is it true you sleep with you eyes open?"

PAUL: "Umm, well you know, I haven't seen myself do it..."

(laughter)

PAUL: "But actually, the fellas say that I do. They've, sort of, seen me sleeping with my eyes open."

DUSTY: "How can you do that?"

PAUL: "I don't know, you know... just sort of half open."

DUSTY: "You're just clever... you're just Brilliant, Paul."

(crowd giggles)

DUSTY: (reading) "Please ask Paul if he plucks his well-shaped eyebrows."

(laughter)

PAUL: "Umm, no."

DUSTY: "You don't. It doesn't look so. You're absolutely beautiful. Paul, do you mind girls screaming all through your act?"

PAUL: "Uhh, no. We like 'em screaming, generally, all of us. But it's a bit much all the way through. But we love 'em screaming."

JOHN: (comically) "Hear, hear!"

(the girls cheer and applaud in approval)

DUSTY: (turning to John) "This is a question which you've been asked a thousand times before but you always, all of you, give different versions or different answers. So you've got to tell me now... How did the Beatles get their name?"

JOHN: "I just thought of it." (comically proud facial expression)

(crowd cheers)

DUSTY: "Were they called anything else before?"

JOHN: "They were called the Quarrymen." (comically giggles)

DUSTY: "You rugged character! ...Oh John, listen. (reading) Do you have false teeth, as they always look so even?"

JOHN: "No! (scratches front teeth with fingernail) They're all chipped and battered."

(laughter)

DUSTY: "Girls, would you say his teeth were chipped and battered?"

CROWD: (in unison) "NO!"

JOHN: "No, they're real."

DUSTY: "Is it true that, when you were a kid, you were shot at for stealing apples?"

JOHN: "Yeah."

(laughter)

DUSTY: (gesturing to the side of his face) "Is that what these beautiful marks are?"

JOHN: "No, they're scabs."

(laughter)

DUSTY: "There's nothing there at all, really. He's got a quite beautiful complexion."

JOHN: (suggestively, joking with Dusty) "Let me see YOUR scabs!"

PAUL: (objecting comically) "HEY!"

(laughter)

Beatles Interview: Playhouse Theatre, London 10/16/63

2009-02-12T10:42:00.000-08:00

Q: "Well lads... Almost unknown in January, and now going to the Royal Command Performance in November. This is quite a rise even for 'your' business, isn't it Paul?"

PAUL: "Yes a bit. It's been very quick and we have been very lucky."

Q: "How much of this is due, do you think, to your musical talent?"

PAUL: "Uhh, dunno. No Idea. You just can't tell, you know. Maybe a lot of it, maybe none of it."

Q: (to john) "How much would you have said?"

JOHN: "I agree with Paul, you know."

Q: "How much of this is getting popularity by acting the fool a bit and playing around?"

JOHN: "Well I mean, that's just natural. We don't... We do it anyway, whether we're on-stage or not."

Q: "But your funny haircuts aren't natural?"

JOHN: (comical voice) "Well, we don't think they're funny, ya see... cobber?"

(laughter)

Q: "George, can I turn to you now? How long do you think you're going to be successful? You've had this monumental rise. Obviously this sort of thing can't go on, but do you think you can settle down to a life in show business?"

GEORGE: "Well, we're hoping to. I mean, not necessarily a 'life' in show business, but at least a couple more years."

Q: "A long run."

GEORGE: "Yeah. I mean, if we do as well as Cliff (Richards) and The Shadows have done up to now, well I mean, we won't be moaning."

RINGO: "Very happy."

GEORGE: "I mean, naturally, it can't go on as it has been going the last few months. It'd just be ridiculous."

Q: "How do you find all this business of having screaming girls following you all over the place?"

GEORGE: "Well, we feel flattered."

JOHN: "...and flattened."

(Beatles laugh)

GEORGE: (giggling) "Yeah, and flattened. But I mean, if the screaming fans weren't there then we wouldn't be here, would we."

Q: "Paul, coming quickly back to you again. Mister Edward Heath, the Lord Privy Seal, has said that the other night he found it hard to distinguish what you were saying as Queen's English."

PAUL: "Ah, yes."

Q: "Now, are you going to try and lose some of your Liverpool dialect for the Royal show?"

PAUL: "No, are you kidding. No, we wouldn't bother doing that."

GEORGE: "We just won't vote for him."

(Beatles laugh)

PAUL: (jokingly, in upperclass dialect) "We don't all speak like them BBC posh fellas, you know?"

Q: "Right well, with that, I better wish you good luck in the show. What song will you be singing most there, do you think?"

PAUL: (upperclass dialect) "Well, I don't know, but I should imagine we'd do 'She Loves You.'"

(Beatles errupt in stuffy, mock-upperclass laughter)

PAUL & JOHN: "Jolly good, jolly good."

Beatles Interview: London Airport 10/31/63

2009-02-12T10:41:00.002-08:00

Q: "Paul, have you thought about your act for this show yet? Any changes in the act, or is it going to be, you know, the usual routine?"

PAUL: "No, we'll have to change it I'm sure. We can't do the same thing all the time. We haven't thought about what we're gonna do yet."

Q: "Suits with collars on? Brush part in hair? Anything like that?"

PAUL: (jokingly) "You never know. We might not wear suits! You never know! No idea."

Q: "John, in this Royal Variety Show when you're appearing before royalty, you're language has got to be pretty good obviously-- this thing about Teddy saying that he couldn't distinguish your... The Queen's English."

JOHN: (mock upperclass dialect) "I can't understand Teddy! I can't understand Teddy saying that at all, really." (smiles)

(laughter)

JOHN: (serious look into camera) "I'm not going to vote for Ted."

PAUL: (quietly) "Oooo."

Q: "But you're not going to change your act for the Lord Privy Seal?"

JOHN: (exaggerated lowerclass dialect) "Ah no, like, we'll keep, like, the same kinda thing, like. Won't we?"

PAUL: "Oh! Aye, yes!"

JOHN: "That's right."

PAUL: (laughs)

Beatles Interview: Odeon Cinema, Cheltenham 11/1/63

2009-02-12T10:41:00.001-08:00

Q: "What do you think of (the fans) coming in and then screaming..?"

GEORGE: "Well, they've payed the money so they can scream, can't they. I mean, if they haven't payed and they were screaming, it'd be a liberty, wouldn't it!"

(Beatles laugh)

PAUL: "Oh aye, oh aye."

RINGO: "Would, that, Georgie."

Q: "What is your, sort of, 'perfect touch' in music? Beethoven, for instance?"

GEORGE: "No. I like trad jazz, you know, Kenny Ball and all that."

PAUL: (to George) "You don't... you told me you didn't."

GEORGE: "I do. I changed. Washington Square, got it."

Q: "Now then, let's know a little bit about your personal life. What do you like to do in your spare time when you get it?"

PAUL: "Spare time? Ehh, Go to the pictures or watch telly, or umm read. (laughs) Read comics, you know."

(Beatles giggle)

Q: "What sort of films do you like?"

PAUL: "What sort of films... uhh, just ordinary films like 'The Trial,' 'The Servants.'"

(Beatles laugh)

PAUL: (laughing, jokingly) "Just ordinary, you know... Love Walt Disney. You know, 'The Trial' by Walt Disney."

Q: "Mmm."

PAUL: "It's great."

Q: "What sort of music do you like personally?"

PAUL: "Just, I like everybody else. Stravinsky, Beethoven, all that."

(Beatles laugh)

PAUL: (laughs) "No, American groups actually, I listen to."

Q: "Female groups..?"

PAUL: "But mainly American records generally."

Q: "Now then George, what do YOU like to do on your spare time?"

GEORGE: "Umm. (pause) Well, I umm, uhh. (to the others) What do I do?"

PAUL: "What does he do? I'll tell ya what George does. He goes to the pictures."

GEORGE: "I go to the pictures, yeah."

PAUL: "He reads Tolstoy."

GEORGE: "I read Telstar."

PAUL: "Tolstoy."

GEORGE: "And umm..."

RINGO: "Beethoven's poems."

(Beatles laugh)

GEORGE: "And play records and play the banjo!"

PAUL: "Beethoven's poems."

Q: (laughs) "What have you got ambitions in, George?

GEORGE: "Umm, to join the Navy."

JOHN: (laughs)

GEORGE: "I want to join the Navy and be a lieutenant commander on HMS Queen Victoria."

Q: (to the group, regarding their upcoming TV appearance in December) "You've never been on 'Juke Box Jury' before?"

RINGO: "Oh no. John's been on."

JOHN: (yelling, from a distance) "I'VE been ON! I was ON!"

Q: "How long?"

JOHN: "For twenty minutes!!"

(laughter)

Beatles Interview: Dublin, Ireland 11/7/63

2009-02-12T10:40:00.000-08:00

Q: "Tell me first of all, is the haircut an act by accident or design?"

JOHN: "Accident."

Q: "You didn't have time to get your hair cut in the first place?"

JOHN: "No, it just happened, you know. Ringo's was by design because he joined later."

RINGO: "Yeah, I designed it."

(laughter)

Q: "How often do you get your hair cut, by the way?"

JOHN: "Uhh, well we don't-- we try not to mention that."

PAUL: "It's a dirty word."

Q: "The Liverpool Sound is a bit of a puzzle to some of us older people especially in Ireland. Could you define it for me?"

GEORGE: "It's a puzzle to us, too."

PAUL: "It's not really a Liverpool Sound, you know."

JOHN: "There's no such thing."

PAUL: "It just so happens that the new groups that have come out all happen to have come from Liverpool, so people sort of generalize a bit and say, 'Aha! The Liverpool Sound!' but really, you know, if you listen to the groups they're all quite different. It's not all one big sound that's coming out."

Q: "Well, it's no use saying, 'are you surprised by your success,' because quite clearly you're not a bit surprised."

PAUL: "Oh, We are!"

JOHN: "We are surprised, but you're just sort of, you know, so surprised that it doesn't even register."

PAUL: "We look surprised everyday!"

Q: (laughs)

PAUL: "We look off our heads."

Q: "About your Irish backgrounds..."

PAUL: "Yeah, I think we've all got a bit."

Q: (to john) "I think I saw you being greeted by somebody outside."

JOHN: "No, no, that was George."

GEORGE: "That was me. Well actually, it was my mother."

(laughter)

GEORGE: (laughs) "She came over here, you know, because she's got hundreds of cousins and relatives over here, and then she hadn't seen us for weeks anyway 'cuz we've been away. So she's come to see the show and to see her cousins. And one of the cousins was here with her."

Q: "Your mother has to come to Ireland to see you?"

GEORGE: "Yeah." (laughs)

Q: "Well, this in a way kind of typifies the kind of extraordinary upset that must occur in your private lives. Do you get home at all?"

GEORGE: "Uhh, yeah. Sometimes you get home for a whole week. But sometimes you don't get home for months on end."

PAUL: "It's normally about one day in, say, three weeks."

GEORGE: (jokingly) "A new idea-- 'telephones' help a bit, you know."

Q: "God bless Graham Bell."

PAUL: "Yeah."

GEORGE: "Freddie Bell."

(laughter)

Q: "Does the continuous living together and working together cause any tempermental stress on you?"

PAUL: "No, actually it's quite lucky because we've been..."

BEATLES: (singing together) "'We've Been Together Now For Forty Yeeeears!'"

PAUL: "You know, we've all been mates for quite a long time so we don't get on each other's nerves as much as we could."

(mock fighting breaks out between them)

PAUL: "We're quite friendly."

Q: (laughing) "Yeah, so I see. So far as I can see-- the greater portion of your public seems to be female. To what do you attribute this extraordinary success? Alot of people here would be very interested to know this."

RINGO: "You can't make it out, you know."

JOHN: "We're male, aren't we!!"

(laughter)

JOHN: "It'd be a bit funny if they were all fellas. (effeminate voice) 'Oh! get away!'"

RINGO: "It's very nice, you know. We don't know why. If we knew we'd be 'made' more or less-- You'd just go and get about six groups like us who are attractive to women."

Beatles Interview: Day By Day, 11/12/63

2009-02-12T10:39:00.000-08:00

Q: "Are you beginning to find the strain of this going around the country at this tremendous speed getting you down a bit?"

BEATLES: (laughing) "NO!!"

JOHN: (giggling) "No, we like it. It's great."

PAUL: "You know us."

Q: "You don't find it frightening, this business of being mobbed and having to go through all these rigamaroles to get here?"

JOHN: "No. The police get mobbed, we don't."

PAUL: "It's always well organized, you know. Tonight was very good."

Q: "How did you get here tonight?"

PAUL: "A van."

Q: "You're getting so much publicity these days, and even the 'egghead' papers are writing about you. Have you been just a little bit worried that you might be going over the top fairly soon?"

JOHN: "No, you know. When you gotta go, you gotta go."

(Beatles laugh)

Q: "What are you going to do when your time comes?"

GEORGE: "Sail on me yacht."

(laughter)

JOHN: "Yeah."

RINGO: "We don't know. We haven't got any definite ideas what we're all gonna do."

(John gestures to Ringo's scarf)

RINGO: "Yeah, it's me school scarf. Borstol High."

(laughter)

Q: (to Ringo, referring to the reason for the scarf) A touch of throat?"

RINGO: "Yeah. (coughs, then continues jokingly) There's nothing wrong with it!!"

(laughter)

RINGO: "I always talk like this."

Q: "You're not thinking of giving up the Big Beat stuff and going in for some harmony singing? Because one or two people said you're very good harmony singers."

JOHN: "Well, we do it, you know. There's harmony in the big beat. It just happens to have a beat as well. All of our records have had some kind of harmony on them."

Q: "I noticed in the Royal show that you did one ballad number. Is this something you're going to do more of?"

JOHN: "We've been singing it for about five years, and we've always done numbers like that. It's just that we're known for faster numbers."

Q: "Do you like the ballads?"

JOHN: "If they're good. You know, there's good ballads and good beats."

Q: "How did you enjoy the Royal Variety show?"

GEORGE: "It was great. Fabulous. It was very good, you know. The audience was much better than we expected."

JOHN: (jokingly) "Much taller."

GEORGE: "Yeah."

Beatles Interview: Stuart Hutchison, Plymouth 11/13/63

2009-02-12T10:38:00.000-08:00

HUTCHISON: "Well Paul, how are you after your collapse we read about?"

PAUL: "I didn't really collapse. That was just the naughty newspapers, writing it. Misquote! Nah, I just had a bit of flu, you know. I'm fine today, thank you."

HUTCHISON: "You're feeling alright?"

PAUL: (comical voice) "Lovely. Real lovely."

HUTCHISON: "How are the rest of you? How are you going to avoid catching...?"

JOHN: (in pathetic voice) "We're fine, thank you."

GEORGE: "Oh, we're OK. Yeah, great."

HUTCHISON: "Are you taking any cold prevention, now?"

PAUL: "Yeah, I'm taking 'em all. Got 'em all."

JOHN: (quietly) "It's only one-and-six a tube."

(Paul giggles)

HUTCHISON: "How about these escape plans you keep beating about? You got out of one place disguised as policemen."

BEATLES: "No, no!"

GEORGE: "We didn't, actually. We put the policemen's helmets on..."

PAUL: "Just for a laugh, you know."

GEORGE: "Yeah."

PAUL: "The policemen said, 'Aww, let's have a laugh, and put these helmets...'"

GEORGE: "We jumped out of the van, and you know... The press were there to take the photographs, so we jumped out with the helmets on. So the next day it was..."

PAUL: "The next day you read in the papers..."

GEORGE: "...here they are, disguised."

RINGO: "Have you ever seen a policeman in a corduroy coat?"

JOHN: "I have. I saw one back in 1832, I think."

RINGO: "He knows, you see."

HUTCHISON: "Did you put the helmets on over the haircuts?"

PAUL: "Yeah."

RINGO: "Sure."

JOHN: "Well, we couldn't put them underneath."

(Beatles laugh)

PAUL: "And I also read in the papers today, there's a man who said we wear wigs!"

RINGO: (loudly) "WE DON'T!"

PAUL: "We don't. Honest. Feel it."

HUTCHISON: "True. It's lovely, yes. Oh, on this program a few weeks ago, somebody said the Beatles haircut was going out because the fringe was so long you couldn't see the birds. What comment have you got to make on that?"

JOHN: (yells) "IT'S A DIRTY LIE!"

GEORGE: (laughs)

PAUL: "We can see quite well. I can see quite well, thanks, John."

GEORGE: "Well, some of us can."

(laughter)

HUTCHISON: "Are you looking forward to doing it tonight?"

BEATLES: "Yeah!"

PAUL: "Of course."

HUTCHISON: "Well, they've all been looking forward to seeing you, and they're out there now. Thank you very much, boys."

BEATLES: "Thank you."

JOHN: "Pleasure."

Beatles Interview: Juke Box Jury 12/7/63

2009-02-12T10:37:00.000-08:00

PAUL: "The only thing I don't like about Elvis now is the songs. You know, I love his voice. I used to love all the records like 'Blue Suede Shoes' and 'Heartbreak Hotel,' lovely. But I don't like the songs now. And Kiss Me Quick, it sounds like Blackpool on a sunny day."

(laughter, followed by applause)

RINGO: "I didn't like it at all, no."

GEORGE: "I must admit I didn't like it very much. Not at all. It's an old track. And I think, seeing as they're releasing old stuff, if they release something like 'My Baby Left Me' it'd be number one. Because Elvis is definitely still popular, it's just the song's a load of rubbish. I mean, Elvis is great. He's fine. But it's not for me."

JOHN: "Well, I think it'll be a hit because it's Elvis, like people said. But I don't think it'll be very great. (comically) I like those hats, though, with 'Kiss Me Quick' on it!"

(laughter)

(Beatles vote by holding up cards. Consensus: HIT)

Song heard: Hippy Hippy Shake - The Swinging Bluejeans

RINGO: "I liked it. I thought it was good. But it's not as good as the original by Chan Romero. It still swings, and it should sell. I hope it does, anyway."

GEORGE: "I think it could possibly be a hit, because I know for a fact that The Hippy Shake's a very popular song around here. We used to do it ourselves."

(John laughs comically, the crowd of fans cheer)

GEORGE: "I know a lot of the groups around here do this song, and they're expecting somebody to come up with a new version of it. I think it could possibly be a hit. I like the way the Bluejeans did it, but I still prefer Chan Romero's version."

JOHN: "Yeah, I think it'll be a hit because they sort of re-made it for the last one, and it's better. Especially without that banjo. I like Bill Harry's version as well. I think it'll be a small hit, at least."

(laughter)

PAUL: "I think it'll be a hit too, because I don't think it matters much about the Chan Romero record being greater, 'cuz I don't think many people will remember the fact that he did it, and he wrote it as well. You know, I don't think people will remember. They'll just think of it as a new song."

(Beatles vote by holding up cards. Consensus: HIT)

Song heard: Did You Have A Happy Birthday - Paul Anka

GEORGE: "Well, I had a happy birthday, yeah."

(laughter)

GEORGE: "But I mean, If I'd have heard the record first, I maybe would have cut that out."

(laughter)

GEORGE: "You know, I definitely don't like it. It's not for me. (jokingly) And I didn't get the flowers either that he sent me."

(laughter)

JOHN: (jokingly, at the top of his voice) "I LIKE IT !!!"

(laughter)

JOHN: "I don't like these sort of sob songs, and it sounds as though he's on tremelo, technically. You know, it sounds a bit wobbley. Anyway, I don't like it."

PAUL: "Well, I don't like it either, because of that little crack in his voice. He sounds, you know, off his head."

(laughter)

PAUL: "Instead of 'Happy Birthday' it's (comically) 'Woo woo woo!'"

(laughter)

PAUL: "It's a bit off, and I don't like it."

RINGO: "Uhh, I didn't like it at all. It's such a big drag, man, the way it sounded, you know."

(Beatles vote by holding up cards. Consensus: MISS)

Song heard: The Nitty Gritty - Shirley Ellis

JOHN: "Uhh yeah. I like it. I thought it was somebody else. I've never heard of Shirley Ellis. I like all those kind of things. I'll buy it. But I believe it won't be a hit."

DAVID JACOBS: "Who did you think it was?"

JOHN: "At first I thought it was Mary Wells. I liked that."

PAUL: "The same as he said. In fact, I will say exactly the same 'cuz I agree with him. I love these kind of records but I don't think this one will be a hit, 'cuz I dunno... It doesn't say anything."

RINGO: "You know, we all like this sort of thing. I'd buy it, but I don't think it'll be a hit."

GEORGE: "Well, it definitely won't be a hit, in England anyway. It probably will be, or probably is already in the States. But I don't think it'll be a hit. The public haven't got 'round to that sort of stuff yet. When they do, I mean, that would be..."

DAVID JACOBS: "So, you mean you think that our teenagers are behind the Americans in their tastes?"

GEORGE: "Yeah I mean, just lately they've been going for some more way-out stuff, and Rhythm and Blues, and THIS sort of thing we've always liked. We've liked it for years. And it still hasn't caught on in England."

PAUL: "Well it's just that people who buy the records, their taste doesn't match the teenagers generally. Lots of teenagers love this kind of music but don't buy it, because they don't buy records."

(Beatles vote by holding up cards. Consensus: MISS)

Song heard: I Can't Stop Talking About You - Steve And Eydie

PAUL: "Uhh, yeah. I don't think it's a good'n. It's alright. That kind of thing is catchy. It may be catchy, but I just don't think it's good, generally."

RINGO: "I like it, you know. I think she carries them, actually."

(laughter)

GEORGE: "I think it's equally as good as (sings) 'da de-de-de-de de-de da-deee.' It's great, I like it, the sort of relaxed style of both. Yeah, I like it and I think it's a hit."

JOHN: "I don't like it as much as their last one. I don't even like it... I usually like everything Goffin and King write, but not this one. It's too sweet, you know. de-da-de, you know. A bit Christmassy, maybe. I don't like it, though. It'll be a vague hit."

DAVID JACOBS: "A vague one."

JOHN: "A vague hit."

(Beatles vote by holding up cards. Consensus: HIT)

Song heard: Do You Really Love Me Too - Billy Fury

DAVID JACOBS: "Do you really love me too, Ringo?"

RINGO: "Not you."

(laughter)

RINGO: "I didn't like it, you know. I've never bought one of his records, but he's very popular, so it's just uhh... no."

GEORGE: "Not bad, but it was okay, but I wouldn't buy it. And I thought the guitar is just exactly the same as Cliff's. In fact, it's only about a note difference."

JOHN: "He just said the bit about the beginning, didn't he, being like Cliff's one. The tune's not bad. It's quite pleasant. It's one of those you gotta hear again... uhh, tomorrow."

(laughter)

PAUL: "I quite like it, and the same things John said jokingly. The only thing I thought, as well as the guitar bit being like the Cliff Richard bit, the tune is just a little bit like (sings) 'Well I feed the cows and I milks the sheep and I...'"

(laughter, followed by applause)

PAUL: "But I still think it'll be a hit."

(Beatles vote by holding up cards. Consensus: HIT)

Song heard: There I've Said It Again - Bobby Vinton

GEORGE: "Umm, it's quite nice, but I mean, I don't think the record buying public buys this sort of stuff, I mean, the majority -- which will make it a miss. But you know, it's quite alright. I wouldn't buy it me-self."

JOHN: "Uhh, well, I dunno. What is Bobby Vinton doing? He's bringing the oldies back. He might do it, but people always cover them over here. But especially anything old. You know, everybody does it all at once. And he missed it with the last one here. (loudly, comically) I THINK HE'S GONNA MISS IT WITH THIS ONE TOO!!"

(laughter)

PAUL: "Umm, yeah. I think the thing about bringing back old songs and doing them these days, teenagers don't really want old songs brought back. I'm sure they'd like to have songs that they can call their own instead of bringing back their mum and dad's songs."

DAVID JACOBS: "Well now, just a minute. What about Frank Ifield and all that lot?"

PAUL: "Yeah, okay."

GEORGE: "What about Mule Train?"

(laughter)

PAUL: "Yeah well, you're probably right. But I'm sure that if you could get songs these days as GOOD as the old ones, only new songs, that would be ten times better."

JOHN: "Frank Ifield... that's just practically the same as the old."

DAVID JACOBS: "I might tell you that I'm terrified of disagreeing with you chaps, you know, in front of all these people. However, let's see what Ringo says. Ringo."

RINGO: "I liked it, you know. It's nice and smooth. And if you're sort of staying in one night, put it on."

(laughter)

RINGO: "But yeah, right. It won't sell."

DAVID JACOBS: "Thank you, Don Juan Starr."

(Beatles vote by holding up cards. Consensus: MISS)

Song heard: Love Hit Me - The Orchids

DAVID JACOBS: "Three Coventry school gils called the Orchids on 'Love Hit Me.' John Lennon."

JOHN: "Well you know, it's just a big cop, or pinch. It sounds... If it had come out before the Crystals and the Ronettes it would've been great. They've even got that, what is it... castanets?"

RINGO: "Tambourine."

JOHN: (loudly, giggling) Tambourine, is THAT what it's called!!"

(laughter)

JOHN: "It's quite nice, but it's sort of the British version, you know, which... although the song's original, I think. But it sounds... doesn't sound right."

PAUL: "It's okay. It sounds great for an English record, though, you know. Because about a year ago, if someone had brought this out and said 'Listen to this record,' I don't think you would've believed that it was an English one. It's marvelous, the sound things. And I think it's great. I like it."

RINGO: "It's good, you know. I wouldn't buy it. It may sell a few but not that many."

(Beatles laugh)

GEORGE: "I thought it was quite nice. I liked the idea of the British records sort of being on the way to boom-chicka-boom-chicka, all this. I like the American stuff like the Crystals, I mean, even though it is a pinch, you know. I'd rather they pinch the Crystals than carry on doing the stuff they've been doing."

(Beatles vote by holding up cards. Consensus: MISS)

DAVID JACOBS: "They say that it will be a miss, which in fact is most unfortunate, because we do have sitting in the audience three young ladies called The Orchids. Stand up, young ladies. There they are"

(crowd applauds)

GEORGE: (jokingly) "Sorry! Didn't mean it!!"

JOHN: (switching his card) "I'll change it to hit!"

(laughter)

JOHN: "I'll buy it! I'll buy two!"

DAVID JACOBS: (laughs)

JOHN: (comically) "I didn't know you were here!"

DAVID JACOBS: (laughing) "John thinks it's a lousy trick but we'll get on to the next record."

Song heard: I Think Of You - The Merseybeats

(As time was running out in the program, the Beatles did not share their comments on this song, but simply held a quick vote. Consensus: HIT)

DAVID JACOBS: "This is where I say that unfortunately we have to take our leave of you. So, on behalf of the Jury, that's John Lennon, Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, and George Harrison. Don't forget to join the Beatles later at 8:10 on BBC television tonight. And join us at the usual time next week for another session of Juke Box Jury. Goodnight."

Beatles Interview: Doncaster, England 12/10/63

2009-02-12T10:36:00.002-08:00

Q: "Ringo Starr, it's been suggested that boys coming from the particular area that you've come from, if you'd hadn't found an interest in music, might have found it much more difficult to get out and make a go of life. Would you comment on this?"

RINGO: "I think it's true, you know. I mean, when I was sixteen I used to walk along the road with the rest of the lads, and we'd have all our trade coats on. You know, we'd had a few knocks with other rival gangs, sort of thing. But then I got the drums, and the bloke nextdoor played a guitar. And I got a job..."

JOHN: (sings) "'Teddy Booooy!'"

RINGO: (laughs) "...and we started playing together. And another bloke from work made a bass out of an old tea chest... you know them days. This was about '58, mind you. And we played together, and then we started playing on dances and things, you know, and we took an interest in it. Then we stopped going, you know, out to sort of hanging around corners every night."

Q: "Would you say that the enormous difference which your success in this field has had, has greatly influenced you, Ringo, as far as your philosophy of life or what you want to get out of it?"

RINGO: "Oh, yeah."

Q: "George Harrison, how different is your life now as a member of the Beatles to what it was, say, even four years ago?"

GEORGE: "Everything's completely changed. We don't have a private life anymore. And we, umm, are public property now. Not that we mind."

Q: "You don't mind being such public property with no private time at all?"

GEORGE: "Well, you get accustomed to it, and after a while you just take it for granted and you just do everything automatically... like signing autographs and (laughs) waving at people."

Q: "What about homelife with your own family? Do you ever get any these days?"

GEORGE: "Yeah. Occasionally, say once every fortnight, we manage to get home. And, umm, if we're not appearing in our hometown then it's usually OK; they don't expect us to be there, and we... It's, you know, quite quiet."

Q: "Does this change the status for the family much?"

GEORGE: "Umm, not really. It makes 'em more popular (laughs) and people sort of after a while spot 'my' parents, anyway. You know, it's the same with the others. They'll say, 'There's George's dad,' whereas before they wouldn't know him from Adam. But, you know, they're just still the same as before."

Q: "What about the wealth that comes with this kind of success? Has that made a great deal of difference to the way you live... and the way your family live?"

GEORGE: "No. It hasn't made... not so far anyway... it hasn't made any difference. Except for holidays and things like that. You know, we can just get the money out of the bank and go wherever we want."

Q: "You are one of the reputive deep-thinkers in this group. How do you see it as a peak in your life? What happens to you after this is over?"

GEORGE: "Well, umm, I suppose we'll stay doing this sort of stuff for a couple of years. Whether we're... I mean, naturally we wont be able to stay at this level. But, umm, we should have another two years at least, I think."

Q: "What happens to George Harrison then?"

GEORGE: "I don't know. I'll know by the time that comes along. Probably I'll have a little business or something like that."

Q: "You don't want to go on in the profession?"

GEORGE: "Probably, yeah. I'd like to make records, you know, with other artists. I don't mean perform... I mean as a producer."

Q: "The technical side."

GEORGE: "Mmmm. But I don't know. You can't really tell at this stage."

Q: "Paul McCartney, you're one of the original Beatles. Where did the name Beatles originate?"

PAUL: "Well Dibbs, uhh, John thought of it first of all. Just as a name; just for a group, you know. We just didn't have any name. Well, oh yeah; we did have a name, but we had about ten of 'em a week, you know... and we didn't like this idea so we had to settle on one particular name. And John came up with the name Beatles one night. And he sort of explained how it was spelled with an 'E-A,' and we said, 'Oh yes, it's a joke.'"

Q: "Since then, it's come to represent a large section of the young population-- called the 'Beatle People.' Do you people regard yourself as leaders of this particular group?"

PAUL: "No, we're not leaders of any sort of group. The thing is-- people always say, 'Well, you started great trends and things,' but in actual fact all that we've done is gone along with the trends. And if, in going along with it, we sort of encourage other people to go along with a couple of our ideas, you know; all very well. But we haven't tried consciously to start anything like a trend, you know."

Q: "Now, you were very much younger when this enormous success started, and you're riding the summit of it now. Do you see it as a peak... a mountain... interfering with the flow of your life?"

PAUL: "I don't really know what you mean by 'very much younger.' It was only a year ago."

Q: "But you've been working since '58, haven't you?"

PAUL: "Well, yeah... not working, you know. I mean, strictly speaking we've been out of work since '58 and we've been doing this as a hobby. 'Cuz we've only been doing it as semi-pros. I left school and went right into it. And we were only sort of picking up a few quid a week, you know. It really wasn't work. I think the main thing is now that, as we've got ourselves a bit of security... we don't really have to worry, at the moment anyway, what we're gonna do after it. So we don't."

Q: "None of you are really concerned with going on in this field as a profession?"

PAUL: "Yeah, of course we are. I think all of us really, if it suddenly flopped, then we would do something in this profession. But what we mean by Ringo and George's answers, that we don't really want to do... like the conventional answer is, 'I'd like to do ballads and films and straight-acting,' which is so corny. Because half the people who say that can't act or ballad or film. So, umm, we probably wouldn't want to do that unless we thought we could do it. We're having a bash at a film next year, and if we find that any of us can act, say, one out of us may become actors. But we haven't got any great hopes of being actors at the moment."

Q: "It's said, John Lennon, that you have the most 'Goon-type' humor of the four Beatles."

JOHN: "Who said that?"

Q: "I think I read it in one of the newspapers."

JOHN: "You know what the newspapers are like."

Q: "I don't know. What are they like?"

JOHN: "Wrong."

Q: (laughs) "This is going wrong... I want to get a nice 'Personality' bit."

JOHN: "I haven't got a nice personality."

Q: (laughs) "Is this evidence of Goon-type humor?"

JOHN: "No, I don't think I really have Goon-type humor. That's just an expression people use."

Q: "What has the success you've enjoyed with the Beatles meant to you personally?"

JOHN: "More money than I had before. That's the good bit."

Q: "Is it going to make any difference to your life the way you live it after, say, this calms down... the enormous excitement you're generating at the moment?"

JOHN: "I don't know, you know. Really."

Q: "Do you think your career as a comic might open up to you?"

JOHN: "No. (laughs) I don't stand a chance being a comic."

Q: "Why not?"

JOHN: "I'm not funny enough."

Q: "Umm, you were interested in poetry in school."

JOHN: "Who said?"

Q: "It's printed in a book compiled by the Beatles and entitled, 'The Beatles.'"

JOHN: (laughs) "I haven't read that book. We don't normally write those things."

Q: "Written any good comic poems lately?"

JOHN: "Yes."

(interviewer hands John a piece of paper containing one of Lennon's poems. The other Beatles giggle)

Q: (laughs) "I just happened to have it here by sheerest coincidence."

JOHN: "'Dressed in my brown...' Oh no, I've lost it. Hold on. I can't read it, you see. I've only just written it. (giggles) Well, that's how it starts, actually!"

Q: (laughs)

JOHN: (reads) "Dressed in my teenold brown sweater I easily micked with crown at Neville Club, a seemy hole. Soon all but soon people accoustic me saying such thing as 'where the charge man?'"

JOHN: "I'm turning it over--"

(reads) "All too soon I noticed boys and girls sitting in a hubbeled lump; smoking Hernia and taking Odeon, and getting very high. Some were only 4 foot 3 high, but he had Indian Hump which he grew in his sleep.'

JOHN: "But things like that just help me keep sane."

Q: "Is this business enough to drive you insane?"

JOHN: "No, I'm quite normal really. If you read in the Beatle books... it says I'm quite normal."

Beatles Interview: Meet The Beatles, January 1964

2009-02-12T10:36:00.001-08:00

Q: "How did you ever decide on a name like The Beatles for the group?"

JOHN: "Well, I had a vision when I was twelve. And I saw a man on a flaming pie, and he said, 'You are Beatles with an A.' And we are."

(laughter)

JOHN: "That's how it started, anyway."

Q: "How did it all start for you, Paul?"

PAUL: "We made our first record at the beginning of 1963 and we had a hit with that. But I think, uhh, the whole bit really started when we did a Palladium show. And then later we were asked to do the Royal Variety Command Performance, you know, and we met the Queen Mother-- and she started clapping." (laughs)

JOHN: "And Princess Margaret, too."

PAUL: "Yeah, and Princess Margaret."

Q: "Do you know how many records you've sold up to the present time?"

RINGO: "Uhh, well... The last count was, umm, six million, I think.

JOHN: (jokingly) "That's just Ringo's records."

PAUL: (laughs)

RINGO: "Well, the others' are on sale."

(laughter)

Q: "Have you heard that your records are getting into the Pop charts in countries all over the world?"

GEORGE: "Yes. Well, we've heard that our latest record 'I Want To Hold Your Hand' came into the Australian Top Twenty right at Number One, which is very nice. And I think it's selling in Finland and Sweden and other places like that, too."

RINGO: "Also, Ireland."

JOHN: "Israel, I believe."

PAUL: (to John) "Oh yeah!"

GEORGE: "Israel, to mention but a few."

PAUL: "I'm glad they like us."

Q: "Bet you never thought you'd get that kind of world-wide acceptance."

GEORGE: (jokingly) "Well, that's a nice thing to say, isn't it."

(laughter)

RINGO: "We're very lucky."

Q: "There's a rumor that you fellas wear wigs."

PAUL: "No, it's a dirty rumor. We don't."

JOHN: "No, we cut it ourselves."

(laughter)

Q: "What influenced you fellas to let your hair grow so long?"

PAUL: "I think it was my dad, really. He said, 'You know, Paul, it's a bit square,' the haircut I had-- you know, short back and sides. He said, 'Why don't you get a Beatle Cut, son.'"

(laughter)

Q: "Was there ever a time when you felt you were in danger of being mauled by exuberant fans?"

PAUL: "Well they get exuberant, you know, but we're uhh-- We enjoy it. We don't come to any harm, 'cuz the policemen are equally as exuberant. The police have a great time."

(laughter)

Q: "Where'd you get those snappy jackets?"

RINGO: "I don't know. We were just walking 'round town and looked in a shop window. And we liked it so went and just bought a jacket each, and decided to get suits made for the stage. That's how it started, you know, and we've worn them ever since."

Q: "Well, you know you started a new trend among your fans."

JOHN: "Yeah, quite alot of 'em are wearing it. Quite alot of 'em aren't. But there are a few of 'em wearing it. (laughs) I've seen an old man in one, as well."

RINGO: "I've seen an old woman."

(laughter)

JOHN: "I saw four old men. Top that!"

RINGO: (laughing) "I give in."

Q: "Alot of your songs contain the words, 'you,' or 'me,' or 'I.'

GEORGE AND JOHN: "'Please Please ME,' 'From ME To YOU,' 'She Loves YOU,' 'I Want To Hold YOUR Hand.'"

Q: "Right. Now, what is the significance of that?"

PAUL: "No, the only idea about that is that, uhh... When we sing songs, we prefer to sing ones with a sort of personal touch, you see. So, the best way to get that into a song is just to write them with 'I' or 'you' or 'me' or 'him' or 'through' or 'by' or 'that.'"

(laughter)

Q: "What brings you to the U.S. at this particular time?"

GEORGE: "Well, we're over here to do three Ed Sullivan TV shows, and meet the press, and a bit of a rest on Miami Beach."

Q: "Are there plans for a movie?"

GEORGE: "Yeah. Well, when we get back to England from this current visit of America..."

JOHN: (giggling) "...to America."

GEORGE: "...by America, yeah. Well, you see, we're making a film-- which we don't know the title of-- but it should be a film just about us."

PAUL: "We don't know the script, and we don't know what songs will be in it."

GEORGE: "It should be released in the states by the end of this year sometime, we hope."

JOHN: (laughing) "With no title and no songs!"

PAUL: "And no script."

JOHN: "Top that!"

(laughter)

Q: "We'd like to thank you for dropping by, and we wish you the best on your U.S. tour."

GEORGE: "Pleasure to be here."

PAUL: "Thank you."

JOHN: "Bye Bye."

RINGO: "Thank you very much."

Beatles Interview: Armed Forces Network, Paris 1/24/64

2009-02-12T10:35:00.000-08:00

Q: "This afternoon in our Paris studios we're visiting with four young men. And if I just mention their first names, such as Paul and George and Ringo and John, I doubt if you'd know about whom we're speaking. But if I said we're here this afternoon with the Beatles, and if we were in England, I think we'd get a great big rousing 'Hurrah!' Wouldn't we, boys?"

(Beatles laugh)

PAUL: (dryly) "Oh yeah."

Q: "Well, let's see. We have to my right here, Paul McCartney. Paul tell us, how did the Beatles get going? How did you start?"

PAUL: "It's a funny story, really. (laughs) You know, it was back in the old days. We were all at school together, really, you know. We grew up as school teenage buddies, and things. It developed from there, really."

Q: "Well, did you sing together around school, or..?"

PAUL: "Yeah. George and I were at school together and John was at the school next door, and Ringo was at Butlins."

(Beatles laugh)

PAUL: "...and we just started playing guitars, and things. And it went on from there, really, as far as I'm concerned."

Q: "Well, you say those were the olden days. Now within the past year, you have mushroomed in tremendously... almost out of sight popularity. What was the click? What levered this great rage for the Beatles?"

PAUL: "Well, it's funny really. I think it was the Palladium show, you know, the television show in England. And then following hot in the footsteps we had the Royal Variety Command Variety (clears throat comically) performance."

(Beatles giggle)

PAUL: "It's difficult to say that, actually. Royal Variety Command Performance for the Queen Mother, you know. And it all came up from there, really. The national newspapers got ahold of it. And they got ahold of Ringo."

JOHN: "And Mike Brown found out about it."

PAUL: "Mike Brown found out about it. Yeah. A lot of columnists and things got onto the idea and started calling it 'Beatlemania.'"

Q: "Lets ask a question here of George Harrison. George, what is the status of Rock & Roll in England today? Is that what you call your music?"

GEORGE: "No, not really. We don't like to call it anything. But the critics and the people who write about it, you know, they have to call it something. So they didn't want to say it was Rock & Roll, because Rock's supposed to have gone out about five years ago. And so they decided it wasn't really Rhythm & Blues... so they decided to call it 'The Liverpool Sound' which is stupid, really, because as far as we were concerned it was just, you know, the same as the Rock from five years ago."

Q: "Can you describe Liverpool's sound?"

GEORGE: "Well, it's more like the old Rock, it's just everything's a bit louder. More bass and bass drum, and everybody sort of sings loud and shouts. (laughs) And that's it!"

Q: "Is the Liverpool Sound, then, 'THE' sound in the U.K. today? In England?"

GEORGE: "Yeah, well, that's... You know, all the records now... Everybody's sort of making records in that style."

Q: "Let's ask Ringo here. Now, you're the drummer. We caught your act at the Olympia the other evening. How long have you been beating those skins?"

RINGO: "Oh, about five years now. I've been with the boys about 18 months... with other groups before that. So that's five years."

Q: "Since you boys have gained your current popularity, have there been many other organizations trying to imitate you, or perhaps take the thunder away from you? Let's ask John Lemmon this."

JOHN: "Well, I suppose, a couple of people have jumped on the... (pause) railway carriage."

(laughter)

JOHN: "I mean, the bandwagon. But it doesn't really matter, you know, because it's flattery and it promotes the whole idea of us if we're away, and there's a few little Beatles still going to remind people of us."

Q: "Paul, let's go back to you for a moment. Whenever anyone sees your pictures, the first thing that strikes them is, naturally, your hairdo."

RINGO: "Hair-don't."

Q: (laughs) "Or Hair-don't! Some people have written as though you were having the sheepdog cut, or perhaps an early Caeser. What do you call it, and how come you cut it that way?"

PAUL: "To us it just sort of seems the natural thing, really, because it all arose... We came out of the swimming baths one day, and you know how your hair, sort of, flops about after the swimming baths. Well, it stayed that way, you see, when nobody bothered to comb it. And it sort of stayed in a style. So we've never really called it anything, I don't know, until the papers got ahold of it, and they called it the Beatle style. So I suppose we go along with them now, really."

Q: "Do you go to the barber at all?"

PAUL: "Well, you know, now and then. Do and don't."

Q: "Just to keep it trimmed."

PAUL: "Yeah. Just to keep it trimmed. But sometimes we do it ourselves, you know."

JOHN: "With our feet."

(giggles)

PAUL: "The other thing is, its really only our eyebrows that are growing upwards."

Q: "We've been told that in England today there's this 'Beatlemania' going on. What would you say Beatlemania is? That all the girls scream when they see you, and perhaps faint waiting in line. Let's be immodest a moment. What is the attraction?"

GEORGE: (laughs) "I don't know."

JOHN: "I think it's that dressing gown."

(laughter)

JOHN: "George's dressing gown is definitely a big attraction."

PAUL: "No, I don't think any of us really know what it is. We've been asked this question an awful lot of times, but we've never been able to come up with an answer yet, because I think it's a collection of so many different things, like, happening to be there at the right time, at the right moment. (sings) 'But the wrong face.'"

(laughter)

PAUL: "No but... A little bit of originality in the songs, a little bit of a different sound. I don't know. It's an awful lot of things. Maybe the gimmick of the haircut, as well. The luck getting into the national press at the right time. It's an awful lot of luck."

JOHN: (deep, comical voice) "It's all these things and more!"

Q: "Well, you mentioned songs. I understand you boys write your own material."

PAUL: "John and I write them. This is Paul speaking. John and I write."

Q: "Paul, yes. How do you think up an idea? Do you get together regularly, or an idea pops in your mind and you say 'Let's sit down and do it'?

PAUL: "Umm, if an idea does pop in your mind, then you do sit down and say 'Let's do it,' yeah. But if there's no ideas, and say we've been told we've got a recording date in about two days time, then you have got to sit down and sort of slog it out. But you normally get, first of all, just a little idea which doesn't seem bad. And you go on, and then it builds up from that. It varies every time though, really."

Q: "Paul, we've seen you here at the Olympia. Can you compare the French audience with what you're familiar with back in England?"

PAUL: "Well, there's a lot of difference, because in England the audiences are seventy-five percent female. Here, seventy-five percent male. And that's the main difference, really. Because they still appreciate it, but you don't get the full noise and the atmosphere of a place."

GEORGE: "No screams."

Q: "No screams and fainting. Why is it seventy-five percent boys?"

GEORGE: "I don't know, but I think they don't let the girls out (laughs) at night."

JOHN: "I think it's your dressing gown."

(laughter)

GEORGE: "Somebody said that they still have to have chaperones, a lot of them, you see. Whereas in England their out. It's funny. It's the same in Germany, all the boys like the Rock, and it's usually the same on the continent. I don't really know why."

Q: "'I Want To Hold Your Hand' is #1 on the Hit Parade, and we have a copy of it here right now, so let's sit back for a moment and listen to it."

('I Want To Hold Your Hand' is played)

Q: "How did you come to write that, 'I Want To Hold Your Hand'?"

PAUL: "This was one of those songs we were told we definitely had to get down to it. We had to get working. So we went and we found an old disused house. We were sort of walking along one day. We just thought 'We've got to really get this song going.' So we got down in the basement of this disused house, and there was an old piano there. It wasn't really disused. It was, sort of, rooms to let. We found this old piano and we started banging away there."

JOHN: "And I played organ."

PAUL: "Yeah. There was a little old organ there too. So we were just having this sort of informal jam session down there. And we started banging away, and suddenly just a little bit came to us. I think it was just the catch line. And so we started working on it from there. We got our pens and paper out, and we just wrote the lyrics down. And uhh, eventually you know, we had some sort of a song. So we went back and we played it to our recording manager, and he seemed to like it. So we recorded it the next day."

Q: "Do all your songs have a basic theme or story or message?"

JOHN: "Umm, no."

(silence, followed by laughter)

PAUL: (laughing) "That was a quick answer!"

Q: "That was quick."

PAUL: "They don't, but there's one thing that nearly always seems to run through our songs. People always point it out to us. That's the 'I' and 'You' and 'me' always seems to be in the title. You know... 'I' want to hold 'YOUR' hand, She loves 'YOU,' Love 'ME' do, and things like this. Well, I think the reason for that really is that we nearly always try and write songs which are a little bit more personal than others, you see. So by having these prepositions, whatever you call them, I and ME and You in the titles, it makes the songs a little bit more personal. I think that's the only sort of basic message that does run through our songs."

Q: Now, you coined this 'Yeah, yeah, yeah!' Isn't that really sweeping England right now?"

JOHN: "Yeah. Well, that was sort of the main catch phrase from 'She Loves You.' But we stuck that on... We'd written the song nearly, and we suddenly needed more, so we had 'Yeah, yeah, yeah.' And it caught on, you know. They use it for... If you're gonna be 'with it' or 'hip.'"

Q: "It's sort of a trademark for you boys now."

JOHN: "Yeah, we'll have to write another song with it." (laughs)

Q: "Paul, what do you think of your trip to the States? I understand in about a week or ten days you're going to be on the Ed Sullivan show. Could you tell us about it?"

PAUL: "Yeah, that's right. We're gonna do Ed Sullivan's show in New York. And we're taping one for later release, I think. And we're looking forward to those, and then we go down to Florida, Miami... Can't wait! And we do another Ed Sullivan there, but I think before that we do Carnegie Hall, don't we?"

BEATLES: "Yeah."

Q: "How were you selected for Ed Sullivan? Was he in England and caught your act or something?"

GEORGE: "When we were flying back... this is the story we heard... we were arriving from Stockholm into London Airport, and at the same time the Prime Minister and the Queen Mother were also flying out, but the airport was just overrun with teenagers. There was thousands of them waiting for us to get back. And Ed Sullivan was supposed to have arrived at that time and wondered what was going on, and you know, he found out it was us arriving. And also our manager went over to the States with another singer called Billy J. Kramer, and he did a couple of TV shows over there. And while he was over there, our manager got the bookings with Ed Sullivan. But he'd also heard of us from this London Airport thing. And that's about it."

Q: "And how about a movie? Is there a movie in the future?"

PAUL: "Mmm, yeah. We've been asked by United Artists to do a feature movie."

Q: "Will it be dramatic, or just strictly wrap around your singing?"

PAUL: "Oh, we don't know yet, really, what it's going to be like. I don't think we'll have to do an awful lot of acting. I think it'll be written 'round the sort of people that we are, and there'll be four characters in it very like us."

Q: "Do you plan to compose two or three songs specifically for the film?"

PAUL: "Actually, we've got to compose six songs specifically for the film. We've got to get down to that, too. That's a job."

Q: "And you boys really haven't had much of a chance to see Paris, have you?"

GEORGE: "Not really, no."

Q: "What do you think of it so far?"

GEORGE: "Well, it's nice. Quite nice."

Q: "How about the French girls compared to the British girls?"

RINGO: "Oh, we havn't seen any yet!"

(laughter)

Q: "John?"

JOHN: "Yeah well, I'm married so I didn't notice 'em."

(laughter)

Q: "We'll go back to Paul, then."

PAUL: "I think they're great."

Q: "You're single."

PAUL: "Yeah. I think the French girls are fabulous."

GEORGE: "But we have seen more French boys than French girls. So I mean, you know, we can't really tell."

Q: "Well, perhaps when you get to the Ed Sullivan show there will be more girls for you."

GEORGE: "I hope so."

RINGO: "Yeah."

Q: "Any of you been to America before?"

GEORGE: "Yeah, me. I went in September just for a holiday for three weeks."

Q: "Just George Harrison. Well, I see our time is up, boys. Thank you very much, Beatles, for being our guest on AFN this afternoon on Weekend World."

Beatles Interview: Returning from Paris 2/5/64

2009-02-12T10:34:00.000-08:00

Q: "What was the reaction like in France?"

GEORGE: "The audiences were a bit funny, you see. There were more boys than girls, and we missed the good old screams. But you know, there were quite alot of shouts."

Q: "You mean they actually listened to you? That's the difference, is it?"

JOHN AND PAUL: "Yeah."

GEORGE: "Yeah."

Q: "What's the French electrical supply like over there?"

PAUL: "It's good actually. Oh, the equipment's great. But on the first night, as you may know, we had a bit of trouble. Because we suddenly found there was a radio program just sort of plugging into everything, and it overloaded all the amps and everything. They just went, 'Boompf!'"

RINGO: "Three times."

PAUL: "Boompf... Boompf."

Q: "What's the sort of stuff they like over there on the Hit Parade?"

PAUL: "Umm, wilder stuff I think. We stuck in a wilder number to finish off with."

JOHN: (jokingly) "'Gone With The Wind.'"

PAUL: "Gone With The..." (laughs)

Q: "They go for the Elvis Presley kind of stuff, there, do they? I mean, do they go for the older rock and roll stuff?"

PAUL: "I think so, yeah, a bit more. It depended really who was in."

Q: (to Ringo) "I hear that you are going to give us some poetry recitals."

RINGO: "Beethoven's poems."

Q: "When's this? At the City of London Festival?"

RINGO: "Yeah, yeah. (to the others) He knows, you see. It's a secret! Don't tell anybody!"

(laughter)

Q: "What poems?"

RINGO: "Beethoven's. Remember him? Beethoven."

(laughter)

Q: "Looking forward to this American trip, have you had any reaction over there? Have you got any fan clubs going as we speak?"

RINGO: "Well, there's one supposed to be started and they're getting quite a good response, you know. (jokingly) Twelve thousand letters a day!"

(Beatles giggle)

Q: "But the Beatle movement's going over there?"

RINGO: "Yeah. (jokingly) So you needn't be a Beatle Booster, folks!"

(laughter)

Q: "I must tell you, by the way, that Detroit University have got a 'Stamp Out The Beatles' movement."

GEORGE: "I know, yeah."

JOHN: "Yeah, we heard something about that."

PAUL: "We've got a 'Stamp Out Detroit!'"

(laughter)

Q: "They think your haircuts are un-American."

JOHN: "Well, it was very observant of them because we aren't American, actually."

PAUL: (laughs) "True, that."

JOHN: "True. True."

Beatles Press Conference: American Arrival 2/7/64

2009-02-12T10:33:00.002-08:00

Q: "Are you a little embarrassed by the lunacy you cause?"

JOHN: "No, it's great."

PAUL: "No."

RINGO: "Marvelous."

GEORGE: (giggling) "We love it."

JOHN: "We like lunatics."

Q: "You're in favor of lunacy?"

BEATLES: "Yeah."

JOHN: "It's healthy."

Q: "Are those English accents?"

GEORGE: "It's not English. It's Liverpudlian, you see."

PAUL: "The Liverpool accent - so, the way you say some of the words. You know, you say GRASS instead of GRAHHSS, and that sounds a bit American. So there ya go."

Q: "Liverpool is the..."

RINGO: (jokingly) "It's the capital of Ireland."

PAUL: "Anyway, we wrote half of your folk songs in Liverpool."

(laughter)

RINGO: "Yeah, don't forget!"

Q: "In Detroit Michigan, there handing out car stickers saying, 'Stamp Out The Beatles.'"

PAUL: "Yeah well... first of all, we're bringing out a Stamp Out Detroit campaign."

(laughter)

Q: "What about the Stamp Out The Beatles campaign?"

JOHN: "What about it?"

RINGO: "How big are they?"

(laughter)

M.C: "There's a question here."

Q: (yelling over the crowd noise) "Would you tell Murray the K to cut that crap out?"

BEATLES: (yelling, jokingly) "CUT THAT CRAP OUT!"

PAUL: "Hey, Murray!"

(laughter)

REPORTER: "Is that a question?"

M.C: (attempting to calm the chaos) "Will you be quiet, please."

Q: "A psychiatrist recently said you're nothing but a bunch of British Elvis Presleys."

JOHN: "He must be blind."

RINGO: (shaking like Elvis) "It's not true!! It's not true!!"

JOHN: (dances like Elvis)

FEMALE FAN: "Would you please sing something?"

BEATLES: "NO!"

(laughter)

RINGO: "Sorry."

M.C: "Next question."

Q: "There's some doubt that you CAN sing."

JOHN: "No, we need money first."

(laughter)

Q: "How much money do you expect to take out of this country?"

JOHN: "About half a crown."

RINGO: "Ten dollars."

Q: "Does all that hair help you sing?"

PAUL: "What?"

Q: "Does all that hair help you sing?"

JOHN: "Definitely. Yeah."

Q: "You feel like Sampson? If you lost your hair, you'd lose what you have? 'It'?"

JOHN: "Don't know. I don't know."

PAUL: "Don't know."

M.C: "There's a question here."

Q: "How many of you are bald, that you have to wear those wigs?"

RINGO: "All of us."

PAUL: "I'm bald."

Q: "You're bald?"

JOHN: "Oh, we're all bald, yeah."

PAUL: "Don't tell anyone, please."

JOHN: "And deaf and dumb, too."

(laughter)

M.C: "Quiet, please."

Q: "Do you know American slang? Are you for real?"

PAUL: "For real."

JOHN: "Come and have a feel."

RINGO: (laughs)

Q: "Aren't you afraid of what the American Barbers Association is going to think of you?"

RINGO: "Well, we run quicker than the English ones, we'll have a go here, you know."

Q: "Listen, I got a question here. Are you going to get a haircut at all while you're here?"

BEATLES: "NO!"

RINGO: "Nope."

PAUL: "No, thanks."

GEORGE: "I had one yesterday."

(laughter)

RINGO: "And that's no lie, it's the truth."

PAUL: "It's the truth."

Q: "You know, I think he missed."

JOHN: "Nope."

GEORGE: "No, he didn't. No."

RINGO: "You should have seen him the day before."

Q: "What do you think your music does for these people?"

PAUL: "Uhh..."

JOHN: "Hmmm, well..."

RINGO: "I don't know. It pleases them, I think. Well, it must do, 'cuz they're buying it."

Q: "Why does it excite them so much?"

PAUL: "We don't know. Really."

JOHN: "If we knew, we'd form another group and be managers."

(laughter)

Q: "What about all this talk that you represent some kind of social rebellion?"

JOHN: "It's a dirty lie. It's a dirty lie."

(laughter)

Q: "What do you think of Beethoven?"

RINGO: "Great. Especially his poems."

(laughter)

M.C: "Can we have the last question now, Gentlemen, please?"

PAUL: "My favorite."

(laughter)

Q: "Have you decided when you're going to retire?"

JOHN: "Next week."

PAUL: "No."

JOHN: "No, we don't know."

RINGO: "We're going to keep going as long as we can."

GEORGE: "When we get fed up with it, you know. We're still enjoying it."

RINGO: "Any minute now."

Q: "After you make so much money, and then..."

BEATLES: "No."

GEORGE: "No, as long as we enjoy it, we'll do it. 'Cuz we enjoyed it before we made ANY money."

(At the conclusion of this press conference, since they were still unknown as individuals to most of the American press, the Beatles chanted their names in the order they were standing at the microphones.)

BEATLES: (in unison) "Paul... Ringo... George... John!! Paul... Ringo... George...John!!"

Beatles Interview: AP & CBS News, Plaza Hotel 2/10/64

2009-02-12T10:33:00.001-08:00

Associated Press interview:

Q: "Your program was reviewed by a music critic, and uhh..."

RINGO: (comically exaggerated) "OH NO!!!"

(laughter)

RINGO: "Not again!!!"

Q: (reading from newspaper) "...and he said that you had 'unresolved leading tones, a false modal frame ending up as a plain diatonic.' What would you say to that?"

JOHN: "He ought to see a doctor about that."

(laughter)

PAUL: "No, he's just copying the fella in the London Times who did a review like that. The only difference is, I don't know if that's favorable or not. The London one WAS, you see."

RINGO: "Why doesn't he just say if it's good or bad."

Q: (laughs) "What do you think of the reaction of Amer... What do you think of American girls in the first place, now that you've had your first contact with them?"

PAUL: "Marvelous. They're the same as British girls only they've got a different accent."

Q: "Is it your ambition to continue what you're doing, or what do you plan to do?"

JOHN: "Yeah."

PAUL: "Well, as long as it lasts like this. As long as we keep enjoying it. Once we stop enjoying it, and people stop enjoying it, then uhh..."

GEORGE: "We'll pack in."

RINGO: "We'll HAVE to pack in if people don't enjoy it."

GEORGE: "That's a British saying for 'give up.'"

Q: "One of the big attractions is your haircut and your manner of dress. What prompted that? The haircuts, for instance."

RINGO: "It just happened, you know. (looks up at his own hair) You just wake up one day and there you are."

(laughter)

CBS News interview:

Q: "Who came up with the name Beatles, and what does it really mean?"

RINGO: "John thought of the name Beatles, and he'll tell you about it NOW."

(Beatles laugh)

JOHN: "It means Beatles, doesn't it. But that's just a name, you know, like shoe."

PAUL: The Shoes, you see? We could have been called The Shoes for all you know."

Q: "There have been huge crowds of teenage girls outside complaining that they don't want to mob you, they just want to speak to you. What do you think about this? Do you want to talk to them?"

RINGO: "Well, have you ever tried talking to about two hundred people at once?"

JOHN: "We'd love to, you know. If we wave, somebody always says 'Stop that waving! You're inciting them!'"

Q: "How do you feel about your appearance at Carnegie Hall this week, the center of musical culture?"

RINGO: "Umm well, a bit nervous, but not too much, you know. We just hope we go down, 'cuz we're on with a lot of Americans. So we hope they like us."

Q: "What have you done in New York, and what do you hope to see while you're here?"

JOHN: "Well, we've been out to a couple of clubs. Rock clubs, mainly. 'Cuz we just like listening to rock when we're not working, anyway. And we're hoping some of our favorite artists will come up, but you know, they're all out on the road or something. They're not here."

Q: "Who is your favorite American artist?"

JOHN: "There's a lot, you know. Marvin Gaye, Miracles, Mary Wells. Those people."

Q: "When was the last time you had a haircut?"

PAUL: "Uhh, quite a long time, actually. (jokingly, but straightfaced) The last time was about 23 years ago, was the last time I had one."

Q: "Have you met any interesting American girls?"

GEORGE: "Umm... not yet, but hoping."

Q: "What do you think of the police protection you've been receiving here in this city?"

RINGO: "It's marvelous. They're doing a great job, you know, looking after us."

Q: "Are the crowds as large as you expected?"

JOHN: (giggling) "No. We didn't expect anything like this, you know."

Q: (aiming the microphone at Paul) "What is the most interesting offer you've ever received?"

PAUL: "Ahh... Yes... Umm... We've had a lot of interesting offers, actually. (pause) No comment!"

Q: (laughs) "What do you think of the Christine Keeler Profumo affair?"

GEORGE: (dryly) "It's great, yeah."

(Beatles laugh)

PAUL: (laughing) "Good publicity!"

GEORGE: (laughing) "Yeah."

JOHN: "They're all happening."

Q: "Have you heard any reviews of your appearance last night?"

PAUL: "The papers this morning just sort of... we only read two of them, and they weren't very favorable. I think one of the microphones was off, so that may..."

JOHN: "The kids still liked it, you know."

PAUL: "Yeah. The audience was fantastic. Great reception."

Q: "Thank you, gentlemen."

BEATLES: "Thank you!"

Beatles Interview: Carroll James, Washington Coliseum 2/11/64

2009-02-12T10:32:00.000-08:00

Q: "Welcome everyone. John Lennon."

JOHN: "Thank you, Carroll."

Q: "And Ringo Starr. Did your drums get off the train safely?"

RINGO: "I hope so. We got a man looking after them."

Q: "Good, good. And over here is Paul McCartney."

PAUL: "How do you do."

Q: "Good to see you, Paul. And over here is George Harrison, who I met the other night in New York."

GEORGE: "Yeah. How do you do."

Q: "I had a 30 second interview with him before a man with the network said, 'Here, put that thing away!'"

GEORGE: "Oh yeah."

Q: "Remember? And Dizzy Gillespie got my Beatle wig, and I still don't have one for tonight. Let me sit down here next to you, John. I have these phenomenal questions. We'll never get to them all. But these are just some of the questions that some of my listeners wanted to know about your careers and your selves."

JOHN: "Mm-hmm."

Q: "What was the first million seller in England that you had, and when was it?"

JOHN: "It was 'She Loves You,' I think. (to the others) Was it?"

PAUL: "Yes."

Q: "And the second was..."

JOHN: "I Want To Hold Your Nose."

Q: (laughs)

JOHN: "Hand."

Q: "And the other side has now become popular here."

JOHN: "Yeah, it's amazing, that. Yeah."

Q: "No it's not, it's a great arrangement."

JOHN: (jokingly) "Okay-yeah-it-is-thanks."

Q: (laughs) "The girls want to know what is your favorite food, and they want to know whether you like fish and chips."

JOHN: "Yeah, I like fish and chips quite a lot."

Q: "What is your favorite food?"

JOHN: "STEAK and chips, I think."

Q: "Paul, they of course want to know about the closest shave you've ever had in a crowd. The toughest spot you were ever in."

PAUL: "Uhh, I dunno."

GEORGE: "Ireland."

PAUL: "Yeah. We were playing in Ireland, and there's a place called (adopts heavy Irish accent) Belfast... no it was in Belfast. (loses accent) Lovely place, it is. We came out of the theatre in the front entrance, and they had sort of things to keep all the crowds back. Crush barriers. They had police on (laughs) mounted police."

(laughter)

PAUL: "Police on mounted dogs... whatever you call 'em."

(laughter)

PAUL: "And just as we were sort of driving away, and there were all motorcycles and things, the crush barriers gave in. And the crowds all sort of..." (imitates comic sounds of motors, felines, and objects crushing to the ground)

(laughter)

Q: "Do you attribute this to the fact that there are so many redheads in Ireland?"

PAUL: "Well I dunno. I didn't see any, actually. There may have been some underneath that crowd."

Q: (laughs) "How many rings do you own, Ringo? How many have your fans sent you?"

RINGO: "They've sent quite a lot. If I counted them all, I got about two-thousand- seven-hundred-and-sixty-one... and a bit."

PAUL: (laughs)

Q: "I see. The girls want to know, to where they should send the rings to you. What would the address be?"

RINGO: "13 Monmouth Street, London. Make sure they're gold!! I only wear gold!!"

(laughter)

Q: "You could possibly make more from your rings than from your records in that case."

RINGO: "Yeah, they send a lot of silver ones."

(laughter)

Q: "Do you play cricket at all, George?"

GEORGE: "No."

Q: "What is your favorite sport? Singing and fighting for your life, but other than that..."

GEORGE: "I don't like many sports. I don't mind watching motor racing. That's about it. I wouldn't mind to have a go."

PAUL: "We all enjoy sleeping, you know. That's one of our favorite sports."

Q: "Well, it's been a long time since that's happened, isn't it?"

PAUL: "No, no. It happens. We try to get to the... you know, every night, actually. We try hard."

Q: "What are some of the American artists that you feel maybe had an influence on your career?"

PAUL: "Definitely Sophie Tucker. Very big influence. VERY big."

Q: (laughs) "Well you know, Tessie O'Shay who appeared on the Sullivan show with you, of course she is British..."

PAUL: "Tessie O'Shay is our favorite American group."

(laughter)

JOHN: (jokingly) "Well, we can't use THAT gag tonight, anyway."

Q: "What about drummers, Ringo?"

RINGO: "I don't know. There's so many."

JOHN: "What about Big Deaf Arthur?"

RINGO: "Oh yeah, Big Deaf Arthur. He's good."

JOHN: (to Carroll) "You know Big Deaf Arthur?"

Q: "No I don't."

JOHN: "He's with Small Blond Johnnie. Yeah."

Q: (laughs) "Really? Is that a..."

JOHN: "Oh yeah. It's really swinging."

Q: "Oh. They want to know if you still like Jellybabies."

RINGO: "No."

Q: "Not at all?"

RINGO: "We used to like them, and then we got about 18 ton sent to us. So, you know, our teeth are dropping out with them."

Q: (laughs)

RINGO: "We give 'em up."

Q: "This is National Dental Health Week here in America so I guess we forget the Jellybabies for the time being."

RINGO: "Yeah."

Q: "They hurt when they hit, don't they George?"

GEORGE: "They do, yeah. They make you stick to the floor, as well."

Q: "What is your dream in life? This is ridiculous because you have achieved more than a dream already. But John, what would be your dream from now on?"

JOHN: "Umm... (comic voice) I don't really know, Carroll. I couldn't honestly say."

PAUL: (giggles)

Q: "Do you drink a lot of tea, incidentally?"

JOHN: "Yeah, but I don't like these teabags so much, 'cuz they sort of stick in the teeth."

Q: "You don't use them at all in England, do you?"

JOHN: "Uhh, some people use them. But they're usually foreigners, you know."

Q: "Americans."

JOHN: "Well, people like that."

Q: "We'll leave England out of this, and America out of this but..."

JOHN: (jokingly) "What's left?"

Q: (laughs) "What is your favorite foreign country of all the countries you have appeared in?"

PAUL AND RINGO: "England."

(laughter)

PAUL: "I dunno. I'd rather have England than any of the foreign countries, I think."

JOHN: "Ireland. We like playing in Ireland. That was quite fun."

RINGO: "I like playing in America."

JOHN: "No, but besides America and England, you see. Sweden was quite nice."

PAUL, GEORGE AND RINGO: (agreeing) "Sweden."

JOHN: "And France."

Q: "Anybody know any foreign languages?"

JOHN: "Oh, we all speak fluent Shoe."

RINGO: "Well, Paul speaks ANY language. He just gets 'em off like wildfire."

PAUL: (gibberish)

Q: "Johnnie Johnson told me I wouldn't be able to understand the Liverpool accent. Was that a Liverpool accent?"

PAUL: (jokingly) "No, that was a London accent. A bit different down there."

Q: "What do you feel about some of the songs that have been written about you? Donna Lynn has a recording called, uhh... You may not even have heard all of these."

PAUL: "Yes."

JOHN AND RINGO "Oh yeah."

GEORGE: "We have."

PAUL: "I've heard 'em. (sings) 'My boyfriend's got a Beatle haircut.'"

Q: "How do you feel about this? You've got a Beatle haircut yourself."

PAUL: "Actually, I haven't heard the record. I've heard about it, though. But it's good publicity, isn't it."

RINGO: "Is it selling?"

Q: "I believe so. Bill Turner tells me it's selling."

RINGO: "Well, I say the best of luck to her."

JOHN: "Yeah, best of luck."

PAUL: "Best of luck, Donna!"

Q: "You, George, are the only Beatle who had been in America before this trip. Is that correct?"

GEORGE: "Yeah. That's correct."

Q: "Went to visit your sister a few months ago."

GEORGE: "Yeah. September."

Q: "At that time, did anybody out there know of the Beatles?"

GEORGE: "Nobody had here, either. In New York, I went into a record shop to ask if they'd ever heard of us and they hadn't."

PAUL: (giggles)

GEORGE: "No, that was October."

Q: "That was October. And then we started hearing things in this country, I guess, first around November. And in December WWDC flew your record 'I Want To Hold Your...'"

GEORGE: "You did?"

Q: "Yes."

GEORGE: "Thanks, that was great."

PAUL AND RINGO: "Thanks."

JOHN: "Thank you very much."

Q: "Well, you're very welcome. I'd like you to meet the young lady, right after we're finished talking here, Marsha Albert is... Come on in here very quickly, Marsha."

RINGO: "Alright, Marsha."

PAUL: "Hello, Marsha."

JOHN: "Good ol' Marsha!"

GEORGE: "Marsha Mellow."

RINGO "Thank you, Marsha."

(each of the Beatles is introduced to Marsha Albert)

Q: (to John) "They call you the chief Beatle..."

JOHN: (jokingly) "Look, I don't call YOU names."

Q: (laughs)

JOHN: "Why do you have to call me names?"

Q: Who is responsible for the haircut?"

JOHN: "Well, I think it's... (pause) bigger than both of us, Carroll. That's all I can say."

Q: (laughs)

RINGO: "Nobody, really."

Q: "When you went to high school... grammar school... what did you have in mind as a career?"

PAUL: "I dunno. At that time I thought of being a teacher, actually. But luckily I got into this business, because I would have been a VERY bad teacher."

Q: "George?"

GEORGE: "I was going to be a baggy sweeger."

(laughter)

Q: "I beg your pardon?"

GEORGE: "A baggy sweeger."

Q: "And what is that?"

GEORGE: "Well, you see, in every city there are twenty-five baggy sweegers."

PAUL: (cracks up)

GEORGE: "And their job is to go out to the airport each morning..."

(laughter)

PAUL: (laughing) "Baggy sweeger!"

GEORGE: "...and baggy sweeging all along the line, man."

Beatles Press Conference: Washington Coliseum 2/11/64

2009-02-12T10:31:00.000-08:00

Q: "When did the group first get togther?"

GEORGE: "Well you see, Paul, John and George met at school about five years ago, and we met Ringo when we left school. And we've been the Beatles for three years."

(Paul begins singing, and the other Beatles join in)

BEATLES: (singing) "We've been together now forty yeeeears!"

Q: "Where did you get the name the Beatles?"

JOHN: "I thought of it."

RINGO: "That's John."

Q: "Why?"

JOHN: "Why not!"

(laughter)

Q: "Do the four of you ever fight among yourselves?"

JOHN: "Only in the morning, ha."

RINGO: "No, we're very good friends."

Q: "Did you always have your hair this way?"

JOHN: (laughing) "Only in the morning!"

(laughter)

Q: "Did Ringo get his name from 'The Ringo Kid'?"

RINGO: "No. From all this on me fingers. Can you see 'em?"

Q: "Do you know who 'The Ringo Kid' is?"

RINGO: "He was a cowboy, wasn't he?"

Q: "Thank you."

RINGO: "Thank you."

(laughter)

Q: "How long do you think Beatlemania will last?"

JOHN: "As long as you all keep comin'."

(laughter)

Q: "Do any of you have any formal musical training?"

JOHN: (comically) "You're joking!!"

PAUL: (giggles)

RINGO: "No, we just picked it up."

JOHN: (laughs)

Q: "What do you think of President Johnson?"

RINGO AND JOHN: "Never met him."

JOHN: (comically, to Ringo) "Oh, we're thinking alike!"

PAUL: "We haven't met him."

RINGO: "We don't know. We've never met the man... (pause) Does he buy our records?"

(laughter)

Q: "What do you think of America, Amercican girls, and American audiences?"

RINGO: "Marvelous."

(laughter)

Q: "Can you compare them with Europeans?"

RINGO: "They're all the same, you know."

Q: "Have you visited the United States with any sense of revenge?"

JOHN: "He's been reading that paper, hasn't he!"

RINGO: "No! No, we just... (pause) come for the money."

(laughter)

RINGO: "It's a lie. No. We're..."

PAUL: (comically) "Excuse me?"

(Beatles laugh)

Q: "Are English disc jockeys as important as American disc jockeys?"

JOHN: "They're all as important as each other, if they've got any listeners."

Q: "What was the big break that led to your success?"

JOHN: "Making a record."

PAUL: "Making our first hit record. The BIG success was doing the Royal Variety show in front of the Queen Mother, and then right after that nearly at the same time, doing the London Palladium."

Q: "This phenomenal popularity you have acheived, do you feel you owe it all to press agents?"

JOHN: "We didn't get the press agents until we made it. We couldn't afford 'em before that."

(laughter)

Q: "What do you think about the criticism that you are a bad influence?"

PAUL: "I dunno, you know. I don't FEEL like a bad influence. (to John) Do you?"

JOHN: "Nah, I think you're a GOOD influence, Paul."

PAUL: "Thank you, John."

Q: "Is there any chance of the Beatles becoming knighted?"

(Beatles laugh)

PAUL: "No. (pause) No, YOU may be, though."

(laughter)

JOHN: "Can you imagine, Sir Ringo."

(laughter)

Q: "Who writes most of the songs?"

PAUL: "John and I write most of the records that we recorded. And Brian Sommerville (Beatles' Press Agent) does all the lyrics."

(laughter)

PAUL: "He's a BEAUTIFUL lyricist. Listen to him, now. Go on, Brian."

(no sound from Brian Sommerville)

PAUL: "He's fantastic. No, it just comes and goes, you know."

Q: "Who are the Beatles' favorite performers?"

JOHN: "The Miracles."

GEORGE: "Marvin Gaye."

JOHN AND PAUL: "Tommy Roe."

Q: "How long will you be in America?"

JOHN: "Till we go."

(laughter)

PAUL: "It's just a week. About a week."

Q: "What do you like or dislike about America?"

JOHN: "We like it all."

RINGO: "Yeah. We haven't any dislikes yet."

GEORGE: "Dislike the snow."

(laughter)

PAUL: "I don't. I love the snow."

GEORGE: "I do."

Q: "Have you ever really been afraid of the large crowds?"

BEATLES: "No."

PAUL: "We enjoy it, you know. There's enough police, anyway."

Q: "What has been your most exciting moment in the last year?"

PAUL: "There's been a lot of them. You know, meeting the Queen Mother at the Royal Command Performance, being number one in America, coming to America, traveling..."

RINGO: "...in America?"

(laughter)

PAUL: "We've enjoyed America. Been a lot of them, though."

Q: "Are the Beatles still number one in Europe?"

JOHN: "Well, Europe's got a lot of lists."

GEORGE: "A lot of countries."

PAUL: "A lot of hit parades."

Q: "In England."

PAUL: "Not in England."

JOHN: "No, the record's gone down to 7 or something."

PAUL: "But it's been out about 12 weeks... longer than 12 weeks in England."

JOHN: "It's been out about 3 months."

GEORGE: "'She Loves You' is still in the Top 20 and it's been out 25 weeks."

Beatles Interview: Washington Coliseum 2/11/64

2009-02-12T10:30:00.000-08:00

Q: "Here I am surrounded by Beatles and I don't feel a thing. Fellas, how does it feel to be in the United States?"

RINGO: "It's great! Wonderful!"

PAUL AND GEORGE: "Very nice!"

Q: "What have you seen that you like best about our country?"

JOHN: "You!!"

(laughter)

Q: "Thank you very much. I'll take that under advisement. Now, do you have any plans or any arrangements to meet the Johnson girls?"

JOHN: "No. We heard they didn't like concerts."

GEORGE: "I didn't know they were on the show!"

(laughter)

Q: "They may come.... Are they coming to your show tonight?"

RINGO: "We don't know."

GEORGE: "I don't know."

PAUL: "We're not sure. But if they do, you know, we'd love it."

RINGO: "We'd like to meet them."

Q: "You and the snow came to Washington at the same time today. Which do you think will have the greater impact?"

JOHN: "The snow will probably last longer."

RINGO: "Yeah. We're going tomorrow."

Q: "Have you ever heard of Walter Cronkite?"

PAUL: "Nope."

GEORGE: "Yeah. News."

JOHN: "Good old Walter! NBC News, isn't he? Yeah, we know him. See? You don't catch me!"

Q: (correcting) "CBS News."

RINGO: "CBS News."

(laughter)

PAUL: (jokingly) "CUT!"

GEORGE: "I know, but I didn't want to say it. 'Cuz I thought it was CBS."

JOHN: "Yeah?"

GEORGE: (to John) "We're doing ABC..."

JOHN: "Yeah?"

GEORGE: "The other fella is on CBS, and the other one is NBC."

Q: "This is NBC, believe it or not."

JOHN: "And you're Walter!!"

Q: "No, I'm Ed."

JOHN: (jokingly) "What's going on around here!!"

Q: "I don't know! So, we're all together here."

GEORGE: "This is NBC."

(A different reporter begins asking questions)

Q: "What do you think of your reception in America, so far?"

JOHN: "It's been great."

Q: "What struck you the most, so far?"

PAUL: "YOU!! (laughing) We won't do that one again."

RINGO: "When we first came in, you know--- The airport. We never expected nothing like that. It was great."

Q: "You mean the crowds?"

PAUL AND JOHN: "Yeah."

JOHN: "It knocked us out!"

Q: "In spite of the snow, you still got a good crowd?"

JOHN: "Great crowd, yeah. I don't know-- Half of them thought we were coming by air, and we came by train."

Q: "Tell me this. Why do you think you're so popular all of a sudden?"

JOHN: "I don't know. It must be the weather."

PAUL: (giggles) "We've no idea at all why. Really."

Q: "Do you think it's your singing?"

JOHN: (Operatic singing voice) "Eeeeeee Dhhooooo!"

PAUL: "I doubt it. It could be alot of things, and we don't know which it could be."

Q: "Where did you get the idea for the haircuts?"

PAUL: "We didn't. It just the way we..."

RINGO: "Where did you get the idea for yours??"

PAUL: (laughs) "No, it's just something that we liked. We enjoyed wearing our hair this way, so it's developed this way."

Q: "You save on haircutting, at least?"

PAUL: "Yeah, uhhh-- We're saving."

JOHN: "I think it costs more to keep it short than to keep it long, don't you?"

Q: "I don't know. I imagine."

PAUL: "Yeah. We're saving our money."

Q: "Well, where do you go from here?"

RINGO: "Back to, ummm..."

PAUL AND JOHN: "New York."

RINGO: "...New York tommorrow."

GEORGE: "Then Miami at the weekend, just for the next Sullivan show, and then we go home."

RINGO: "On Monday."

Q: "Are you still number one in Europe?"

JOHN: "Well, Europe is alot of countries."

Q: "Where are you number one then?"

GEORGE: "We're now number one in America and England."

JOHN: "Hong Kong and Sweden..."

GEORGE: "Australia, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, France..."

Q: "And you haven't any idea why?"

RINGO: "We lay down and do it."

JOHN: "We're coming out in Hong Kong and suddenly you're number one there years after so many records. Even here, you know, we've got records we've forgotten."

PAUL: "Funny records, yeah."

Q: "You call your records 'funny records'?"

GEORGE: "Yeah!"

JOHN: "They're funny once we've forgotten them."

GEORGE: "You know-- It's unusual because they've been out in England for over a year. Like "Please, Please Me" is a hit over here now, but it's over a year old, you see. And it's funny."

Q: "But, what I'm saying is-- Do you think of your records as funny records?"

BEATLES: "NO!"

GEORGE: "We think it's funny-- peculiar-- that they should be hits after such a long time."

Q: "Do you feel they're musical?"

JOHN: "Obviously they're musical because it's music, isn't it! Instruments play music. It's a record."

PAUL: "It's musical, you know."

JOHN: "It is musical."

PAUL: "It's music, isn't it! (sings) 'Bumm Bumm Bumm.'"

JOHN: "That's music, too."

PAUL: "He's good-- He knows music!"

Q: "Alright, but what do you call it?"

PAUL: "We try not to define our music because we get so many wrong classifications off it. It's no use. We just call it-- MUSIC??? (laughs) ...even if you don't."

Q: "With a question mark."

PAUL: "Pardon?"

Q: "With a question mark?"

PAUL: "No."

JOHN: "We leave that to the critics."

PAUL: "With an exclamation mark!"

Q: "OK. Have a good time in America."

PAUL: "Thank you very much."

JOHN AND GEORGE: "Thank you."

JOHN: "Keep buying 'em."

RINGO: "Look after yourself."

Lennon Interview: British Embassy, Washington D.C. 2/11/64

2009-02-12T10:29:00.000-08:00

Q: "Which one are you?"

JOHN: "Eric."

Q: (gesturing to the TV camera) "Eric, here is the American public..."

JOHN: "I'm John."

Q: "You're John?"

JOHN: "Yeah, it was a joke."

Q: "Well John, here is the American public. Forty million American viewers..."

JOHN: "It just looks like one man to me. Oh. It's the camera man."

Q: "What is your impression of the American public? You've been here for a while, now."

JOHN: "They are the wildest."

Q: "Why?"

JOHN: "I don't know. Tonight was, you know, marvelous. Ridiculous. Almost eight-thousand people all shouting at once, and we were trying to shout louder than them with microphones, and we still couldn't beat 'em."

Q: "Was America something like what you thought it would be like?"

JOHN: "No, nothing like it. We thought it would be much quieter. We thought we'd, you know, have to grow on everybody, and everybody seems to sort of know us all, you know, as if we've been here for years. It's great."

Q: "What is your impression of the new American singing group, 'The Cockroaches'? Have you heard them yet?"

JOHN: "I haven't heard them. But it's already been done about eighty times in England. Sorry Cockroaches!" (grins and giggles)

Beatles Interview: Carnegie Hall 2/12/64

2009-02-12T10:28:00.002-08:00

(The interview begins with Rudy asking where else the Beatles will be touring)

RINGO: "We go to Australia, and we go to Israel and South Africa next year. And we also have a holiday. In fact, THIS was a holiday until we got booked for America."

Q: "Paul, What do you do about the reaction from teenagers?"

PAUL: "The main thing is, we keep calm. I dunno. You can look at it in two ways. You can look at it just as a thing that's happening and take it in your stride, or else you can sort of get nervous by it and then you get worried. We try and keep it calm."

(Next, Rudy asks about the Beatles' upcoming movie project)

PAUL: "It'll be about us, and things. The story's been written by Alun Owen, an English playwrite -- very good. It should be quite a good story and a good film all around."

Q: "Have you been out since you've been here?"

PAUL: "I dunno, with the police hanging around all the time."

Q: "I can understand."

PAUL: "We've been out to one or two clubs. Not exactly dating, but we met one or two girls, you know. We didn't go out WITH girls, we met girls in the clubs."

Q: "What are your ambitions?"

PAUL: "We used to have LOTS of ambitions. You know like, number one records, Sunday Night At The Palladium, Ed Sullivan Show, go to America, you know. All kinds of ambitions like that. I can't really think of any more. We've done an awful lot of them at the moment. (pause) To be havin' a laugh. To be happy."

Q: "John, do you find that the reaction here in the United States is very different from what you experienced back home? The reaction of the teenagers."

JOHN: "No. I find it very similar, only over here they sort of went wilder quicker, you know. In England we sort of had to go 'round, and you know, we toured and things like that and got known. But I suppose the publicity helped a lot here."

Q: "Yeah, you were pretty much pre-sold when you came over here, uhh..."

JOHN: "Well, it could have killed us, as well. You know, I mean, we could have just come over and got off the plane, if they said 'We don't want to know about THAT,' you know, 'Look at 'em, we don't...' Publicity can do a lot, but you can't sell anything if the kids don't want it."

Q: "The whole reaction has been fantastic. Do you feel that it's a fad? Would you call it a fad?"

JOHN: "Oh, obviously. Anything in this business is a fad. I mean, we don't think we're gonna last forever. We're just gonna have a good time while we last, you know."

Q: "Will you call it a fad that should last a long time?"

JOHN: "Well, you know, something that's got this wild, whatever people say about it -- 'You'll die tomorrow,' we could go on working for another five years, even if not at this rate, and make a lot of money, you know. Obviously it's gonna level out. People say 'You're gonna die next month.' You might'nt be as popular but (giggles) you know, you can go on and on from this peak, I think."

Q: "It's pretty difficult for me to determine exactly what the Beatles sound is. I like rock and roll, I'm not putting it down, but I don't really understand what is the Beatles sound. Can you define it for me?"

JOHN: "Well, as far as all of us are concerned, there's no such thing as the Liverpool sound, the Mersey sound, or even a Beatles sound, you know. It's just a name that people tag on. It's just us playing rock and roll. The only difference is, we wrote it. You know, that's the only difference. Most of it, anyway. We didn't write all of it."

Q: "Do all of you write, John?"

JOHN: "Paul and I do most of the writing. George has written a few. Ringo hasn't 'cuz (giggling) it's hard to write something on the drums, isn't it."

Q: "Yeah. And you do your own arrangements, I assume?"

JOHN: "Yeah. Well, we arrange them in the studio normally, you know. We get a basic idea, because you write a song and you get a sound in your head that you think it's gonna sound like. And it usually turns out different, you know. We've given up trying to plan it too much before we go in. None of us can read music. Our A&R man (George Martin) can read music, so sometimes he'll say 'That note's just... it doesn't work, you know. You can't have it.' And we have to go into detail with the piano and everything and work it out and say 'It DOES work. You know, we're singing it. It works.' And sometimes he's right, sometimes he's wrong, you know. (giggling) But it usually all works out in the end."

Q: "If you can feel it, then it sounds good. Is the way you feel?"

JOHN: "Yeah. I mean, sometimes you THINK you feel it, and you listen back and it doesn't happen. You were really feelin' and you're swingin' and it doesn't happen. But when it does, it's great."

Beatles Interview: Return To London From America 2/22/64

2009-02-12T10:28:00.001-08:00

PATHE NEWS INTERVIEW:

Q: "George, your fans obviously enjoyed it over there, I assume the press enjoyed it, did you enjoy it?"

GEORGE: "Yeah, it was marvelous. You know. Everything. Every bit of it was a knock-out."

Q: "Even the work?"

GEORGE: Yeah, we enjoyed it, you know. It was different working in different places with the audience all around us."

Q: "What impressed you most about the place? Did you have time to take anything in properly?"

GEORGE: "Oh, yeah. I think I enjoyed the sun in Miami most of all. You know-- healthy."

Q: "You're the healthy one of the four?"

GEORGE: "No, but the sun was sort of very healthy."

Q: "Did you have a chance to get away from anybody at any time on the trip?"

GEORGE: "Yeah."

RINGO: "He got away from me-- twice!"

(laughter)

Q: "What did you most like about the trip, Ringo?

RINGO: "Oh, I just loved all of it, you know. Especially Miami-- the sun. I didn't know what it meant till I went over there."

Q: "Don't you get it up in Liverpool?"

RINGO: "No, they're finished up there, you know. They've cut it out."

(laughter)

Q: "Did you ever have a chance, John, to just get away on your own without anybody recognizing you?"

JOHN: "Yeah. We borrowed a couple of millionaires houses, you know."

Q: "You could afford to BUY a couple of millionaire's houses, couldn't you?"

PAUL: "Naw."

JOHN: "Yeah, we'd sooner borrow 'em. It's cheaper.

(laughter)

JOHN: "And we did a bit of water-skiing. Well, sort of, anyway."

RINGO: "Yeah, we had a great time."

Q: (to John) "Did your wife enjoy it over there?"

JOHN: "She loved it. (comically) Who?? Who??"

PAUL: "Shh-Shh."

RINGO: "Don't tell 'em he's married. It's a secret."

Q: "What about the taste of the fans over there. Did you find the same stuff?"

PAUL: "Yeah."

JOHN: "He never bit any."

(laughter)

PAUL: "We expected them to be very different, but they weren't at all. The accent was the only thing, you know. That was the only difference."

Q: "Did they reckon you sang in an English accent or an American accent?"

PAUL: "No, some fella said, 'How come, because you're from Britain, and you still sing in an American accent,' or something. We were trying to explain it to him.... oh, it was funny."

Q: "When you came back from France you told me that they like the sort of quicker numbers."

PAUL: "Yeah."

Q: "But what did you do? Did you just do all the same routine as you do here?"

PAUL: "Uhh, yeah."

JOHN: "We did the older song."

GEORGE: "Most of our records are hits over there."

PAUL: "Oh yeah, we had to do 'Please Please Me' over there. We hadn't been doing that for a long time here, but it's in the charts there."

Q: "That's history, here. What about the Beatles' styles-- all these wigs and suits and things? Are they catching on over there?"

GEORGE: "Yeah, they're selling well."

RINGO: (jokingly) "15 million a day!"

Q: "I hear that the four of you have been millionaires by the end of the year."

GEORGE: "Oh. That's nice."

(laughter)

Q: "Have you got time to actually spend this money?"

BEATLES: (in unison) "What money??"

Q: "Doesn't he (Brian Epstein) give any to you?"

GEORGE: "No, no. Have you seen that car of his?"

(laughter)

Q: "Is there any intention for you to go back to America-- or in fact, join the brain-drain and a big guitar-drain and stay there?"

RINGO: "We'd like to go back. We wouldn't stay there. We love England."

BBC-TV GRANDSTAND INTERVIEW:

Q: "Welcome back, boys. How does this reception here compare with America?"

RINGO: "Oh, it was great! It was every bit as good."

JOHN: "It was better."

PAUL: "Better."

RINGO: "It was better."

Q: "I must say even you boys looked surprised as you came down the aircraft steps."

PAUL: "Yeah."

JOHN: "Well, wouldn't you be?"

GEORGE: "It's so early in the morning."

JOHN: "Yeah, we only just got up."

RINGO: "We haven't got up, we haven't been to bed yet. Don't forget, it's four o'clock in the states now."

Q: "What do you think about America? Is it very different from your point of view?"

RINGO: "It's bigger."

Q: "Did you get lost then, George?"

RINGO: (jokingly) "I'll pass you on to George now."

GEORGE: "No, I didn't get lost, George."

PAUL: "Nobody let him out, you know. He was in the hotel the whole time."

GEORGE: "Yeah, as soon as we got there they strapped me up in bed."

(laughter)

PAUL: "But it's a marvelous place. We loved it."

Q: "Is it very different for performance over there than performing here?"

GEORGE: "Yeah."

Q: "In what way?"

GEORGE: "You don't play theatres over there, you know. The places we played-- Carnegie Hall and this place in Washington."

RINGO: "A big stadium."

GEORGE: "Yeah, a big stadium with the audience all around and the acoustics were terrible."

JOHN: "So we sparred up, you know, before we got..."

RINGO: "Yeah, it was good."

GEORGE: "But it was good for, you know-- It was quite a novelty, wasn't it, John?"

JOHN: "Yeah it was. (jokingly) I'll pass you on to Paul."

(laughter)

PAUL: "It was, too. Yes."

Q: "Now Ringo, I hear you were manhandled at the Embassy Ball. Is this right?"

RINGO: "Not really. Someone just cut a bit of my hair, you see."

Q: "Let's have a look. You seem to have got plently left."

RINGO: (turns head) "Can you see the difference? It's longer, this side."

Q: "What happened exactly?"

RINGO: "I don't know. I was just talking, having an interview (exaggerated voice) Just like I am NOW!"

(John and Paul begin lifting locks of his hair, pretending to cut it)

RINGO: "I was talking away and I looked 'round, and there was about 400 people just smiling. So, you know-- what can you say!"

JOHN: "What can you say!"

RINGO: "Tomorrow never knows."

JOHN: (laughs)

Q: "George, how do you like being described as the Prime Minister's secret weapon?"

GEORGE: "It's great, yeah. The thing is-- I didn't get the bit where they said, 'Earning all these dollars for Britain,' like, are we sharing it out or something?"

(laughter)

Q: "But we're told that you've come back from America millionaires."

PAUL: "Naw, you're kidding."

JOHN: "Next time."

Q: "Now what about Miami? I mean, you were in the millionaire's playground."

RINGO: "Oh, that was marvelous-- Miami!"

Q: "You lived well, did you?"

PAUL: "Yeah. Well, we borrowed these houses, you see. These people rang-up and said, 'Do you want our house, lad?' So we said, (American accent) 'By gum, we do!'"

(laughter)

PAUL: "And we went across there, and we all water-skied, and fishing."

(Paul gestures a two-foot fish with his hands. John demonstrates a one-inch fish with his fingers)

RINGO: "He caught a monster!"

Q: "How did it compare with New Brighton?"

PAUL: (laughs) "With New Brighton? It wasn't as sunny, of course, as New Brighton."

RINGO: "Of course, we missed the docks."

JOHN: "And the people didn't have as much money."

GEORGE: "And there was more oil on the sand in Miami."

Q: "We'd like to hear what you thought about (meeting) Mister Clay." (Cassius Clay, aka Mohammed Ali)

JOHN: "Very tall."

RINGO: "Oh, he's a big lad."

PAUL: "He's a great laugh, more than anything. He's a big lad."

GEORGE: "He's gonna get Sonny Liston in three."

JOHN: "...he said."

RINGO: "So he said."

PAUL: "That's what he said. I don't think he will, though."

Q: "I hear you were creeping up to Harry Carpenter in the training camp, Paul, and whispering things to him."

PAUL: "Yeah. Well you see, the only thing was-- He asked me who was going to win! And I would have told him out that I thought Liston was gonna win."

JOHN: (jokingly) "You coward!"

PAUL: (laughs) "I'm a coward! And it was in Clay's camp, you see, and there was all these big fellas around. I had to whisper, you know."

JOHN: (starts singing, and Paul joins in) "'Liston, do you want to know a secret.'"

(laughter)

RINGO: "Pluggin' you know. We're still trying to sell!"

Q: "How did Clay compare with you?"

RINGO: "He's bigger than all of us put together."

Q: "We're told that he was acting in a way that even the Beatles couldn't match."

PAUL: "Yeah. He was, actually."

RINGO: "He was good."

JOHN: "He was saying, 'I'z beautiful, and you'z beautiful, too!!'"

(laughter)

PAUL: "Yeah, he's a showman."

RINGO: "Oh, definitely."

Q: "Well now that you're back, you're out of the Top Ten for the first time for a long time."

JOHN: (comical choking sound)

Q: "What about it."

PAUL: "Uhh, I don't know."

JOHN: "What do you suggest?"

Q: "Have you got anything on the way?"

JOHN: "We could go straight, couldn't we."

GEORGE: "I'm going to try tap-dancing."

PAUL: "And Ringo's doing comedy on the high-wire."

Q: "But have you got anything on the way, apart from the film?"

PAUL: "We're doing recording next week."

JOHN: (to Paul) "Shhh!!"

RINGO: "Don't tell 'em."

PAUL: "We're not! It's a lie! Sorry! (whispers) We're recording next week."

Q: "We daren't ask you where."

PAUL: "No!"

RINGO: "We couldn't tell you."

JOHN: "Oh no. --DECCA!"

(laughter)

Q: "What about your impression of American adults? I mean, we hear your impression of teenagers and so on. I saw you, Ringo, being quoted as saying something about this."

RINGO: "What did I say?"

Q: "You tell me."

RINGO: (jokingly) "I don't know. You know, I'm quoted so much it's just ridiculous."

(laughter)

Q: "You tell him what he said, Paul."

PAUL: "I don't remember. About adults?"

RINGO: "They're older than I am!"

(laughter)

Q: "You said the adults were a bigger problem than the teenagers."

RINGO: "Oh, yeah. Well, you know, they've sort of gone potty."

PAUL: "Yeah, they were."

RINGO: "I mean, the teenagers will ask for the autograph, and take it, and leave it at that. But the adults want to know where you've been, and..."

PAUL: "Yeah. Cut your hair, too."

RINGO: "Yeah. Well, I don't know if it was an adult, but somebody did."

Q: "Did you manage to get much time away from all this, and really get away by yourselves?"

JOHN: "We got three days at the end, after the 'Ed Sullivan in Miami,' you know, we stayed on. Was it three days?"

PAUL: "Yeah."

RINGO: "It was around that."

JOHN: "Three days, you know... nearly three."

Q: "Anyway, nice to see you back, boys. Thanks very much..."

PAUL: "Thank you."

RINGO: "Good to see you. Keep kicking."

JOHN: (giggling to Ringo) "Keep kicking."