THE BEATLES
Greatest Rock and Roll Band Ever, or a bunch of showoffs?
Contributed by Dustin Rojas
In the year of 1957, John Lennon met Paul McCartney and
so was formed a friendship that would last...about ten years. Lennon and
McCartney were two members of a British rock group called The Beatles,
which also featured George Harrison and Ringo Starr, aka
Richard Starkey. In 1962, they released the single Love Me Do
which immediately went to number one in England. By 1964, The Beatles had
not one but four hit singles in the US.
They toured from '62 till '66, when the four of them decided that touring
was impossible and set about working just on studio albums. The biggest thing
to come out of that was the album
Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, inspired by the album
Pet
Sounds by the Beach Boys,
which was inspired by the Beatles album Revolver
.
Unfortunately, in 1967 their manager, Brian Epstein, died of an overdose of sleeping pills. This ultimately led to the break up of the band in 1970. Rumours of them getting back together were popular, even parodied by Saturday Night Live, until the untimely death by shooting of John Lennon in 1980. In 1995, McCartney, Harrison and Starr released two new singles from old demo tapes of John Lennon's, and in 2001, George Harrison died of lung cancer.