Beatles Ltd

Through days crowded with press interviews, TV appearances, recording sessions, photography sessions, signing autographs (even for waitresses before they've eaten), stage concerts, travelling, and waiting, the moods of the Beatles range from the hilarious to the depressed, either as individuals or as a group.

The photographs in this book search out their moods and bring you a close-up of their varied activities and movements over a period from August to early November 1963.

Two specific locations are the Southern Television studios at Southampton (pages 2 & 3), and E.M.I. recording studios (pages 8 to 13), where the boys were working out their new LP 'With the Beatles'.

For the rest, pictures were taken in dressing-rooms, hotels, concerts, and finally on the trip to Sweden. (The long thin picture shows John climbing the North face of the town hall in Stockholm.)

A word about their 'sound'. In their early days as a group they were mainly interested in solo artists like Elvis, Carl Perkins, Chuck Berry. Gene Vincent and Bo Diddley. They began to develop their special 'group sound' when the Everly Brothers and the Coasters came on the scene. At the time their singing style was influenced by Little Richard and Larry Williams among others.

Their present sound, referred to as the Liverpool sound, relates to American R & B and harmony groups, and solo artists such as the Miracles, the Shirelles, the Chiffons, the Crystals, Martha and the Vandellas James Ray, Mary Wells, Phil Flowers and Inez Foxx, to name a few.

The Beatles themselves have the ability to develop their talents and avoid routine. There are many successes still open to them. Just one kind has been reached recently when they received a Golden Disc for a record before it had even been released!