Beatles 50th Blog

Gaumont State Cinema, Kilburn, London

This date, the 12th of The Beatles' 1964 British tour, was the second time they performed at the Gaumont State Cinema in London's Kilburn district. They had previously performed there on 9 April 1964.

On this day The Beatles performed two concerts, for which they were paid £850. Their set throughout the 1964 tour contained 10 songs: Twist And Shout, Money (That's What I Want), Can't Buy Me Love, Things We Said Today, I'm Happy Just To Dance With You, I Should Have Known Better, If I Fell, I Wanna Be Your Man, A Hard Day's Night and Long Tall Sally.

The support acts on the tour were The Rustiks, Sounds Incorporated, Michael Haslam, The Remo Four, Tommy Quickly and Mary Wells, and the compère was Bob Bain. The evening's two shows began at 6.40pm and 9pm.

Odeon Cinema, Leeds

For George Martin, another mono mix of "I Feel Fine", made between 11:00 am and 12:00 noon in studio one at EMI. For the Beatles, two more performances in Leeds.

Odeon Cinema, Glasgow

While the Beatles were in Scotland, George Martin and team worked this day from 2:30 to 5:45 pm at Abbey Road producing mono masters of "I Feel Fine", "I'll Follow The Sun", "She's A Woman" and "Everybody's Trying To Be My Baby", with tapes of "I Feel Fine" and "She's A Woman" being cut out and dispatched to Capitol Records in Hollywood the next day.

Caird Hall, Dundee

A camera crew from Grampian Television - ITV franchise for north-east Scotland - visited the Beatles in their Caird hall dressing-room before the first of this evening's two "houses", filming an interview they gave to June Shields. The crew also shot some more general footage concerning the concert, including some Beatles stage action. The resulting package, running a little over five minutes, was inserted into Grampian Week, introduced by Shields and transmitted on Friday, October 23rd - 6:10-6:45 pm.

THE COMPLETE BEATLES CHRONICLE - Mark Lewisohn

ABC Cinema, Edinburgh

The first of three consecutive nights in Scotland.

The seventh date of The Beatles' 1964 British tour took place at the ABC Cinema in Edinburgh. It was the first of three consecutive nights in Scotland.

The Beatles performed two concerts, for which they were paid £850. Their set throughout the tour contained 10 songs: Twist And Shout, Money (That's What I Want), Can't Buy Me Love, Things We Said Today, I'm Happy Just To Dance With You, I Should Have Known Better, If I Fell, I Wanna Be Your Man, A Hard Day's Night and Long Tall Sally.

The support acts on the tour were The Rustiks, Sounds Incorporated, Michael Haslam, The Remo Four, Tommy Quickly and Mary Wells, and the compère was Bob Bain. The evening's two shows began at 6.30pm and 8.50pm.

Studio Two, EMI Studios, London

Scarcely baulking at the idea of having to record during this break from their concert tour, and a Sunday at that, the Beatles put in a solid nine hours' work at Abbey Road, starting and completing the recording of six new album tracks and the A-side of their next single.

Working from 2:30 to 11:30 pm - a late finish by any standard, even more so considering they had to give two performances in Edinburgh the next evening - the Beatles first completed the October 6th recording of "Eight Days A Week" with two edit pieces, one for the intro (not used) and the other for outro (used), and then set about the new material.

Only two of the six new recordings were Lennon-McCartney songs, and one of these was already several years old. For the others, the Beatles dived into their memories and returned with four songs from their pre-fame stage act. First to be taped (in just two takes but the first was 'best') was Little Richard's medley of "Kansas City"/Hey-Hey-Hey-Hey!, next was a re-make of Dr. Feelgood and the Interns' Mr. Moonlight", improving upon the August 14th recording with four more takes, next was the new single, John's "I Feel Fine" (nine takes); Paul's late-1950's composition "I'll Follow The Sun" (eight), Carl Perkins' "Everybody's Trying To Be My Baby" (just one take), Chuck Berry's "Rock And Roll Music" (just one take) and Buddy Holly's "Words of Love" (three takes).

"I Feel Fine", released as the Beatles next single on Friday, November 27th (backed with "She's A Woman") gave public warning that recording studio experimentation was afoot, its distinctive opening sound being deliberately-administered amplifier feedback.

THE COMPLETE BEATLES CHRONICLE - MARK LEWISOHN

The Beatles took a rest today.

ABC Cinema, Hull

While George Martin was busy in Studio One at Abbey Road, 2:30 to 5:30 pm, producing two mono mixes of "No Reply", the Beatles were about to arrive in Hull for their night's work at the ABC. After this date the tour resumed on the 19th.

Globe Cinema, Stockton-on-Tees

The Beatles' first visit to Stockton-on-Tee had occurred on the same day (November 22, 1963) that President Kennedy was assasinated. This second and last visit to the north-east town coincided with a General Election in the United Kingdom, which returned the Labour Party, headed by Harold Wilson, to government after 13 years of Conservative rule. In their Stockton hotel room, the Beatles were visited by an interviewer and camera crew from local ITV station Tyne Tees and asked, among discussion about other subjects, about their voting intentions. The item was held over for a day and then transmitted in the news-magazine programme North-East Newsview on October 16 (6;35-7:00 pm).

Studio Four, Granada TV Centre, Manchester and ABC Cinema, Ardwick, Manchester

During the afternoon the Beatles made a rare return visit to the Granada TV Centre in Manchester, taping a mimed performance of "I Should Have Known Better". It was slotted into Scene At 6:30 on Friday, October 16 (6:30-7:00 pm), the eve of the second anniversary of their TV debut, on Granada's People And Places.

Backstage at the ABC the Beatles gave an interview to Manchester-based TV reporter David Tindall, broadcast in this evening's edition of the BBC1 local news-magazine programme Look North (6:35-7:00 pm). In sound only, the interview was repeated by the BBC North Home Service radio programme "The Week In The North" on Saturday, October 17th (9:30-10:00 am.)