h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: The Beatles at the BBC - A87852432
Author: Bluebottle - U43530

A bit about the BBC's Beatles broadcasts.

<BB<

After reading Live at the BBC, this is interesting

I struggled a bit with the introduction, though...

"On five of the six national singles charts of the time, the sixth, Record Retailer, is now the accepted chart." - should it be a semicolon before "the sixth", so this is saying that they were number 1 on all but the Record Retailer?

"a hard day's night eight-hour gig " - perhaps better to put inverted commas round hard day's night. Just out of interest, what time did the gigs start and finish?

Similarly need to put inverted commas round eight days a week.

The third paragraph in the introduction needs to be moved somewhere else, so that the second paragraph's strength isn't diluted

Next section:

"Between March 1962 - long before the release of 'Please Please Me'- and June 1965" Perhaps this is the place to talk about their debut album, and distinguish it from the single of the same name. 1962 isn't really "long before" 1963, either...

Ah! I just read the quote by George Harrison - is the 8 hour gig thing in the introduction a joke reference?!

You could put a link to New Brighton if you haven't already got one A307216

"Although he had been an early influence, the Beatles never recorded a cover of one of his records and John in particular felt disenchanted by the post-army Elvis." I think you need to mention Elvis earlier in this sentence, as it follows after mention of several people. What does it mean that they never recorded a cover of an Elvis record? Just that they only sang the songs for the BBC recording, but didn't release one themselves?

Up to Radio in the 1960s

Thanks for the read-through, glad I've not put you off reading about the Beatles after the 'Live at the BBC' entry (I just mistyped that as 'Lice at the BBC', which would have been a completely different experience...)

I've changed the bit about the charts - yes, the Beatles were number 1 on 5 of the 6 national charts, except they were number 2 on Record Retailer, which is the one that became the officially used chart. So near, and yet so far...

I'm not sure about putting 'A hard day's night' in inverted commas, as I don't want to imply that they played the song 'A Hard Day's Night' constantly for eight hours. I'll have a think...

The Beatles played for up to 12-hours with half hour breaks 98 days in a row in Hamburg during 1961. When they started, though, they only had to do 4 and 6 hour nights - midweek sets 8-9.30pm, 10-11pm, 11.30pm-12.30am and 1-2am, with 7-8.30pm, 9-10pm, 10.30-11.30pm, 12-1am, and 1.30-3am on Saturdays and 5-6pm, 6.30-7.30pm, 8-9pm, 9.30-10.30pm, 11-12 midnight and 12.30-1.30am on Sundays. Author Mark Lewisohn must have spent the 1960s stalking them all constantly, as his books details their every performance and move. (The George Harrison joke is the being killed with a carving knife)

I've moved the former paragraph 3 down a bit. No-one else who ever reads this will know which paragraph it was. Perhaps they can guess?

I've also tweaked the Elvis bit too.

<BB<

Thanks <BB<

Especial thanks for explaining the 8 hour gig thing - my understanding of the word "gig" was that it only applied to a non-stop performance I therefore learned that it also means an engagement, so in this case the gig consisted of a series of performances with half hour breaks

Right, reading more:

"John sang two songs, covers of 'Memphis, Tennessee' and 'Please Mister Postman', Paul sang 'Dream Baby (How Long Must I Dream?)' and two of these songs were never later recorded by the Beatles."

Would you be better saying which song *was* recorded by the Beatles?

" 'Ask Me Why', a Lennon-McCartney original that was heard on 15 June, 1962"

I read this a couple of times, and think if there is a full stop after original, you can say "The song was heard..."

In Pop Go the Beatles section, there are a couple of typos in the second quote by Paul.

"a song they never recorded and Brian Matthew " - perhaps say they never recorded themselves, or on one of their own albums or something, and put a full stop before Brian Matthew...

" This appearance had been recorded on 22 January, on a day in which the Beatles were interviewed live for lunchtime show Pop Inn along with Jon Pertwee as well as an issue of The Talent Spot"

Does this mean on 22 January the Beatles were interviewed for 3 programmes? And they were interviewed at the same time as Jon Pertwee?

"Soon after this record became the Beatles' first number one." - Not sure if you need this, as it is clearly explained in the introduction, but it might need clarifying that it is "their second single" that went to number one...

The Please Please Me album paragraph 3 fits in nicely there

"Of course the Beatles also appeared on Radio Luxembourg, as The Friday Spectacular was sponsored by EMI" - was EMI the Beatles record company?



Showing the Way

Thanks for the read-through. I've made more fairly straight-forward changes to clarify it, anything that still seems unclear, let me know.

The one thing I will comment on is:
"Soon after this record became the Beatles' first number one." - Not sure if you need this, as it is clearly explained in the introduction, but it might need clarifying that it is "their second single"
I'd already mentioned that 'Please Please Me' was their second single in that paragraph. The point I hoped I was making is that it was after the Beatles played on 'Saturday Club', the UK's most popular radio pop programme, that they got to number 1. Would they have had that success if their song hadn't been broadcast?

<BB<

Thanks <BB< - looking good so far. I think I was a bit confused between records and recordings, so wasn't sure whether it was clear what "this record" was, but the tweak is good, and I see your point about the influence of the radio programme on the subsequent success of the single

"This was the last of 40 live radio sessions that the Beatles gave the BBC in 1963, which Brian Epstein had nicknamed the 'Beatles Broadcasting Corporation'."

I think this needs reorganising a bit to something like:

"This was the last of the 40 live radio sessions that the Beatles gave in 1963 for the BBC, which Brian Epstein had nicknamed the 'Beatles Broadcasting Corporation'."

so that 1963 isn't the thing being renamed

"recording their impressions for their British fans" - their impressions of the USA?

"At the end of that week they appeared on Saturday Club" - I presume "they" refers to the Beatles themselves rather than to recordings of their songs.

"The Beatles also perform 36 songs" - performed.

Excellent concluding section

One side-effect of Captcha is that by the time you've finally been able to update your entry, you've forgotten what changes you've done.

I did make them, mind. And what fantastic changes they are, taking into consideration all of your points. A tweak here, a rephrase there, all aimed at making this entry the best it can possibly be. Just because I personally don't find the changes particularly memorable at the moment should not detract from the fact that the changes were:
a.) Made, and
b.) Unbelievably exciting.

<BB<

I haven't listened yet, but this 2-part BBC documentary on the Beatles recordings is currently available on iPlayer:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01mrm5b

I'll have a listen later.

<BB<

35 minutes and 28 seconds into the broadcast there's a really good bit.

<BB<

Me and my big mouth...

I've enjoyed listening to it.

<BB<

Yes, me too. You can't deny they were one of the best rock & roll bands. Some of their later stuff I can leave. Funny that that show is 34 years old now.

I've had another readthrough today and spotted just a few minor points:

"During the week only a daily half-hour show, Teenagers Turn, for teenagers and younger listeners from 5-5:30pm might possibly include something more modern. Saturdays, however, were a different story."

You mention Thursdays after this sentence, so I wonder if you perhaps need to say just a bit more about Saturdays in that sentence - presumably more than half an hour of modern music was played.

"on 4 April, the Beatles held all top five spots in the US singles chart12 as well as having both top-selling albums in the album chart"

I wasn't quite sure here about whether the Beatles only had two albums, and they were both in the chart, or whether they had two albums at the top of the chart...

"For their BBC appearance on Whit Monday 1965, the Beatles had requested that they be allowed to record the show at EMI's Abbey Road Studios, which they would later make famous with their Abbey Road album. Despite this, they reluctantly agreed to use the BBC's Piccadilly Studio."

Despite what? I presume the request was turned down, so they had to use the BBC's facilities again.

I've tweaked those points so that it is hopefully clearer now

<BB<

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<BB<

Ahh, sorry - you'll just have to keep writing

I need to keep writing, too, to maintain the balance so you don't get more than half and that will be just right