The Vinyl Dialogues Blog

Stories behind memorable albums of the 1970s as told by the artists

Tag: Beatles

The Beatles took the U.S. by storm, and then almost got taken by a storm themselves

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On February 9, 2020

In The Vinyl Dialogues Book

The Beatles – John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr (pictured here during a solo show at the Tower Theater in Upper Darby, Pennsylvania, in 2015) – first appeared in the United States on Feb. 9, 1964, on the “Ed Sullivan Show.”
(Photo by Mike Morsch)

In February 1964, a snowstorm had blasted the northeast. The region was paralyzed and air travel had virtually shut down.

Sandy Yaguda was at his home in Brooklyn, waiting out the storm. 

Yaguda — stage name Sandy Deanne — was one of the original members of the group Jay and the Americans, which by winter of 1964 had recorded a couple of hit songs, most notably “She Cried,” which reached No. 5 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart in 1962.

And then the phone rang Feb. 10 at Yaguda’s house. It was the band’s manager.

“He called and said, ‘Listen, you guys … Read more

Ringo very good at being Ringo – and at getting by with a little help from his All-Starr friends

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On October 31, 2015

In The Vinyl Dialogues Book

Before the show Friday night at the Tower Theater in Philadelphia, people were gravitating toward the stage to take pictures of Ringo Starr’s drum set.

It was the day before Halloween, but the only sign of that was a jack-o-lantern that was sitting on the riser alongside the drum set. On the pumpkin was an image of Ringo. I recognized it right away. It was the way Ringo was drawn for the Beatles Saturday morning cartoon series that ran on ABC from 1965 through 1969. It was one of my favorite cartoons as a kid and I watched it every Saturday.

The image on the pumpkin immediately reminded me of my childhood and a much simpler time. And it reminded me that it’s pretty universally agreed upon now that Ringo was in a pretty good band in the 1960s, a band that was big enough to have its own Saturday … Read more

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