January 13: On This Day in World History … briefly
EMI's American subsidiary, Capitol Records, hindered the Beatles' releases in the United States for more than a year by initially declining to issue their music, including their first three singles.
1964: Fab Four hit US charts
The Beatles were an English rock band formed in Liverpool in 1960. With members John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr, they became regarded as the foremost and most influential music band in history. Rooted in skiffle, beat and 1950s rock and roll, the group were integral to pop music’s evolution into an art form and to the development of the counterculture of the 1960s.
They often incorporated classical elements, older pop forms and unconventional recording techniques in innovative ways, and later experimented with several musical styles ranging from pop ballads and Indian music to psychedelia and hard rock. As the members continued to draw influences from a variety of cultural sources, their musical and lyrical sophistication grew, and they were seen as an embodiment of the era’s socio-cultural movements.
The Beatles’ first visit to the United States took place when the nation was still mourning the assassination of President John F. Kennedy the previous November. Commentators often suggest that, for many, particularly the young, the Beatles’ performances reignited the sense of excitement and possibility that momentarily faded in the wake of the assassination, and helped make way for the revolutionary social changes to come in the decade. Their hairstyle, unusually long for the era and mocked by many adults, became an emblem of rebellion to the burgeoning youth culture.
The subject of massed teenage hysteria in Britain and irate debate in London’s House of Commons, enter the US pop charts at number 45 and climb fast. The group’s new single ‘I Wanna Hold Your Hand’ brings America its first taste of the new Mersey Beat from Liverpool. Billboard magazine described the new single as ‘a driving rocker with surf on the Thames sound’ – predicting it would be a chart-topper.
Most notable historic snippets or facts extracted from the book ‘On This Day’ first published in 1992 by Octopus Publishing Group Ltd, London, as well as additional supplementary information extracted from Wikipedia.
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