Blondie’s drummer on the Fab Four’s first album.
People of my generation in the States all cite The Beatles’ first appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show as a lightbulb moment. Everyone mentions it. I’ve since come to realise that for you guys in the UK
The Beatles were more like boys next door, not particularly unusual. But for people in the States, the way they used English colloquialisms in their songs seemed so exotic. When the film
A Hard Day’s Night came out you actually heard them speak, their personalities came to the fore, another major insight for people in America.
Introducing… The Beatles was the first UK album Please Please Me,
minus a couple of tracks . Back in the day, I’d have bought the mono version because the stereo was a dollar more. But we’ve all since come to know that The Beatles were only present for the mono mixes, the stereo stuff was done later.
It kicks off with I Saw Her Standing There and ends with Twist And Shout.
It’s mostly covers of stuff by Arthur Alexander, Buddy Holly and girlgroup songs like Boys, Chains and
Baby, It’s You. I always thought it a bit weird having Ringo singing Boys.
Even to this day it seems odd. It was very unusual then for any guy groups to do girl-group stuff. A Taste Of Honey would make me cringe, but the whole album’s so eclectic. And that eclecticism was a role model for everything we did with Blondie.