Elvis' favourite Beatles songs were all written by Fab Four member 'he loved'
EXCLUSIVE: Elvis Presley's favourite Beatles songs were all penned by the same member of the Fab Four whose writing "he loved".
By GEORGE SIMPSON, Senior Film and Arts Reporter
Express
Mon, Mar 10, 2025
Elvis Presley's favourite Beatles songs were all written by the Fab Four member 'he loved'.
(Image: GETTY)
Elvis Presley had a mixed relationship with The Beatles. The Fab Four were heavily influenced by the King of Rock and Roll during their 1950s upbringing. And by the time the five men finally met 60 years ago this August, The King saw them as his rivals whose music careers were in a much better place than his own. By 1970, he was telling President Nixon that the Beatles were “un-American” due to their association with hippy drug culture. And yet Elvis would end up covering a number of their hits live during his residency years from Yesterday to Hey Jude.
Daily Express spoke exclusively with the King’s step-brother David Stanley, who we interviewed on that very Las Vegas stage where the star performed every show. During our conversation, the Memphis Mafia confidant and bodyguard shared that, of all the Beatles, Elvis “loved George Harrison.” Davis shared: “He thought George was the most prolific writer. He really liked his writing.” He then listed off Elvis’ four favourite Beatles songs all penned by the Quiet Beatle.
Something (1969)
This is the only Beatles song on the list Elvis regularly covered live, including at his 1973 concert movie Aloha from Hawaii via Satellite. Penned by Harrison for the Abbey Road album, the track is believed to be a love song to his first wife Pattie Boyd.
(Image: APPLE CORPS)
If I Needed Someone (1965)
Harrison wrote this Rubber Soul album track for Pattie too. Upon its release this song was widely considered to be his best to date.
(Image: GETTY)
Here Comes the Sun (1969)
Another Abbey Road classic, Harrison’s lyrics on the arrival of spring also reflected his brief break from the Beatles’ business dealings. With over 1.5 billion listens to date, it’s by far the most played Beatles song on Spotify with Let It Be in a far-off second place on 786 million.
(Image: APPLE CORPS)
Norwegian Wood (1965)
This Rubber Soul track is a cheeky addition, because it was penned by John Lennon with lyrical contributions by Paul McCartney. However, Harrison introduced his sitar part for the first time to a Beatles song. This song also marked the first time an Indian string instrument featured on a Western rock recording.
John Lennon and Yoko Ono at the "Bed in For Peace" at the Amsterdam Hilton Hotel, March 25, 1969. Photo by Eric Koch-Anefo/Wikimedia Commons
Of the thousands of books written by or about the Beatles and seemingly everyone in their orbit, it’s astonishing to think there have been only a handful on someone so close to epicenter: Yoko Ono.
Lennon and the Beatles of course are players in David Sheff’s Yoko: The Biography (384 pp., $30, Simon & Schuster). But he keeps the focus mostly on Ono and her own life and career as an visual/music/film artist, activist and collaborator.
Sheff does a solid job delving into Ono’s life and career prior to entering the Beatles orbit. This includes her privileged upbringing in a wealthy and well-known Japanese banking family, relations with two cold and distant parents, two pre-Lennon marriages, and early attempts at staging art happenings that clearly put her on the edge of the avant garde.
Book cover
In probably her most famous one, Cut Piece, a placid Ono sat on stage in a dress and had audience members come up and clip away pieces of her clothing. That some men crossed a line (one pretending to stab Ono with the scissors) or tittering with sexual malice spoke volumes.
In Kitchen Piece, Ono threw eggs and jello on a canvas, smeared it, and lit it on fire—which critics saw as a comment on what was expected of women and their roles in society.
Some of Ono’s works were simple instructions for people to think, breathe, or move a certain way. In Audience Piece, a couple dozen actors stood on the edge of a stage, wordlessly glaring at the audience, who glared back. Some people left immediately. Others stayed for…4-5 hours. Hey, it was the ‘60s.
At the time, some thought it was way out there. But the decades since have improved both her standing and reputation in the art world.
Then it’s where most books pick up her story: The initial meeting with Lennon during a fall 1966 one-woman art show at the Indica Gallery. That’ where Lennon famously ate part of an apple that was part of an exhibit. And climbed to the top of a ladder to peer through a spyglass to read the word “Yes” on the ceiling.
The pair felt an instant connection, and flirted on-and-off while both were still married. But when Cynthia Lennon came home one morning from vacation to her marital home to find Ono calmly sitting at her kitchen table (not, according to Sheff, clad only in Cynthia’s robe per some Beatle Lore), it was JohnandYoko (one word, please) from then on.
Was it annoying and unprecedented that Ono, stuck to Lennon’s side, sat in on Beatles recording sessions and offered advice (including, after a miscarriage, prone on a full hospital bed)? Yes. Did Ono alone “break up” the Beatles? No. Tensions were already high within the group, and in Ono, Lennon found an exciting new partner that broadened his horizons well beyond just music.
Though the music that they did create together (often featuring Ono’s piercing and continual screams) was not really going to hit the charts. Not that either of them even cared about the commerciality of what they were doing. Or what Chuck Berry thought in a now-famous meme of his pop-eyed, uncomprehending face while jamming with the duo on The Mike Douglas Show.
Ono bore the brunt of the hatred, racism and misogyny directed at her about the marriage, things that seem unfathomable in 2025. Sheff details the highs of her love affair with Lennon, but also the lows: heroin addiction, multiple miscarriages, threats of deportation, Lennon’s drunken “Lost Weekend” that lasted 18 months.
As a biographer, Sheff in some parts is less than subjective. He’s a journalist who had in-depth, on the record talks with Lennon and Ono. But after Lennon’s 1980 assassination, he became a close, personal friend to his widow, spending thousands of hours together.
As a result, he’s more subjective and defensive of Ono, at times even a cheerleader. Or makes grand pronouncements (was John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band really “one of the best rock-and-roll records ever made?”)
He also breaks ground with insightful and in-depth observations and remembrances from Ono’s children, Sean (with Lennon) and Kyoko (with second husband Tony Cox). Kyoko’s input is especially valuable given that she basically disappeared from Ono’s life for more than two decades while Cox “kidnapped” her into isolation and a religious cult.
Houston plays a small part in the location of a December 1971 hearing that granted visitation rights to John and Yoko (Cox’s then-wife was a Houstonian), but from which Cox fled with his daughter, not to be seen or heard from for a long while. The book even namechecks the Houston Press for a 2013 article titled “Yoko Ono Turns 80, Still Weird as Hell.”
Probably the book’s most revelatory section is also its shortest, the 45 years of Ono’s life post-1980 and Lennon’s assassination (something shared with Ono assistant/friend Eliot Mintz’s recent memoir We All Shine On). It probably gives the most detailed look at her daily life and struggles, work to burnish Lennon’s legacy, reemergence as an artist, and positive hindsight reevaluation of her work.
Disturbingly, Sheff details a shocking amount of death threats to the grieving widow (and to Sean) and potential assassination attempts she endured in the years right after John’s killing. The sickest drawings and missives would pour into her Dakota mailbox (including a bullet-ridden cover of the couple’s 1980 comeback album Double Fantasy) with vague proclamations of coming to “finish the job.”
Sheff does get some comments from the “mysterious” Sam Havadtoy, Yoko’s interior designer-turned-live-in-boyfriend and business adviser for nearly 20 years after Lennon’s killing. Rarely seen or mentioned (and imagine that status in life), it seems that to bring him out would jeopardize Ono’s public persona as Beatle Widow.
Well into her 70s and 80s she continued to stage both retrospective exhibitions, create new art, find unlikely success in dance clubs with remixes of her music, and even go on a concert tour with Sean beside her onstage. Sonic Youth’s Thurston Moore, Questlove, Michael Stipe, Rufus Wainwright, and other contemporary musicians sang her praises.
Now at age 92, Yoko Ono—even if her work is absolutely not to everyone’s taste—has by now firmly established her own cred, and not just as an adjunct to one of the world’s most famous and beloved musicians. Yoko more than gives this “Ocean Child” (the literal Japanese translation of her name) her just due.
George Harrison - Taxman (Rehearsal at Shepperton Studios, April 5, 1992, MTV footage)
Two new videos with George Harrison were recently uploaded, from when he and the band were rehearsing for the Natural Law Party – Royal Albert Hall performance in 1992. The rehearsals took place at Shepperton Studios and MTV was there to make a feature for MTV news ahead of the concert.
The band was the same one he had used on the tour of Japan with Eric Clapton the previous year, but minus Eric, who was replaced by Gary Moore. Ringo also appeared at the concert itself, but he is not in this recording.
Now someone has obtained the raw footage of the song George and the band performing for the TV cameras, “Taxman”, as well as the interview he gave to MTV. The TV company only showed glimpses of this in their newscast, but here is the full song and the uncut interview! So let’s hope this is allowed to stay on YouTube.
George Harrison - Interview at Royal Albert Hall (April 6, 1992, MTV footage)
Paul McCartney’s first post-Beatles gig and the one song he never played live with Wings again
By Ewan Gleadow
Cult Following
March 5, 2025
Early performances following the split of The Beatles were tough for Paul McCartney.
Not only had the songwriter decided against including any material he wrote with John Lennon, but his earliest shows with the newly founded Wings had only a handful of originals ready. Where the band may have found success with Band on the Run and Live and Let Die, the early shows where the band played university stages and smaller venues, were filled with covers. Though McCartney says he was “pretty nervous” to head back on stage without songs from his time in The Beatles, the end result was a mix of singles, early Wings material and covers. Those covers, from Little Richard to Bill Monroe and the Bluegrass Boys, formed the earliest live works from Wings.
Speaking on the decision not to include Beatles songs in these shows, McCartney said: “We decided not to do any Beatle material, which was a killer, of course, because it meant we had to do an hour of other material, and we didn’t have it then. I didn’t have something like ‘My Love’ that was sort of mine. I felt like everyone wanted Beatles stuff, so I was pretty nervous on that.”
McCartney would later claim Wings were “always in the shadow” of his previous group, though he and Linda McCartney would find huge success with Wings, which lasted from 1971 to 1981.
In one of the earliest shows the band played, at the Portland Building in Nottingham, England, Wings played a song which would only feature in their live line-up once. A cover of Henry McCullough’s Shuffle Blues was performed once and once only. The eleven song showcase on the 1972 Wings University Tour featured a rough mix of solo material and covers from McCartney. A full setlist can be found below.
Blue Moon of Kentucky
Give Ireland Back to the Irish
Help Me Darling
Thank You Darling
Wild Life
Bip Bop
Shuffle Blues
The Mess
My Love
Lucille
Long Tall Sally
McCartney would reintroduce Beatles songs like Lady Madonna and The Long and Winding Road back into his setlist in 1976. Wings, who by that point were playing stadiums and arenas around the world following the release of Venus and Mars, would also perform songs McCartney had written during his time with The Beatles.
Speaking of the decision to add The Beatles’ songs back to his live shows, McCartney said: “As time went by and the pressure was off, I could nod and wink at the Beatles stuff, so I could now do ‘Yesterday’ on a Wings tour, and it didn’t hurt.
“But until we had enough Wings songs and an identity as a group, I didn’t do any of that, even though the promoters were weeping, ‘Please finish with ‘Yesterday.’ And I’d say, ‘No, we’re not even gonna do it.'”
McCartney went six years without performing any songs by The Beatles. He would introduce Beatles songs Lady Madonna, The Long and Winding Road, I’ve Just Seen a Face, Blackbird and Yesterday for the first time with Wings on the Wings Over the World tour, on September 6, 1975.
‘A huge buzz’ … McCartney during the Wings Over the World tour, Philadelphia, 1976. Photograph: Robert Ellis/MPL Communications Ltd
www.nme.com
Paul McCartney announces new book ‘Wings: The Story Of A Band On The Run’
It features over 100 photographs, many of which have never been shared before
By Liberty Dunworth
NME
26th February 2025
Wings - Paul McCartney, Linda McCartney, Denny Laine, Henry McCullough and Denny Seiwell. Spain, 1972. CREDIT: 1972 MPL Communications Ltd
Paul McCartney has announced details of a new book titled Wings: The Story Of A Band On The Run. Check out the details below.
Set to arrive on November 4, the new book comes as an oral history of the iconic band, which was formed by Paul, his wife Linda, and Denny Laine back in 1971, following the huge global success of The Beatles.
Described as “a rousing, stereophonic celebration of the songs, collaborations and performances that would shape the soundtrack of the late 20th century”, the book is drawn from over half a million words and countless hours of interviews from McCartney and other key players in the band’s orbit.
It explores the impact of the band across their albums and follows various incarnations of the line-up through their career. Anecdotes include the time they were mugged in Nigeria, their surprise appearances at university halls in the UK, and how they came to write hits including ‘Let ‘Em In’, ‘Live And Let Die’, ‘Band On The Run’ and more.
Over 100 photographs are featured in Wings: The Story Of A Band On The Run – many of which have never been seen before. The book is also set to “shed new light on the immediate aftermath and seismic global impact of The Beatles’ break-up, as the musical landscape and tastes began to splinter and diverge along with societal views.”
Wings – Denny Laine, Paul McCartney, Linda McCartney and Denny Seiwell. Osterley Park, London. CREDIT: 1971 MPL Communications Ltd / Photographer: Barry Lategan
Speaking about the new book, McCartney said: “I’m so very happy to be transported back to the time that was Wings and relive some of our madcap adventures through this book.”
“Starting from scratch after The Beatles felt crazy at times. There were some very difficult moments and I often questioned my decision. But as we got better I thought, ‘OK this is really good’,” he added. “We proved Wings could be a really good band. To play to huge audiences in the same way The Beatles had and have an impact in a different way. It was a huge buzz.”
Wings: The Story Of A Band On The Run will be available to pre-order at a later date.
News of the book arrives just weeks after it was confirmed that the band’s classic album ‘Venus And Mars’ is set to be reissued to mark its 50th anniversary. Set for release on March 21, the new version of Wings’ 1975 fourth studio record is set to arrive in the form of a special half-speed master edition.
Both the book and the album reissue are part of a larger celebration of the band, who made a massive global impact on the music scene before their dissolution in 1981.
Wings – Joe English, Jimmy McCulloch, Linda McCartney, Paul McCartney and Denny Laine. CREDIT: 1976 MPL Communications Ltd / Photographer: Clive Arrowsmith
Other new releases around the band have included a theatrical release of the film One Hand Clapping, as well as its accompanying 1974 live-in-studio album. Both arrived in 2024.
Earlier that year, the band also shared a five-decade edition of their 1973 third album, ‘Band On The Run’.
In other news, Paul McCartney has recently teased that he hopes to finish a new solo album this year. “I’ve been working on a lot of songs, and have had to put it to the side because of the tour,” he said. “So, I’m hoping to get back into that and finish up a lot of these songs. So, how’s about that? ‘My New Year’s resolution is to finish a new album!’”
Meanwhile, the musician has played three surprise intimate gigs in New York City, and also said that proposed changes to copyright law would allow AI to rip off artists and result in a “loss of creativity”.
www.paulmccartney.com
'Wings: The Story of a Band on the Run' - Coming 4 November 2025
A landmark account of Paul’s triumphant musical reinvention in the 1970s and the subsequent rise of one of the decade’s most iconic bands.
“I’m so very happy to be transported back to the time that was Wings and relive some of our madcap adventures through this book. Starting from scratch after The Beatles felt crazy at times. There were some very difficult moments and I often questioned my decision. But as we got better I thought, ‘OK this is really good.’ We proved Wings could be a really good band. To play to huge audiences in the same way The Beatles had and have an impact in a different way. It was a huge buzz.”—Paul McCartney
As the Sixties came to a close, Paul was faced with the daunting prospect of being a solo artist for the first time. Wings’ ascension to the top of the charts with classic albums including Band on the Run, Venus and Mars and At the Speed of Sound, along with the band’s stadium-filling live shows would prove to critics and fans that not all great acts are impossible to follow. Wings:The Story of a Band on the Run is a rousing, stereophonic celebration of the songs, collaborations and performances that would shape the soundtrack of the late 20th century.
Drawn from over 500,000 words, based on dozens of hours of interviews with Paul and numerous key players in the band’s orbit, Wings: The Story of a Band on the Run weaves together the improbable trajectory of Paul McCartney and his newly formed band (featuring co-founding members Linda McCartney and Denny Laine) across the technicolor 1970s until their dissolution in 1981.
Edited by the prize-winning historian Ted Widmer and organized around nine Wings albums, the oral history sheds new light on the immediate aftermath of the seismic global impact of The Beatles’ break-up, as the musical landscape and tastes began to splinter and diverge along with societal views. The narrative follows the various incarnations of the band as they survive a mugging in Nigeria, appear unannounced at UK university halls, tour in a sheared-off school bus with their children, while producing some of the most indelible and acclaimed music of the decade, including: “Mull of Kintyre,” “Live and Let Die,” “Band on the Run,” “My Love,” “Jet,” “With a Little Luck,” “Silly Love Songs,” “Let ‘Em In,” “Junior’s Farm” and more.
With more than 100 black-and-white and color photographs, many never seen before, Wings: The Story of a Band on the Run is part of a larger reexamination and appreciation of the group and their catalog, including the 2024 theatrical release of the rare Wings live-in-studio performance film One Hand Clapping and its accompanying album; 50th anniversary editions of the Wings albums Band on the Run (released February 2024) and Venus and Mars (releasing March 2025); and a forthcoming documentary on Paul McCartney’s solo and Wings-related musical work of the 1970s from Academy Award-winning filmmaker, Morgan Neville.
"Wings was about love, family, friendship and artistic growth, often in the face of tremendous adversity. It was a joy to relive the madcap adventures of a special band, by listening to their stories, and compiling this oral history."—Ted Widmer
Ringo Starr's debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville: Our best photos
Andrew Nelles
THE TENNESSEAN
Published Feb. 21 , 2025
Ringo Starr performs on stage during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr places his hat on the mic stand while performing on stage during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr, center, performs with Molly Tuttle, left, and Ketch Secor, right, during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr performs on stage during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr performs on stage during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr performs on stage with Molly Tuttle, left, during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr performs on stage during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr performs on stage during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr performs on stage during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr, center, performs with Molly Tuttle, left, and Ketch Secor, right, during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr performs on stage during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr performs on stage during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr performs on stage during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr performs on stage during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr performs on stage during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr performs on stage during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr performs on stage during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr performs on stage during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr performs on stage during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr performs on stage during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr performs on stage during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr performs on stage during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr performs on stage with Molly Tuttle, left, during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
Andrew Nelles / The Tennessean
Ringo Starr performs on stage during his debut at the Grand Ole Opry in Nashville, Tenn., Friday, Feb. 21, 2025.
With his new album, Ringo Starr reunites with T Bone Burnett and his first musical love.
BY CHRIS PARTON
Nashville Lifesyles
FEBRUARY 17, 2025
SCOTT ROBERT RITCHIE
It’s definitely a cliché to describe someone as “84-years-young,” but in the case of Ringo Starr, it's definitely warranted.
If you’re lucky enough to spend any time with the rock-and-roll legend, you can tell he’s still having fun. And he’s still looking out for new things to try. After changing the world forever as the drummer of The Beatles, then embarking on a decades-long solo career defined by a joyful surrender to whichever direction his inspiration led, Starr has now done something even he didn’t see coming. His country album Look Up arrived early last month (January 10), marking his first full album in six years, and first with Nashville connections in 55.
Never one to plan things out, a twist of fate led to this brand-new chapter for the pop culture icon. But to hear him tell it, that’s where Starr has always thrived. He’s still in love with making music and has never needed more of an excuse to do it than that. And hey, it’s been working so far.
“It’s what I do. I’ve only ever dreamt of being a musician, and I’ve been a drummer since I was 13 [who] went to be in a band, and that’s all worked out really well,” he says through a charming, Cheshire Cat grin, with close- cropped hair matching round sunglasses in a jet-black gleam. It’s an understatement, sure, yet Starr keeps coming back to the thread. “It all just fell into place, and even this record just fell into place. I didn’t sit here planning ‘I’m going to do a country album.’”
That may be true, but as he speaks with Nashville Lifestyles from his home in Los Angeles, Starr admits the end result feels perfectly natural, too. Produced by American roots master T Bone Burnett (with co- production by Daniel Tashian, Bruce Sugar, and Starr himself ), Look Up’s 11 songs combine a classic take on country songcraft with the refreshing, British-invasion “cool” Starr helped define, plus Americana guest appearances by Billy Strings, Molly Tuttle, Alison Krauss, Lucius, and Larkin Poe.
Optimism shines alongside an unmistakable vocal, and right from the start, Starr’s enthusiasm is obvious – even if his drawl comes with an English twang.
“It’s a country album because the songs can be sad, but they’re sad in an up kind of way,” he says.
In the end, it’s an intriguing, unexpected project from an artist known all around the world by a single name – one who is synonymous with America’s pop music explosion. Yet Look Up offers a glimpse at where the explosion started, and that’s a story even lifelong fans may not know. Often described as the “country-est” Beatle, the down-home detour actually speaks to Starr’s deep love of country, which he says goes a long, long way back indeed.
DAN WINTERS
“Always,” he declares, hitting a note of solemn respect. In fact, Starr came into The Beatles as a roots-music obsessive, enthralled by Hank Williams, Lightnin’ Hopkins, and more. He actually tried to immigrate to the U.S. through Houston as a teen, because he found out that’s where Hopkins lived. Lucky for the world, the pile of forms he was given to fill out was far more work than Starr and his pals were up for, so they ended up heading home.
Eventually, Starr’s voice graced country- inspired recordings at the height of Beatle Mania, including songs he wrote himself like
“What Goes On” and “Don’t Pass Me By,” and the band’s beloved cover of Buck Owens’ “Act Naturally.” He says his partners John Lennon, Paul McCartney, and George Harrison appreciated country as another flavor in their groundbreaking mix. “They were open to that ... there was no like, ‘Oh, you can’t do that,’” he explains. “I’m an emotional type of guy, and every country song back then was, ‘the wife’s left, the dog’s dead, and I don’t have enough money for the jukebox.’ ... I’ve just always loved country music, and I still do.”
Look Up started when Starr bumped into Burnett in L.A. in 2022, reconnecting decades after their first introduction. Now known as the Grammy-winning producer behind monumental projects like the O’ Brother Where Art Thou? soundtrack, Robert Plant and Alison Krauss’ Raising Sand, and more, Burnett is fully at home in the mystic world where the classic forms of American music converge — and has even helped others like Elton John and B.B. King tap their early influences. As it turns out, the reunion was perfectly timed.
It was sometime in the 1970s when Starr and Burnett first met — and that’s according to Burnett, since Starr finds that whole era a bit... fuzzy. It would have been a few years after Starr did his first Nashville album, Beaucoups of Blues — which officially proclaimed his love of the country style — and when the pair crossed paths again, Starr was working on a series of pop and rock EPs. He casually asked his old friend to write a song for one of those projects, and somewhat accidentally, Burnett wrote nine. But they weren’t pop, or rock.
“This has been my problem all through life,” Burnett admits, speaking with Nashville Lifestyles in a separate interview. “Once I start, I can’t stop.” “He sent me this song, an incredibly beautiful country song ... I had this big plan to invite him to produce an EP on me,” Starr recalls. “Anyway, we were talking and he mentioned to me, ‘I’ve got some songs.’ I said, ‘Well, how many have you got?’ And he goes, ‘Nine!’ And I thought, ‘Man, let’s make an album!’”
Once they got started, Burnett quickly realized how comfortable Starr seemed as a “country” artist. It was like he was made for the role. The producer notes that, in truth, The Beatles were just as influential to modern country as Hank Williams or anyone else, so the trick was just to let Starr be himself.
“I mean, really, The Beatles were a roots- music band if you get right down to it,” Burnett explains. “They reinvented rock and roll several times. But if you think about it, all their stuff was very much what would now be called American roots. So, it’s not really a step away from anything, it’s just him.”
Still, a big part of the record’s authentic feeling comes down to Burnett’s songwriting. It’s a very purposeful combination of the “emotional” headspace Starr described, full of nuance. Topics often deal with loss or hardship, but leave plenty of space for hope to spring through. And that’s precisely where the Look Up title comes from.
“I was trying to write songs that were the truest to who Ringo actually is,” Burnett goes on. “One of the mistakes I think people make when they do records with heritage artists is they get the idea that they’re going to update them. Do a hip-hop track with Ringo or something. I wasn’t about to try to update Ringo — more like go for the core of who he is. Who he was, and who he is still.”
Burnett would get the songs started in Nashville and send them to Starr, who would lay down his drums and vocals in the comfort of his home. The song would go back and forth a few times, and then Burnett would add in harmony vocals or guitar contributions from their flattered guests, who were all overjoyed to help out a hero.
“And between us, we made a great country album,” Starr says.
In terms of sound, the Brit-country brightness is established from the opening track, “Breathless” (featuring Billy Strings), but it’s Starr’s rich, melancholic voice that steals the show.
“My voice came out great, because every song is in my key,” he says with a laugh. “Usually, people send me a song and it’s in like F-demented. It’s like very high, some craziness to it, and I think, ‘Don’t they know me?’” “I’ve always thought he was the least appreciated of the four singers in The Beatles,” Burnett adds.
Fans got an early taste of the record with “Time On My Hands,” which Starr says ticked all of his country-music boxes — from lost love and loneliness to a weeping steel guitar, and the determination to make a new start.
“It’s a really cool track, and it has a lot of space in it,” he says. “And it’s the [country] sentiment that, for me, is great.”
Others like “Never Let Me Go” feel like a prime-era Beatles single (plus twang, that is), and while “I Live for Your Love” (featuring Molly Tuttle) shimmers with euphoric devotion, “Come Back” features a Gene Autry-style Western flair, and the crunchy country-rocker “Rosetta” taps a blazing guitar solo from Billy Strings. The swinging rockabilly track “You Want Some” is one of only two songs Burnett did not write — it was penned by Billy Swan — and it’s joined by the last track on the record, “Thankful” (featuring Alison Krauss), which Richard Starkey and Bruce Sugar wrote before Look Up started.
Thinking back now, “thankful” is how Starr is feeling about the whole adventure. Just after the album’s release, he headlined two nights at the Ryman Auditorium, and although he’s played there with his All Starr Band before, this time felt different. Maybe it was knowing that his country dreams were finally realized, and that he was truly following in the footsteps of heroes like Hank, Patsy, and the rest.
“When I get on the Ryman stage, my heart is full,” he says with honest reverence. And that’s what he hopes fans take from Look Up as well. “I hope they get joy from this record,” he says. “I mean, it’s a lot of sad songs, but there’s always an upside. There is sunlight at the end.”
He didn’t see it coming, but everything worked out in Starr’s favor once again. In fact, it’s been such a positive experience, he might even consider doing another.
“I am so pleased I did it,” he says. “As I said at the beginning, it just came about. I didn’t plan it ... but it was easy for me. I’d have no problem doing another [country album], so we’ll see.”
