What got you into The Beatles?

[practicallyzen]

Did you grow up listening to them? Or was it something else?

For me...I grew up listening to them every so often (my dad only had the Sgt Pepper LP, and I remember putting that on when my sister and I sat down and listened to records) not REALLY knowing who they were when I was little. I remember asking my parents about who John and Yoko were after actually listening to the words in Be My Yoko Ono by The Barenaked Ladies (being so Canadian as we are, my family listened to the Ladies more than The Beatles). My dad told me who they were (without ever being biased against Yoko, for which I'm glad, because that made me grow up without the opinion that she was the one who broke up the band), and I guess I just put the info away in my brain. After that, I always thought of each Beatle's full name and what they played in the band whenever I heard a song by them, for some reason, just to make sure I could always remember them all. I did that sort of thing a lot. And I asked what Elton John's song "Empty Garden" was about, and my dad told me it was for John Lennon, which made me sad whenever I heard it. I still can't listen to it without crying.

I remember being sad when I found out George Harrison died, but nothing compared to what I would feel now. I was only about 12 when it happened and I still only knew vague things about The Beatles. I still remember the actual newspaper and seeing it in there, and where I was when I read it, though.

Then, a few years later, I asked my one of my friends to burn me some CDs, on one of which I requested she put some Beatles songs. So I listened to them a lot around then, when I was 14-16, without ever really finding out any more about them. Although George was part of my inspiration to pick up the guitar, because I always loved the guitar in Beatles songs and wanted to learn them (in fact - yes I know it's Paul's song - Blackbird was the first full song I ever learned on guitar).

Then I just started finding out more about them, buying tons of books and DVDs, and several years later, here I am! A long-time Beatles fanatic.

What's your story? You don't have to be as stupidly thorough as me if you don't want to.  

[stickyfeet]

American Idol. xd They had the big Lennon/McCartney songbook deal. I had heard some Beatles before that, but Idol really made me look more into them. Now all my friends think I'm weird because I love the Beatles so much.  

[Liebe Thelema]

I consider this fairly embarrassing, but for reasons I don't really understand, I guess I don't mind sharing it with strangers on the internet.
Well, I didn't really know much about them for most of my life, but I always knew who they were and knew songs like "I Wanna Hold Your Hand" and "Yellow Submarine". At the end of my freshman year, I was at a friend's house, and I burnt a CD of a couple of songs from her iTunes. She had the Beatles "1" CD, so I put the songs "Hey Jude" and "Come Together" on my mix. So those were the first songs I had, although I never really listened to them much. Then, at the beginning of last year, I developed a crush on this one guy I knew. He really liked the Beatles, so I asked him to burn me a CD of their songs. So he gave me 28 of his favorite songs and the CD "Let it Be". And from then on I was really into them. At the time, he was transferring the songs onto CDs for some reason (I think it had something to do with an mp3 player) and he offered to give me the CDs when he was done. He gave me the White Album on the day before Thanksgiving, and I absolutely wore it out that weekend, so now the album has a deep significance to me- I never really liked "Let it Be", so I consider the White Album the first album I had, and I really enjoy it still. He gave me the rest of the CDs in January, on the last day of the second semester. Then he transfered schools. And because of an embarrassing facebook message, he doesn't talk to me anymore. But I don't really blame him, it was my fault, and it was an incredibly stupid thing to do.
But, I still really love the Beatles, and continue to find information on them and stuff. Because, they're really the best band ever.
Oh, and yeah- I'm pretty much the "Beatles girl" at my school now. So people always tell me things related to the Beatles because it makes them think of me (this usually just consists of them going "I SAW ACROSS THE UNIVERSE AND THOUGHT OF YOU" and me going "That's nice, thank you. ...Although I really don't like that movie"). I actually feel bad about it sometimes, because, it was his thing, and I feel like I stole it from him, and I'm just "borrowing his scene", or something. (Also, my second favorite band is Pink Floyd. Which he got me into as well. And it's his second favorite band. So I always feel guilty about "stealing" that, too.) I don't know if that makes alot of sense, but... whatever.

...Haha. I guess I was overly thorough, too. Ah well. (And just so you know, I've edited this about ten times... haha.)  

[HistoryWak]

My Dad would watch Yellow Submarine some Saturday mornings and my younger brother actually bought the Yellow Submarine toys so that was my first exposure to them. After that I had listened to my Dad's old cassettes (Beatles 1962-1966) and Hey Jude all the way up and I have vivid memories of playing those cassettes in my room. Around middle school age I got into them more but still only listened to the cassettes. Seeing commercials for Beatles 1 and also the news of George Harrison's death got my interest going more. I remember playing those Beatles cassettes as a tribute to George. I was in middle school from Fall 2000 to Spring 2002 and both Beatles 1's release and George Harrison's death took place during them years. When I entered high school I decided that it's time to get them on CD. The first Beatles CD I bought was 'Beatles 1967-1970'. I got it right after Christmas with Christmas money. I was content with that for a while and after listening to later Beatles all that time on CD I had a craving for early Beatles. (I had pretty much given up cassette playing) That came about from me getting the 'A Hard Day's Night' DVD. The CD I got next actually was A Hard Day's Night. Then when I went to Disney World I bought 'Beatles 1962-1966' on CD. At that time I felt I got all I want from them. That would not be the case. I would hear more songs of theirs and would have to get it and through 2001-Early 2005 I got all of their CDs. By that time I was a huge Beatles fan and my friends were calling me a hippie and all. Now I knew my Dad had records but I only had looked at them with ignorance on what they were. So one day I asked to look at them and to my surprise there were a couple Beatles/Beatles related records in the small stack (Abbey Road, Rock 'n' Roll, McCartney, Imagine; I would later find a couple of Beatles/Beatle related 45s of his as well.). This was the first time I had seen something I actually knew on record. I was blown away by nice the covers looked. Of course I wanted to actually play them. My grandmother had a record player with her stereo system. I got to play the records on there. She showed me how the player worked and all. I loved how it sounded and looked being played. I then decided that I wanted to collect them. My record collection would explode in size very shortly after that.  

[practicallyzen]

@ stickyfeet: Oh, it's cool that something like that is actually exposing more young people to Beatles music! That makes me generally optimistic.

@ Liebe Thelema: Aw, why's that embarrassing?

And you shouldn't feel like you're "stealing" anyone's scene. wink After all, they're the most popular band in music history. Generally when people get other people into music, they consider it a good thing. Like how I've gotten my sister into all things Beatles. I was playing Sean Lennon in her car when she was driving me to the ferry, and she was singing along! I was like, "wtf, you know this song?" and she told me she had that album on her computer. I said "I'm proud of you!" and we both had a laugh because of how deep I've gotten her into it all.

So basically, other people influencing your music taste is never a bad thing, in my opinion.

@ HistoryWak: I wish my parents had watched Yellow Submarine with us. I don't think they like it much, though. Haha, it's awesome that you had the toys.

Why is it that people always start calling you a hippie when you listen to The Beatles a lot? gonk I mean IRL, obviously, because people make assumptions based on my avatar on Gaia.

And records...I love the covers too. I'm an artist, and I just love how visually awesome most of them are. When I visit home, I'll sit in the corner of our basement where my dad keeps his records and just look at all the covers for ages. Then I'll listen to a few, because, well, I just have to. I love the sound. And it's extra-good on the stereo my dad's got. I'll just crank it up and fill the entire house with The Beatles or Elton John or Billy Joel.  

[Singing4life]

Ever since I was little, I was exposed to The Beatles. My favorite movie was The cartoon movie the Yellow Submarine. I always have loved the Beatles, and I will always love them. True Fact: I can't fall asleep at night without listening to either Cry Baby Cry or A Day in the Life  

[XxSilence_IntendedxX]

...I'm new on here...so I felt like posting something:
Surprisingly, my parents had nothing to do with getting my fascinated by the Beatles. It was my preschool teacher. She brought in a poster with pictures of them. She even brought in the Yellow Submarine movie. After my parents learned I had fallen in love the Beatles, they got all sorts of stuff, from albums to movies. Now, keep in mind...I was only 3-7 years old. Soon enough, by fourth grade kids were making fun of me, so I tried to keep it on the down low. It DIDN'T work out...so, now I'm known as the Beatle-freak, and I'm loving it.  

[The Twilight Bringer]

I listened to the songs "hey jude","all you need is love",and"Let it be"and thats what got me into the beatles  

[paawiis]

I was in year two and I was learning songs for the school concert.
The theme was under the sea.
Two of the songs were Yellow Submarine and Octopuses Garden.
I wanted to learn the songs at home.
I typed in Yellow Submarine and Octopuses Garden in Foobar.
I started listening to other songs.
And then my dad made me listen to other songs because it turned out he'd been hiding all this wonderful music from me.
And then when I listened to Black Bird i remembered watching Parky with my dad and Paul was on playing Blackbird. = ]
And that's when my Beatles craze started.

 

[[Your Worst Nightmare]]

As a young kid, I didn't hear much classic music- not even from my parents. I guess they didn't think I'd be into it.

Anyway... this is going to sound strange but, John Lennon's music got me into the Beatles. Yep, I listened to John's solo work before I started listening to the band itself. I didn't even know he was a member of the Beatles until a few years ago- Oh, the musical deprivation I went through and didn't even realize it! Anyway, I started to listen to them about two years ago. I liked them, but it wasn't until a little over a year ago that I really got into them. A lot of you will hate me for this, but the movie Across the Universe made me really understand the depth of the lyrics and it became a full-blown obsession.

And here I am. XD

 

[Cr4shley]

I cant remember. confused  

[practicallyzen]

[Your Worst Nightmare]

A lot of you will hate me for this, but the movie Across the Universe made me really understand the depth of the lyrics and it became a full-blown obsession.

Not at all! That's what first got my sister interested in them. She'd heard me listening to them before, but never really did herself, until she watched that movie. She really liked it, so started listening to the music...and then I started being all obsessive around her and she started finding out more about the actual people that made up The Beatles...and last time I visited her we watched both the Imagine documentary and Gimme Some Truth and it's great to have someone that close to me into The Beatles, and I have Across the Universe to thank!  

[[Your Worst Nightmare]]

Ohh, I see. That's really cool, I wish my brother was that into the Beatles. At least my dad is. (:
It's just that I've heard a lot of fans say, "I hate when people watch Across the Universe, then they suddenly love the Beatles."
In all honesty, I think that it's a good thing, in a way. It makes some kids in this generation aware of the Beatles' music when they may not have heard it before. After all, they were a band that impacted the world... it's nice to see that a simple film can resurrect them.

 

[izzib1202]

I've actually been listening to the Beatles my whole life. When I was really little, my dad would sing me "Rocky Raccoon" on my way to daycare, and my mom would sing me "Golden Slumbers" before I went to bed. And this is before I even knew what the Beatles were, but I loved those songs.  

[Everlasting Boner]

i started to get interest in the beatles when i was about in the 6th grade. my dad put the cd in the car, and i just loved the beatles since then.