The most influential light music formation of all time, the legendary foursome from Liverpool has enjoyed unbroken popularity since the 1960s, which probably won't let up any time soon. We have collected eight lesser-known, surprising facts and stories about the Beatles
Peter Jackson's three-part documentary series, Get Back, presented in November, and the book based on the show, invite curious viewers behind the scenes of the work on the last Beatles LP, Let It Be - on the occasion of this, we took a look at the bizarre selected by Unbelievable Facts From Beatles facts.
They want to clone John Lennon
The musician, who died in tragic circumstances in 1980, gave one of his extracted molars to his housekeeper in the 1960s, and she passed it on to her daughter, a Beatles fan, who put the strange relic up for auction half a century later. The tooth was bought for $31,000 (roughly HUF 10 million) by Canadian dentist Michael Zuk, who says he wants to use the DNA extracted from it to clone the late Beatles frontman - although the plan can still be classified as science fiction for the time being, fans can hope.
The previous pope also likes them
In the film The Two Popes XVI. Benedek (Anthony Hopkins) plays a Beatles song on the piano for his successor, Ferenc (Jonathan Pryce): the former head of the church actually likes the Liverpool team's music, on a list published in 2010, Benedek is next to the works of U2, Paul Simon, Santana and others named the Beatles' 1966 album Revolver as one of his favorite records.
They set a condom on fire, the Germans broke them out
The Beatles, still performing as a five-piece at the time, traveled to Hamburg for the first time in August 1960, where they were signed by the Kaiserkeller, a club of dubious quality in the infamous entertainment district, the Reeperbahn. The British boys quickly achieved serious success, and just four months later they were lured by the much more prestigious Top Ten Club, but the owner of Kaiserkeller, Bruno Koschmider, did not take kindly to the desertion - the man revealed to the police that the youngest member of the team, 17 year-old George Harrison was working illegally in nightclubs before the West German authorities issued a deportation order against the teenage guitarist.
When Paul McCartney and then-drummer Pete Best went back to the movie theater that served as their accommodation during the Kaiserkeller period to retrieve their belongings, they found the room in total darkness - driven by an impromptu idea, they lit the first flammable object they could get their hands on, a condom, and then hung on a nail on the wall to give them light. The funny improvisation did no harm to the room, but the enraged Koschmider reported the band for arson - the police revoked the Lennons' work permit, so the entire Beatles - with the exception of bassist Stu Sutcliffe, who stayed in Hamburg with his German lover, Astrid Kirchherr - traveled home to Liverpool. Three months later - after George officially came of age - the band was able to return to the Reeperbahn.
George lost his virginity in the presence of his fellow musicians
During the time spent in Hamburg, the boys from Liverpool did not only gain life-long experiences as musicians - thanks to the dancers, prostitutes and other ladies of the infamous night district, they got to know the other sex more thoroughly. This is especially true in the case of George Harrison, who lost his virginity in the cramped accommodation in the said cinema, while his friends all listened from their own beds as a German dancer blessed with rich limbs "worked him" under the duvet - at the end of the act, they were rewarded with loud applause and congratulations that the slightly tense guitarist went through the baptism of fire.
They banned one of their album covers
The 1966 LP Yesterday and Today, which was released exclusively in the United States and Canada, included previous hit songs and some tracks from the soon-to-be-released Revolver, but the album remained memorable not because of this, but because of its scandalous cover. The original cover, on which the members of the Beatles can be seen dressed as butchers, with the body parts of shredded toy dolls in their hands and laps, shocked radio hosts and other professionals, to whom the Capitol label had sent the record before the official release, so the company's management ordered all printed copies copies - around 750,000 records - and then changed the cover to a much more innocent group photo after shelling out considerable money.
There are several theories as to what the mushroomheads wanted to symbolize with the infamous photo: McCartney once said that the picture was taken as a stand against the Vietnam War, other sources say that they wanted to use it to send a message to Capitol, which often "mutilates" their records for overseas release.
They drank coffee with LSD
The close connection between the Beatles and psychedelic drugs is a well-known fact, but few people know that John Lennon and George Harrison - at least that's how the anecdote goes - thanks to a small trick, they unknowingly had their first LSD experiences. According to the story, the band's dentist, John Riley, once invited the two musicians to his London home for dinner in the spring of 1965: the young doctor wanted Lennon and Harrison to "relax" during the evening, so he injected LSD into the sugar cube, which the put in their coffee. The effect didn't last, although at first the two Beatles members thought Riley was preparing for an orgy when he told them that he wouldn't choose to leave quickly if he were in their place.
Their concerts stank of urine
During the Beatle mania, the music was often barely audible at the foursome's concerts in Liverpool, as everything was drowned out by the screams of ecstatic teenage girls in the auditorium - however, the owners of the venues were less bothered by the noise and more by the stench. According to the reports, the fangirls sometimes peed under themselves in their shock ecstasy, which caused the cost of cleaning and disinfecting concert halls and clubs to skyrocket.
They were the first to show a metal fork
The most famous gesture of fans of harder music, the "metal fork" hand sign holding up the index and little finger at the same time, the origin of the hand sign is still the subject of debate: according to the most accepted version, the idea of the hand sign comes from the frontman of Rainbow and Black Sabbath, Ronnie James Dío, at the same time Kiss's flamboyant bassist, Gene Simmons, also attributes it to himself. However, few people know that the hand sign - which also appears in Buddhism and Mediterranean folklore - was first shown by John Lennon on an album cover, on the cover of the 1966 single Yellow Submarine (at that time, of course, the gesture had nothing to do with metal music).
