Screw It, We're Just Gonna Talk About the Beatles

We discuss our feelings about the new "last" Beatles song - "Now and Then." Based off a demo John Lennon left on a cassette tape, Paul McCartney led the creation of this new single. We've got drums and vocals from Ringo, a little bit of acoustic guitar from George, and a George-inspired lead part from Paul, as well as contributions (over time) from producer Jeff Lynne, Giles Martin, the audio team with Peter Jackson and lots more.  We try to separate sentiment from sonic quality and get into the details of the song itself. But then we dive right headfirst into the sentiment, because it's impossible to separate it out.  We hear George chords, Chaos and Creation vibes, Anthology production and lots more in this. We also try to start an extremely unsubstantiated rumor that John wrote "For Paul" on the cassette and was thinking of Paul Stanley of KISS. Let's get that one going around.

The panel goes over the new Revolver Super Deluxe remix (2022). Topics covered: Revolver's importance in the Beatles' history and discography, Ray Davies' contemporary review of the album (not as mean as you might have heard, but also dismissive of major songs in a funny way), the murky meaning of "remaster" and "remix" and a summary of the history of Beatles re-releases, a bit of comparison of the new mix with the previous version, Will's grouchy take that these new releases are unnecessary (he was tired, folks), and wondering when the "deez nuts" version will come out. We then pore over the extra tracks! We talk about the complexity of the early versions, the sadness of the original Yellow Submarine, the fuzz guitar that briefly existed on Got to Get You Into My Life, the insanely fast take of Rain, the magic vibraphone that vanished from I'm Only Sleeping, the disputed account of Paul leaving the session for She Said, She Said, the beauty of Paul's voice, the modernity of George's songs, Ringo's creatively great drumming, the spell John could cast, and more! Other podcasts go deeper in the facts, but no one else enjoys their own "maybe we're wrong"ness more than us! Panel: Will Hines, Brett Morris, Katie Platner, Joel Spence  

Will went to Liverpool and he wants to tell the panel about the many Beatles things he did and what he thought of them.  THINGS DISCUSSED: The Beatles Story museum at the docks, the "Beatles Disneyland" that is Matthew Street, including the perhaps-uncool-but-happy-and-fun Cavern Club, the hyperlarge Beatles statues, the Magical Mystery Tour bus, LIPA and of course, Ye Crack pub (not of course, Will had not heard of it before visiting). We also talk about how many Liverpudlians Will met who seemed fond of the Beatles but had never visited any Beatles tourist things, which made the panel observe how few touristy things anyone does in their own city. We talked about how close Liverpool is to Manchester, and the surprise of finding how creative and vibrant modern Liverpool is. Weirdly we also talk about Seattle, ancient Rome and Sir Mix-A-Lot.

In this two hour discussion, the panel gets into the amazing tour de force Beatles documentary "Get Back." Directed by Peter Jackson, released as three 2.5+ hour episodes on Disney+ over American Thanksgiving weekend in 2021, this doc is taking Beatle fandom by storm. It's an incredibly intimate look at the band at work. Yes, we see the fights and the tension. But we also see the friendship and empathy, the musical genius and passion for what they were making. You feel as if you are really hanging out with the Beatles in an unguarded environment. In addition to that intimate feeling, you see many now-iconic Beatles songs (aren't they all iconic, though) get developed, sometimes from scratch right before your eyes. Among the many subjects we touch on: all the toast, Yoko Ono's presence, the relationships between Paul and John and George, whether Ringo is chill sad or hungover, the director Michael Lindsay-Hogg (villain or just arrogant 'college sophomore' energy), Billy Preston's incredible impact, calming George Martin, George's cool clothes, the musicianship and seeing them play, how we're hungry for MORE MORE of this kind of footage if only it existed, Ringo's fart, the cops and the straps in their mouths, the stuffy London business owners, Peter Sellers, Paul's ambition, the flowerpot conversation, the songwriting, Allen Klein, Glyn Johns, Apple Studios and Magic Alex' insane guitar prototype. Beatles fans everywhere are joyfully examining and discussing this documentary.  It's an incredible film and a joy to watch. I hope everyone listening to this feels the same way!

As all Beatles fans wait the release of Peter Jackson's documentary "Get Back," here's a fun "meeting a Beatles in real life" story. Will Hines asks special guest J.M. DeMatteis (writer: Justice League, Spider-Man, Captain America, and a million more things!) to tell his story of meeting John Lennon! Will met J.M. on Will's comics podcast Screw It, We're Just Gonna Talk About Comics, and asked him to come on this one to tell this story. Comics fans: check out J.M.'s new stories in "Justice League Infinity" and the soon-to-be-released "Ben Reilly: Spider-Man." And check out J.M.'s album "How Many Lifetimes?" on Spotify, iTunes or YouTube! (And while we're at it, can we get someone at Marvel to release J.M.'s run on Spectacular Spider-Man in trade form? Or any form? Those were terrific issues and this fan wants them in some easy-to-find format!) Also, Will plugs a new project from Arthur Meyer and Bridey Elliott: "Bridey & Arthur Sing Some Songs By The Beatles" which is coming out on the 25th! Yes, that's the same day the "Get Back" documentary comes out!  

This week, Peter Jackson released the trailer for his upcoming "Get Back" documentary, the much-anticipated reworking of all the footage recorded while the Beatles made their second-to-last album "Let It Be" (second to last recorded, last one released). There's tremendous excitement in Beatledom around the trailer and we wanted to talk about it! The Beatles looking happy! The story of the album told in a clear way! Cleaned-up audio! The Beatles being, like, you know, human beings with each other! We can't wait! So we released the Official Screw It, We're Just Gonna Talk About the Beatles falcon to gather the panel post-haste to discuss, and so we did.

The panel discusses the recent Paul McCartney documentary "McCartney 3,2,1." We love it, of course. We get into these topics: Paul's canned anecdotes, the way he's evolved into his job as Primary Beatles Ambassador, the joy of just WATCHING him listen to music, learning that the Beatles loved Bach, seeing Rubin take the low status role, hearing Paul give shout outs to the Kinks and James Jamerson and others, Paul's Spinal Tap moments, what John would have said if he were alive, why Klaus isn't in this doc  and many other things! Panel: Brett, Joel, Katie and Will.  

A special episode about how the Beatles can bond family members! The panel takes a break and host Will talks to his youngest brother Brian about their lifelong love of the band, and how it is a big part of their friendship. Will asks a lot of his usual hypothetical questions to Brian: which concert would you see? What is the most John Paul song, etc? We also dig into silly inside jokes, trips to Beatles conventions, tribute bands, watching the Anthology and how we text each other every October 9 and December 8. We really indulge ourselves and get chatty. I hope those of you who share Beatles love with members of your family can relate!

Part 2 of our grab-bag of topics! We continue with a quick look at George Harrison's 1982 album Gone Troppo (our take: hey, there's good stuff here) and also a choice video in which Paul walks around his high school! Panel: Will Hines, Brett Morris, Katie Plattner, Joel Spence

The panel missed each other and hence, here is a new episode. We each picked a Beatles topic. But Will talked forever, so this is now the first of two parts. In this episode we touch briefly on McCartney III Reimagined (our take: it's good), and then Will gets into the first half of Anthology 1, and Katie talks about the different ways in which songs can remind her of the Beatles. Panel: Will Hines, Brett Morris, Katie Plattner, Joel Spence

The panel discusses Paul's latest album, McCartney III. We go over how he's adapted his songs to his voice, his ambitious lyrical choices, his cool drumming, the modern heavy sound of Slidin', his impressive producing talent, that one of the tracks was recorded 15 years ago and not all of us noticed.  Spoiler: we like it. We also talk a bit about the new "trailer" for the Peter Jackson film/doc "Get Back."

In honor of the upcoming album "McCartney III," the panel discusses the 1980 album "McCartney II." Just like its predecessor, 1970's "McCartney,"" McCartney II is a completely solo project -- just about everything done by only Paul.  Unlike its predecessor, and unlike anything Paul had done to that point, McCartney II features a lot of experiments with synthesized keyboard sounds, ambient noise, repeated dance beats. Disliked by idiot critics upon its release, McCartney II ended up being seen as a prescient pioneer in the direction that electronic music would soon go in. The panel discusses all this, and also gets into: Joel saying "the Wings" and Will pronouncing "jazz" like "jaws." Katie and Brett probably say dumb stuff too, who can remember? Anyway this is a fun episode and we hope you like it! Oh, and we'll do a new episode when "McCartney III" comes out on Katie's birthday in Decemeber 2020!

A noble attempt to recapture the fun of the previous Beatles Games episode.  Some discussion: Which songs would you most like to have said you wrote? What would Paul say about Klaus? Which is the Beatles of social media platforms? How often can the subject of "bifurcated genitals" make its way into a Beatles discussion? Panel:  Will Hines, Brett Morris, Katie Plattner, Joel Spence

The panel plays a variety of games: F**k Marry Kill, Would You Rather, Listener Questions, Who Are the Beatles of X?, Which X is Which Beatle and perhaps regrettably: Klaustalk. We call it "Beatles Games" in the audio of the episode, but then after we were done Joel suggested "Fab Bag" and I like it so here it is in the podcast title. Lots of explicit language for the first five minutes, for almost no reason at all. Panel: Will Hines, Brett Morris, Katie Plattner, Joel Spence

The panel takes a look at the Beatles second album "With the Beatles" (going by the British releases). It seems ot be overlooked in favor of Please Please Me and A Hard Day's Night, but we throw in the three mighty singles they also released around the same time: "From Me to You," "She Loves You" and "I Want to Hold Your Hand" --- whew, looks a lot better now, doesn't it? And it didn't look bad before! This is the second time we've gone over this album for this podcast, for those obsessive SIWJGTATB fans. Okay, and NOW the podcast is finished. Wink! Panel: Will Hines, Brett Morris, Katie Plattner, Joel Spence

Recorded on March 18, 2020 while the panel members were trapped in their homes because of the Corona virus! Consider this a bonus episode, or unreleased track, or a momentary change of heart -- at any rate, it's a new episode. The panel looks at the Beatles' first album "Please Please Me." It's the second time this podcast has gone over that album. The first time was the very first episode, which was the episode that your host, Will Hines, was LEAST prepared for. Now, all these years later, he's ready to take another crack at this album. Standard panel of: Will Hines, Brett Morris, Katie Plattner and Joel Spence are on hand, remotely, to tackle this first, amazing, album. Okay, and NOW the podcast is finished.

We go over the film Let It Be, the documentary that lets us see the Beatles... be quietly annoyed with each other. But also lets us see the glorious rooftop performance! It's also the FINAL EPISODE of this podcast! It's been mostly dormant for about a year, and I felt like it was time to officially put it to bed. It's strange how a project occupies mental space until you really say THE END (Beatles reference). I have loved doing this podcast so much and want to thank everyone who's ever listened to any part of it! And to all the amazing panelists who have ever been on it!  My final hot take on the Beatles is: they're great! Your friend in Beatledom, Will Hines  

Comedy writer/producer Jake Fogelnest comes on the podcast and announces his opinion of what a 12 song White Album should be. This was an unsolicited opinion that Jake brought on, and it's interesting and great. An interesting side note is that Will and Jake talked for over 2 hours and Will decided to include only this. The rest was great, but it was mostly Will bringing stuff up and Jake responding, and the White Album stuff was the stuff that Jake brought up of his own volition and passion, and so host/editor Will made the call and here we are. Hope you enjoy the ep!  

The panel heads to Brett Morris' underground lair, where we all listen to the new Abbey Road 2019 remix in 5.1 sound on his superb system. We love the album, of course, and geek out on all the sonic details given new attention on this mix! We also talk about the cool extra tracks. And we give Wayland a hard time because for 10 seconds Will thought he was mocking Abbey Road (which he was not).  Skip to the final 15 minutes or thereabouts for Will Hines' note-perfect impersonation of Giles Martin! Thanks to Brett for recording and mixing this episode! Apparently he used something called Abbey Road plugins, which I'm sure were unnecessary but make for a great creation story of this ep! Panel: Will Hines, Wayland McQueen, Brett Morris, Katie Plattner, Joel Spence  

We return to our series where host Will Hines plays Beatles albums for his Beatles-neutral friend Eugene Cordero, to see what Eugene thinks! Eugene largely liked Sgt. Pepper! Interesting wrinkle: because of these episode, Eugene is now becoming a Beatles fan and also knows a lot about the band. He's starting to lose his unbiased view! Listen to how quickly he likes the first track! We talk about what makes Pepper great, how much Paul is on it, and of course the amazing final track. Oh, also Emmett Otter's Jug Band Christmas.

We discuss the 2007 film Across the Universe, a musical which used Beatles songs to tell its story. Host Will Hines joins Across the Universe superfan Alex Lewis (Lewberger) and moderate appreciator John Flynn (Two Old Queens) to watch the film and then discuss it! Bad news, skeptics: Will liked the movie. I mean, sure it's weird that it's about a guy named Jude who falls in love with a girl named Lucy (roommates: Maxwell, Sadie and Prudence). But the visuals are cool and the songs are good! Check it out! Panel: John Flynn, Will Hines, Alex Lewis. 

Host Will Hines and panelist Joel Spence (and Brett Morris via text message) talk about their experience seeing Paul McCartney live at Dodger Stadium July 13, 2019 --- featuring an appearance by Ringo Starr!    

The panel reviews the movie "Yesterday," in which a struggling singer-songwriter comes out of a coma to find he's the only person on earth who knows Beatles songs. Will loved this movie and was dismayed to realize that it may in fact be not that great! Panel: Will Hines, Wayland McQueen, Katie Plattner, Joel Spence

We go over the last John Lennon released while he was still alive: Double Fantasy, which came out November 1980. John had not released music for five years. Then he announced he and his wife Yoko were doing a co-album -- each one handling about half the tracks. It's easiest to consider them as two separate albums. As for John's half, they were a stellar set of pop songs expressing the insecurities and hopes of a rocker facing middle age. Tragically, John was murdered three weeks after it came out.  A fascinating album! We get into it. Panel: Will Hines, Brett Morris, Katie Plattner, Joel Spence    

After a long-ish break, the podcast returns! We talk about plans for the future of the podcast, the upcoming Beatles-centered movie "Yesterday" and then settle in for an in-depth talk about Paul's terrific 1973 solo album "Band on the Run." Well, it's a Wings album, really, but we think of it as a Paul solo album. Panelists: Will Hines, Brett Morris, Katie Plattner, Joel Spence

The panel discusses the 2018 remix of the beloved double album: The self-titled The Beatles, better known as the White Album. Giles Martin's remix has all of Beatledom discussing this beloved album, as well as the newly collected original demos and lots of alternate takes!  Panelists: Will Hines,  Brett Morris, Katie Plattner, Joel Spence, Heather Woodward  

The panel watched The Rutles: a 1978 mockumentary / parody of The Beatles done by Eric Idle (of Monty Python) and Neil Innes (of many cool art/music/comedy credits , among other things, the Magical Mystery Tour film)! Panelists: Will Hines, Ariana Lenarsky, Katie Plattner, Joel Spence 

Some of us saw Ringo Starr and the All-Starr Band in Los Angeles (Sep 29, 2018 - Greek Theatre) and we talk about it! Panelists: Will Hines, Jackie Johnson, Adam McCabe,  Katie Plattner, Heather Woodward

A mammoth look at the new Paul McCartney album (Sep 2018), "Egypt Station." The main point: WE LIKE IT. Things we get into: --the wide variety of songs --Paul's use of his new, older voice --the production --the pretty, soft songs like "Hand in Hand" --the epic, poppier songs like "Feh You" and "Come On To Me" --every other song --plus we talk about the Beatles masturbation story, and then don't stop talking about it. Panelists: Will Hines, Brett Morris, Katie Plattner, Joel Spence

We discuss Mark Lewisohn's 1000-page (ish) bio of the Beatles, which hilariously only covers through the end of 1962 (i.e. before the group finished any albums). WE STILL LOVE THIS BOOK! Panelists: Katie Plattner, Jennifer Wang, Will Hines    

The panel discusses the incredible 1971 John Lennon solo album Imagine. Topics discussed: how great this album is, how amazing the song "Imagine" is, how amazing the song "Jealous Guy" is, how petty and mean the song "How Do You Sleep" is. We also listen to Paul McCartney's recent singles and decide that he is very good. Panelists: Will Hines, Brett Morris, Katie Plattner, Joel Spence, Heather Woodward.

The panel does an unsolicited and unnecessary commentary track for the Beatles second movie Help! Heather knows a ton, and the rest of us know less, but not nothing. Panelists: Will Hines, Katie Plattner, Joel Spence, Heather Woodward.

Beatles fan and obsessive list-maker Wayland McQueen picks Beatles 5-20.  Also, we plug the current theatrical release of Yellow Submarine!

I play Revolver for Eugene, who's never heard it. This is the fifth in a series of "playing albums for Eugene." Regular panelist Brett Morris heard I was playing Revolver, and asked to come by, so he sits in too! That makes TWO people just staring at a dude as he listens to an album for the first time! Fun! 

We go over Paul McCartney's second post-Beatles album, RAM. Criticized upon its release, it's now considered one of his best solo albums! Brett Morris in particular doesn't want to hear you people who don't appreciate this album!  We get into the unfair expectations on Paul, his insane vocal range, the inventive orchestrations, the as-usual-perfect-melodies. We also get into what we think the other Beatles might have brought to this. And Joel does too many puns about name Klaus, a man who was not involved at all with this album! Panelists: Will Hines, Brett Morris, Katie Plattner, Joel Spence.

The panel goes over John's first post-Beatles solo album: PLASTIC ONO BAND. Not enough Beatles fans have heard this, and it's one of the best solo Beatles albums out there. The bleakness, the raw blues rock, KLAUS' BASS and RINGO'S DRUMS!  Plus Barbara Streisand covered "Mother?" Weird. Panelists: Will Hines, Brett Morris, Katie Plattner, Joel Spence

Continuing the series of "playing Beatles albums for Eugene" (this is the 4th installment) we do Rubber Soul! Hear Will try hard not to influence Eugene's opinion! Luckily he doesn't have to as Eugene falls in love with this album almost immediately.

In the 3rd episode of "Playing Albums for Eugene," host Will Hines plays "A Hard Day's Night." HOWEVER due to a recording error, the levels are off and so it's hard to hear us talk when the music gets loud. Sheesh. My apologies. That's why I'm releasing this as a bonus ep. Feel free to IGNORE or to PUSH THROUGH, as is your wishes.

Beatles fan Amy walks us through the evidence of John's affection for Paul. Sure, we know Lennon cared about Macca, but he sure was stubborn about showing it when journalists were around, especially in the 1970s. Amy takes us through deep cuts of interviews, testimony, and even shopping lists to which reveal what every Beatles fan knows but still loves to hear: John loves Paul.

We loved playing a Beatles album for someone who'd never heard it last week, so let's try it again. With the same person! but a different album. We play "The White Album" for Eugene Cordero and get his moment-by-moment reactions. Some highlights include: Dear Prudence, Honey Pie and Revolution 9.    

Sure, the album Abbey Road is a favorite of Beatles fans -- but what does someone think of it if they're not a particular fan of the band, and have never really heard the album? We find out as Beatles-neutral actor Eugene Cordero (Kong: Skull Island, UCB) listens to this seminal album and says what he thinks! Robert Baker (Justified, Grey's Anatomy) is along for the ride too.  Hosted as usual by Will Hines. Pardon the slight-but-yep-you-hear-it echo -- your host did not realize his hotel room had such bouncy sounds.

Here's a major one: We go over George Harrison's first solo album, the triple-album All Things Must Pass. After having lots of his songs passed up for the later Beatles albums (except when they were so-goddamned-good-not-even-John-Lennon-could-deny-it like Something and Here Comes the Sun) --- George explodes with productivity on his debut. We talk about the million people who worked on this album, the obvious (though still restrained) "screw you" vibe, the spirituality, the weird house George lived in, the many many great songs, and oh yeah that third disc which is just... uh.. blues jams. Guess what: we love this album. Panelists: Will Hines, Brett Morris, Katie Plattner, Joel Spence, Heather Woodward. 

The second post-Beatles solo album is the you've-probably-never-heard-it Beaucoups of Blues, a country album by Ringo Starr released July of 1970. It is quite solidly okay, which is honestly better than probably a lot of people expected, since Ringo Starr is basically the Ringo of the Beatles. Our panelists are Will Hines and Heather Woodward. Circumstances made us do this episode in a bit of a hurry, with Heather phoning in and Will playing music by holding his iPhone up to a microphone. The audio is, just like this album, still quite solidly okay!  

The first true Beatles solo album: McCartney. Recorded almost entirely by himself, including many sessions done alone in his apartment -- this was a sad and lonely time for Paul. The Beatles were over, and he was trying to see what kind of record he would make without his three collaborators around. Turns out: a pretty damn good one. Just "Maybe I'm Amazed" alone makes this a must-have album. But even the smallest trifle is fascinating for what it tells us about how the very recently former Beatle is feeling. Panelists: Will Hines, Brett Morris, Katie Plattner, Joel Spence, Heather Woodward

We take a break from going over the solo stuff to discuss BEATLES WOMEN. An all-female panel discusses the wives and girlfriends of the fab four, with a German photographer and British journalist thrown in there too. This is the second long episode in a row. I promise the episodes are normally gonna be an hour or less! But we had a lot to cover! The next episode will come in two more weeks since this one is basically a double. Panelists: Jackie Johnson, Jen Krueger, Katie Plattner, Jennifer Wang, Heather Woodward  

We're back for season 3! And now we're going over SOLO BEATLES. First, a massive episode that goes over all (well, most) of the solo projects they did before the breakup. And we get into the breakup, too! Allen Klein vs. Lee Eastman! Yoko Ono! Apple Corps! Eeesh. But we also dig into the music: Wonderwall! Two Virgins! Give Peace A Chance! Sentimental Journey!  It's the Beatles! Fascinating, even as they couldn't stand each other. This is a long episode, and so the next episode will come in TWO weeks instead of next week. Panelists: Will Hines, Brett Morris, Katie Plattner, Heather Woodward

We talk about stuff - lyrics, music, licks, moods -- the Beatles stole for their songs! Wait, are we really saying the Beatles are thieves? Well, no. Not usually. Sometimes we're just interested to see which songs influenced them. Except for one or two in which case we're like, "Yikes!" ("If I Needed Someone" and "The Bells of Rhymney," anyone?) This episode is inspired by a new project by our special guest Matt Besser (Improv4Humans, UCB founder). Besser(along with Bobby Matthews as well as Beatles podcast regular Brett Morris) has made a rock opera called "Stolen Idea" -- which we hope you check out on Stitcher Premium. Also, we are taking a break from the podcast for a bit to recharge our Beatles engines! While we're recharging please know that we appreciate everyone who's taken time to listen! Thank you! Panelists: Matt Besser, Will Hines, Ariana Lenarsky, Brett Morris, Joel Spence.

On this episode we talk about two less-often-discussed Beatles movies: Nowhere Boy (2009) and Backbeat (1994). These are not Beatles movies as in the Beatles were in them, but that are Beatles movies in that they are fictionalized accounts of the Beatles real lives. First we discuss Nowhere Boy, which shows John Lennon in high school, meeting his reckless but inspiring birth mother Julia, learning to play banjo and guitar, meeting Paul McCartney and coming to terms with his strict but reliable Aunt Mimi. Then we get into Backbeat, which shows the life of Stu Sutcliffe, John's friend in Liverpool art college, who was the Beatles original bass player and who joins the band when they go to Hamburg. Plus we talk about the very cool band of 1994 grungy all-stars that got assembled to make this movie's soundtrack! Although both movies have their flaws, I think big Beatles fans would love them both and in this episode we get into why! My panel for this episode is Brian Hines (Sea Tea theatre in Hartford, Ct and brother of the host) and Tara Ariano (previously.tv web site and podcasting network). As I note in the introduction, the recording quality for this ep is a bit less than usual. We were all in different cities and I was using some new software. I didn't configure everything exactly right. Everyone is still easy to understand, but you can hear that we are all on phones, etc. My apologies!  

For our third episode recorded in the vaunted facilities of actual Abbey Road recording studios, we perform our own cover versions of Beatles songs. They start weird, and get weirder. We go in roughly chronological order, but because of a combination of jet lag and how last-minute we got the studio -- our song selections are truly insane.  Thankfully Joel Spence had arrived so we have his great guitar playing. And we have my own and Connor Ratliff's and Joel's spirited singing. I do recommended listening to the whole thing for our interpretations of When I'm 64 and You Know My Name, Look Up The Number. Thanks to engineer Stefano Civetta for his patience and sense of humor throughout! Back to normal next week!

Musician/subway busker Nicola Hogg (@nicolahoggmusic), with her terrific voice and great songs, saved the day in this episode! To re-cap: podcast host Will Hines along with temporary co-host Connor Ratliff were in London for improv reasons and impulsively decided to try and rent time at famed Beatles recording studio Abbey Road. To their shock, it WORKED and they suddenly had 10 hours of studio time with almost no plan. The day before the session, they pass Nicola Hogg playing "You Can't Hurry Love" at the Tottenham Court Road subway station, and she sounded terrific. But that's not a Beatles song, you say. Well, so what? She's a young talented musician, and didn't the Beatles foster many such talents via their Apple Records label? And weren't Connor and Will, for the day at least, owners of official Abbey Road studio recording time?  After exchanging a few tweets ("Uh, hi, you don't know us -- want to meet us at Abbey Road and record?") the delightful Nicola Hogg becomes the one and only client of our day-long adventure in running a record label, which is called Songer Records for reasons made clear in this episode. Nicola plays us her songs, as well as some great Beatles covers. We talk about her music story, her thoughts on the Beatles and songwriting and performing in general. She's great! Check out Nicola's terrific music at these places: On Spotify, she's Nicola Hogg.  And she's @nicolahoggmusic on twitter, Instagram, Facebook and Soundcloud!  One more Abbey Road ep next week!

HOLY CRAP THIS EPISODE RECORDED AT ABBEY ROAD STUDIOS. Is this an act of hubris? Or a fulfillment of a destiny? We may never know, but the fact is: THIS EPISODE, and the two that will follow, ARE RECORDED AT ABBEY ROAD STUDIOS! We explain it in full detail in the episode, but basically Connor and Joel and I were all going to be in London and so we sent an email to Abbey Road Studios to ask if we could record there... AND THEY SAID YES. I mean, for a normal fee, it wasn't like they had any idea who we were. We recorded 3 episodes on September 22, 2017 (mark that down, Mark Lewisohn). For this episode, we talk to Abbey Road engineer Stefano Civetta. Abbey Road Studios has a new small studio in their complex called The Gatehouse and that made is financially possible (though still impractical and foolish) for us to record there! We saw the Beatles studio! We took our photo in the crosswalk! We ate in the Abbey Road work cafeteria! IT WAS AN INCREDIBLE DAY! Panelists: Will Hines, Connor Ratliff, Stefano Civetta, and for one brief word Mariana Feijo.