THE LAST DAYS OF THE BEATLES

THE BEATLES AND THE ROLLING STONES

So young, but already fed up with fame: Never-before-seen pictures capture The Beatles on their last ever tour They are the lost photographs that show four young men at the height of their dizzying fame: behind-the-scenes snapshots of The Beatles on their last American tour in 1966. Taken by Bob Bonis, the band’s U.S. tour manager, these pictures are part of a collection that remained unseen for four decades until his son Alex opened his late father’s archive of memorabilia. Now they are published in a new book for the first time. Ticket to ride: Paul McCartney takes a thoughtful swig as the interminable touring drags on The fresh-faced four from Liverpool appear relaxed as they tour the States. But they also seem lost in thought — for behind the unique photographs is a story of disappointment as fame began to take its toll. Tomorrow never knows: Resting after their LA concert by the poolside at the home of artist David Wynne, Ringo Starr plays cowboy with a toy gun reported to be a gift from Elvis Presley From the very beginning, America was seen as the end of the rainbow for The Beatles. That was where the real glory and the pot of gold would lie, they’d told themselves when, as unknown hopefuls, they’d played night after night in Hamburg and Liverpool’s Cavern Club. But when they finally got to the  U.S. in 1964 they felt as though they were prisoners — locked in by their own impossible fame. From the moment they stepped off the BOAC plane in New York and were surprised to find a frenzied, screaming mob, to their last ever concert, in San Francisco in 1966, they would be besieged by uncontrollable hysteria. At first, of course, touring America was exciting. With their singles claiming the top five positions on the U.S. charts and their film A Hard Day’s Night a box office smash, their manager Brian Epstein agreed to a 24-city tour of the U.S. and Canada over 32 days. That meant travelling an average of 600 miles a day in their own private plane and playing 32 concerts of about 30 minutes each. And looking at the photographs of that first tour in the book, there’s almost a sense of schoolboy euphoria as The Beatles, like any four lads on holiday, goof around the hotel swimming pool in Los Angeles. Very quickly, however, the excitement began to pall. Unable to go out to a restaurant, into a bar or simply to walk unnoticed down a street, they only saw the real America from a distance, through hotel windows and from the insides of limousines. Other, later, photographs reveal their isolation. Taken in hotel rooms, backstage or in rehearsal, The Beatles are either alone or together as a group, the four of them driven ever closer by the demands of a voracious, grasping adoration. Enlarge Enlarge Looks like it's been a hard day's night for John Lennon in August 1966, while the mystery tours had stopped being magical for George Harrison Wherever they went there would be fans, while frequently so many people would congregate in their hotel suites to luxuriate in simply being in The Beatles’ presence that all four would escape into a bathroom to smoke or play poker. For Lennon and McCartney the boredom could be broken by working on new songs, but the more temperamental George Harrison would very quickly begin to complain about the ‘madness’ of it all. Fame never really suited him. Perhaps the placid Ringo Starr, who’d only been recruited by The Beatles when they were on the cusp of fame two years earlier, enjoyed it most. ‘I’ve always had crazes. I could be happy with a camera shop,’ he once told me, so it’s no surprise to see him in other pictures with a brand new camera photographing his colleagues. A second tour of the U.S. took place in 1965. It was shorter and The Beatles by now were more cynical. Later, John Lennon would describe The Beatles on tour as being like four Caesars, surrounded by drugs, groupies and, sometimes, prostitutes. Enlarge The long and winding road: A young Ringo Starr puts his feet up on the way to St Louis, Missouri By now, playing the same few songs almost every night to fans who couldn’t hear them because of the screaming seemed pointless. ‘How often do you think The Beatles enjoyed a show?’ John Lennon would later say to me. ‘One show in 30 would give us any real satisfaction, and you’d go through all kinds of hell to get that. So, what was I? A performing flea.’ By the time of the last U.S. tour in 1966 The Beatles knew they couldn’t carry on. There was no fun in playing live any more and the sounds created for their Revolver album couldn’t be reproduced when piped through the primitive sound systems of the stadiums in which they performed. When they returned to Britain, it was to the recording studios, the only place they would ever play together again as a band. Though they struggled on for another three years, the end was inevitable. What these pictures capture is The Beatles’ calm at the centre of a hurricane of their own creation,   Summer 1960, and Britain was finally seeing the green shoots of affluence after years of austerity. Fashion and pop music were in, teenagers were desperate for heroes  -  the time was right for four likely lads from Liverpool to seize their moment, reveals Tony Rennell. Ready to rock: Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, John Lennon and George Harrison during rehearsals for the Royal Variety Show at the Prince of Wales theatre, London, in November1963 The birth almost went unnoticed. But as the summer of 1960 bloomed, an earth-shattering phenomenon known as the Beatles came into being. With their £15 guitars and chipboard amplifiers, teenagers John, Paul and George (no Ringo - he came later) had been around the Liverpool music scene for a couple of years as a group of sorts. In leather jackets (collars turned up) and drainpipe jeans, hair slicked up in teddy boy quiffs, they played dance halls and youth clubs - the back of a coal lorry, even - under various names and with a changing assortment of members. They were the Quarrymen - after John's school, Quarry Bank Grammar - playing skiffle with a tea-chest bass and a washboard, then Johnny and the Moondogs, for reasons no one can remember. They became the Silver Beatles next, as a nod to the Crickets, American rocker Buddy Holly's backing group. 'The guitar's all very well John, but you'll never make a living out of it' But over the course of the summer of 1960, they played a series of shows at the Grosvenor Ballroom in Wallasey as, simply, The Beatles. It was the habitually word-playing John who had switched 'beetle' to 'beatle', as in beat music. The Britain the Fab Four grew up in was not fabulous at all and almost unrecognisable to us now, a country still rooted in the past. The war had been over for 15 years but the damage it had wreaked was still visible, in city centre bomb sites where post-war planning had done little to make up for the devastation Hitler caused. The country was slowly emerging from postwar poverty, and prime minister Harold Macmillan rejoiced that his fellow countrymen had 'never had it so good'. He told them, 'Go around the country, go to the industrial towns, go to the farms and you will see a state of prosperity such as we have never had in my lifetime - nor indeed in the history of this country.' As the 1950s closed and the 1960s opened, Britain was still a land of promises rather than promise. But there was affluence in the air, even if, at £500, the iconically styled Minis rolling off the assembly lines were out of the reach of most people. The number of cars on the road passed five million for the first time, jamming up the A-roads because the only motorway was 60-odd miles of the M1 from London towards Birmingham. But there were no self-service petrol stations - a pump attendant filled up your tank - and supermarkets were a rarity, so there was a grocer's shop on almost every corner. Just about the most hi-tech gadget you could get was a ballpoint pen with a tungsten carbide tip. There were no desktop computers, and telephones were clumping great Bakelite contraptions with slow dials. The contraceptive pill hadn't been invented, but even when it was, a year later, it didn't stop art school student John getting his girlfriend, Cynthia, pregnant. But, rebel though he yearned to be, he married her. It was the done thing - only one child in 20 had parents who were unwed. The school leaving age was 15, homosexuality was a crime, murderers could be hanged and the country was shocked that the Queen's sister was marrying a commoner (albeit a double-barrelled one schooled at Eton). Feminism hadn't yet got off the ground, so it wasn't surprising when the QC for the prosecution at the obscenity trial of the novel Lady Chatterley's Lover asked the jury, 'Is it a book you would wish your wife or your servants to read?' That year, boxer Cassius Clay, later Muhammad Ali, won a gold medal at the Rome Olympics; the Real Madrid football team lifted the European Cup for the fifth time in a row, beating Eintracht Frankfurt 7-3 in the final in Glasgow, and 26-year-old Judi Dench was a stunning newcomer as Juliet at the Old Vic. Raw talent: It was at frantic lunchtime sessions in that cellar room of the Cavern, packed with gyrating and adoring office girls in beehive hair and stilettos, that the Beatles really came to life But these splashes apart, this was a world lacking in colour, as monochrome as the blackand-white TVs showing just two channels on 14in screens and sending viewers off to bed with a Horlicks by 11. Coronation Street, Britain's first soap, was a babe in arms and American imports such as Wagon Train and Rawhide Into this mish-mash of traditional values crashed three louts from Liverpool, for louts and teddy boys were what their respectable families feared they would become if they persisted in this music lark. John's guardian, Aunt Mimi, standing in for his absentee parents, was concerned that he was so easy-going he would be lured into bad ways by those she dismissed loftily as 'real whackers' and 'low types'. But then she did buy him his first guitar, after she discovered he was hanging around Hessy's music shop in central Liverpool and enviously eying the rows of instruments, along with every other likely lad in town. That was in 1956. He was 15 and a slave to Elvis, the scowling sensation from the US. As John practised playing his guitar, strumming and picking until his fingertips split, Mimi hoped he was getting the demon out of his system. It was all a waste of time, she told him. 'The guitar's all very well, John, but you'll never make a living out of it.' It was the grammar schools they went to after passing the 11-plus that were the making of John, Paul and George. Not because they were academically minded, but because they picked up on the unique spirit of those post-war incubators of opportunity and ambition. The essential grammar school lesson was aspirational, opening doors, minds and horizons for the students. If you had ability, anything was possible. Humble beginnings: The Quarrymen, named after after John's school, Quarry Bank Grammar, play from the back of a lorry in 1957 At Quarry Bank, John was the class smart aleck. He rubbed up against authority - and got his backside tanned in the process - but never really defied it. School was the stage for showing off, getting a laugh. He was bored, mostly - until he got that guitar. It was his headmaster who spotted his potential and then encouraged the skiffle group John founded by allowing them a slot at the sixth-form dance. If never teacher's pet, John was not a hopeless case either. Diehard, disaffected rebels don't, as a rule, name their band after their school. By contrast, Paul, a pupil at the Liverpool Institute, the city's number one grammar school, cruised through classwork. Smooth talking and cooperative, he was popular with staff and students alike. Head boy material, he seemed destined to be a teacher or even a doctor, until music got hold of him. His father Jim, a cotton salesman earning £6 a week, was a musician who had led Jim Mac's Jazz Band in the 1920s, and a piano stood in the living room of their council house. He bought Paul his first guitar and would sit at the upright and play chords for his son to learn. From then on, the guitar overruled all else in Paul's life. He played it in the bath and even sitting on the lavatory. It was on the bus to school that he met a younger lad named George Harrison, hollow-cheeked and unsmiling, except when they got to chatting about guitars. George's mum shelled out £30 for a guitar for him but, unlike the cosseted John and Paul, he had to pay the money back, so took a job as a butcher's delivery boy. 'What was different about the Beatles was their canny ability to catch the tide of change in British society - an entrepreneurial spirit built on growing affluence and growing confidence' George, a bus driver's son, was, in his quiet way, much more of a rebel than the other two. He was clever enough to get into the Institute but, once there, took no interest in school work. He wasn't disruptive or loud, but he went his own way, swapping his school uniform in favour of a canary yellow waistcoat, tapered trousers and winkle-picker shoes, his regulation cap balanced on top of hair piled teddy boy high. He wasn't destined for art college like John, or teacher training college, like Paul. He left school as soon as he could and was apprenticed to an electrician, but all he really wanted to do was play the guitar. The three came together in the casual way that mates do, introduced by friends, discovering shared interests. John and Paul were the 'personalities', vying to outdo each other in talent even then. George tagged along, letting his guitar skills do the talking for him. Ambition and self-belief drove them, and the circumstances were right for them to at least have a crack at doing something different. With unemployment at an historic low, there were plenty of job opportunities for bright lads, so you didn't have to rush into one. There was time to kick over the traces and have fun because you never knew where it might lead. They were hardly unique in this. Merseyside was awash with groups chasing the dream - Ian and the Zodiacs, Lee Curtis and the All-Stars, the Remo Four, the Four Jays. The list of wannabees was endless, all vying to be Liverpool versions of American rhythm and blues masters Little Richard and Chuck Berry. Top dogs in town - beating the Beatles into fourth place in a popularity poll - was blonde and beautiful Rory Storm and his pink-suited Hurricanes, now largely forgotten except for their drummer, Ringo Starr, who was nicked by the Beatles when they cut their first record in 1962. But why them? Why were they the ones who gate-crashed the music industry and became superstars? The Beatles were certainly talented musicians, but were they more so than anyone else? They were good-looking and full of energy - but who on the scene wasn't? What was different about the Beatles was their canny ability to catch the tide of change in British society - an entrepreneurial spirit built on growing affluence and growing confidence; and the beginnings of new youth culture, fed by youngsters with money in their pockets. And there was one man who showed them the way. Brian Epstein, a wealthy classical music lover with a family electrical goods business in Liverpool, spotted this trend and began selling records in his store. Kids came to hang out - and spend their money. He listened when they talked about local talent and steered him to a place called the Cavern Club, under the arches of a warehouse between the city centre and the docks where, by youthful public demand, cool jazz was giving way to hectic, home-grown, rough-trade rock 'n' roll. It was at frantic lunchtime sessions in that cellar room, packed with gyrating and adoring office girls in beehive hair and stilettos, that the Beatles really came to life. The air was dank with sweat and cheap perfume, there were rats under the stage and the then drummer Pete Best's kit blocked the only ventilation grille. The excitement was palpable. This, as a local journalist put it, 'was the stuff that screams were made of'. And Epstein, seeing a business opportunity playing on the stage, seized it. The fact that he was a closet gay and fancied John, was probably also a factor. As the band's manager, he cleaned them up, swapping jeans and leather jackets for suits and ties. He took them south to introduce them to London record producers. It wasn't an easy ride. Doors opened and rapidly closed - apparently no one wanted groups any more. But Epstein persisted, until one of the smaller labels, Parlophone, the last on his list, saw some potential. And the rest, they say, is history. Before The Beatles came onto the scene, much of British popular culture was a derivative of glamorous, affluent America, and music was heavily transatlantic. Apart from Cliff Richard, who seemed a pale imitation of Elvis, the only home-grown talent making it in the Top Ten charts were the likes of Anthony Newley and Lonnie Donegan, singing ballads or silly numbers such as My Old Man's A Dustman. But that all changed with the Beatles. In 1963, they reigned supreme for 18 out of 52 weeks, with songs they wrote themselves - by Brits, for Brits, distinctive and new - and were followed by the Rolling Stones, the Dave Clark Five and other British groups. Having had 14 British number one hits, Elvis was the sole chart-topper from the US, and that was for just one week. Before 1964, very few Brits had had hits on the US record charts, then the boys did the unthinkable - they conquered America - starting with I Want To Hold Your Hand, which was number one for seven weeks. From the back of a coal lorry to Carnegie Hall in less than four years was some achievement. Happy birthday, Beatles. I remember the day I was at Harrods, ordering white carpet for John and Yoko. It was to be specially made from natural unbleached wool on extra large looms in China. Another day, on a trip to town, I found white marble Empire mantelpieces. One of my favorite finds was a Queen Anne Chinoiserie desk for John. In their bathroom, they wanted a gigantic circular tub. We considered willow-pattern antique toilets, but settled on modern. John wanted a bed like a turntable for Tittenhurst, their Berkshire mansion, so we ordered a circular one. An army of people was established to accomplish all these and 1,000 other tasks. Ever present: Yoko looks on as Dan takes Lennon's portrait in 1969. He started out as Yoko's assistant and ended up as John's butler And then there was me – Yoko Ono’s ‘American friend’ who came along for the ride: her personal assistant, confidant – and dope buddy. As I once told an old friend: ‘In the end, I was just John’s butler.’ I lived with Yoko and Lennon for four years; an insider witnessing  their love affair and the break-up of The Beatles. I can still see the vivid  cast that surrounded them: the stars, charlatans, groupies, politicians,  sycophants, lawyers and hippies. It was a time of absolute freedom, a time when everything changed. The world was turning on, tuning in and dropping out, and all to the beat of rock ’n’ roll. ‘It’s Allen Ginsberg and he’s f****** naked.’ I didn’t know John Lennon then, but the Liverpool accent was unmistakable. The date was June 3, 1965 and we were celebrating the 39th birthday of our friend Allen, the Beat poet. He was standing in a corner, stark naked with a drink in his hand, surrounded by people trying to get a peep. He loved to take his clothes off, especially in a crowd. I turned to see John and the other Beatles staring at Allen with amused looks on their faces. The Beat scene was spreading into the mainstream. My wife Jill and I made a lot of new friends. Among them were John Dunbar, who ran the Indica Gallery in Mayfair, and the girl who was soon to become his wife: the young singer Marianne Faithfull. She was beautiful, with an aura of vulnerability and innocence. Inner circle: Dan Richter describes his close links with the Lennons Just a few years out of convent school, she had begun her career playing guitar and singing folk ballads. The Rolling Stones manager Andrew Oldham was impressed, and encouraged Mick Jagger and Keith Richards to write As Tears Go By for her. The recording was released in 1964 and she was catapulted into stardom. Marianne and John got married, and invited us to their Chelsea flat for dinner after their son Nicholas was born. Just as we were finishing the meal, there was a knock at the door. There stood John’s friend Paul McCartney, carrying a very big hobbyhorse. ‘Hi, look what I found for Nicholas,’ he said. ‘It’ll be a while before Nicholas can use it,’ said John, and we all laughed. Paul then pulled an envelope of marijuana out of his pocket and explained that Bob Dylan had given it to him. He also said Bob had introduced The Beatles to pot for the first time the previous August in New York. I found it hard to believe they were so new to turning on. John Dunbar was around The Beatles a lot. Once, when he had lit up a pipe of dope, John Lennon had been shocked. ‘Are they really that square?’ I thought. ‘I don’t know how to roll it,’ Paul said at the dinner party, and we all laughed: that was not a problem for us. We all ended up sitting on a rug in John and Marianne’s living room, singing to the accompaniment of pots and pans from the kitchen. Later, Jill and I were nervously expecting Lennon and Yoko. I had become friendly with Yoko when we were in Tokyo in 1964. Now she and John – one of the most famous human beings in the world – were stopping by to chat. ‘What do you serve a Beatle?’ I asked Jill as I went to answer the knock on the door. ‘Do I just roll a joint?’ ‘Don’t be daft, he’s British. We can’t go wrong offering him a cup of tea,’ she replied. ‘I’ll just make a nice pot of Earl Grey.’ 'The media might be ranting that Yoko was breaking up The Beatles, but the fact was they had fallen in love' I opened the door and John and Yoko were standing there. They seemed to fit together as if there was a physical connection. John looked skinny and nervous in jeans, denim jacket and T-shirt. Yoko said something like, ‘Dan and Jill, this is John.’ She had a funny way of sucking in her breath after she spoke. I knew John had started out at art school and always wanted to be an artist and I realised Yoko was introducing her new boyfriend to the hip art world. Yoko was his guide, his entree to that world. The media might be ranting that Yoko was breaking up The Beatles, but the fact was they had fallen in love. John hung on Yoko’s every word. He wanted to be a conceptual artist and Yoko wanted to be a rock star. This, of course, presented a lot of problems. The Beatles juggernaut was in trouble: John and Paul were drifting apart and most Beatles insiders saw Yoko as a gold digger who was exacerbating their own problems. As a result, she was openly insulted in front of John. I had an ongoing problem with heroin, needing it daily, but now I had to find it for John and Yoko too. I took the train into London every day to look for work and buy heroin for myself and for them. Meanwhile, they were moving into Tittenhurst Park, their new 85-acre estate in Ascot with its mansion framed by lawns, stately trees and great walls of rhododendrons, camellias and azaleas. There was plenty of room there, so Yoko and John invited us to join them. Yoko and Jill were very close and I was getting us dope. It was a good solution for all of us. One Friday in August 1969, I clunked into the house in my wellingtons to see The Beatles sitting round like morose pop demigods. John and Yoko at Tittenhurst Park, their 85-acre estate in Ascot with its mansion framed by lawns, stately trees and great walls of rhododendrons, camellias and azaleas They had come to Ascot for a photoshoot to promote their Abbey Road album. It was one of their last meetings together and the atmosphere was tense. Paul and John were arguing over everything. Apple, their company, was haemorrhaging money. Paul had begun telling the others what to do, particularly during recordings and John was angry and disillusioned. The Beatle dream was just about over. John had discovered that Yoko was willing to be his foil: his lover, attendant, teacher, and prime minister. Imagine how effective it was for his purpose of breaking up The Beatles to always have her present at recordings and meetings. This, of course, increased the howls of derision directed at her. Meanwhile, she was trying to transform herself into a rock star, but her singing was not going well. She had a way of wailing when she sang that belongs in a Japanese temple, not  on a rock stage. The word ‘yowl’ was used to describe it. John would not hear a word of criticism, but the more she sang, the more the people at Apple couldn’t stand her. To them, she was not only an interloper but a terrible singer to boot. I was walking in the estate grounds with John and Yoko when they had their first meeting with head gardener Frank. ‘We only want white and black flowers,’ Yoko told Frank, who  was the classic English gardener: tweed jacket, wellington boots and a tie, quite proper and completely confused. ‘Pardon, ma’am, did you say only white and black flowers?’ ‘Yes, we don’t want any colour at all, just pure white and black.’ Yoko was quite firm. I was amused as I watched Frank struggle. ‘Uh . . . I’m sure we can find some lovely white flowers, but black might be difficult.’ ‘There are some very dark tulips that look black. I’m sure you can find some other kinds, too,’ said Yoko. I was trying not to laugh. Life at Tittenhurst was going to be fun. Despite owning a sprawling mansion, John and Yoko spent most of their time in bed by late 1969 By late 1969, John and Yoko spent most of their time in bed. They slept, ate, had sex, worked the phones, read the post, planned their next outing, and whatever else that made up their day. I would drop by to discuss what was going on or whatever needed their attention. John was invariably sitting cross-legged on the bed strumming his acoustic guitar while Yoko took the lead in discussions. You always felt that Yoko and John had discussed things before you arrived and decided on what Yoko would say, while John appeared to be lost in his guitar. All around them was this great unfinished mansion. Some rooms were temporarily set up for use, others were filled with workmen  on scaffolds scraping and painting. Everywhere, walls were being demolished or built. Empty rooms were filled with the flotsam and jetsam of The Beatles phenomenon. Boxes were stacked everywhere, filled with colourful clothes and costumes, shoes and boots, books, acetates, records, hundreds of tapes, guitars, and gifts. On August 1, 1971, George Harrison held a major charity event at Madison Square Garden. The Concert For Bangladesh – a country hit by the double disaster of war and cholera – was the first of its kind and George, Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton and Ravi Shankar were to appear. As soon as we arrived in New York everyone assumed John would join George and Ringo on stage. But he didn’t want to, for fear of being tricked into a Beatles reunion, even though Yoko was keen to take part. They bickered all day. Paul had begun telling the others what to do, particularly during recordings and John was angry and disillusioned. The Beatle dream was just about over My phone rang in the middle of  the night. ‘Get over here right away.’ It was John and I could tell that something was wrong. I hurriedly dressed and went down the hall to their suite in a hotel on Central Park. I could see that the room was a mess. Furniture was overturned and things were thrown about. John was very angry and Yoko was huddling in the background. He said he was leaving. ‘She wants to go onstage at George’s Bangladesh thing. I’m not gonna do it,’ he said. ‘If she wants to go on without me, let her. I’ll be in Paris.’ We rode out to the airport in a terrible rainstorm, John staring grimly ahead. I got him on a flight and returned to the Park Lane and Yoko. Hurt and upset she told me she was determined to go onstage without him, even though it would make George and Ringo uncomfortable and destroy ‘John and Yoko’ in the public eye. Only the following day did she relent and return to Ascot. Less than two weeks later John and Yoko were back in New York, and although they couldn’t have known it at the time, they would never return to Tittenhurst. The Ascot days were a transition for all of us. I broke my dependence on heroin and started on the road to recovery. Yoko had established herself as more than just the woman who had ‘broken up The Beatles’. And John had changed from a Beatle to the John Lennon that we understand today. When John and Yoko had moved into Tittenhurst in August 1969 he was still a Beatle and a tentative neophyte in Yoko’s conceptualist  art world. When he left for New York almost exactly two years later with the master tape for Imagine, his fully realised solo work, he had completed his transformation. He had discovered his new voice and he had a confidence that would stay with him for the rest of his life. He was ready to leave. New York was where the energy was and he was ready to take it on. Forty two years ago yesterday, at 11.35am, The Beatles walked across a zebra crossing in an innocuous North London street. The photoshoot for their new Abbey Road album happened just yards from the eponymous recording studios and took ten minutes - only six frames were taken by the photographer, Iain Macmillan, who was perched on a stepladder. It has since become one of the most iconic covers in history for two reasons - no album cover has inspired more imitations, and none has spawned such a mass of conspiracy theories. The Beatles' world-famous Abbey Road album cover that sparked a million conspiracy theories For Beatles obsessives with fevered imaginations, it was ultimate proof of the bizarre theory of the time - that Paul McCartney was, in fact, dead. According to the legend, Paul had died in a car accident and been replaced by an impostor. The band, it was said, subsequently felt guilty about the deception, and so placed hidden clues on the album cover for their fans. Thus, even today, despite the apparent rude health of McCartney, they insist that if you look closely at the images on the front and back of the album it is packed with deathly symbolism. Beatlemania: A tribute band joined hundreds of fans in Abbey Road yesterday to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the famous photoshoot Surrounded: A bus comes to a standstill as fans mob the Abbey Road site What is certain is that the album denoted one death of sorts. Unbeknown to the public at the time, The Beatles were in the final throes of a bitter break-up and would never record another album. Relations had deteriorated to such an extent that the group abandoned their original title of Everest, together with a shoot in the Himalayas, and were photographed instead walking away from the studios and everything they had once shared. For other devotees, however, far more could be read into the image... 1. THE FUNERAL The procession of The Beatles across the zebra crossing, say the conspiracy theorists, represents Paul's funeral. John Lennon leads in a white suit and symbolises the preacher; Ringo Starr is the mourner, dressed in black; George Harrison, in scruffy shirt and trousers, denotes the grave-digger; Paul is wearing an old suit and is the only one who is barefoot. He later explained that he began the shoot wearing sandals but, because it was a hot day, he kicked them off. The theorists believed that if this was the case, the hot tarmac would be too uncomfortable. This, they argued, was a sign that Paul was the corpse. 2. THE CIGARETTE Paul McCartney is left-handed, but here holds his cigarette in his right hand. At the time, cigarettes were commonly referred to as 'coffin nails'. This, therefore, could be seen as a message that Paul's 'coffin lid' had been nailed down and that the man in the picture was a lookalike. Paul is also out of step with the other band members. Each of the others has his left leg forward, but Paul has his right leg forward - again marking him out as different. 3. THE REGISTRATION PLATE The white VW Beetle in the background has the registration LMW 28IF - 28 being the age conspiracy theorists say Paul would have been IF he hadn't 'died'. In fact, Paul was 27 when Abbey Road was released - but fortunately for the theorists, Indian mystics count a person's age from conception, not birth, in which case Paul would have indeed been 28 at the time. Besides, the band were famously followers of the Indian guru, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. It has also been suggested that the LMW stands for 'Linda McCartney Weeps' - referring to his new wife whom he had married earlier that year. 4. THE SPECTATORS In the background, a small group of people dressed in white stand on one side of the road, while a lone person stands on the other. Is this meant to be Paul, alone and different from the others? 5. THE POLICE VAN On the right-hand side of the road is a black police van, believed to be a reference to the police who kept quiet about Paul's 'death'. According to legend, the band's manager, Brian Epstein, bought their silence, and the presence of the Maria is meant as another subtle thank you. 6. THE LINE OF CARS A line can be traced from the VW Beetle to the three cars in front of it. If it is drawn connecting their right wheels it runs straight through Paul's head, with theorists suggesting that means Paul sustained a head injury because of a car crash. 7. THE BLOODSTAIN On the Australian version of the album, the cover showed what could be a bloodstain splattered on the road just behind Ringo and John, supposedly backing claims of a road accident. 8. THE CRACKED S On the back cover there is a picture of the Abbey Road sign and above it the name Beatles has been written. There is an obvious crack running through the S - thought to suggest problems within the group. 9. THE DOTS To the left of the name 'BEATLES' there are a series of eight dots. When joined together they form the number three. Did this mean there were only three Beatles left? 10. IMAGE OF DEATH If the back cover is turned 45 degrees anticlockwise a crude image of the Grim Reaper appears, from his skull to his black gown. Theorists believed it was a sign that someone in the group had died. 11. THE GIRL Nobody knows the identity of the girl dressed in blue on the back cover. On the night of the theorists' 'car crash' it was raining heavily and Paul is said to have given a lift to a fan called Rita. It could be that this girl is her, either fleeing the scene or running to get help. 12. PAUL'S FINAL RESTING PLACE If the writing on the wall is split into sections, it conveys the cryptic message, 'Be at Les Abbey'. In numerology the following two letters, R and O, are the 18th and 15th letters in the alphabet. By adding this together (33) and multiplying by the number of letters (2), we get 66, the year Paul is supposed to have died. Three also represents the letter C so 33 could also stand for CC. Cece is short for Cecilia, with theorists claiming Paul was 'laid to rest' at St Cecilia's Abbey, a monastery in Ryde, Isle of Wight. Memories of the Beatles collected from around the world have helped scientists to understand how music can help us to tap into long forgotten events. In the biggest online survey of personal memories ever conducted, more than 3,000 people recounted their most vivid memories relating to the 1960s pop band. Participants ranged in age from 17 to 87 spanning 69 different nationalities in the six months study. She Loves You from 1963 was the hit that generated the most memories The aim was to see how Beatles associations shed light on the psychological effect of autobiographical memory. 'Autobiographical memory is essential for our sense of self,' said researcher Dr Catriona Morrison, from the University of Leeds. Most respondents were 'silver surfers' between the ages of 55 and 65 who would have been in their teens during the Beatles hey day in the 1960s. The memories showed an expected 'reminiscence bump' - a time in life which is remembered especially vividly and often coincides with the teenage years. In the case of Beatles memories, the bump occurred somewhat earlier than usual, the scientists found. 'What's interesting is that the majority of memories cluster in the early teenage years,' said Dr Morrison, who will outline the research at the British Association Festival of Science at the University of Liverpool. 'The early teenage years are the years during which you are making your musical decisions. By the age of about 14 most people have made up their mind, and that's the age when music makes the most powerful impression on us.' Music from The Beatles had the most profound effect on people who were in their teens in the sixties The Beatles song that generated the most memory associations was 'She Loves You', the biggest selling single of the 1960s. Although 'I Want to Hold Your Hand' sparked off the most memories for Americans. However the researchers were struck by the similarity of moods, feelings, scenes and situations relayed by Beatles memories around the world. 'We were so impressed with how vividly people could recall memories, sometimes from more than 40 years ago, especially when many eloquent and vivid memories appeared to have been little recalled in decades,' said Dr Morrison. 'This shows the power of music in shaping and reliving sometimes long-neglected memories.' With the exception of John Lennon's murder, memories were on the whole overwhelmingly positive. Dr Morrison added: 'We argue that music is more than auditory cheesecake. It's a means by which people can account for themselves both as an individual and as part of society.' As the world celebrates 50 years of the biggest band of them all, why are we still in love with the Beatles?   August 7, 1957, was just another day at The Cavern Club, Liverpool, but owner Alan Sytner was in a grey mood.The Quarry Men Skiffle Group, a local band of youngsters playing for the first time at the newly opened club, were doing covers of Elvis Presley and it was not his kind of music. 'Cut out the rock,' he ordered band leader John Lennon. Five years on, Lennon was still playing at the club, which Sytner had opened with the dream of making it the greatest jazz venue in the UK outside London, but the band he'd cobbled together was defining the music that rocked a generation - and, half a century later, still gets people on to their feet. The Beatles, who formally became the Fab Four on August 19, 1962, after Ringo Starr replaced original band member Pete Best on the drums, performed 292 times at The Cavern Club, lending it the pilgrim spot immortality its founder couldn't have imagined in his wildest dreams. The Beatles gives their first media interview for a broadcast on close-circuit radio for patients of the local Cleaver and Chatterbridge hospital on October 27, 1962 His plan was to replicate the Paris jazz club, Le Caveau de la Huchette but the Fab Four turned the club plan on its head. It was there that Brian Samuel Epstein, music manager with the Midas touch, discovered The Beatles. It was also where the band made Liverpool synonymous with music. 'The legacy of The Beatles stretches beyond the timeless appeal of their music, for as well as being a pop legend they were a social and cultural phenomenon,' says The Cavern Club's director, Dave Jones. 'The story of their rise to fame is one of the great chronicles of our time and it began here in Liverpool in 1962.' In the iconic Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band cover, the band poses with photos of people who had inspired them. George Harrison insisted on four Indian savants - Mahavtar Babaji, his Kriya Yoga student Lahiri Mahasaya, his disciple Yuktananda Giri and his famous follower, Yogananda Paramahansa IT ALL BEGAN HERE Jan 16,1957: The Cavern Club opened in a warehouse cellar at 10, Mathew Street, Liverpool. Owner Alan Sytner named it after a Paris jazz club, Le Caveau De La Huchette, and dreamt of it becoming the top jazz venue outside London. Aug 7,1957: John Lennon debuted at the club as part of The Quarry Men Skiffle Group. It played skiffle, the folk style music with a rock ’n’ roll influence. Feb 9, 1961: The Beatles debuted at the club for their first lunchtime gig with John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Stuart Sutcliffe with Pete Best on drums. The club became the place where the band’s musical identity was forged and its fans still say it was at its best during those gigs, when, ironically, many thought it was a German band! Nov 9, 1961: Liverpool businessman Brian Epstein, whose family owned a nearby record store, visited the club and saw The Beatles performing. Epstein offered to become the band’s manager and by June 1962, he had secured a recording contract for them from Parlophone Records. Aug 19,1962: Richard Starkey (aka Ringo Starr) debuted at the club as The Beatles drummer. Pete Best had played his last gig with The Beatles on August 15. Aug 3, 1963: The day saw the last of the 292 performances by The Beatles at the club. By 1964, the Beatles had taken America by storm and their phenomenal success turned The Cavern Club into an iconic institution. Today: The Cavern Club, which has seen many changes of ownership, is now a tourist spot, live music hub and warm-up venue for famous bands. Fifty years after The Beatles rewrote the history of pop music, the Liverpool City Council has lined up a slew of programmes, collectively titled Fab 50, to celebrate those early days of the band when it was just another act playing in just another club. 'This is a hugely significant year in the history of The Beatles, one that Liverpool couldn't let pass by without a huge celebration,' says city council chief Joe Anderson. 'We should never underestimate the power of The Beatles to attract visitors to the city.' The city council has planned events centred around The Cavern Club; Mendips at 251 Menlove Avenue, where John Lennon grew up with his aunt Mimi and her husband George Smith; and 20 Forthlin Road, the childhood home of Paul McCartney. Excitement is also building up at The Beatles Story, the museum dedicated to the Fab Four, which was in the news last week because of the visit of the Duchess of Cornwall, Camilla Parker Bowles. Says The Beatles Story MD Jerry Goldman: 'I am confident that the stunning calendar of events the city has put together will showcase Liverpool to the world. We look forward to welcoming thousands of new visitors to our city and promise them all a unique cultural experience.' On the city's agenda are 'Beatle Birthdays', to be celebrated throughout the year; The International Beatles Week in August, followed by the Port Sunlight Summer Festival. If Port Sunlight in Wirral doesn't ring a bell, Hulme Hall should, for it was here on August 19, 1962, that Ringo Starr made his first appearance as official drummer of The Beatles. The three band members (John Lennon, George Harrison and Paul McCartney) had a two-hour rehearsal with the 'new lad' before taking to the stage as the headline act of the local horticultural society's annual dance. It was on that night that the world first saw the four young musicians turning into the Fab Four together. The rest is history. The Fab Four in their prime, from left, George, Paul, John and Ringo Indian soul curry for Fab Four By ANAND VARGHESE A glance, even a cursory one, at the patterns and shapes that have defined popular music, is testimony to the fact that music trends are cyclical. Characterised by a well-defined series of peaks and troughs, the one unwritten rule of thumb is what goes up must inevitably come down. The Beatles are an exception. They have completed five decades of being completely immune to the debilitating effects of falling out of favour with the mainstream since they signed their first major record deal with EMI Parlophone and sang their first hit single, 'Love Me Do'. Ringo Starr, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and John Lennon and their wives at Rishikesh with Maharishi Mahesh Yogi in March 1968 India's affair with the Fab Four has paralleled the zenith of Beatlemania around the world - and it's been longer lasting than the band's flirtation with our gurus. Evidence of our enduring romance with the Liverpool lads is everywhere. The Beatles Festival in Rishikesh, where the Fab Four spent time at Maharishi Mahesh Yogi's ashram in 1968, was an attempt lauded by Beatles fans all over, even though it was neither particularly well-organised, nor sustainable as a long-term music property. The online marketplace, www. jabong.com/beatles, has been financially more viable, and more attractive to Beatles fans, who get to choose from a quirky variety of tees inspired by their idols. Another initiative, www.beatlesinindia.blogspot.in, demonstrates how deep is our almost umbilical connection with the band. Not just the established rockers, even the younger bands worship The Beatles. Former Beatle George Harrison (centre) is greeted by Sitar maestro Ravi Shankar's brother Uday Shankar (right), himself a famous Indian classical dancer, and an unidentified member of the Shankar family, during a visit to their home in Calcutta in 1972 'We keep playing tribute gigs dedicated to the Fab Four,' informs Akshay Chowdhury of Delhi-based rock band Barefaced Liar. For some rockers, their romance with The Beatles extends beyond gigs. Hitesh Madan of Eka has the complete eightvolume Beatles anthology and keeps shelling out cash for any Beatles memorabilia he doesn't already own. 'There is something about the compositions, the harmonies and the way The Beatles presented their songs that is infinitely inspiring,' say Hitesh's bandmates Lokesh Madan and Benny Pinto. Paul McCartney played with colours on Holi during one of his soul-searching visits Graphic designer Pushkar Thakur points to another factor responsible for the evergreen mystique of the band. The vibrancy of the colours and depth of the symbolism of the Fab Four album jacket. The designs have tickled the fancy and the imagination of successive generations. It's not nostalgia, for sentimental value alone cannot make any music timeless. The Beatles have transcended time because, as Chowdhury puts it, 'the melodies were outstanding and the songwriting was unsurpassable'.

The Beatles arrive at New York's Kennedy Airport Feb. 7, 1964 for their first U.S. appearance. From left are: John Lennon, Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr and George Harrison. (AP Photo) # May 12, 1964 twelve young men in New York publicly burn their draft cards to protest the war. August 1964: the Gulf of Tonkin Incident and Gulf of Tonkin Resolution. In December 1964, Joan Baez led six hundred people in an antiwar demonstration in San Francisco Famed photographer who snapped The Beatles, The Who and the Stones shares unseen photos and tells how he got his big break after finding Mick Jagger in bed with two naked women Alec Byrne, 68, recalls to DailyMailTV how he snuck into film sets and snapped photos of rock stars when he was a young photographer in London in the late 60s and early 70s Some of his never-before-seen photos, which survived a flood, a building fire, and an earthquake, are showcased in his new book, London Rock: The Unseen Archive  At 19, Byrne watched Mick Jagger make his acting debut after the photographer finagled his way on the set of the film Performance, and snapped a photo of him in bed with actresses Michele Breton and Anita Pallenberg 'There was nowhere else to go so I had to sit on the edge of the bed, Mick glared at me with the two women beside him, I'll never forget it,' he told DailyMailTV  Byrne smoked marijuana with Bob Marley, hung out at Elton John's house, and befriended Paul and Ringo He remembers vividly the time he was at the Marquee Club in SoHo when Keith Richards collapsed on stage, his eyes rolling back in his head and his body crashing into an amp  As a young photographer, Byrne was present at Brian Jones's funeral and walked over to his open grave and captured an iconic photo +23 Photographer Alec Byrne, now 68, recalls being on the front lines of London's rock n' roll music scene in the late 1960s It was the summer of 1968 and Rolling Stones frontman Mick Jagger was filming his first movie. The film, Performance, was being shot in a house in Knightsbridge, west London on a closed set, but word quickly got out. Young music photographer Alec Byrne had somehow managed to sneak in - but the 19-year-old wasn't prepared for what would happen next. 'To this day I don't know how I pulled it off, when I got there the house was nothing fancy and, with a full complement of cast and crew, a bit cramped,' Byrne told DailyMailTV.  'I followed the flow of people to where the focus of the activity was and I suddenly found myself in a small bedroom - there was Mick Jagger lay in bed with two naked women, it was some sight.' Jagger was in the middle of filming a steamy scene with actresses Anita Pallenberg and Michele Breton when Byrne stumbled in - he couldn't believe his luck. 'It was pretty special, the girls were free and easy about being naked,' he recalls. 'Mick was very quiet, intensely focused on what he had to do. But shooting bands on stage and behind the scenes did nothing to prepare me for this situation.' Byrne squeezed passed the production crew tried to position himself in the corner of the room out of the way. But as he did so did a grip guy carrying a lightning stand and blocked him off. 'There was nowhere else to go so I had to sit on the edge of the bed, Mick glared at me with the two women beside him, I'll never forget it. +23 Iconic: One of Byrne's favorite shots, he says, was the photo he took of Mick Jagger filming a steamy scene on the set of his first film, Performance, which the 19-year-old photographer happened to walk in on. 'There was nowhere else to go so I had to sit on the edge of the bed, Mick glared at me with the two women beside him, I'll never forget it,' he said  +23 The film, Performance, was being shot in a house in Knightsbridge, west London on a closed set, but word quickly got out, Byrne said 'I quickly moved off into the corner and stayed for the rest of the shoot grabbing shots between takes. I got some of my favorite photos that day.' Byrne's extraordinary photos - seen here for the first time and showcased exclusively on DailyMailTV - make up part of his new book on the British music scene of the late 1960s and early 70s called London Rock: The Unseen Archive. The photos are among hundreds of pictures documenting his early career as a rock photographer snapping music legends like Jagger, David Bowie, Jimi Hendrix, Bob Dylan, Jim Morrison, and Bob Marley as well as iconic bands of the day including The Beatles, Cream, Beach Boys, and The Who. Incredibly, the entire archive sat gathering dust in Byrne's garage for almost 50 years until the treasure trove was recently unearthed. And amazingly the thousands of photos had somehow survived through a fire, flood, and earthquake over the years - events which had destroyed thousands more images in Byrne's collection. Byrne recalls those early days captured on film fondly. He started life as a dispatch rider for Keystone Press, a photo agency in Fleet Street, collecting film from photographers to be processed. +23 Byrne's extraordinary archive will be released on December 7 'I was riding around on a scooter and I was a Mod with the parka and the whole "Quadrophenia" set up. 'But I got to know the photography end of it by hanging out in the dark room. 'I picked up various things a long the way and my brother had a real cheap 35mm camera and I started shooting that - going to the park, snapping family, and friends. 'I was earning five guineas (£5.25) a week and remember buying my first camera for £42. I had to get my mother to sign a hire purchase loan agreement.' After getting an artsy photo of a building published in the local paper, Byrne became hooked. He began taking photos of bands after work trying to go to as many gigs as possible. 'I was shooting everything and I'd do three or four bands a week and I would send these pictures in and the magazine New Musical Express (NME) would publish one or two and it got to the point I was making as much money from the weekly music papers as I was from my job. 'I was ready to quit, but before I made that decision I'd done a gig and went back to the office, snuck in through the window, and developed some pictures. 'Problem was I fell asleep though complete exhaustion then the morning guy came on and said: "What the hell are you doing here?" and I was fired immediately.'  Byrne went straight to NME asking for a job and they gave him a retainer. It was 1966 and the London music scene was about to explode. 'I was in the right place at the right time,' Byrne recalls. 'There was a music revolution happening and I was in the thick of it.' One of Byrne's most memorable photos came on May 4, 1967 - the day after his 18th birthday. +23 Byrne, who began taking pictures of bands as a teen, recalls seeing rock legend Jimi Hendrix and Mick Jagger at the taping of the weekly music show Top of the Pops on May 4, 1967 - a day before his 18th birthday - He snapped a photo of the two stars which he believes had met for the first time this night +23 The young photographer's extraordinary photos - seen here for the first time - make up part of his new book on the British music scene of the late 1960s and early 70s called London: The Unseen Archive. Above is Byrne's shot of Keith Moon, Peter Townshend, and Mick Jagger in 1968  +23 Byrne remembers vividly the time he was at the Marquee Club in SoHo when Keith Richards (pictured in 1971) collapsed on stage, his eyes rolling back in his head and his body crashing into an amp  Byrne was going to the BBC's studios at Lime Grove every Thursday for the taping of the weekly music show Top of the Pops, and that night Jimi Hendrix was playing. He recalls: 'I was in awe of Hendrix, he blew the doors off the place, but the cool moment came when I noticed Mick Jagger behind stage, out of the lights, just standing there watching Jimi's set. 'When taping finished, Jimi went over to Jagger and I immediately followed. 'I asked if they minded my taking their picture and they said no, I snapped a shot on my Rolleiflex, just one frame, no other photographers were around. 'As far as I'm aware that was the first time these two music legends met.' The following month Byrne covered the Our World TV special at Abbey Road Studios. The Beatles's Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band album was only three weeks old, and the event would include the band's first performance of 'All You Need Is Love.' It was the world's first international satellite broadcast - the first worldwide show - and involved contributions from 19 nations and an estimated audience of 700 million people, mindblowing figures in 1967. Byrne remembers the press day at Abbey Road Studios the day before being a scrap of media, but when all the newspaper guys went he stuck around. 'After the crush inside, everyone was ready for a little fresh air, including the Beatles,' he recalls. 'I found myself standing with Paul and Ringo, who were out on the forecourt having a cigarette. 'I asked if they don't mind me taking a few more shots and they were fine. They were the best shots I got all day. 'I asked Ringo if he was nervous about the satellite show and he smiled: "Not really. I just keep the beat y'know."' Alec Byrne on his time photographing the Rolling Stones Loaded: 0% Progress: 0% 0:11 Previous Play Skip Unmute Current Time0:11 / Duration Time3:12 Fullscreen Need Text SHARE THIS MORE VIDEOS Keith Richards on his favourite part of Rolling Sto… Golden Oldies? 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Outdoor yoga ends with woman falling in river Watch video Persons of interest in the death of Sydney Loofe release video +23 Young Alec: Byrne landed a young photographer's dream job in the late 1960s photographing rock legends when London's music scene was about to explode. Above he is pictured in his London studio in 1968  +23 Byrne's nearly lost his valuable body of work several times over the years. In 1994 the devastating Northridge earthquake, with a magnitude of 6.7, struck the San Fernando Valley region of Los Angeles. Byrne's office in Hollywood was badly hit and hundreds of negatives were again damaged +23 +23 In 1971 he recalls how a fire ripped through his studio in London destroying thousands of negatives +23 Five years later when Byrne decided to move to the States hundreds more negatives were damaged by sea water during the Atlantic crossing in a shipping container (pictured) During those golden days of the London music scene, gaining access to huge music stars was not like it is today. Byrne remembers setting up a photo shoot with David Bowie in a park. 'It was agreed we would go to a park in Beckenham (South London) which is where he was living at the time,' said Byrne. 'But when I got there I was surprised, it was just him standing at the gate, none of his people. 'His star was rising but he didn't arrive with an entourage of publicists, make-up artists, and hangers-on the way an artist would today. 'I always had an interest in Bowie and his 'Space Oddity' was special, but while I was expecting a withdrawn, artsy, introverted guy, he was the opposite - he was warm and easy going. 'We were both South London boys and I think we clicked right away, we spent a few hours together working out how to get the best pictures. Byrne managed to capture some incredible portraits of Bowie in his prime and shortly after the shoot the star's office called asking if they could use one of his photos as his publicity shot in the program for the Humble Pie tour. 'Fast forward to 2015, and I got word that the same photo , pulled from an old copy of the program, was to be the lead image for the book accompanying Bowie's new box set, Five Years (1969-1973). 'I was humbled, here's a guy who has been photographed thousands of times over the past 50 years but he remembered that one picture, I was honored.' For Byrne, the stories come thick and fast. Smoking marijuana with Bob Marley during a photo shoot was particularly memorable and hanging out at Elton John's house was great, he says.  +23 Byrne, who had had the privilege of hanging out with some the biggest music icons, says the death of Rolling Stones founder and guitarist Brian Jones deeply affected him (Pictured December 11, 1968)  +23 Jones died aged 27 shortly after being pulled, unconscious, out of the floodlight swimming pool at his home in Hartfield, East Sussex on July 3, 1969. After the ceremony when nearly everyone had drifted away Byrne walked over to the open grave and captured a memorable photo But Byrne seems to gravitate back to the Stones, a band he had the privilege of photographing dozens of times. He remembers vividly the time he was at the Marquee Club in SoHo when Keith Richards collapsed on stage, his eyes rolling back in his head and his body crashing into an amp. 'It was a small venue, low stage and literally I could feel the sweat coming off Jagger because I was right in the front,' he recalls. 'The guys were having so much fun because this was their last gig before they were going to leave England and go to France. 'So there was lots of booze and substances being passed around and at one point you can see in the picture that Mick is looking at Keith because no one knows what he is playing and he's weaving around. 'Next thing he falls back, crashes on the amplifiers, slumps down on to the stage and everyone starts thinking "has he died?"' 'People rushed to him and he was taken away and I caught it on camera. I was amazed that he reappeared on stage a short time later.' While Byrne remembers how easy success came to bands like the Stones, he also remembers how others needed a leg up. In January 1968 he began working with an emerging band called Love Affair whose first single 'She Smiled Sweetly', written by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, flopped. The band was desperate for their next hit so they turned to Byrne to give them a boost. The young rock photographer whisked them to Piccadilly Circus where he came up with the idea of shooting photos at the statue of Eros - the goddess of love. But his idea came with a twist. +23 In a few short years, Byrne had built up an archive of material that would be the envy of music photographers the world over. Pictured is his shot of Iggy Pop, King's Cross Cinema, in 1972  +23 'The Who, Who's next' press party at Keith Moon's house, Chertsey, Surrey, July 14, 1971 +23 He attended The Who, Who's next Press party at band drummer Keith Moon's house (pictured in 1971)  +23 +23 Byrne also befriended The Beatles while the band was making their appearance on Our World TV special at Abbey Road Studios. Pictured left is a photo he snapped of John Lennon and his first son Julian in 1968, and right, Paul McCartney in 1973 +23 The incredible archive of material sat in storage for more than four decades. Pictured above is Jim Morrison, The Roundhouse, September 1968 'I told them to climb up on the statue for a photo and the traffic began to slow down with all the people looking up,' he recalls. 'Then it clicked, I told them to stay up there as long as they could, the traffic was backed up and now hundreds of people began to gather to see what was going on and the police were called. 'The police eventually coaxed them down, they get arrested and taken away, and by the time they appeared in court a week later all the newspapers had covered the story, job done. 'Their new record Everlasting Love shot straight to number one - I'd definitely credit my little stunt for that.' Cutting his teeth in the rock and roll scene in London in the swinging 60s had been incredible for young Byrne. In a few short years he had built up an archive of material that would be the envy of music photographers the world over. But as a young lad who had had the privilege of hanging out with some music icons, nothing affected him more than the death of Brian Jones. Stones founder and rhythm guitarist Brian Jones was a universally respected pioneer of new musical forms. He died aged 27 shortly after being pulled, unconscious, out of the floodlight swimming pool at his home in Hartfield, East Sussex on July 3, 1969. 'I just couldn't take it in,' recalls Byrne. 'Just a few months before, I'd been photographing and chatting with him at the Rock and Roll Circus. Now his life was over, and the reality hit me hard.' Byrne decided to go to his funeral in his hometown of Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, 115 miles from London. He said: 'Brian's hearse arrived as part of a 14-car procession. 'His coffin, carried into the church through the crowd, was covered with flowers, including a guitar shaped wreath from the Stones office.' Byrne said Jagger couldn't make the funeral because he was filming a movie in Australia, but Bill Wyman and Charlie Watts were there. Keith Richards was expected but never arrived. +23 Byrne managed to capture some incredible portraits of Bowie in his prime and shortly after the shoot the star's office called asking if they could use one of his photos as his publicity shot in the program for the Humble Pie tour. In 2015, that same photo was to be the lead image for the book accompanying Bowie's new box set, Five Years  +23 Byrne was lucky to meet some of London rock's biggest legends, including Marc Bolan, the lead singer of English rock band T. Rex (pictured in 1971). Bolan in 1977, at age 29 +23 T. Rex live at Lyceum Ballroom, London on January 16, 1974 After the ceremony when nearly everyone had drifted away Byrne walked over to the open grave and captured a memorable photo. He said: 'There was no security, just Brian's coffin in the ground and two young female fans in long dark coats and hippie hats standing there paying their respects. I captured the moment on film. 'The experience drilled home a simple fact, good times don't last forever.' Byrne covered music in London from the mid-1960s to the mid-1970s eventually setting up his own photo agency. Eventually in 1976 he decided to switch to America, settling in Los Angeles where he stills lives today with wife Kim at the family home in Encino. He has two daughters Lucy and Chloe. His incredible archive of material sat in storage for more than four decades. Byrne, 68, said: 'For nearly 50 years these images were in boxes hidden away in my garage until a friend I was working with, Drew Evans, came by the house and saw a picture on the wall of The Beatles and said, 'where did you buy that?' 'I explained I had taken it along with photos of other bands and that's what got the ball rolling.' Byrne also explains how he almost lost his valuable body of work. In 1971 he recalls how a fire ripped through his studio in London destroying thousands of negatives. Five years later when Byrne decided to move to the States hundreds more negatives were damaged by sea water during the Atlantic crossing in a shipping container. Then in 1994 the devastating Northridge earthquake, with a magnitude of 6.7, struck the San Fernando Valley region of Los Angeles. Byrne's office in Hollywood was badly hit and hundreds of negatives were again damaged. 'Looking back I feel fortunate that there's still so much material that has survived through fire, flood and quake,' he said. With the remaining photos dusted off, in late 2012 Byrne held an acclaimed one-night show in LA attended by more than a thousand people. 'That showed me just how important these images are,' he explained. Since then Byrne's work has been featured during the 2013 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony, exhibited by the South by southwest music festival, and accepted into the National Portrait Gallery in London. Now his impressive body of work will be available for wider consumption in the book, London Rock: The Unseen Archive, which will be released on December 7. 9 The four members of Britain's young singing group, the Beatles, stand in front of the microphones in the press room of Kennedy International Airport today during press conference following their arrival, February 7, 1964. From left: John Lennon, George Harrison, Ringo Starr, Paul McCartney. (AP Photo) # "And I Love Her" was recorded over three days, in Abbey Road Studio Two. The sessions were produced by George Martin and engineered by Norman Smith. The second engineer was Richard Langham. John Lennon and his wife, Cynthia, 24, walk toward their plane with the other members of The Beatles as fans look on at London Airport in London, England, on Feb. 7, 1964. (AP Photo/Victor Boyton) # 11 Ed Sullivan, center, stands with The Beatles during a rehearsal for the British group's first American appearance, on the "Ed Sullivan Show," in New York on Feb. 9, 1964. From left: Ringo Starr, George Harrison, Sullivan, John Lennon and Paul McCartney. The rock 'n' roll band known as "The Fab Four" was seen by 70 million viewers. "Beatlemania" swept the charts with twenty No. 1 hits and more than 100 million records sold. The Beatles broke up in 1970. (AP Photo) # 12 The Beatles are shown with Ed Sullivan on stage Feb. 10, 1964 before their TV performance on his show in New York. (AP Photo) # 13 The Beatles are shown on the set of the "Ed Sullivan Show" in New York, Feb. 10, 1964. In back is John Lennon; the others, from left to right, are: George Harrison, Ringo Starr and Paul McCartney. (AP Photo) # 14 Three of the four Beatles, from left, John Lennon, Ringo Starr, and Paul McCartney, walk in Central Park in New York City, Feb. 10, 1964 on their first U.S. tour. (AP Photo) # 15 The Beatles perform at the Coliseum in Washington, D.C., Feb. 12, 1964, during their first American tour. The British band members are, in foreground, Paul McCartney and John Lennon; Ringo Starr on drums; and George Harrison on guitar, far right. (AP Photo) # 16 The Beatles, from left, Paul McCartney, John Lennon, Ringo Starr, and George Harrison, take a fake blow from Cassius Clay while visiting the heavyweight contender at his training camp in Miami Beach, Fla. on February 18, 1964. (AP Photo) # 17 The British rock and roll group The Beatles are seen during their first U.S. tour in this 1964 file photo. The band members, from left to right, are George Harrison, John Lennon, Ringo Starr and Paul McCartney. (AP Photo) # 18 The Beatles, George Harrison, Ringo Starr, Paul McCartney and John Lennon, have their hair combed by stylists on the set of their first movie production, "A Hard Day's Night," at Twickenham Film Studios in Middlesex, outside London, England, on March 12, 1964. The hair stylists, who have parts in the film, are, from left, Patti Boyd, 19, Tina Williams, 17, Pru Bury, 22, and Susan Whitman, 17. (AP Photo) # 19 John Lennon, member of Britain's pop group The Beatles, shakes hands with contestants in the Miss Hong Kong Beauty Pageant, Hong Kong, June 8, 1964. (AP Photo) # 20 The Liverpool beat group The Beatles, with John Lennon facing the camera, are pictured at their arrival at the Liverpool Town Hall, Liverpool, England, Friday July 10, 1964, were given a civic reception, before attending the Northern Charity Premiere of their film "A Hard Day's Night". Returning home after an absence of seven months, they were welcomed by a crowd of some 150,000 fans lining the eight-mile route from the airport to the town hall. (AP Photo) # A good movie then at your right Von Ryan Express 22 With some of their fans in the background, The Beatles board a plane for England at New York Airport, NY, Sept. 21, 1964. From bottom of ladder, Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, John Lennon and George Harrison. (AP Photo) # 24 Beatle John Lennon is shown in this 1965 photo at an unknown location. (AP Photo) # 25 Beatles John Lennon continues to play the guitar as he evades a young fan who wants Lennon's yachting-style cap as a souvenir during the Beatles concert in Rome, Italy, June 28, 1965. (AP Photo) # 26 British rock and roll singer John Lennon of the Beatles arrives in an armored car before a concert in Houston, Tex., on Aug. 19, 1965. Screaming fans surrounded the group from the moment their plane arrived in Houston for radio station KILT's "Back to School Show" at Sam Houston Coliseum. (AP Photo/Ferd Kaufman) # 27 The Beatles pose together before their performance in a TV studio in London, England, in 1966. (AP Photo)   28 John Lennon, one of the members of the Beatles is shown as a state trooper aids him through a crowd of newsmen at Logan International Airport in Boston, Aug. 11, 1966 as he and other members transferred planes after a flight from London. The Beatles were en route to Chicago where they would start their third tour of American cities. It was Lennon who was quoted as saying the group is more popular than Jesus, setting off a ban by numerous U.S. radio stations on playing their records. (AP Photo) # 29 Rock and roll singers for the group The Beatles John Lennon, right, and Paul McCartney, holding the hand of Julian Lennon, walk with actress Jane Ashre across the tarmac following their arrival in Athens, Greece on July 22, 1967. The woman in the background is unidentified. (AP Photo) # 30 Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, considered as the "spiritual father" of the Beatles sits amidst George Harrison, left and John Lennon, during the UNICEF gala at the Palais du Chaillot in Paris, December 15, 1967. (AP Photo) # 31 Beatles members John Lennon and Paul McCartney sing their harmonizing vocal lines in the Abbey Road Studios in London, England, February 11, 1968, during a recording session. (AP Photo) # 32 Beatles John Lennon, center, and Paul McCartney, arrive at the London Pavillion cinema on July 17, 1968 for the premiere of their new animation film "Yellow Submarine." At left is Japanese film producer Yoko Ono. (AP Photo) # 33 Linda McCartney's photo of John Lennon, left, and Paul McCartney taken during the photo session for the cover of the Abbey Road album in 1969. The photo was part of the Linda McCartney photography exhibit at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum which ran through Aug. 8, 1999 in Cleveland. (AP Photo/Linda McCartney) # 34 Beatle John Lennon, right, and Yoko Ono are shown circa 1969 at an unknown location. (AP Photo) #     35 Beatle John Lennon waves his marriage certificate as his bride, Japanese artist Yoko Ono, stands at his side after their wedding at the Rock of Gibraltar on March 20, 1969. They are about to board a chartered jet to Paris where they will honeymoon. (AP Photo) # 36 Beatle John Lennon and his wife, Yoko Ono, right, hold a bed-in for peace in room 902, the presidential suite at the Hilton Hotel in Amsterdam on March 25, 1969. The newlyweds, holding solitary tulips, begin a seven-day Love-In to protest against war. (AP Photo) # 37 John Lennon and his wife Yoko Ono share an Eskimo kiss (rubbing noses) during an interview in London, Feb. 9, 1970. Both had their hair shorn in Denmark to be auctioned off in London. The proceeds went go to the Black Power organization in Britain. (AP Photo/Bob Dear) # 38 John Lennon and his wife Yoko Ono speak to news media on their arrival at New York's Kennedy Airport, June 1, 1971. The trip to New York is part of a bid by the Lennons to gain custody of Yoko's seven year old daughter Kyoko. (AP Photo/Ron Frehm) # During spring of 1967, just before the Summer of Love, thousands of Americans flocked to San Francisco, the epicenter of the hippie movement that challenged everything that was understood about the world. Psychoactive drugs, creative expression, revolutionary music and political ideals swept the nation. Long-haired flower children spoke of free love, peace and the necessity of exploring realms of consciousness. People questioned the policies of the generations before them and demanded change. One thing that brought hippies together was music. It was during the hippie era that rock concerts became the megaevents that they are to this day. But there were big differences. For one thing, rock in the 1960's and 70's focused exclusively on the music; choreography was non-existent. In this day of emaciated females gyrating across gargantuan stadium stages, it's easy to forget that Jerry Garcia and his friends could attract huge crowds just by standing on stage and playing.   THE BEATLES: FIRST VISIT TO AMERICA, 1964 Beatles concerts, like this American show in 1964, are noisy affairs where screaming crowds drown out the band. Even with their amplifiers, Lennon marvels after a show, "we still couldn't beat 'em." The Beatles wave to fans as they arrive at the Los Angeles airport for a press conference in August 1964.   .

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