Star Image - The Beatles

In Order... Please Please Me, 1963

Help 1965

Revolver 1966

During the Making of Sgt. Peppers, c.1967

Yellow Submarine 1969

Let It Be 1970

The Full Circle, In and Out of Psychedelia?

The Beatles, formed in 1960, were to change the face of music forever. Formed in Liverpool, they were first named The Beatles when John Lennon, Paul McCartney and George Harrison were joined by Drummer Pete Best, and the group set off for a 48 night stay in Hamburg. In 1962 however Best was replaced by Ringo Starr in a move that highlights the importance of image to a group like The Beatles, even back in the 60s. Today’s pop and rock artist have images that are as successful at selling albums as the music and this has always been the case. A quote attributed to a source close to the band highlighted this fact, “Pete Best was a better drummer, but Ringo was a better Beatle.”

‘Beatlemania’, as the frenzied support of the group was known as, kicked off in late ’62 and coincided with the start of their success on the chart front too, with their first UK number 1 single, ‘From Me To You’ being released in April 1963. After this point the group went from strength to strength amassing an incredible 17 UK Number 1 singles in total including well known efforts such as; ‘She Loves You’, ‘Help’, ‘Yellow Submarine’, ‘All You Need Is Love’ and ‘Hey Jude’.

Over the period they were at their most successful, The Beatles went through several phases that epitomised what it was to be part of ‘The Swinging Sixties’, an experimental time in a changing Britain. Whilst album covers and the way they dressed and behaved were at the forefront of the image they created for themselves, Music Videos were not as key to the artist meeting a target audience and selling records, as it is perceived they are today. When videos were created they tended to be quite raw and simply showed the group performing the song. An example of this is the painfully simple video for ‘Help’ that just included the band lined up 1 after the other in performance mode with John Lennon singing and playing his guitar and Paul; McCartney at his shoulder providing the backing vocals. But with Music Videos still a relatively new thing, this still offered the fans something extra to just buying the records and listening to the band on the radio.

Whilst Music Videos didn’t play a massive part in the success of The Beatles, film did. And the way they were portrayed in these films just increased the huge following they were amassing on their music alone. The films themselves were hardly blockbusters or brilliantly written, and in some cases they have comedic value where none was intended, but they were highly effective as a tool of propaganda at the time. Picking on ‘Help’ in particular, it’s obvious from the start the story is going to contain a lot of mad chases in a pretty nonsense story about a cult and a sacrifice ring. The Beatles role in this is to continuously escape from perilous positions, visit all sorts of interesting places and exotic Countries and perform some music. Other characters are shown to be mad, psychotic and cowardly, thus creating an even better profile for the heroic band.

Following on from the success in the early years and the films came the stage of psychedelia and the Yellow Submarine film. This was all very much relevant to the culture of late 60s Britain of opposing the establishment, post pirate radio and sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll, drugs in particular. Yellow Submarine features Pepperland and ‘The Blue meanies’. These pretty much sum up the coherence of the film and the style aimed for. Again though it was a very effective propaganda tool for the way in which the group were moving as they pushed for a large fan base through exploring strange new ideas in their music.

After this period there was more to come on a serious note for The Beatles and ‘Let It Be’ was the album that saw them return to something like normality. Their image had gone full circle by this point with the song hair return to mop length and their images less wild than the years that came between the start and end points. This was to be their last album, and that serves to prove a point about image and the importance it plays in the careers of any pop or rock stars. You go on a journey throughout your career and if it isn’t the right journey it can lead to problems like it did for The Beatles. There were definitely artistic differences and this came down to the image the band and the individuals wanted to portray differing towards the end of their time at the top.