REFLECTIONS AFTER ATTENDING
THE PAUL McCARTNEY CONCERT We had played and enjoyed the music of The Beatles quite awhile before they hit North American shores and they have been an ongoing influence ever since. In the early sixties Alan Jones joined our band having just arrived from England. He was still in touch with his brother Keith back in the UK who sent over records and news clippings of a band who were starting to take the Isles by storm They had shaggy long haircuts and a goofy name - The Beatles. We learned and performed a few of their songs and around this time a Winnipeg band called Chad Allan and the Reflections (who later became The Guess Who) made many appearances in the Brandon Roller Rink where we were working as house band. These guys also had a pipeline to the UK through record aficionado Wayne Russell and had worked many of the Beatles' songs into their act.

Soon after, the British Invasion hit and we and almost every local band let their hair grow and were decked out in collarless jackets, tight stovepipe trousers, and cuban-heeled "Beatle boots." There was a sudden shift from all-instrumental groups to four-piece bands who sang Beatles harmonies and played Gretsch guitars and Hofner basses. Many bands, including ourselves started to write songs and book recording time with dreams of breaking out with a hit record.

Suddenly it was cool for fans to emulate the rushing and screaming Beatles fans they saw on television. We saw these exciting changes during our prairies tour with Canadian pop star Bobby Curtola and when we opened for the Everly Brothers and backed their opening acts. Two television events that were major events in my life were the Ed Sullivan appearances of Elvis in the '50s and The Beatles in the '60s -- each event bringing about major changes in music and society.

In the mid-'70s our buddy Alan Jones went back to England for a visit and set up a 30-night tour for us in Northern England. We were excited to find ourselves in some of the off-stage dressing rooms that The Beatles had been in during their pre-fame tours about ten years before. Many of the locals regaled us with tall tales about their memories of the Beatles playing their clubs. This led to two more summer tours. We capped each of our three UK tours by recording albums in London, Newcastle and Durham. They were exciting times during which we met and worked with many prominent musicians and explored the places we had heard so much about, including Liverpool. When Paul McCartney had a hit with "Silly Love Songs" a Winnipeg radio station ran a Silly Love Songs contest. For a lark I submitted a silly love song we had recorded. -- I won and received a complete set of McCartney/Wings albums as the prize :)  We've related some of these adventures in our online music bio at: www.hillmanweb.com/book

Another interesting connection with the Fab 4 came about in 20 years later. I create all the Official Tribute Websites for author Edgar Rice Burroughs and was excited when one of his stories, Tarzan of the Apes, was adapted by Phil Collins to award winning stage musical format.  Sue-On and I were invited to the play's opening night premieres in Broadway NYC, Holland and Hamburg. Accepting Phil Collins' invitation to the Hamburg opening we went a week early so I could explore all the sites that the Beatles had frequented and played in back before their Beatlemania days. www.hillmanweb.com/BEATLES

It was a thrill then when Sue-On insisted on buying tickets for Paul McCartney's 2018 show in Winnipeg to celebrate our 52nd Wedding Anniversary. I've admired each of the Beatles for all these years, but Paul is probably the one I admire most. He is even older than I at 76 and is still going strong with one of the most exciting concert events of all time -- an amazing performer who has excelled in song writing, lead and harmony vocals, imaginative creativity, an expertise in an endless variety of instruments --  a man with an always pleasing personality and a family man who has not succumbed to addictions, scandals, extreme morals and superstition.

BEATLES QUEST: 
"IT WAS 'FIFTY' YEARS AGO TODAY. . ."
Excerpt from our Gig Notes project:
www.hillmanweb.com/book

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Early 2014 saw a flurry of Beatles excitement in the media, since it had been 50 years since their appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show -- a television appearance that had launched their "invasion" of North America. Thinking back there are a few things I remember about that exciting time.

I had been waiting to see the Fab 4 for some time in the early '60s. Alan Jones, a bandmate from England had a brother in Yorkshire who'd been sending reports about an unusual pop band with a funny name and strange haircuts. who were the latest rage with teens and the media in England. Since I was a real fan of British music and was always looking for new songs to learn, he had been sending us Lonnie Donegan and Shadows records. He then started to enclose a few Beatles singles in his packages. Around this time Chad Allan and the Reflections, who made regular appearances at the Brandon Roller Rink where we worked as house band, started to feature Beatles songs in their act. Interest piqued by all this and the stories in the imported UK papers which I bought occasionally at Brandon newstands, it was a thrill to finally see the band on the Ed Sullivan Show.

This North American debut kicked off a tremendous change in the music, fashion and attitudes of the young. We soon let our hair grow longer, bought Beatle boots, tailored our trousers to a skinny fit, shopped for jackets with Nehru collars, replaced many of our band instrumentals with vocals and harmony, tried our hand at writing our own songs, looked at Gretsch and Hofner guitars with even more admiration, and developed an even stronger fascination with all things British.

It was quite amazing that someone so stodgy as Ed Sullivan became a major force in launching two music and cultural revolutions. Back in 1956 I had been just as excited and inspired when I watched Elvis, the Blue Moon Boys and Jordanaires on his show.

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BEATLES QUEST

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Thinking back over the last 50-plus years and reading through our "Music Odyssey" project notes I realize just how influential the Beatles have been on our music. I've jotted down some of the highlights of this "Beatles Connection" that we've expanded upon elsewhere in this tome:

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  Not only did they inspire changes in appearance, music styles and social attitudes, but they also provided the incentive for us to book studio time in Canada and England to record our own music

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  My sprawling packrat collection includes a full library of Beatles books, magazines, records/tapes/videos . . . as well as numerous Beatles-inspired instruments
• 50 years ago I also married an Asian girl . . . and we too have two musician sons . . . but going beyond Lennon's lead, we also have a beautiful daughter

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  I had the thrill of singing through John Lennon's favourite microphone during a recording session . . . which I accidentally broke -- very embarrassing

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  The engineer for one of our albums had worked at Abbey Road on the White Album sessions

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  Spent time exploring Liverpool during one of our England tours in the '70s. . . where we were ticked off to find that the original Cavern Club had been demolished

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  Played many of the same clubs in Northern England that the Silver Beetles had played in their early days

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  Spent two weeks in the Reeperbahn district of Hamburg visiting and photographing the clubs and haunts where the Beatles had evolved their act

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  Two afternoon meetings in the London Soho office of Dick James whose company had notoriously taken over the Beatles' Northern Songs publishing rights

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  Performed a stint in a Beatles "tribute" band

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  A highlight of our last New York visit was attending the Letterman broadcast in the Ed Sullivan Theatre and taking an afternoon hike to the Dakota Apartments

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  The Beatles figure prominently in our Rock Roots section:


ROCK ROOTS
Hamburg Years Tribute
www.hillmanweb.com/BEATLES
Post Hamburg - Fab Four Years
www.hillmanweb.com/beatles4