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Please Please Me – How Manchester’s brutalism set the scene for The Beatles’ debut – Mancunian Matters appeared on www.mancunianmatters.co.uk by Mancunian Matters.
The Beatles first album Please Please Me celebrates its 60th anniversary this week.
Their critically acclaimed album was a smash hit, launching the Fab Four to superstardom.
But many fans may not know that the iconic photo on the album’s cover was snapped right here in Manchester.
This is the story of the cover of Please Please Me.
Original Plans
It was important to The Beatles, their manager Brian Epstein and producer George Martin that the personality of the group came across in the cover of their debut album.
In that spirit, George Martin originally wanted to call the album Off The Beatle Track, and photograph the Beatles outside London Zoo; they were, after all, beetles.
The Zoo however didn’t wish to associate with the Beatles – likely due to pop music’s low standing at the time, and the band’s rather strange name.
Angus McBean was hired instead, a portrait photographer known for his surrealist and theatre work. He had been used in the past by EMI, for example on some early 1960s Cliff Richard albums.
McBean met the Beatles on a few occasions in January 1963 to take some photos, but neither the band nor the photographer were happy with the results.
EMI House
McBean entered EMI house that February. EMI house is located in Manchester Square, and Angus was struck by the building.
Described by the Royal Institute of British Architecture as a “sleek but average-looking Modernist office block”, it may have seemed unremarkable to most.
McBean however walked across the now famous stairwell, and looked up at the employees passing by. He realised in that moment that he may have his cover.
He gathered the band, got them to stand above him and look down on the stairwell. Many pictures later, the Please Please Me cover was born.
One of the most iconic album covers of all time, it has been satirised by Blur, The Sex Pistols and even the Beatles themselves, who came back to the location to recreate the image in later years. A recreation of the snapwould become the cover of 1973’s ‘Blue Album’ compilation.
And it was Manchester that set the scene.
The Album
McBean took a few more shots with the Beatles but it was the EMI House cover that stuck.
The album was released that March, and was a massive success. Please Please Me remained in the Top 10 for well over a year, longer than any other Beatles record.
But despite its success and it being the Fab Four’s first album, it may be one of the most underrated Beatles albums – if such a thing can exist.
Many modern fans, myself included, will be quicker to put on Abbey Road, Revolver or Sgt Pepper with their lush arrangements, psychedelic sounds and timeless songwriting – and even fans of the early Beatles sound may opt for A Hard Day’s Night or Help over the hastily recorded debut.
And whilst it is true that the album is less complex and innovative than the Beatles’ later work, with ten of its fourteen tracks famously recorded in a single session, the live nature of the album captures the youthful energy of the Beatles better than on any record. It is as close to their Cavern Club and Hamburg sound we can get aside from terribly recorded bootlegs and anecdotal accounts.
Here is the last track they recorded for the album in their mammoth 10-song recording session – a cover of the Isley Brothers’ classic Twist and Shout. What you are hearing is the only completed take; John Lennon’s voice broke down in take two!
Image attribution: Library of Congress, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_Beatles,_The_Ed_Sullivan_Show_group_photo.jpg
Image attribution: Ingen Uppgift, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
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