Me and the Beatles
and how they saved my life.
Good evening
I am wanting to share
with you.
I love guitars.
I have one now. I didn’t then. I was 12 years old.
I had a Beatle haircut….
I bought my first one after seeing the Beatles
in the Portland Coliseum in August 1965.
Paul, John, George and Ringo.
The first chord twanging loud.
It was “I Want to Hold Your Hand”
That is all I heard of the concert.
The rest was yelling, crying, screaming.
My two brothers also on their seats
standing and crying and screaming at the top
of their lungs. I was tossing and screaming.
It was Beatle Mania.
It was like a fire spreading almost instantly through the arena
of 20,000 people. That is all it would hold.
Later that month I bought a guitar, a fake japanese fender
with painted shitty pick ups
and an amp that was home made
and butt ugly.
The family and I went to Seattle the next day.
Dad pulled into the Edge Water Hotel.
A thousand fans blocked the gate and the police
escorted our black 1958 Impala in.
The Beatles were staying there.
What are the odds we would end up there not knowing they were.
I then fell ill.
Double pneumonia.
Had it for 13 weeks.
Stranded at home.
Face bloated
with water and infection.
They had to use a scalpel to drain the fluid out.
Ears jammed up. Lungs full of liquids.
I could hear nothing.
Only a faint hiss. My hair long and greasy.
The Doctors said I would die.
What saved my life was drawing pictures of all The Beatles and their equipment.
Vox amps, Georges Gretsch Tennesean guitar, John and his 3 pick up black Rickenbacker
and Ringo and his grey simple 4 drum kit. Ludwig. and Paul and his famous Hofner violin bass,now titled the Beatle Bass.
30 years later I bought all the gear. All of it.
Then I made the recording studio I drew.
I recorded all their songs off Rubber Soul.
That saved my life again later.
Creatively speaking.
Next, of course I got to meet a couple of them
when I worked in Los Angeles recording and production in music.
1980.
True Story.
r.w. mcewen
Nov. 9, 2017
When I am 64