Your first Beatles experience

I'm pretty sure this topic has been posted before, but I'm new here. So I'm
going to ask again. What is your first experince with The Beatles?

JohnB...

I was about 8 or 9 years old and used to the pop fare of the day that
the BBC's Light Programme gave us when Twist And Shout blasted out of
the speaker. The rawness and energy in that record knocked me back.
It wasn't very long after that that She Loves You was released and that
was that - I was a committed Bealtes fan forever. I don't know why the
first three singles didn't really grab me at first though I soon
learned to love them too.

Living in northern England back then with family in Liverpool, it was a
seismic shock. Up to then there'd been the feeling that pop music was
American (even Lonnie Donegan and Cliff were more American influenced
than genuine British) or safe Thames Valley English (e.g. Matt Monro)
or cheery Cockney (e.g. Tommy Steele). Even though the Beatles cut
their teeth on American imports, their own original material was
straight from the back streets of Liverpool, accents and humour
unfettered.

Seth Jackson...

Ed Sullivan.

Seth Jackson...

Their first appearance, I should add. It took all of about 3 notes
for me to become completely swept up in Beatlemania.

DoctorElefant...

NYC. I was 5. My parents had another couple over to visit, and me and
my sister and brother were playing with their kids.

Their mother said to mine, "Turn the TV on. The Beatles are gonna be on
Ed Sullivan tonight."

Beetles? I wondered why our parents wanted to watch little bugs on TV,
and why Ed Sullivan would bother televising bugs crawling around. I
mean, he had the talking mouse, and the guy who talked to his hand, but
bugs?

They turned the TV on and I heard all the teenagers in Ed Sullivan's
studio screaming, so I just had to look.

The next thing I remember is my mother getting a bit weary of us kids
walking around singing "Yeah, yeah, yeah" all the time for the next
couple of weeks.

Of course, I still do that pretty often.

Chris Jepson...

Their second Sullivan appearance. I was 8. I thought the music was
pretty good, but not great enough to deserve all the frenzy they were
generating.

During the following year or two, I guess my main exposure to their
music was through the Saturday morning cartoons on TV... so I was pretty
familiar with a number of the early tunes. I thought they were cool but
music wasn't yet a big deal to me. I became a serious Beatles fan with
the white album (I was 13).

Chris Jepson

My first experince with them was when I was around 8 or 9 and my father had
a cassette tape of Magical Mystery Tour. I remember sitting in the car while
my father went into the grocery store and the only tape in the car was
Magical Mystery Tour, so I popped it in the deck. After the first song I was
floored compared to the modern day music in the early 90s. After I had
gotten to Strawberry Fields I had became a Beatles fan forever, I just loved
how the whole album sounded. I listened to that tape so much that the tape
became warped and it sounded like a very unbalanced turntable. I still have
that tape of MMT.

Barbara & Wim Meijnen & Kombrink...

Nice story!
I 'discovered' The Beatles in 1977 when the "Strawberry Fields
Forever"-clip played on the legendary show Toppop on the Dutch
television. I was 12 at the time and the Beatles were a band I somehow
knew about but this clip and music were nothing short of a relevation
after years of Abba, Queen and a bit of glamrock; the brave and strange
sounds and the mysterious atmosphere of the clip. A week later I bought
the Blue double-album and SFF was te most-played track.

Larry B...

Mine was watching Jack Paar on TV with my mom in Jan 1964 and he previewed
the Beatles phenom in England. He was actually a bit disgusted by the
uncivilized behavior but at 11 years old, I did hear that. I saw that clip
about a year ago and it was what you would expect (screaming, fainting,
etc). Next month it was Ed Sullivan's first big Beatles moment. Anyway, that
was mine. I think most Beatles fans remember such moments quite clearly.
Like getting my mom to buy me Meet The Beatles at Sears. I couldn't believe
she said YES! $1.99 for mono, $2.99 for stereo.

godismycodependent...

Did she spring for the stereo?

Larry B...

What 11 yr old kid had a stereo in 1964? Mine was an old Webcor with a cast
iron tone arm. An earthquake couldn't have made that skip. Besides, if there

sixtiesgen...

Your experience pretty much mirrors mine. I never heard of The Beatles
until that 1/3/64 Paar show. I was totally captivated by the entire
film clip of them singing "She Loves You". It was like everything I
heard before claiming to be music...wasn't... and what I was hearing
that night was the first real music of all time.

poisoned rose...

Sometimes I wonder if you can get through a single post without
grandiose overstatement or mythologizing.

So, is "She Loves You" your favorite song as it is mine?

was something cheaper than mono, that is what I would have gotten.....(one
channel only?)

godismycodependent...

You're lucky you didn't wind up with an 88-cent copy of The Buggs'
album.

Larry B....

Never heard of them but they are apparently a bad beatles cover band back in
the day. So, you are right. From my research, it could have been The
Liverpool Kids, too!

Taking that lp home was a fine moment that brought endless enjoyment and had
the added value of putting off my folks. The 60's were a comin'!!!

godismycodependent...

The Buggs' album had a cover designed to trick people into thinking
they were buying Meet the Beatles. You can see it here:

CodeOrange...

My first experience was when I was 11 years old (1978). My mother (who
was British living in the States) had a record collection in her
closet. Being a curious child I started to play the records. She has
some 50s songs collection but she also had five Beatle albums, "Songs,
Pictures and Stories of the Fabulous Beatles", "Meet the Beatles", "A
Hard Day's Night", "Beatles VI" and "Help". I started playing AHDN
over and over. I thought the songs were very catchy (even the
instrumentals) and better than most of music of the day. I was
surprised when I found out Paul from Wings was in the band. ("Let 'Em
In" was his first song I remember as a kid).

Anyway, I really started liking them and started to buy their other
albums. I actually started with "1962-1966" because I was still only
familiar with the "mop top" years. I still remember when I had to
decide to buy "Sgt Pepper's" or "Beatles at the Hollywood Bowl", I
choose the Bowl because I recognized the songs. While vacationing in
England, I did not realize the albums were different and wondered why
when I bought AHDN and "Revolver" they were not the same.

I have been a fan ever since.