Posted in: Oldies by Alistair Briggs on September 27th, 2011 | 5 Comments
Finally, the answer to the question of just who were the Beatles influenced by!
On our mission to find out just who were the Beatles influenced by we have already found many names of bands and artists that have, in their own small way, been an influence on the Beatles music, but that list has to be narrowed down further to get the main influences on the Beatles music.
Over the course of the number of previous articles, looking at who the Beatles were influenced by, a few names kept creeping up mainly Chuck Berry, Carl Perkins and Elvis. In the case of the latter it could be argued that it was in fact Leiber & Stoller who wrote most of the songs for Elvis! Yet, the names of Chuck Berry, Carl Perkins and Elvis are the ones that keep cropping up – could it be said that they were the biggest influences on the Beatles music?
It seems that the answer may have been with us all along though! On the Beatles album Live At The BBC Disc 1, track 33 is a ’speech’ entitled ‘From Fluff To You’ which is of DJ Alan Freeman interviewing Paul McCartney (and John Lennon trying to promote his book in the background).
From Fluff To You
The question Alan Freeman asks of Paul McCartney is if there was any particular idol that he has copied his singing style from. Three of the names that Paul McCartney mentioned were Elvis, Chuck Berry and Carl Perkins! Sure, it may have been a case of those names influencing the singing style of Paul McCartney, but it wouldn’t be a stretch of the imagination to conclude that those three were also big influences on the musical style that all the Beatles together performed.
It wouldn’t be a stretch of the imagination at all as the previous articles are proof positive that the Beatles were influence very heavily by Elvis, Chuck Berry and Carl Perkins.
There are, of course, many other names we have come across previously that have influenced the music of the Beatles to varying degrees but the three main ones appear to be Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry and Carl Perkins. Outwith those names the three names that keep cropping up are Larry Williams, Little Richard and Buddy Holly.
Image via Wikipedia
And there you have it, the six biggest influences on the music of the Beatles were Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry, Carl Perkins, Larry Williams, Little Richard and Buddy Holly. Each and every single one of them was a music star and, with the exception of Elvis Presley, were songwriters of the highest calibre. Such talent clearly rubbed off on the Beatles as they took the influence of those six people, shook it up, mixed it all together, and combined it in to something new and something unique. The Beatles sound was first formed from a ‘compilation’ of influences and became greater that the sum of its parts.
The Beatles music may have rocked the music world to a point that we are still feeling the tremors, but would the Beatles have been able to do so without the influence of Elvis Presley, Chuck Berry, Carl Perkins, Larry Williams, Little Richard and Buddy Holly? Maybe they would, maybe they wouldn’t!
ittech September 27th, 2011 at 8:52 pm
thanks for this
STEVE666 September 28th, 2011 at 4:18 pm
Apart from the usual rock ‘n’ roll suspects you’ve listed another influence, initially, was Cliff and the Shadows. I guess they gave them the belief you could make it happen on this side of the Atlantic too.
IMO though, the biggest influence that proceeded this and furthered the progression of The Beatles (especially Lennon) was Bob Dylan. His poetry-in-music style inspired them to think beyond the ‘I love you; you love me; oh how happy we can be’ schmaltzy pop ditty; the mainstay lyrical format of pop music of that era.
And as The Beatles changed and tried to shake off their pop group persona and be taken more seriously, Dylan then seemed inspired by them. By ’65, the two albums of that year—The Beatles ‘Rubber Soul’ and Dylan’s ‘Bringing It All Back Home’—showed how each of their genius had rubbed off on the other.
Without Bob, the Fab Four may have simply run out of steam and faded into the annals of musical obscurity alongside the likes of The Dave Clark 5, The Searchers…et al.
And without the Fab’s, old Bob may never have picked up an electric guitar and stayed a Woody Guthrie-esque folky.
Alistair Briggs September 29th, 2011 at 12:05 pm
The thing is though Steve, by 1966 John Lennon had all but ‘disowned’ Bob Dylan, but that is a story for another time.
shafikamal1 October 21st, 2011 at 10:58 am
nice article .thanks for this.
jeyraul December 5th, 2011 at 9:57 am
A very informative article. Thanks for sharing it.