Beatles Walk Blog

While Liverpool was home to the Beatles and where they did much of their developing as a band, London became their second home throughout the 60s as they changed the music, fashion, and art scenes. During our Beatles walk through London, we saw many of the important places much the same way the Beatles would of back in their heyday. From our walk through Carnaby Road to our stop at Apple Studios, we saw several of the spots that the Beatles frequented and made prominent during their time in London.

To begin our tour, we took the underground from King’s Cross to Tottenham Court Road to meet our tour guide for the Magical Mystery Tour Walk. After meeting him, we preceded to Soho square, which is the current home to Paul McCartney’s offices, MPL Communications. Though this location was not from the Beatles glory days in London, it still holds significant importance in the music world today. We showed the tour guide that we knew our stuff when it came to Beatles history and got to enjoy the sights of Soho during pride weekend, which was interesting to say the least.

Following our stop in Soho square we went down an alleyway to see Trident Studios, the studio were the Beatles and many other prominent bands of the late 60s and 70s recorded songs. There was a list of bands and songs that they recorded in the studio in the window, which included the Beatles because they recorded Hey Jude there along with songs for the White Album. I found this stop to be interesting not only in the fact that the Beatles recorded there but that so many other well known musicians and bands recorded songs there too, such as Elton John, The Rolling Stones, Genesis, and Judas Priest.

After we finished talking about Trident Studios, we proceeded down Broadwick street passing the Broadwick street toilets, which were the backdrop for a sketch John Lennon acted in for the British comedy show “Not only … but also” in 1966. Broadwick Street ended into Carnaby Street, which was the fashion centre of the 60s and was our next stop on the tour. We stopped by the mural that contained elements to those of the Sgt. Pepper’s album cover and discussed the significance of the street. Carnaby Street was where many musicians of the 60s came to shop prior to Time magazine publishing an article and the secret getting out. Soon the streets were filled with adoring fans trying to get a glimpse of their favorite bands and finding nothing but overpriced clothing shops.

From Carnaby Street, we made our way to 3 Savile Row, which was home to the Apple Corps and Studios.  Seeing the building from the street was really neat considering all I’ve ever seen is the clips of the rooftop performance. Though the ground up view was fascinating, it would have been amazing if we would have been able to get up on the roof where the Beatles performed their last live performance. While we where there our guide said something that really struck me as odd, He claimed that the Beatles used their offices as a way to lose money (to taxes) but in a manner so that they could choose where the money would go as opposed to having the government getting to spend it on whatever it pleased. I never realized that the taxation was that bad even though I have heard George’s Taxman and Only A Northern Song.

Our final stop along the tour was at Abbey Road, which became famous after the Beatles used it as the background for the album, cover to their last recorded album, which was aptly named Abbey Road. Abbey Road has now practically become holy grounds to Beatles fans everywhere as they flock to try and recreate their own version of the Beatles Abbey Road album cover. I couldn’t help but be excited to walk across such a well-known Beatles landmark. Also, we could see EMI’s Abbey Road Studios from the crosswalk but unfortunately the front of the building was covered up for some kind of restoration work. It was odd though that Beatles fans had made it a tradition to graffiti the wall in front of the studio. Before leaving us, our tour guide gave us an interesting piece of information about the wall, which was that the British government paints over it every 3 months to cover up all the vandalism. I found this hard to believe when I looked at the wall because there were just so many names written all over it. This was yet another reminder of just how popular the Beatles really were/are and how many fans they still have.

It was amazing that in one day, we could walk to see so many important places in regards to the Beatles. The tour gave me prospective on what the Beatles may have seen as they reached the pinnacle of their success in their second home. While many stops we made would seem quite ordinary to those few who are unfamiliar with the Beatles, it was quite interesting how important they were in the development of one of the greatest bands to rule the airways.