The Beatles By Charles [1] I will never forget that glorious moment of revelation. I had just turned eight and was on swings at the rec in Ripley, Surrey. There was a group of teenagers nearby with a transistor radio and for the first time I found myself consciously listening to pop music. [2] The song being played was the Beatles’ From Me to You (April 1963) and as soon as I heard the first notes I got off the swing and went and stood as close to the teenagers as I dared, listening in a state of wonder. I was hooked with my first hit. That Christmas my parents bought me my first record player, and Aunty Kay gave me my first LP, the Beatles’ second album, With the Beatles. [3] I saved my pocket money and bought every Beatles single as they came out, though I couldn't usually afford the albums until Christmas or birthdays came around. But from 8 to 13, with the release of the double White album, the Beatles were undoubtedly my favorite band. Never a football fan, I finally felt I had a team to follow. [4] And now Beatlemania is about to explode all over again. All the album CDs have been carefully remastered and lovingly repackaged and on a first listen to some of them, the sound has a freshness and depth that helps revitalize songs you thought you had played to death. There are movies about Lennon and Brian Epstein in the works. There’ s even a Beatles video game coming out that could win them a new generation of fans. [5] The year it all really started to happen for the Beatles is 1963. Something changed when Beatlemania erupted in that miraculous times. In a Britain that was still rigid with class and snobbery, the mop-tops brought a refreshing blast of irreverent cheek and fresh air into our lives.“For those of you in the cheap seats I’ d like you to clap your hands,” John Lennon told the audience at a Royal Variety Show attended by the Queen Mother and Princess Margaret. “The rest of you... just rattle your jewellery.” [6] Unlike the Stones, the Beatles were hardly ever threatening. Their early songs were about the innocence of young love. John, Paul, George and Ringo seemed to be delightful at the possibility of holding their girlfriend’ s hand. Indeed, right through their works, they never really communicated sexual passion, normally the bedrock of popular song. They were superbly tuneful, quirky, melancholy, funny, and touching and in later years thrillingly weird and spaced out. Unlike the Stones, there was no throb of lust. [7] What remains starting, even miraculous, is just how much ground they covered between the release of Love Me Do in October 1962 and the final single, The Long and Winding Road in 1970. They came up with a dozen albums and a succession of superb singles that constantly took their listeners by surprise with their melody, wit and freshness. The Beatles’progress seemed to be journey from innocence to experience, and finally disillusion. Watching their bitter break-up in 1970 was a bit like witnessing your parents go through a divorce. It left a nasty taste, particularly when John blamed Paul in the extraordinarily bitter How Do You Sleep? [8] Over the years we hoped they would bury the hatchet, reform, come up with a new album and even perhaps return to the stage. The speculation was endless, and intense, but the murder of John Lennon outside the Dakota Building in New York in 1980 put an end to that, while the more recent death from cancer of George Harrison was another reminder of mortality, and of the truth of his beautiful song All Things Must Pass. [9] Now, 40 years since they broke up, the Fab Four look set to reclaim their position as the hottest property in pop music. The Beatles are dead. Long live the Beatles! What did the author mean by saying “I finally felt I had a team to follow” (Line 4, Para. 3)?