Beatles Quiz

[Owners' Account]

Ok, I have a quiz for you. These questions are not from a book or anything, I am asking the questions as I know the answers being both a die hard Beatles fan, and a complete smart arse.......

1. How many UK number one's did the Beatles have?

2. Paul claims one of his most famous songs came to him in his sleep. contrary to popular belief, the song was never released as a single in the UK. Name the song.....

3. In what year was John Lennon shot?

4. What was the Beatles first UK single? (bonus point if you can say it's highest chart position)

5. Name the Beatles first feature length film

6. Before they were famous, the Beatles once traveled all day on a bus across Liverpool to go and meat a guitar player who could show them a chord on the guitar they did not know how to play. What was the chord? (got I'm either mightily clever or mighty sad)

7. Name the Beatles drummer who was replaced by Ringo Star

8. The Beatles were famous for playing the first ever big stadium gig in America. Can you name the stadium?

9. The Beatles once held the record for the highest ever TV viewing audience in the UK. Can you name the song they performed and the date it was performed on.

10. Carrying on with the TV theme, the Beatles were credited as being responsible for creating the longest ever period in recent American history where there was absolutely no reported crime across the entire USA. (a whole 3 minute). It was claimed that even the criminals took 3 minutes off to watch there first ever TV performance in the USA. Can you name the show on which they appeared that night?

11. Which Beatle missed much of his schooling as a youngster due to illness and was only given 6 months to live before the age of 10?

12. Name the first track on the Album "Rubber Soul"

13. Where was the Beatles last ever live performance together played?

14. Name the Beatles Recording Producer (credited by many as being the 5th Beatle)

15. Apart from there first two singles, the Beatles only ever released 1 other single in the UK that did not reach number one. Can you name the song? And for a bonus, name the song which kept it of number one...

That's it for now. Anyone who gets over 10 without looking the answers up gets a big huge for being "like me" Also bear in mind that more Beatles quizzes will be coming and a running total will be kept. Also for 20 bonus points, someone has top come up with Beatles questions that I do not know.......

1. 19 (Please Please Me;From Me To You;She Loves You;I Want To Hold Your Hand;Can't Buy Me love; A Hard Day's Night;I Feel Fine; Ticket To Ride; Help!; Day Tripper/We Can Work it Out; Paperback Writer; Yellow Submarine/Eleanour Rigby; All You Need Is Love; Hello Goodbye; Lady Madonna; Hey Jude; Get Back; The Ballad Of John And Yoko; Let It Be) Sad or what? ;D

3. 1980

4. Love Me Do (Number 18)

5. A Hard Day's Night.

7. Pete Best

8. The Shea Stadium in New York

10. The Ed Sullivan Show

12. Drive my Car.

14. Brian Epstein - no sorry, he was their manager, the Producer was George Martin.

15. Penny Lane/Strawberry Fields Forever. In March 1967 it was kept off number 1 by Release Me by Englebert Humperdinck.

Nice quiz, Glenn, great to see you entering into the spirit of things. ;)

And regarding number 2, I'm after bonus points here. I think the song to which you refer is Yesterday, which Paul reckoned came to him in his sleep but under the title "Scrambled Eggs". It was never released durung the time the Beatles were together, however it was released by Apple after their split, and its highest chart place was number 5 on 3rd April 1976.

[Sir Chancelot]

1 - 17
5 - Yello Submarine
8 - Shea Stadium
9- I want to hold your hand - Saturday night at the London Paladium
11 - John Lennon

[Mark James]

13. On the roof of the Apple building in London, as featured in the film Let it Be.

Thank you, and I hope I passed the audition....

[Owners' Account]

Ok, the answers. That you all for participating, I will put you out of your misery.

1. How many UK number one's did the Beatles have?

Tommo, not sure that that sad mate, as your answer to this is wrong. It was in fact 17. I will list them for you….

From me to you
She loves you
I want to hold you hand
Can’t buy me love
A hard days night
I feel fine
Ticket to ride
Help
Day Tripper/We can work it out
Paperpack writer
Eleanor Rigby/Yellow Submerine
All you need is loveHello Goodbye
Lady Madonna
Hey Jude
Get Back
Ballard of John and Yoko

Let it be was never a single I’m afraid tommo, and Please please me, even despite what George Martin says in the anthology, only ever got to number 2, everyone gets that one wrong.

2. Paul claims one of his most famous songs came to him in his sleep. contrary to popular belief, the song was never released as a single in the UK. Name the song.....

Yes, it was indeed yesterday. We was convinced it was a jazz song he had heard when he was a kid (his father way a jazz trumpet player). It was never released in the UK as a single, but it was in America.

3. In what year was John Lennon shot?
Yep, 1980

4. What was the Beatles first UK single? (bonus point if you can say it's highest chart position)
Yep, Storming was right, got to number 17, the single was Love Me Do

5. Name the Beatles first feature length film
A hard days night

6. Before they were famous, the Beatles once travelled all day on a bus across Liverpool to go and meat a guitar player who could show them a chord on the guitar they did not know how to play. What was the chord? (got I'm either mightily clever or mighty sad)
Tough one this. The chord was G7. I would not think that The Beatles did not know G7. I can play G& and I can’t play the guitar.

7. Name the Beatles drummer who was replaced by Ringo Star
Pete Best

8. The Beatles were famous for playing the first ever big stadium gig in America. Can you name the stadium?
Yes, Shea Stadium, home of the New York Yankees I believe

9. The Beatles once held the record for the highest ever TV viewing audience in the UK. Can you name the song they performed and the date it was performed on.
Nobody got this. June the 25th 1967, and the song was “All you need is Love”. Not only was it the highest in the UK, it was broadcast via satellite to an estimated 350 million people round the world.

10. Carrying on with the TV theme, the Beatles were credited as being responsible for creating the longest ever period in recent American history where there was absolutely no reported crime across the entire USA. (a whole 3 minute). It was claimed that even the criminals took 3 minutes off to watch there first ever TV performance in the USA. Can you name the show on which they appeared that night?
Yes, it was the Ed Sullivan Show, well done

11. Which Beatle missed much of his schooling as a youngster due to illness and was only given 6 months to live before the age of 10?
Ringo Star

12. Name the first track on the Album "Rubber Soul"
Drive My Car

13. Where was the Beatles last ever live performance together played?
Mark James you are superb. You were spot on, on the rooftop at Apple Studios. And well done for the legendary Lennon line you added.

14. Name the Beatles Recording Producer (credited by many as being the 5th Beatle)
Easy, George Martin

15. Apart from there first two singles, the Beatles only ever released 1 other single in the UK that did not reach number one. Can you name the song? And for a bonus, name the song which kept it of number one...
Well done Tommo, but you got the songs mixed up. The A side was Strawberry Fields (prelude to Sergeant Pepper) and the B side was Penny Lane. It was indeed kept off number 1 by Please Release me, for 5 weeks I believe.

Thanks guys. Anyone want to throw out a Beatles question for me?

[Mark James]

admin said:

Let it be was never a single

I have to challenge this, Chubbster, because I know for certain that there are two different versions of the song available on record.

The version on the album has a George Harrison guitar solo in the middle, while the other one has a keyboard solo of some kind instead, and sounds quite different.

I'm almost as sure as I can be that this latter version was a single, released at around the same time as the album, i.e. not a remix done years later.

I'm sure some of our ardent researchers will be able to provide chapter and verse.

Oh, by the way, Shea Stadium is the baseball home of the New York Mets, not the Yankees. They play at, err, Yankee Stadium.

Right Chubbster,

I'm normally the diplomat, but in this instance I can't just "Let It Be" ! ;D You ought to know that when the Beatles burst on the scene in 1963, I was an impressionable teenager of 13, so have first-hand knowledge of "Beatlemania". Where where you, at that time, Glenn, not even a twinkle in your dad's eye !

First of all, Please Please Me shot up the charts and became number one on 23rd February 1963. The Beatles appeared on Blue Peter to mark the event, performed the song and were interviewed afterwards by either Valerie Singleton or Muriel Young (can't quite remember which, but they were asked about their "Beatle cut" hairstyle and comment was made about Paul playing the bass guitar left-handed.)

Please Please Me was knocked off the top two weeks later by Cliff Richard's Summer Holiday, but by saying that it never made number one is to infer that Gerry and The Pacemakers were the first Liverpool band to have a number one (with How Do You Do It ? in April 1963) - which is just not the case.

Secondy, Let It Be WAS, as Mark says, released as a single, and I always remember it as their last hit before the group disbanded. But you are right and I am wrong on one thing, which is that it didn't make Number One: It reached number 3 in the last two weeks of March 1970, and was kept off the top by Simon and Garfunkel's Bridge Over Troubled Water. But it WAS as single, on Apple.

Thirdly, Strawberry Fields Forever and Penny Lane was a double-sided A side in every sense of the word. Agreed that the track Strawberry Fields Forever was laid down first on the disc (of which I own a vinyl Parlophone original, no.R5570) and it has 7XCE18415 as its song catalogue number as opposed to Penny Lane's 7XCE18416. But Penny Lane got most of the initial airplay, and was shown by itself at number one by both the New Musical Express and the Record Mirror, as well as being performed by itself on Top Of The Pops. Strawberry Fields Forever got all the attention a week later, due to its psychedelic nature, and thereafter it was billed as a double-sided hit.

So there we are, call me sad, and a bit of a pedant, but being told that I'm wrong about anything to do with the Beatles is as annoying as anyone referring to Paul Weller (a relative Johnny-come-Lately) as the "Mod-father" - as any original mods will tell you, he (with The Jam) was merely part of a 'mod' revival movement.


Okay, as you've asked, here's half a dozen questions to test you. They're all on Penny Lane.

1. A handful of promotional copies of Penny Lane were pressed and sent to radio stations: These records are among the rarest and most valuable Beatles collectibles, as they have something extra on them to the eventual mix which was released. What is it?

2. What is meant by the mysterious lyrics "A four of fish and finger pie" ?

3. A famous author claims that, upon the release of the "Penny Lane" single, he beat up a child who'd heard the song on the radio, reportedly just to get him to hum the tune. Name the author.

4. In the 1968 film Wonderwall, one of the characters, a suicidal model, is named Penny Lane. Name the actress who played her.

5. Also, in the 2000 film Almost Famous, a character - the famous "Band Aid" who travels with the band - is named Penny Lane. Name her.

6. At which number did Rolling Stone rank the song on their list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time ?

[Owners' Account]

Let It Be..... ahh whatever. Seems you are right. I don;t know as much as I thought

Lets remember that this was all 10 year before I was born...

As for Please Please me I can only say two things.

I know for certain the Beatles had only 17 number ones, and I know that was not one. I have 2 Guinness Book's of hit singles here and both of them say it got to number 2. However, I believe there were actually 2 UK charts back then, and I have been told in the past it got to number one in of of them, but not the one considered the official charts these days...

Your questions Tommo

1. Easy, had piccolo trumpet sounds on it. Knowing that helps when you have a Father who was a DJ for 30 years and is now a rare record collector lol

2. Tommo where do you get this stuff from? Do you do this for a living.
Well, I know finger pie is slang for a sex term used at the time. So I would say a date involving fish and chips and a quick snog on the train home...

3. It was the Hitch Hikers guild guy. Something Adam I think

4. Hmmm, is that really Beatles related? Either way I don't know

5. Yeah, don;t know that one either

6. Easy Easy Easy..... well sort of. I'll go for 449 or 349, or 249. It's something 49.....

Right Tommo, Revenge is close. I just have to go and think of some stuff that will boggle your mind and make you cry.....

Maybe I'll do a sheep quiz, anyone ever thought of that?

Re: Please Please Me (- funny how when you listen to the lyrics in this day and age they take on a deeper meaning ... please please me oh yeah like I please you ! :-* :P ) Here's what Wikipedia has to say on the subject :

"Please Please Me" has been subject to controversy in the UK, because at the time there were many charts circulating, and Record Retailer, whose opinion is now most widely considered as being the correct chart, published the single at #2, whereas all other charts published it at #1. Today, The Official UK Charts Company, claim the song only made #2 in the charts. However many believe it to have been a #1 – especially as the NME chart was the main one at the time – thus making The Beatles the first group to score 18 #1 singles on the UK charts, and also increasing their overall count to 18

You hit the nail on the head when you said yourself that there was more than one chart.
At the time, in the early sixties, there were four magazines, the NME, the Melody Maker and the Record Mirror being three of them. The NME and Record Mirror were more or less in harmony, and everyone (including Alan Freeman's Pick of the Pops) used to go by them. By contrast the MM was a twat publication and often showed the 'wrong' number one, and in the case in point probably had Frank Ifield at Number One with "The Wayward Wind". During the seventies, the four charts were consolidated into one for the purpose of finding a non-conflicting chart for TOTP so then all arguments ceased.
The charts themselves lost all credibilty (with me at any rate) when I tried to buy a Genesis single in its first week of release, only to be told that it had been deleted (pulled by the record company as they did not want to affect sales of the new album We Can't Dance). >:( I've since managed to acquire a rare copy.

Anyway, you've done very well with your answers to my questions. But you don't get scored by me until you've scored everyone else on what is after all your main quiz. ;)

And you should have been impressed at the speed with which I answered your questions straight away off the top of my head. If I had 'cheated' by googling I wouldn't have quoted all the titles and counted 'em (wrongly) to 19, I'd have just said 17 or 18 straight off and left it at that !

[Chris_Sav]

admin said:

Maybe I'll do a sheep quiz, anyone ever thought of that?

??? ??? ???

[CraigC]

Also for 20 bonus points, someone has top come up with Beatles questions that I do not know.......

OK, who recorded a cover of Helter Skelter on their 1978 album "The Scream". (worth a try for 20 pts)

[Mark James]

craicc said:

Also for 20 bonus points, someone has top come up with Beatles questions that I do not know.......

OK, who recorded a cover of Helter Skelter on their 1978 album "The Scream". (worth a try for 20 pts)

Why, that would be Siouxsie and the Banshees.

markjames said:

craicc said:

Also for 20 bonus points, someone has top come up with Beatles questions that I do not know.......

OK, who recorded a cover of Helter Skelter on their 1978 album "The Scream". (worth a try for 20 pts)

Why, that would be Siouxsie and the Banshees.

LMAO ;D
Keep that up, Mark, and you'll be upsetting the Forum Owner. ;)
We were instructed to test him out on his Beatles knowledge and the challenge is: 20 points for anyone coming up with a Beatles question that he doesn't know the answer to !

[Mark James]

Oops, sorry, I thought Chubbster had already won that himself with his own question one ;D

I can see where you're coming from, there, Mark. ;)

Anyway, as no doubt our trusty Forum Owner is busy with other things, it might be timely - for the sake of tidiness - for me to have a go at scoring this one up.

So:
Stormin 3pts for correct answers to 1,4 & 8
Tommo 9pts for correct answers to 2,3,5,7,10,12,14,15 including bonus for 15.
MarkJ 3pts for correct answer to 13 (including bonus) plus (later) Siouxsie and the Banshees.
CraigC a token 2pts for setting a question which Glenn may not have been able to answer.
Tommo 2 further points for stumping Glenn on two Penny Lane questions – more to come if he can’t get the one about the stamps !
Glenn 8pts for answers to four difficult questions set by tommo. (The missing answers by the way being 4.Jane Birkin and 5.Kate Hudson)

Final tally:

1. tommo 11pts
2. Chubbster 8pts
3= Stormin' 3pts
3= MarkJ 3pts
5 CraigC 2pts

The above will be entered into yearly table (under "Quiz-mania")