Talk:The Beatles' studio years

Article
This could be a really great article. The different studios they used (Trident in Soho as well as Abbey Road) and the argument about Klein managing them (which was in the Olympic studio in Barnes, London.) I am of the opinion that it should only be about the studios and what happened, and only one-liners about other outside stuff. --andreasegde (talk) 16:53, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

"studio work" vs "studio years"
Studio years was better. &mdash; John Cardinal (talk) 13:26, 15 June 2009 (UTC)

Move this and rename it
The title is a bit awkward; "Post-touring studio years" is more compact and  precise.  R ad io pa th y  •talk•  07:30, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Yes, that's better. Nice one. I'll change it now. PL290 (talk) 09:23, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
 * I hate to keep the changes churning, but "Studio years" was fine and we should go back to that title. The article's lead explains the title, and references from the main Beatles article include a summary that does the same. What problem are we attempting to fix by using the various awkward variations? &mdash; John Cardinal (talk) 13:12, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Because the band spent time in the studio from 1962 on, the first rename to "The Beatles' studio work" was inappropriate. Everyone involved in the discussion seems to agree on that. The problem, then, if there is one, is that "studio years" needs a context, or it can be misunderstood to mean what the original renamer presumably thought: all the years they spent in the recording studio. I know the first sentence of the Lead makes it abundantly clear, but it would still be better if the title could encompass the whole meaning without relying on knowledge of the wider context. But that's only an ideal and if editors aren't happy with any resulting name that can be thought of, perhaps that aspect should be abandoned and we should go back to the original name. I don't have too strong a feeling about it beyond agreeing that "The Beatles' studio work" is inappropriate. PL290 (talk) 13:36, 24 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Don't over-think this. Phrases like the "the xyz years" don't have to refer to an exhaustively exclusive period where "xyz" occurred. Readers know that, and I am not referring to people familiar with the specific topic of "xyz". Readers know that the phrase is not to be taken literally. Did The Beatles take vacations, get married, take out the garbage during the studio years? Of course. Did they work in the studio before and/or after the studio years? Yes. What was their focus or main activity during the studio years? Recording music in one or more recording studios. Simple. Check out chapter titles in books--a close analogy, IMO--and you'll see titles like "The studio years." Most readers aren't dumb, and the ones that are face worse issues with WikiPedia and The Beatles articles than naming an article with less than ultimate precision.


 * The problem&mdash;if any&mdash;with "studio years" is small, and the suggested cures are worse than the disease. &mdash; John Cardinal (talk) 14:55, 24 June 2009 (UTC)


 * The only thing about the chapters-of-book analogy is that that's exactly why it works as a section title in The Beatles, but the sub-article, as well as being a sub-article, is a Wikipedia article that may be read in its own right. Nevertheless, even then the "book" is still implied by dint of the context being "The Beatles", so I think you' re right. It's adequate. I still wonder if there is a "perfect" name but won't object myself if we drop it and go back to the original. As an aside, other sub-articles have been renamed too with possibly similar loss of original intent. The UK and U.S. ones are OK, but for instance, "The Beatles: The Cavern Club and Brian Epstein" is now The Beatles at The Cavern Club, and "The Beatles in 1966: Backlash and Controversy" is now The Beatles in 1966; again, the original names weren't necessarily the best but the new ones have lost an intended emphasis (and gained a new, incorrect one). There may be others. Perhaps a general review of sub-article names is needed. PL290 (talk) 15:44, 24 June 2009 (UTC)

(outdent) The naming difficulty (with the 1966 article too) is once again suggesting to me that it's a content issue. I think those two splits may be too low-level. I suggest merging this article and The Beatles in 1966, and calling it "The Beatles 1966–1970" or whatever is the best punctuation. PL290 (talk) 17:03, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
 * I oppose merging the 1966 and studio years articles as they are two distinct periods in The Beatles' history. 1966 was a major transitional period for the band and the "studio years" name is fine with me as the group was not touring anymore. Steelbeard1 (talk) 17:25, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Agreed; nineteen sixty-six was a very turbulent year for The Beatles (!) and the studio became an oasis for them.  They are effectively two very distinct periods.  R ad io pa th y  •talk•   01:11, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

(outdent) There seems to be consensus on the article title, to return to a simple "studio years" one. I will do this in a day or so, using "The Beatles: the studio years" as the title, unless anyone gets there first or wants different punctuation etc., or consensus changes. PL290 (talk) 07:09, 26 June 2009 (UTC)

Refs
No refs in the lead. It is only supposed to be a summary of the article, where the refs should be.--andreasegde (talk) 13:21, 13 July 2009 (UTC)


 * Why are there still refs in the Lead? This article looks like a trivia page as well.--andreasegde (talk) 19:16, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Studio albums
It occurs to me that this article would be a good place to elaborate on the studio albums and how they were made, what they were like, what was significant about them ("Rubber Soul was critically hailed as a major leap forward in the maturity and complexity of the band's music"...). Or even if it's limited to the albums from 1966 on (see new section "Article scope" I'm about to create). PL290 (talk) 19:36, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Article scope
One possibility for this article is that it does cover studio aspects over their whole career. Is it useful to restrict it to only the post-touring years 1966 on? Even though it's intended to act a sub-article for that period, it could still do so even if it covers the wider period. I haven't yet formed an opinon which I think is more useful, just the idea. See also suggestion above re. elaborating here on studio albums. Thoughts? PL290 (talk) 20:47, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Ad for Maharishi/TM
Recent edits turned this page into an ad for TM--way too much detail about general topics like TM and the Maharishi--and deleted important items such as when The Beatles learned of Epstein's death. The trip to India was important, and it should be described in detail, but let's leave out general information about TM and the Maharishi that are covered by articles devoted to those topics. &mdash; John Cardinal (talk) 12:57, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Merge to:The Beatles in 1968
It has been proposed that we merge The Beatles in 1968 into this article. That article is almost solely concerned with the relationship between The Beatles and Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. Over at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject The Beatles, I proposed creating an article to cover the roughly one-year period when the members were disciples of the Maharishi. So my suggestion is that we rename the article to something like "The Maharishi and The Beatles", and expand it to include all significant aspects and points of view of that topic.  Will Beback   talk    08:59, 29 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Support - I support merging The Beatles in 1968 into this article. Both articles are short, they cover a sequential period of time, and combining them makes sense to me. IMO, few moderate-length articles is better than a lot of short ones. — John Cardinal (talk) 13:50, 29 January 2010 (UTC)
 * Support - For the same reasons that John Cardinal made. Steelbeard1 (talk) 14:48, 29 January 2010 (UTC)
 * We can do both: merge the1968 ar icle here and split the India material into a standalone article.   Will Beback    talk    05:14, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

After looking at it more I couldn't resist digging into it and have now re-written about half of it, and added about a hundred words. I think it could easily be twice its present length of about 800 words, or more. To better focus it, I moved it to The Beatles at Rishikesh since it didn't have any coverage of other events in 1968. I've added several links from other articles, and have added it to the TM category and template. I intend to make further improvements and so ask that any merger be suspended for now.  Will Beback   talk    09:47, 20 April 2010 (UTC)

Brian Epstein's death
We need to add more about the effects Brian Epstein's death had on The Beatles. As I stated, his death marked the beginning of the end for the group. We should add that the band members were forced to become business people which began the discord within The Beatles. Steelbeard1 (talk) 18:25, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

Orphaned references in The Beatles: the studio years
I check pages listed in Category:Pages with incorrect ref formatting to try to fix reference errors. One of the things I do is look for content for orphaned references in wikilinked articles. I have found content for some of The Beatles: the studio years's orphans, the problem is that I found more than one version. I can't determine which (if any) is correct for this article, so I am asking for a sentient editor to look it over and copy the correct ref content into this article.

Reference named "NowhereMan4": From Brian Epstein:  From The Beatles at The Cavern Club:  

I apologize if any of the above are effectively identical; I am just a simple computer program, so I can't determine whether minor differences are significant or not. AnomieBOT ⚡ 21:10, 29 January 2010 (UTC)


 * Got it. — John Cardinal (talk) 22:56, 29 January 2010 (UTC)

McCartney's drums
I'm thinking this sentence could be clarified a bit:

"The studio sessions for The White Album saw deep divisions open within the band, Starr temporarily leaving and McCartney taking over drums on the tracks "Martha My Dear", "Wild Honey Pie", "Dear Prudence" and "Back in the U.S.S.R."

While McCartney drummed in Ringo's absence for USSR and Prudence (well, actually it's been documented that the USSR drums were pieced together by Paul as well as John and George, but that's another story), the drumming on Martha and Wild Honey Pie was indeed Paul as stated...but not because of Ringo's absence, it was just because Paul did these by himself (these songs not being recorded during the two weeks or so that Ringo had left). The sentence is a little confusing since it implies that all four songs were done by Paul BECAUSE Ringo was gone, when in fact that really only applies to two of the songs. Since Paul went "solo" quite a bit (e.g., Yesterday, Blackbird, etc.), the fact that he did the aforementioned songs by himself shouldn't really be chalked up to rifts in the band, certainly not Ringo's absence. OK just taking those two songs out?70.91.35.27 (talk) 18:25, 15 November 2016 (UTC)Tim

Is there any reason not to redirect this article?
--Ilovetopaint (talk) 15:50, 20 May 2017 (UTC)