The Fab Four might be a pervasive part of modern pop culture, but we’d bet you might not have heard these interesting facts about the Beatles. (Save for hardcore Beatlemaniacs, of course.) From their Liverpool roots to John Lennon’s uncanny connection to certain numbers, there is no shortage of real and fantastical lore surrounding the iconic pop-rock group.
In honor of the seven years, seven months, and 24 days the Beatles were actively together—there’s a bonus fact for free—we’ve rounded up seven of the most interesting tidbits about the band you probably didn’t know.
1. They almost copied the name of an American rock group
Before the Beatles were, well, the Beatles, the original quartet floated a number of possible band names—including cheeky stage names each member took for themselves. After then-bassist Stuart Sutcliffe left the group’s earliest incarnations, Paul McCartney, John Lennon, and George Harrison performed as The Quarrymen for a brief time.
Lennon, who was a big admirer of American rock and roller Buddy Holly, suggested they rename the band the Crickets. Of course, Holly and his band already performed under this stage name, prompting McCartney to shoot the idea down. The trio settled on the Silver Beetles instead and, eventually, just the Beatles.
2. The Beatles tried to form an island utopia
At the height of their fame with plenty of money to spare, John Lennon, George Harrison, and Paul McCartney set off on an island hopping excursion in the Mediterranean Ocean in the summer of 1967. Tripping on acid and playing music for most of the journey, the three Beatles (Ringo Starr was at home with his pregnant wife) got the grand idea to form an island utopia just off the coast of Greece.
It didn’t take long for the group to give up on the idea. “It’s a good job we didn’t do it,” McCartney later said. “There would always be [arguments about] who has to do the washing-up and whose turn it is to clean out the latrines. I don’t think any of us were thinking that.”
3. Ringo Starr angered his hometown so badly that they lobbed off his head
The Beatles might have been lucky in fame, but they were less fortunate when it came to the topiary memorials cities have planted in their honor. In 2008, a vandal chopped off the head of a shrubbery likeness of Ringo Starr in Liverpool’s Parkways Transport Exchange. Some speculated it was in response to Starr’s comment that he missed nothing about his hometown.
Six years later, in 2014, George Harrison’s memorial tree in Los Angeles’ iconic Griffith Park met a rather ironic fate when an infestation of beetles killed the pine tree, which was over ten feet tall at the time.
4. The infamous “Paul is dead” line was something else entirely
One of the most well-known Beatles myths is that one (or all) of the members died and were replaced by lookalikes. Most commonly, some believers claim that Paul McCartney was dead. A muffled line from John Lennon in “Strawberry Fields Forever” that almost sounds like he’s saying, “I buried Paul,” has certainly added fuel to the speculative fire.
Lennon addressed this morbid rumor outright in one of his final interviews with David Sheff for Playboy in 1980, explaining, “I said, ‘cranberry sauce.’ That’s all I said. Some people like ping-pong, other people like digging over graves. Some people will do anything rather than be here now.”
5. Their official breakup happened at Disney World
Although it would be easy to assume the Beatles’ final year as a band was 1970, the year they released their last album, ‘Let It Be,’ a contentious legal battle over tax disputes drew out their infamous breakup for years. The musicians, Apple record executives, and their attorneys scheduled a meeting to sign the official dissolution contracts on December 19, 1974.
Instead of going to the meeting, Lennon, who had the greatest grievances about the tax implications of the split, went to Disney World with his then-girlfriend May Pang and his son, Sean Ono Lennon. An Apple lawyer tracked him down at the Polynesian Village Hotel in Disney World’s Magic Kingdom. Lennon acquiesced, signing the papers and marking the Beatles’ official split at the “happiest place on Earth.”
6. They were turned down by Decca Records
The Beatles auditioned for London’s Decca Records on December 13, 1961, performing a 15-song set that included future hits like “‘Till There Was You” and “Hello Little Girl.” Decca’s head of A&R, Dick Rowe, told Mike Smith, the A&R representative at the audition, to decide between the Liverpudlian Beatles or local Londoners Brian Poole and the Tremeloes.
“We decided it was better to take the local group,” Rowe recalled (via the BeatlesBible). Officially, Decca told the quartet, “Guitar groups were on the way out,” cementing their mistake as one of the most shortsighted decisions in record label history.
7. Their music was the first to be beamed into deep space
Finally, our last and most celestially interesting fact about the Fab Four is that in 2008, the Beatles became the first band to have their music broadcasted into deep space, thanks to a celebratory transmission by NASA in honor of the space agency’s 50th anniversary. NASA converted the Beatles’ “Across the Universe” into digital data sent through a transmitter toward Polaris, the North Star—a journey that would take roughly 431 light years.
“Well done, NASA,” Paul McCartney said of the technological feat (via The Guardian). “Send my love to the aliens.”
