In the film Help The Beatles living together in the ultimate bachelor pad. Four doors lead into a miraculous shared space, with all mod cons. No boring housework to worry about.
Unsurprisingly, this fun palace bore little resemblance to The Beatles own living arrangements, past or present. Before they were famous, the band had shared countless dingy rooms and transit vans. They had never, however, formally lived at the same address.
Paul McCartney, conscious of his local reputation, was still officially living in his childhood home when he returned from USA in February 1964. Like his bandmates, the 22 year-old millionaire had always relied on 'home' for bed & board, plus laundry and poste restante. Even after he left Liverpool, he moved in with another family: that of his then girlfriend, Jane Asher
London
Brian Epstein finally moved The Beatles base of operations to London in the summer of 1963. He arranged for them to stay at the Hotel President, near the British Museum in Bloomsbury. Though a major upgrade on what they were used to, the President was chosen for the comparative anonymity of its location and reputation.
Soon, however, there were practical problems. Fans began tracking them down. Every day larger numbers laid siege to their hotel. By early autumn, with She Loves You at Number One, staying in any public building had become untenable.
Green Street
To increase their privacy, Brian Epstein arranged for the band to move into a three bedroom top floor flat in Green Street, Mayfair, near Hyde Park. There were three bedrooms, with the Lennon family taking one and the other three Beatles sharing the rest of the apartment.
The Green Street arrangement — the only time The Beatles formally lived together — only lasted a few months. John, Cynthia and the toddler Julian soon moved to their own flat on Emperor’s Gate.
George and Ringo followed Brian Epstein to Whaddon House, an exclusive development near Harrods. They shared another apartment there for a year before eventually escaping to the suburbs.
Before they broke-up, The Beatles sold far more singles that LPs. The album, as it became known, was a luxury item - well beyond the financial reach of the core teenage market. Singles generally outsold albums until the early seventies. The Beatles released a total of 63 singles worldwide By 2014, the official figure for US single sales was an astonishing 1.6 billion . Estimated world sales were over 2 billion . Studio Albums The Beatles officially released 13 albums, plus three anthologies They had a total of 21 Number 1 albums in the US. Total US album sales are estimated at around 177 million Album sales outside of the US are in excess of 600 million . The Beatles (The White Album) is the biggest selling studio album. It has sold over 24 million copies. Later acts, like Fleetwood Mac, Elton John and Michael Jackson, all benefited from the increasing availability of affordable stereo systems. Older fans were now buying Beatles albums in large numbers but these
The Everton area of Liverpool, 1960 All four Beatles had what Mark Lewisohn calls ‘unvarnished working class roots’ in an industrial city that had seen better days. Two (Paul and George) lived in social housing, but neither believed themselves to be poor. Paul was astonished by what he perceived to the the poshness of John's home - marvelling that John called Mimi rather than the 'Auntie' he was used to. From Aunt Mimi's perspective, George was very much from the wrong side of the tracks and she spoke disapprovingly of his strong accent ('he's very 'dose', John). By more objective measures, the Harrison family had modest means but were reasonably comfortable by local working class standards. One future Beatles did experience a Dickensian childhood combining poverty, ill health and paternal abandonment. The then Richard Starkey would not meet the other Beatles until October, 1960. Ringo Starr was not around to visit Mendips in the late 1950s. Had he done
