I feel enormously privileged to be part of the generation that witnessed the magic of the Beatles first hand, and I think 'A Hard Day's Night' connected with my four-year-old self because it was the whole package: an album and a movie.

Imagine' is a big hit almost everywhere - anti-religious, anti-nationalistic, anti-conventional, anti-capitalistic, but because it is sugar-coated, it is accepted. Now I understand what you have to do. Put your political message across with a little honey.

That is one of the main reasons the Beatles ended. I can't speak for George, but I pretty damn well know we got fed up of being sidemen for Paul.

We're not Beatles to each other, you know. It's a joke to us. If we're going out the door of the hotel, we say, 'Right! Beatle John! Beatle George now! Come on, let's go!' We don't put on a false front or anything.

I was looking for a name like the Crickets that meant two things, and from crickets I got to beetles. And I changed [to] B E A because ... B E E T L E S didn't mean two things, so I changed ... the E to an A. And it meant two things then. ... When you said it, people thought of crawly things; and when you read it, it was beat music.

There's only one person in the United States we ever wanted to meet ... not that he wanted us. And we met him last night. We can't tell you how we felt. We just idolised him so much. ... You can't imagine what a thrill that was last night. Nothing really affected me until I heard Elvis. If there hadn't been an Elvis, there wouldn't have been the Beatles.