How The Beatles altered the course of the Cold War, according to Mikhail Gorbachev
Music is one of the most powerful art forms in the world, and The Beatles remain one of the biggest testaments to that.
Never before has a band travelled quite as well as the Fab Four, as their sound didn’t stop at the UK border. It travelled overseas, taking the Merseyside sound around the world, but also taking from other countries’ music in a bid to make blends of sonics which led to new genres entirely.
The first time that the band ever travelled was when they went to Germany, which is where The Beatles learned how to perfect their live sound. They were playing for hours a night in Hamburg, which gave them insight into how you can create a dynamic live sound, and how you can act on stage in a way which engages the audience.
“We lived backstage in the Bambi Kino, next to the toilets, and you could always smell them,” said Paul McCartney when discussing the band’s living conditions in Germany, adding, “The room had been an old storeroom, and there were just concrete walls and nothing else. No heat, no wallpaper, not a lick of paint, and two sets of bunk beds, with not very much covers, Union Jack flags; we were frozen.”
They then took that live show to America, where they performed on The Ed Sullivan Show and officially started Beatlemania, which saw them become one of the first British groups to break America. They wouldn’t have been able to do this were it not for their dynamic live sound, which they had previously picked up in Germany.
“It transformed America,” said E Street Band guitarist Steve Van Zandt, “On February 8th, there were no bands in America; on February 9th we had Ed Sullivan, and on February 10th, everybody had a band in their garage. It was literally overnight.”
The Beatles didn’t stop in America though, always keen on travelling to different countries, and in doing so, they learnt a lot more about music. Perhaps one of their biggest sonic influences was India, as the Fab Four went out there and were able to learn a lot about different instruments and styles of playing, all of which were eventually injected into their own sound.
“George Harrison, on his own, opened up India to England,” said Andy Partridge, guitarist for XTC, “The man brings back a sitar and flirts with sitar lessons and all of a sudden, India means things to people […] Single-handedly, George Harrison brought India to English consciousness. In a non-colonial and non-judgemental kind of way.”
However, perhaps the most significant place The Beatles travelled to was the Soviet Union. Prior to the band playing out there, there was a great deal of friction between it and America, but the Fab Four were able to diffuse the situation slightly when they toured. They were a real cultural force in the Soviet Union, to the extent that Mikhail Gorbachev said they were instrumental in ending the Cold War, noting, “More than any ideology, more than any religion, more than Vietnam or any war or nuclear bomb, the single most important reason for the diffusion of the Cold War was…The Beatles.”
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