Click here for the Globe Directory

 

 

Beatles News Extra

 

Beatlemania Alive and Kicking for New Generation

It was about this time of year in 1966, that The Beatles were playing in Japan, yet the fervour that accompanied their visit has barely subsided since.

For the five days that the lads from Liverpool were in Japan, they did much to reinforce their image as symbols of youth culture. And with this year marking 30 years since the group broke up and 20 years since John Lennon was gunned down in New York, little suggests The Beatles influence is declining.

 

Work is going full steam ahead on the John Lennon Museum in Yono, Saitama prefecture, just south of Tokyo. The museum, the world's first permanent exhibit to the slain Beatle, will be built and operated by general contractor Taisei Corp, and will house Lennon's guitar, costumes, notes he wrote and pictures he drew.

 

John's widow, Yoko Ono, is due to be at the museum's opening ceremony on October 9, the 60th anniversary of John's birth - along with plenty of fans from overseas.

 

" We've been flooded with offers from copycat bands to play and people who want to lend us mementos", said Taisei's Junichi Akutsu. Mr. Akutsu, still has fond memories of watching The Beatles performance in Tokyo on television. "When I was in high school, I was crazy about The Beatles. I bought all their records. Now my kids listen to them on CD and say, 'Hey dad, have you ever heard this stuff? It's real cool' ".

 

One of Japan's largest department store chains, Seibu, is capitalising on The Beatles boom. More than 40,000 people have visited a Beatles exhibition at the store's headquarters in Tokyo's Ikebukuro district since it opened in May. Takanao Iijima, who is in charge of the exhibition, said that, surprisingly, 60 per cent of visitors had been in their 20s. "I think they are interested in finding out what their parents lives were like and what their taste in music was", he said.

 

Meanwhile, Toshiba-EMI Ltd, which handles sales of Beatles music, is planning to reissue digitised versions of two of John Lennon's solo albums in September. Spokeswoman Michiko Fujimura said The Beatles were as much a goldmine today as they were in the 1960s. Two greatest hits double-CDs have sold more than 8.3 million copies in Japan in the past five years.

 

The publishing industry is also experiencing Beatlemania, with a planned anthology to be published by the three surviving Beatles. Due out in autumn, the book is poised to shed light on the Fab Four's music, as well as their dabbling in drugs.

28.05.01

 

Beatles News

Beatles News Extra Index

Beatles News Archives