Apple Promotional Videos
Hey Jude (1968)
The Beatles hired Michael Lindsay-Hogg to shoot the Hey Jude promotional film and they settled on the idea of filming with a live, albeit controlled audience. Lindsay-Hogg, who had previously directed a promo film for Paperback Writer shot the film at Twickenham Film Studios on 4 September 1968, with McCartney himself designing the set.
Tony Bramwell, a friend of the Beatles, later described the set as “the piano, there; drums, there; and orchestra in two tiers at the back.” The event is also memorable as it marked Ringo Starr’s return to the group after a two-week hiatus, during which he had announced that he had left the band.
The eventual, final film was a combination of several different takes and included filmed ‘introductions’ to the song by David Frost (who introduced the Beatles as “the greatest tea-room orchestra in the world”) and Cliff Richard, for their respective, eponymous TV programmes. As filming wore on, Lennon repeatedly asked Lindsay-Hogg if he had the footage he needed. After twelve takes, McCartney said, “I think that’s enough” and filming concluded. It was first aired in the UK on 8 September 1968 and the film was later broadcast for the United States on The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour on 6 October 1968. Footage of the performance can be seen in the Anthology DVD series.
Revolution (1968)
The Beatles performed the song semi-live (with live vocals performed over a pre-recorded instrumental track) in a specially produced promotional film shot by director Michael Lindsay-Hogg at the same time as the Hey Jude promotional film. The only contemporary UK screening of the Revolution clip was on the BBC’s Top Of The Pops on Thursday 19 September.
As the Beatles were singing the vocals live on the film, they elected to incorporate part of the vocal arrangement from the slower Revolution 1 version of the track. McCartney and George Harrison added the shoo-bee-doo-wah backing vocals unique to that version behind Lennon’s lead vocal – thus making the vocals on the film performance a hybrid of the two versions of the song.
The Beatles White Album Sessions (2009)
This documentary short film, running just 5:25 minutes, was available exclusively with the 2009 stereo remasters box set release.
Back In The USSR (2018)
A new video for The Beatles’ Back In The U.S.S.R was unveiled to mark the 50th Anniversary release of the White Album
In the new visuals, lyrics from the single appear in green, handwritten scrawls across grainy footage of the band. Flicking rapidly through various locations, including Moscow’s Red Square, the clip ends with the group taking off in a plane. The video features the 2018 Mix of Back In The U.S.S.R, included in the 50th Anniversary release.
Glass Onion (2018)
The video features rare photos and footage of the Beatles inspired by Richard Hamilton’s iconic poster design included with the albums’ original vinyl release.
The Beatles performed the song semi-live (with live vocals performed over a pre-recorded instrumental track) in a specially produced promotional film shot by director Michael Lindsay-Hogg at the same time as the “Hey Jude” promotional film. The only contemporary UK screening of the Revolution clip was on the BBC’s Top Of The Pops on Thursday 19 September.
As the Beatles were singing the vocals live on the film, they elected to incorporate part of the vocal arrangement from the slower Revolution 1 version of the track. McCartney and George Harrison added the shoo-bee-doo-wah backing vocals unique to that version behind Lennon’s lead vocal – thus making the vocals on the film performance a hybrid of the two versions of the song.
The White Albums’ Iconic Poster Artwork Comes To Life in Trunk’s Inventive Promo Video for ‘Glass Onion’
Trunk Animation brings the creative and curatorial process behind the Beatles’ iconic White Album artwork to life in this mesmerising promo.
Earlier this year saw the 50th anniversary of the Fab Four’s animated classic Yellow Submarine, and this month marks the same half-century celebration of the group’s seminal White Album, with a brand new video coming out in celebration of the LP. Glass Onion, one of the album’s best-known tracks, was given a very ambitious stop-motion promo from animation house Trunk.
We reached out to speak with Trunk art directors Alasdair Brotherston and Jock Mooney, and learned a bit more about the Glass Onion video, which is embedded above, along with a making of video released by Trunk. The video for Glass Onion takes as its inspiration a poster that came with the self-titled LP on its release back on November 22, 1968 (shortly before it was dubbed the White Album by the world at large).
The collage featured a montage of images including photographs, strips of film, drawings, and hand-colored elements, all of which were provided by the Beatles to pop artist Richard Hamilton and Paul McCartney. The pair then assembled a varied and detailed collage that reflects the eclectic nature of the album’s tracks, and which Alasdair and Jock brought to life for the video above.
Alasdair explained to Digital Arts about the importance of Hamilton’s original collage piece from 1968 for his and Jock’s work in 2018. “At the outset of the project we heard an interview with Paul McCartney,” he says, “in which he explained how important it was that the collage he made with Richard Hamilton was created real scale – no elements were scaled up or shrunk down during the creative process and this gave rise to particular juxtapositions and techniques that informed the finished piece.”
“We were adamant that we would approach this project in the same way, in the full knowledge that it would cause us some problems on the shoot. (As such) I am most proud that everything you see in the video was created at the scale originally intended and we embraced the challenges that those constraints threw up and that overcoming those really informed the look and feel of the finished piece.
“There were some things that it just wasn’t practical to capture on the main shoot – the 2D animation of John & Yoko escaping the U.S censors pencil for example,” Alasdair continues. “It would have been crazy to attempt that live in camera. But even with that we animated at the same scale as the original drawing and was worked in pencil on paper. The vast majority of what you see was captured in camera, which is largely thanks to the skill of the art department at Trunk and the crew at Clapham Road Studios.”
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Apple Promotional Videos
Hey Jude (1968)
The Beatles hired Michael Lindsay-Hogg to shoot the Hey Jude promotional film and they settled on the idea of filming with a live, albeit controlled audience. Lindsay-Hogg, who had previously directed a promo film for Paperback Writer shot the film at Twickenham Film Studios on 4 September 1968, with McCartney himself designing the set.
Tony Bramwell, a friend of the Beatles, later described the set as “the piano, there; drums, there; and orchestra in two tiers at the back.” The event is also memorable as it marked Ringo Starr’s return to the group after a two-week hiatus, during which he had announced that he had left the band.
The eventual, final film was a combination of several different takes and included filmed ‘introductions’ to the song by David Frost (who introduced the Beatles as “the greatest tea-room orchestra in the world”) and Cliff Richard, for their respective, eponymous TV programmes. As filming wore on, Lennon repeatedly asked Lindsay-Hogg if he had the footage he needed. After twelve takes, McCartney said, “I think that’s enough” and filming concluded. It was first aired in the UK on 8 September 1968 and the film was later broadcast for the United States on The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour on 6 October 1968. Footage of the performance can be seen in the Anthology DVD series.
Revolution (1968)
The Beatles performed the song semi-live (with live vocals performed over a pre-recorded instrumental track) in a specially produced promotional film shot by director Michael Lindsay-Hogg at the same time as the Hey Jude promotional film. The only contemporary UK screening of the Revolution clip was on the BBC’s Top Of The Pops on Thursday 19 September.
As the Beatles were singing the vocals live on the film, they elected to incorporate part of the vocal arrangement from the slower Revolution 1 version of the track. McCartney and George Harrison added the shoo-bee-doo-wah backing vocals unique to that version behind Lennon’s lead vocal – thus making the vocals on the film performance a hybrid of the two versions of the song.
The Beatles White Album Sessions (2009)
This documentary short film, running just 5:25 minutes, was available exclusively with the 2009 stereo remasters box set release.
Back In The U.S.S.R. (2018)
A new video for The Beatles’ Back In The U.S.S.R was unveiled to mark the 50th Anniversary release of the White Album
The Beatles performed the song semi-live (with live vocals performed over a pre-recorded instrumental track) in a specially produced promotional film shot by director Michael Lindsay-Hogg at the same time as the “Hey Jude” promotional film. The only contemporary UK screening of the Revolution clip was on the BBC’s Top Of The Pops on Thursday 19 September.
As the Beatles were singing the vocals live on the film, they elected to incorporate part of the vocal arrangement from the slower Revolution 1 version of the track. McCartney and George Harrison added the shoo-bee-doo-wah backing vocals unique to that version behind Lennon’s lead vocal – thus making the vocals on the film performance a hybrid of the two versions of the song.
Glass Onion (2018)
The video features rare photos and footage of the Beatles inspired by Richard Hamilton’s iconic poster design included with the albums’ original vinyl release.
The Beatles performed the song semi-live (with live vocals performed over a pre-recorded instrumental track) in a specially produced promotional film shot by director Michael Lindsay-Hogg at the same time as the “Hey Jude” promotional film. The only contemporary UK screening of the Revolution clip was on the BBC’s Top Of The Pops on Thursday 19 September.
As the Beatles were singing the vocals live on the film, they elected to incorporate part of the vocal arrangement from the slower Revolution 1 version of the track. McCartney and George Harrison added the shoo-bee-doo-wah backing vocals unique to that version behind Lennon’s lead vocal – thus making the vocals on the film performance a hybrid of the two versions of the song.
The White Albums’ Iconic Poster Artwork Comes To Life in Trunk’s Inventive Promo Video for ‘Glass Onion’
Trunk Animation brings the creative and curatorial process behind the Beatles’ iconic White Album artwork to life in this mesmerising promo.
Earlier this year saw the 50th anniversary of the Fab Four’s animated classic Yellow Submarine, and this month marks the same half-century celebration of the group’s seminal White Album, with a brand new video coming out in celebration of the LP. Glass Onion, one of the album’s best-known tracks, was given a very ambitious stop-motion promo from animation house Trunk.
We reached out to speak with Trunk art directors Alasdair Brotherston and Jock Mooney, and learned a bit more about the Glass Onion video, which is embedded above, along with a making of video released by Trunk. The video for Glass Onion takes as its inspiration a poster that came with the self-titled LP on its release back on November 22, 1968 (shortly before it was dubbed the White Album by the world at large).
The collage featured a montage of images including photographs, strips of film, drawings, and hand-colored elements, all of which were provided by the Beatles to pop artist Richard Hamilton and Paul McCartney. The pair then assembled a varied and detailed collage that reflects the eclectic nature of the album’s tracks, and which Alasdair and Jock brought to life for the video above.
Alasdair explained to Digital Arts about the importance of Hamilton’s original collage piece from 1968 for his and Jock’s work in 2018. “At the outset of the project we heard an interview with Paul McCartney,” he says, “in which he explained how important it was that the collage he made with Richard Hamilton was created real scale – no elements were scaled up or shrunk down during the creative process and this gave rise to particular juxtapositions and techniques that informed the finished piece.”
“We were adamant that we would approach this project in the same way, in the full knowledge that it would cause us some problems on the shoot. (As such) I am most proud that everything you see in the video was created at the scale originally intended and we embraced the challenges that those constraints threw up and that overcoming those really informed the look and feel of the finished piece.
“There were some things that it just wasn’t practical to capture on the main shoot – the 2D animation of John & Yoko escaping the U.S censors pencil for example,” Alasdair continues. “It would have been crazy to attempt that live in camera. But even with that we animated at the same scale as the original drawing and was worked in pencil on paper. The vast majority of what you see was captured in camera, which is largely thanks to the skill of the art department at Trunk and the crew at Clapham Road Studios.”