We popped up from the London Underground station of St. John’s Wood and noticed right away that we were in a leafier part of England’s capital, outside the congested city center.
Just about a five minute walk down Grove End Road, we came around a curve and there it was: the unmistakable zebra crossing of Abbey Road.
Fifty years ago Sept. 26, the Beatles’ “Abbey Road” album was released, showing, on the cover, George, Paul, Ringo and John jauntily striding across this very crosswalk in what would become one of the most iconic photos in rock ‘n’ roll history.
The album was the last one recorded by the Beatles before they broke up. (But not the last to be released. That was “Let It Be.”) And whether or not you think it’s the band’s best, it certainly ranks among them.
We had come to London with our three kids on their first trip overseas, and between visiting the London classics — Tower of London, Westminster Abbey, the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace — we decided to pay tribute to the four lads from Liverpool who changed the music world.
As a Gen Xer, I was born three years after the Beatles split up in 1970, but I had older siblings who introduced me to them early on. They’ve always been my favorite band. Good music is good music. The Beatles are now timeless.
We’ve raised our kids (Jack is 14, Ellie, 11, Charlie, 8) listening to the Beatles on road trips. You start with “Yellow Submarine” and “Octopus’ Garden” and then you’ve got them hooked (thanks, Ringo!). You move up to “Birthday” and “Drive My Car.” Then “Here Comes the Sun.” And that’s how Beatlemania spreads to a new generation.
Two summers ago, we took them to their first concert: Paul McCartney at the Hollywood Casino Amphitheatre in Tinley Park. A McCartney concert crowd these days is a remarkably multigenerational experience, from Boomers to babies all making sure not to miss out on a living legend.
Sure enough, as soon as we arrived at the Abbey Road crossing, we saw a couple dozen or so other fans of various ages standing on the sidewalk. We’d all come together in hopes of stepping into the crossing for a snapshot of our own. From the live camera views you can see online (https://www.abbeyroad.com/crossing), the spot seems to draw people like us doing the same thing pretty much all day, every day. Eight days a week, you might say.
The next thing we noticed was unexpected: Abbey Road is a surprisingly busy road. The cars, trucks, buses, motorcycles and London cabs were whizzing by, one after another, unamused as we tried to do what countless others had done before us. Crossing the road in England can be hazardous for us Americans because, of course, the cars are driving on the opposite side of the road, so we made sure to look right before taking that first step.
We carefully choreographed our order for the crossing: Jack has glasses, so he’d go in front as John Lennon. Charlie, our youngest, is also (as of now) our shortest, so he’d go next as Ringo Starr. I was willing to go barefoot, so that made me McCartney. I don’t smoke, but I carried a cigarette butt for further verisimilitude. My daughter, Ellie, has the longest hair, so she went last, as George Harrison. She also wore a purple T-shirt that said, “All You Need Is Love.” My wife, Joanne, gamely played photographer.
We waited for a break in the stream of traffic — and for a moment when other fans weren’t themselves popping out into the road. It took a while but eventually we seized our chance and hastily made our way across, single file, as The Beatles had half a century earlier.
Was the image perfect? Not quite. For one, unlike the Beatles, I’m cracking up. Another tourist had, unbeknownst to us, shot across at the same time and a Porsche SUV pulled up just as we were crossing. But with all the people waiting to capture their moment too, we decided it was the best we’d likely get. And it was, we all agreed, pretty good.
According to Beatles lore, Scottish photographer Iain Macmillan stood atop a ladder and shot just six photos of the Fab Four crossing the road in August 1969 — one of which became the cover of “Abbey Road.” The crossing is just steps from the studio where the band recorded 190 of their 210 songs, probably the most well known oeuvre in rock history.
The studio first opened in 1931. Formerly known as EMI (Electric and Musical Industries) Recording Studios, it’s now called Abbey Road Studios. It’s still an active studio used by contemporary artists, including Oasis, Radiohead, Ed Sheeran, Kanye West, Lady Gaga and Adele, as well as for movie scores ranging from “Raiders of the Lost Ark” in 1980 to the recent “Harry Potter” series.
Since it’s a working studio, you can’t tour it; but there is a shop (of course) where you can buy T-shirts and vinyl records.
The white wall outside the studio is covered with graffiti from visitors across the globe professing their Beatles’ love and quoting lyrics. Someone had scrawled in black marker the last words of a tune that concludes the epic medley on side two of “Abbey Road,” a song titled simply “The End,” which many believe serves as a coda for The Beatles themselves. Great words to close an album, or, for that matter, a visit to the real Abbey Road.
“And in the end,” the words said on the wall. “The love you take, is equal to the love you make.”
John Biemer is a freelance writer.
