The Beatles had a huge influence over The Lonely Hearts Club. Not only did the title and character names come from the Fab Four, but I listened only to Beatles songs while writing LHC. (Even now as I type this, I’m listening to John Lennon).

Why the Beatles?
Um, they are only the greatest band of all time. The Beatles changed music forever. It’s as simple as that.

I didn’t grow up a huge Beatles fan nor were my parents fans, but when I look back on my childhood, they were present. In second grade, we sang “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da” in music class. My piano teacher got me a Beatles book in fourth or fifth grade. I’d hear their music on the Oldies station my mom listened to. In high school and college, I started buying their albums and realized how many of their songs I knew, everybody knows at least one Beatles song – they are classics.

When I was in London for my semester abroad in college, my friends and I went on a Beatles walking tour. We went to all of the major Beatles sites, including the famed Abbey Road studio.

I didn’t do a lot of research for The Lonely Hearts Club. I re-watched their movies and the excellent Beatles Anthology. I did buy The Beatles Complete Scores, which features every song written and recorded by the Beatles (it’s over 1,100 pages!). I used that to reference song lyrics. Originally, each chapter title was the title of a Beatles song—and in that chapter, a line from the song corresponded to something that happens. That was pretty challenging since I refused to change the lyrics (and because the Beatles are guys and Penny is a girl there were some he/she issues). Eventually, during the editing process we broke up the chapters and realized that it was going to be too tricky to pull off for various reasons.

For those who would like to know which songs I had used, below is the list, from my pre-edited book:
Yesterday
Get Back
Two of Us
We Can Work It Out
Come Together
Getting Better
Do You Want to Know a Secret?
Revolution
If I Fell
Don’t Bother Me
You’ve Got to Hide Your Love Away
I’m So Tired
You Can’t Do That
I’ll Be Back
Help!
With a Little Help From My Friends
Things We Said Today
From Me to You
Here Comes the Sun

While the following songs aren’t included above, they are some of my favorites. And I listened to them whenever I needed to get super-emotional during the writing process:
Ticket to Ride (the first line, “I think I’m gonna be sad, I think it’s today…” breaks my heart every time)
Something
Eleanor Rigby

On July 18, 2009 a huge dream of mine came true – I saw Paul McCartney play at Citified! He was amazing, and I had to fight back tears several times. And before the concert, I was lucky enough to go on a Beatles walking tour of New York City. The photo of me at Strawberry Fields is on my FAQ page.

Check out my blog for more on my Sir Paul experience.