Ringo Starr’s son opens up about being ‘judged’ over Beatles kids’ collaboration as Their Sons of the Beatles Come Together to Release New Music
Ringo Starr’s son opens up about being ‘judged’ over Beatles kids’ collaboration
Zak Starkey, the son of Beatles legend Ringo Starr, has teamed up with the sons of Sir Paul McCartney and John Lennon on a new track and has revealed he was initially wary of the idea
Zak Starkey, Ringo Starr’s son, has recently opened up about his trepidations surrounding a Beatles offspring collaboration.
:max_bytes(150000):strip_icc()/zak-starkey-ringo-starr-roger-daltrey-061925-1-f058996a1d1841b2bd8ab49eb9e65d8d.jpg)
Working with John Lennon’s son Sean Lennon and James McCartney, the child of Sir Paul McCartney, Zak has contributed to a fresh track titled ‘Rip Off. ‘ He confessed he steered clear of such team-ups in the past out of concern for being “judged.”
Chatting with The Sun’s Bizarre column, Zak revealed his previous doubts, “The Beatles kids thing is something I’ve avoided because it’s something we will be judged on forever. I thought it was a daft idea.”
His initial reaction was skepticism: “But I’ve got to know James well over the last decade and Sean over the last five years and we have become great friends.” He praised their talents, “Their music is great.”
Elaborating on the project, he said, “I had a track called ‘Rip Off’ and as we were communicating a lot I asked them to contribute.” Despite apprehensions about camaraderie in the studio, the result was magic.
“We were nervous in case there was no chemistry, but there was loads and it sounded great,” he said. Zak expressed amazement at James’s vocal prowess: “James’ voice is so powerful it nearly blew me off my seat.”
Zak reassured that George Harrison’s kin, Dhani Harrison, harbored no ill feelings about missing out on the recording, “He got it and it’s all cool. He’s got his own great record out at the moment, too.”
James and Sean joined Zak’s supergroup, Mantra of the Cosmos, which consists of Zak, Oasis bassist Andy Bell, and Shaun Ryder and Mark Berry of Happy Mondays. This is the first time in five decades of Beatles music that three of the Fab Four’s children have come together to make music.
Before this collaboration, Zak was the drummer for the famous band The Who, but was fired twice. He claimed that after the most recent firing, he was asked by the band to lie and say he quit instead.
Zak claimed he was kicked out after an alleged altercation with The Who’s lead singer, Roger Daltrey. Zak was allegedly blamed for dropping two beats during a performance, but the famous son said he “got it right” while Roger “got it wrong.”
Sons of the Beatles Come Together to Release New Music
John, Paul and Ringo’s progeny unite on rock song
It’s an intergenerational music affair as the offspring of iconic rock band the Beatles have teamed up to release new music together.
Ringo Starr’s oldest son, drummer Zak Starkey, 59, along with John Lennon’s son Sean Ono Lennon, 49, and Paul McCartney’s son, James McCartney, 47, recently shared a lengthy snippet of their first collaborative single, “Rip Off,” on Instagram, and we have to admit, it sounds a bit reminiscent of the Beatles.
Sean and James are on vocals, while Starkey’s band, Mantra of the Cosmos, provides the backing music.
In a June 13 interview with The Telegraph, Starkey made sure to clarify that Mantra of the Cosmos isn’t just the Fab Four 2.0.
“It’s not,” he said. “It’s like Mantra of the Cosmos with them in it. It’s Sean of the Cosmos and James of the Cosmos. It’s still my band.”
Starr, who appeared on the December 2023/January 2024 cover of AARP: The Magazine, said in the accompanying story that Starkey has always been fascinated by music. “When my son Zak was 9, he came running in with a vinyl record,” Starr said. “ ‘You’ve got to hear this, Dad. It’s this guy named Ray Charles!’ And it was Ray Charles’ big band. I didn’t say, ‘Eh, I’ve heard hundreds of big band records.’ I took the position, ‘Well, let’s hear it together.’ ”
The “Photograph” singer described his relationship with the Beatles as having “three brothers” and said they all “looked out for each other.”
“We all went mad at different times,” Starr added. “You can’t imagine what it was like being in the Beatles. It got bigger and crazier.”
The Beatles are one of the most influential rock bands in music history. Known for hit singles like “She Loves You,” “Help!” and “Come Together,” the eight-time Grammy Award-winning quartet has sold over 600 million albums, making it the biggest-selling music group of all time, worldwide.
The Beatles released their final single, “Now and Then,” in 2023. The song was created using artificial intelligence, which isolated the late John Lennon’s vocals from his piano playing on a home recording.
“My dad would have loved that,” Sean said in a promotional film at the time. “He was never shy to experiment with recording technology.”
Leave a Reply