34 Years Ago In TIME

By Elizabeth L. Bland, Julia Cheng, Victoria Rainert, Sora Song

George Harrison's death further eroded a group that entranced the world, not just with its musical genius but with its sense of camaraderie and fun, as TIME noted in a 1967 cover on THE BEATLES.

The Beatles keep in touch constantly, bounding in and out of each other's homes like members of a single large family--which, in a sense, they are. Their friendship is an extraordinary intimate and empathetic bond. When all four are together, even close friends like Mick Jagger of the Rolling Stones sense invisible barriers thrown up between themselves and outsiders. "We're still our own best friends," each says...They constitute a four-way plug-in personality, each sparking the circuits in his own way. Paul, outgoing and talkative, spreads a sheen of charm; he is the smoother-over, the explainer, as pleasingly facile at life as he is at composing melodies. George, once the least visible of the group, now focuses his energies on Indian music and philosophy; an occasional contributor to the Beatle songbook, he is the most accomplished instrumentalist. Ringo, a thoroughly unpretentious fellow, is also the most innately comic temperament; he is the catalyst, and also the deflator, of the crew. Most mysterious of all--and possibly most important--is John, the creative mainspring, who has lately grown strangely brooding and withdrawn; he is more thoughtful and tough-minded than the others.

--TIME, Sept. 22, 1967