8 August, 1969. A Friday. The date of one of the most famous photo-shoots in rock ‘n’ roll history
Snap Galleries presents The complete session photographs by Iain MacMillan, on view through 28th May 2011.
John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr walk over the zebra crossing next to Abbey Road studios. There and back. Three times. Six clicks of the shutter. Just six photographs, and the shoot was over. Three frames showing the Beatles crossing from left to right, and three walking from right to left.
Iain MacMillan, Snap Galleries
The same order in each of the six frames – John Lennon first in white, then Ringo Starr in black, Paul McCartney in grey, barefoot, holding a cigarette in his right hand (all three in Tommy Nutter suits) and at the back, a denim clad George Harrison.
The fifth frame of six, showing a left to right traverse, was chosen as the actual cover. Abbey Road (the first British Beatles LP without the name of the band or the title of the album on the front) was released in the UK on 26 September 1969 and debuted at number 1. Rolling Stone magazine voted it number 14 of the top 500 albums of all time.
The photographer – Iain MacMillan.
The man behind the camera that hot August day was Scottish photographer Iain MacMillan. He had worked with Yoko Ono in 1966: he included a photograph of her in “The Book of London”, a collection of his photographs published that year. She then commissioned Iain to document her exhibition at London’s Indica gallery, and as a result, Iain was introduced to John Lennon – establishing the Beatles connection. Subsequently, John Lennon invited Iain to photograph the Abbey Road cover. Paul McCartney had already developed the initial concept of the shoot, and in a meeting with Iain, they discussed Paul’s early sketches.
On the appointed Friday, Iain only had a short time to nail it. He spent less than 15 minutes up a ladder, and they had to give way to traffic too. Because of time constraints, the shoot had been very carefully planned. Iain knew exactly what he was trying to achieve. We can see this from his hand drawn sketch of the intended result, included on the front of the exhibition catalogue: the Beatles in step, the vanishing point in the centre of the image, the viewer’s eyes drawn in by the converging lines of pavements and trees.
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