Just 40 years to the minute after the Beatles’ Abbey Road album cover photo was taken, thousands of fans swarmed the now-famous London crosswalk, singing songs, laughing and generally causing a major traffic jam.
Yesterday, at 11:35 a.m. London time, the Beatles tribute band Sgt. Pepper’s Only Dartboard Band strode across the black-and-white striped asphalt (called a “zebra crossing” in England) dressed as the Fab Four were 40 years ago. Fans from around the world, watched in wonder, many of them wearing Beatles’ memorabilia.
Tony Bramwell, the band’s former road manager, was there on the day Scottish photographer Iain Macmillan stood on a stepladder snapping photos while the quartet walked back and forth across the street.
“Other than Paul and Ringo, I’m the only person alive who was here on that day,” Bramwell told reporters. “It’s great to see that the whole thing carries on. Through the musical genres and revolutions of the last 40 years the Beatles are still number one.”
Why weren’t Paul and Ringo in St. Johns Wood?
“They’re probably watching on telly,” he said amid horns honking.
An Argentinian tourist singing “Here Comes The Sun” told Tonic he was disappointed he’d traveled all this way only to have to make do with the souvenirs in the Beatles Coffee Shop just outside the St. Johns Wood tube station. (Police years ago moved the actual Abbey Road street sign out of reach.) The tourist, who didn’t want to give his name, said mournfully: “I thought it [the sign] would look great in my bathroom.”
