ADRIAN THRILLS reviews Look Up by Ringo Starr - Ringo goes country with a little help from his friends
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Verdict: Ringo goes to Nashville. Rating:. Sixty years after Beatlemania and the British invasion of the American charts, Liverpool’s greatest musical exports are still big news. Despite splitting up in 1970, the Fab Four were once again toppermost of the poppermost at the end of 2024.
![[Drummer for The Beatles Ringo Starr pictured performing onstage in 1965]](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2025/01/10/00/93939729-14268953-image-a-11_1736469495476.jpg)
In addition to a deluxe vinyl box-set, and a Martin Scorsese-produced Disney+ documentary, we saw Paul McCartney bringing the curtain down on his Got Back tour in December with four triumphant gigs in Manchester and London. Now Ringo Starr — who made a surprise appearance with Macca on the last night of the tour — is getting in on the act with a new solo album that’s his best in years.
![[The best songs — Everyday Dreamer, Night Or Day and Bar Lonely — hark back to the energetic thrust of early hits Take Me Out and The Dark Of The Matinée]](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2025/01/10/00/93939773-14268953-image-a-12_1736469508306.jpg)
His first since 2019’s What’s My Name, it sees the drummer hook up with producer T. Bone Burnett on a set of country-ish tunes that are well suited to his laid-back voice and loose-swinging playing style. Thanks to crossover albums by Beyoncé and Post Malone, and Shania Twain’s Glastonbury spot, country music enjoyed a resurgence last year.
But you could hardly accuse Ringo, 84, of jumping on the bandwagon. Inspired by country-blues singer Lightnin’ Hopkins, he tried to emigrate to the States while still in his teens. He also sang lead on The Beatles’ 1965 cover of Buck Owens’s country and western standard Act Naturally – a song he still performs live – and made his first solo country album, Beaucoups Of Blues, in 1970.
