The Secret Country Music Life of Ringo Starr and The Beatles

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If it seems like every time you turn on the Internet these days, there’s news of yet another pop star making a country album, you’re not imagining things. Ringo Starr might draw a little more grace for “going country” since irrespective of your genre loyalties, he’s universally considered a music legend of the highest degree. Still, yet another performer is making a country album?

But in the case of Ringo Starr, going country while still being true to himself isn’t so far fetched. This isn’t even his first time dipping his toes in the country genre. If there was any member of The Beatles with authentic country bonafides, it would definitely be Ringo. A true country fan from the beginning of his musical career, Ringo was to The Beatles what Gram Parsons was to The Byrds.

Ringo Starr was the least featured singer in The Beatles—not surprising from the drummer position. But when the Fab Four recorded the country song “Act Naturally” popularized by Buck Owens for their 1965 album Help!, it was Ringo singing lead. And by the way, that rendition right in the middle of Beatlemania was massive for Buck Owens, The Bakersfield Sound, and country music. It’s one of the reasons Buck became one of country’s biggest artist in the ’60s.

Though there are only a few songs by The Beatles you could sell as straight up “country,” one of the most obvious examples is “What Goes On” from Rubber Soul (1965). Not only was this one of the few Beatles songs Ringo co-wrote, he sang lead on it as well. Ringo would also write and sing “Don’t Pass Me By” (1968) that many consider another example of the country influence in Beatles music.

If there was an example of a country album by The Beatles, historians of the band would point to 1964’s Beatles For Sale, and so would The Beatles themselves. “You could call our new one a Beatles country and western LP,” is what John Lennon said at the time, and numerous critics agreed, including Beatles biographer and music critic Ian MacDonald, who said the album was “dominated by the [country-and-western] idiom.”

Beatles For Sale cover


Along with leaning into the Bob Dylan influence (which to the boys from Liverpool might as well have been American country), The Beatles also covered songs by Buddy Holly and Carl Perkins on the album, with Ringo Starr singing the Carl Perkins song “Honey Don’t.” The Beatles and their biographers specifically cite Ringo Starr’s influence in the band for their country shift.

(Trivia bonus: Another great Beatles country song is “I’ll Cry Instead” from A Hard Day’s Night, sung by John Lennon.)

But Ringo’s work with The Beatles was all just the beginning of Ringo Starr’s country music career. After The Beatles split, Starr’s second solo release was a straight up country album of songs written by country writers, played by country pickers, and recorded specifically in Nashville. It was called Beaucoups of Blues, and it is considered an underground country classic.

It’s all the fault of Country Music Hall of Fame steel guitar player Pete Drake. In late May/early June of 1970, fellow Beatle George Harrison was recording his album All Things Must Pass, and wanted to put some steel guitar on it. So he put out a call to Nashville to fly one of the best to the UK, and Pete Drake answered. Ringo Starr also played on the album, and by chance, picked up Drake from the airport and drove him to the studio.

While in the car with Ringo, Pete Drake noticed all the country albums Ringo had with him. The two struck up a conversation about country, and lo and behold, hatched an idea to make a Ringo Starr country album. Drake said Nashville songwriters could come up with songs for Ringo to record exclusively in a week, and the city’s session players would line up to work on it. That’s exactly what happened when Ringo flew to Nashville the week after George Harrison’s album was done, and in three days, Beaucoups of Blues was completed.


A who’s who of Nashville session players at the time appear on the album: Charlie Daniels, Jerry Reed, Jerry Kennedy all played guitar, of course Pete Drake was on pedal steel, Charlie McCoy was on harmonica, and even The Jordanaires appeared on backing vocals. The sessions were engineered by Scotty Moore of Elvis fame.

Like you regularly see from these rock-star-gone-country albums, Beaucoups of Blues was a general flop for Ringo, but he didn’t really care. It was a passion project, and it has since gone on to be a cool project with country aficionados. It also conferred about as much country music street cred as a Brit pop star could possibly receive.

An important footnote: on the same week that Ringo Starr announced that he would be releasing a new country album, word came down that songwriter Buzz Rabin had passed away. Among songs he wrote for Gene Watson, Willie Nelson, Hank Williams Jr., David Allan Coe, Alabama, Mel Tillis, Johnny Paycheck, and more, Buzz Rabin wrote the song “Beaucoups of Blues.” Buzz was considered a songwriter’s songwriter, and also released his own solo album called Cross Country Cowboy.

Born on October 25, 1940 in Alexandria, Louisiana, Buzz Rabin would be barely known outside of Nashville songwriting circles, except that he was the writer of Ringo Starr’s “Beaucoups of Blues.”

So even though some country fans surely rolled their eyes when the news came down that Ringo Starr was releasing a country album called Look Up on January 10th, 2025, they probably shouldn’t. Similar to Beaucoups of Blues, Starr has solicited genuine country music talent to put it together, with T Bone Burnett producing the endeavor, Billy Strings and Molly Tuttle playing all over it, with additional contributions from Alison Krauss, Larkin Poe, and Lucius.


Most of the songs of Look Up are written by T Bone Burnett, so we’ll have to see how that turns out. But if nothing else, the album should be another interesting across-the-pond collaboration that should remind the world what a big country fan Ringo Starr actually is. Starr has also collaborated with Ray Wylie Hubbard (“Bad Trick”) and other country-adjacent artists over the years. In 1989, Ringo cut a new version of “Act Naturally” as a duet with Buck Owens, and the two appeared in the video together.

“I’ve always loved country music,” Starr said as part of the new album announcement. “And when I asked T Bone to write me a song, I didn’t even think at the time that it would be a country song—but of course it was, and it was so beautiful. I had been making EPs at the time and so I thought we would do a country EP—but when he brought me nine songs I knew we had to make an album! And I am so glad we did.”

Look Up will be Ringo Starr’s first solo record in six years, and his first country record in 55 years.

And now you know the secret country music life of Ringo Starr and The Beatles.


Pre-order/pre-save Look Up

Track List:

1. Thankful (featuring Alison Krauss) (Richard Starkey, Bruce Sugar)
2. Breathless (featuring Billy Strings) (T Bone Burnett)
3. Look Up (featuring Molly Tuttle) (Daniel Tashian, T Bone Burnett)
4. Time On My Hands (Paul Kennerly, Daniel Tashian, T Bone Burnett)
5. Never Let Me Go (featuring Billy Strings) (T Bone Burnett)
6. I Live For Your Love (featuring Molly Tuttle) (Billy Swan, T Bone Burnett)
7. Come Back (featuring Lucius) (T Bone Burnett)
8. Can You Hear Me Call (featuring Molly Tuttle) (T Bone Burnett)
9. Rosetta (featuring Billy Strings and Larkin Poe) (T Bone Burnett)
10. You Want Some (Billy Swan)
11. String Theory (featuring Molly Tuttle) (Daniel Tashian, T Bone Burnett)

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