john lennon

- What artists and songs were found on John Lennon's long lost jukebox?

- Ultimate Ears' custom tuned in-ear monitors.

- Condav99's custom Nintendo Boomcase! More on Boomcases here.

- Can a tiny $39 amp make your headphones sound a lot better?

- The Audiophiliac picks 11 of the world's best headphones.

- The Philips Shoqbox is our favorite camp-friendly, rugged Bluetooth speaker.

- Self-portraits done to a different drug every day.

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Bathroom break video: Steve Coogan impersonates Steve Hawking.… Read more

Somebody lucky car collector is going to have a great Christmas this year. An Aston Martin purchased by the late George Harrison in 1965, was sold at auction in London on Wednesday for more than half a million dollars.

According to the auction house, Coys, the winning bid went to an anonymous Beatles and Aston Martin fan from Houston, Texas. The purchaser plans to use the DB5 to raise money for Christian causes, Coys reported in a press release.

The DB5 wasn't the only car formerly owned by a member of the Fab Four this year. In February, John … Read more

A 1965 Ferrari 330 GT 2+2 Coupe once owned by John Lennon is scheduled with be sold at Bonhams' Paris sale of Motor Cars at the Grand Palais, February 5, 2011.

The car was hand-picked by Lennon, after he got his driver's license for the first time, in 1965.

According to Lennon biographer Philip Norman, several luxury auto dealers in the Weybridge area, "jammed the road outside Kenwood's security gates with Maseratis, Aston Martins, and a Jaguar XK-E." But Lennon chose the ?2,000 light blue 300-horsepower, 4.0-liter, V12 Ferrari. He owned the car … Read more

Steve's back for one more episode before we head out, but we'll be posting special Yuletide episodes throughout the holiday so you can still get your 404 fix.

Our guest today is CNET's audio expert, Steve Guttenberg, and he brings a list of the most significant inventions of the early 20th century with him.

Wilson will probably be disappointed to see that the electric washing machine isn't included on that list, and neither are antibiotics like penicillin, so you'll have to tune into today's episode to hear the whole story; you might be surprised to hear about which invention changed Steve's life, for better or worse.

Steve also has plenty of suggestions for the top gifts to buy for the audiophiliacs in your life. You don't have to spend a lot of money to get top-quality sound from your devices, and Steve's list of gifts under $100 includes an affordable in-ear headphone from NOX, a pair of bookshelf speakers that can produce audiophile-quality sound for just $29/pair, and a small amplifier that'll add 15 watts of power to your music.

Also be sure to check out Steve's other list of audio devices for the more affluent gift-givers, and have a great holiday, everyone!

John Lennon would have been 70 today and, one imagines, probably hosting a bed-based political chat show on YouTube.

Google, whose doodles have become increasingly quirky, decided that this was the moment to release its first-ever video doodle. It appears on its home page and when you click on it, the logo plays a delightful movie which is, naturally, also available on YouTube.

On Google's official blog, doodler Mike Dutton explained: "The old saying, 'A picture is worth a thousand words' still rings true, so I hope a moving picture will help me adequately--and simply--thank John for the … Read more

If you're even remotely interested in The Beatles, today's episode of The 404 is a must listen. CNET Audiophiliac Steve Guttenberg helps us out today for all things Beatles. To set it all up, Steve gives the three of us a lesson in how the band essentially shaped a decade of music and culture and how they became innovators in the way that bands record music. For example, did you know that it only took the band 4 hours to record and mix the song "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band?" Later on in the show, Steve tells us about how the Beatles used a vacuum tube-based machine to record their earlier albums and later switched to solid-state, with adverse affects to the low-end sounds. Lots more Beatles trivia on the show!

We also talk extensively about the latest Beatles Remasters and whether or not they're worth the extra investment. Some claim that there are "near-miraculous improvements in the key areas of information retrieval, hidden details, expanded midrange, etc...," but Steve makes the argument that simply remastering doesn't necessarily improve sound quality. Check out the Audiophiliac blog for Steve's Beatles box set review coming soon, but in the meantime you can enter for a chance to win the entire remastered Beatles CD collection!

Bring out your dead: a Michael Jackson movie is in the works.

I'm just amazed it took this long to surface. Details are sketchy, but there are murmurs of a $60 million deal with Columbia Pictures to make the movie using video of Jackson rehearsing for his "This Is It" concerts in London.

The film, possibly in 3D, will be assembled from hundreds of hours of rehearsal and behind-the-scenes footage. So sure, expect lots of "extras" on Blu-ray. I'm sure the film will make oodles of cash, but that's par for the course for dead stars.

The dead rock star thing started on February 3, 1959, when a plane crash near Clear Lake, Iowa, killed three first-generation rock musicians: Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and J. P. "The Big Bopper" Richardson. It was "The Day the Music Died," but the dead-star business really kicked into high gear when Elvis Presley died of an overdose in 1977. The King was dead, but his career was in great shape.

He's been one of the top earners on dead celebrities lists for decades. In 2007, 40 years after his death, Presley-related products pulled in $49 million. Kurt Cobain and John Lennon are also strong "performers." But Jackson looks likely to top this year's list.

Dying is a great way to kick a lagging career into pure profit mode. And it's so easy, just dredge up "lost" tapes and live performances that were deemed sub par while the artist was alive, and devout fans devour them.… Read more

I have no idea why, but "The Beatles at the Hollywood Bowl" has never been released on CD in the U.S.

Worse yet, I don't think it's going to come out on CD or download when the remastered Beatles albums are released later this year. "Hollywood Bowl" came out on LP in 1977, before the CD was invented, and long after the group broke up. In 1977 all four Beatles were still alive. Luckily enough, it's not at all hard to score a decent "Hollywood Bowl" LP now.

I can't think of another major sixties band that didn't eventually put out a great concert LP. For reasons lost to the mists of time the Beatles live recordings were all pretty poor quality, and these Hollywood Bowl dates are less than stellar-sounding. But the thing is, the performances rock harder than the Beatles ever did in the studio.… Read more

LOS ANGELES--If you were among the thousands of people at Microsoft's E3 press briefing on Monday, it's a pretty sure bet that the appearance on-stage there of Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, and Yoko Ono was one of the most unexpected things imaginable.

But if you think about it, the very existence of the game that led to their showing up during the Xbox press briefing, Harmonix and MTV Games' "Beatles: Rock Band," is even more surprising. After all, the Beatles have, over the years, maintained a stranglehold over control of their music. For example the Beatles … Read more