On Aug. 27, 1965 — The Beatles and Elvis Presley met for the first and only time.
65 years ago today, the legendary rock band was enjoying time off from their U.S. concert tour. During their break, they decided to pay a visit to the King of Rock ‘n’ Roll at his Beverly Hills mansion.
The Beatles arrived around 11 p.m, and were greeted by Presley in his living room, which was lit up in red and blue light, and contained a color television, jukebox, crescent-shaped couch, games tables and a bar, according to The Beatles Bible.
Though there were no photos or recordings taken of the meetup, reports claim the band was initially put off by Presley’s 20-strong entourage. After some awkward small talk, Presley asked for guitars to be brought out for the group, leading to an impromptu jam session which immediately lightened up the mood.
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In the Beatles Anthology, Paul McCartney shared all the strings pulled to make the historic visit happen, “We met Elvis Presley at the end of our stay in L.A. We’d tried for years to, but we could never get to him. We used to think we were a bit of a threat to him and Colonel Tom Parker, which ultimately we were. So although we tried many times, Colonel Tom would just show up with a few souvenirs and that would have to do us for a while. We didn’t feel brushed off; we felt we deserved to be brushed off. After all, he was Elvis, and who were we to dare to want to meet him? But we finally received an invitation to go round and see him when he was making a film in Hollywood.”
George Harrison shared in Anthology that meeting Presley was “one of the highlights of the tour.” John Lennon recalled being “nervous as hell” to meet him, and said he remembers being the first one to ask the King of Rock ‘n Roll a question.
“Why do you do all these soft-centred ballads for the cinema these days? What happened to good old rock ‘n’ roll?’” he recalled asking Presley, noting he was “fairly quiet” throughout the interaction.
Though there is no evidence of the meeting, several people close to the iconic rock acts were there to witness history being made. Tony Barrow, a press officer who worked for The Beatles in the ’60s, witnessed the jam session himself. Even though he doesn’t remember all the songs that were played, he’s pretty sure they rocked out to the Beatles hit “I Feel Fine.”
“It would be wonderful to have either photographs or recordings. That recording would be invaluable, surely,” Barrow said. “It would be a multi-million dollar piece of tape. But it wasn’t to be. It was an amazing session to listen to.”
This story was originally reported by Parade on Aug 27, 2025, where it first appeared in the News section. Add Parade as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
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