ABSTRACT
Using the White Album and “Get Back” recording sessions, this chapter builds on Chapters 3 and 4 by using organizational theory, transaction costs, and principal–agent theory to explain why the break-up of the Beatles was inevitable. Once the band was released from the expectation and pressure to tour and perform live, they shifted their creative energies to the recording studio. The technology for producing and distributing music significantly reduced the organizing and implementation costs needed to produce music for each artist. Moreover, without the need to play live, the costs of experimenting with new musical styles more suited to individual tastes fell dramatically, widening the artistic scope available to each musician. The Beatles faced fewer institutional constraints that required them to work as a group while freeing them to pursue individual musical interests and tastes. Thus, the group became less cohesive and found fewer benefits to working as a team. Individual interests became higher priorities as each of the members, working with an innate growth mindset nurtured in their creative internal culture, pushed against the frontiers of conventional popular music and into new areas. These new areas included fusing Indian and Western music, psychedelic rock, hard rock, and forays into experimental music.
