By Sean Piccoli |Pop Music Writer

A LITTLE HELP: Ringo Starr: On ‘Off the Record’ on HBO. (John P. Johnson / HBO)

Ringo Starr doesn’t have much patience for rock stars who won’t play their hits.

Some — Neil Young, Bob Dylan, David Bowie — have viewed their weighty catalogs as a drag on their efforts to evolve and stay relevant. They’ve often resisted audience demand for oldies. Not the ex-Beatle Starr, who comes to Hollywood’s Hard Rock Live on Thursday at ease with his highly familiar songs.

“I have no problem with them,” he says in an interview.

And if playing favorites means shelving new material, no worries. Starr, who turns 68 on Monday, has a memoir-ish new CD out, Liverpool 8, containing nostalgic lyrics such as, “In the U.S.A. when we played Shea/We were No. 1 and it was fun.” But he and his current bandmates will take a more direct route to the past: They’ll play older Starr tracks along with the popular Beatles tunes that he sang and, finally, hits of the various classic-rock veterans who make up the All Starr band. Only the title song from Liverpool 8 will get an airing onstage.

“It’s very hard on an All Starr tour to do [new] numbers because I do have to do A Little Help and Yellow Sub and Photograph,” he says.

He returns to this point about the repertoire, saying, “There are certain things you just have to do.” The alternative, to him, is futility. He says he’s watched as some of his peers — a small group, indeed — vowed to play new songs and nothing else on tour.

“And it never works,” he says. “Within a year they give in when they realize they’re just playing with themselves.”

So it’s Mister Ringo’s Mostly-Hits Club Jam on Thursday night, with backing from a veritable school of rock: Gary Wright (Dream Weaver), Billy Squier (The Stroke), Edgar Winter (Free Ride), Men at Work’s Colin Hay (Overkill), Average White Band’s Hamish Stuart (Pick up the Pieces) and session drummer to the stars Gregg Bissonette.

It follows that Starr will stick to the classic arrangements. “We don’t do … the jazz version of Yellow Submarine,” he says.

Starr, unlike John Lennon, was never one to wage a great public struggle with the fact of his membership in the Beatles — before or after their breakup in 1970. If Lennon found the legacy inescapable, the jovial Starr wore it sportingly. But even he will sometimes put distance between himself and one of the world’s most important bands. Starr speaks about having “a life outside of all that,” and as evidence he points to his work in film and television, and his sideline as a visual artist. An exhibit and sale of his pop art portraits runs through Monday inside the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino.

One could argue that these pursuits are fringe benefits of having been a Beatle. But Starr calls them “just another side” of himself, “and if people want to look they can see. There’s so much more to it than 1962 to 1970,” he says.

Sean Piccoli can be reached at spiccoli@sun-sentinel.com or 954-356-4832.

IF YOU GO
Ringo Starr and his All Starr Band perform at 8 p.m. Thursday at Hard Rock Live, 5747 Seminole Way, Hollywood. Tickets are $50-$100 through Ticketmaster (561-966-3309, 954-523-3309, 305-358-5885, ticketmaster.com) and the box office. Call 954-797-5531 or visit www.seminolehardrockhollywood.com.