All Together Now... We Love The Beatles 1957: 1970

By Seamus Moore

Did you know that ‘Lucy in the sky with diamonds' was inspired by little Julian Lennon's painting of 4 year old Lucy O'Donnell, who sat beside him in school, not about drugs?
This book tells the story of The Beatles from their coming together as young teenagers in Liverpool in 1957 to their traumatic break up in April 1970. Each chapter covers a year in the life of the group, followed by the music, mini biographies and locations of people and places relevant to the band in that particular year.
Paul McCartney is quoted as saying that he hardly ever finished a book about The Beatles because he "rarely passed the first chapter without finding at least four inaccuracies". Paul, you will read to the end!
"The music was positive, it was positive in love... the basic Beatles' message was love" (Ringo)
This book captures the essence of that music and the interaction of the personalities of the four young Liverpudlians that combined to create it - music that caused hysteria at that time and continues to inspire joy and happiness all over the world.
All together now, "WE LOVE THE BEATLES"

• Language: English
• Publisher: Austin Macauley
• Release date: Jun 30, 2015

Book preview

Dedication

To my beautiful grandchildren, Jodie, Sean and Seadhna, also to the memory of my brother Michael, and my dear friend Anne who passed away during the writing of this book.

Seamus Moore

All Together Now... We Love The Beatles 1957–1970

Copyright © Seamus Moore (2015)

The right of Seamus Moore to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with section 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.

Any person who commits any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

ISBN 9781784555207

www.austinmacauley.com

First Published (2015)

Austin Macauley Publishers Ltd.

25 Canada Square

Canary Wharf

London

E14 5LB

Acknowledgments

I would like to thank the following;

My friend Tony Liston, author of ‘You can never go home anymore’ for all his help. He patiently typed from my illegible longhand while constantly encouraging and providing constructive criticism.

Sinead Davey for her computer skills in times of trouble.

My publishers Austin Macauley for facilitating the publication of this book.

More than two thousand books have been written about The Beatles, and I have read many of them. I want to acknowledge my debt to them, particularly to those listed, and would recommend them to all Beatles fans.

Finally, I would like to thank my family, Monica, Evan and Leah for their endless patience when constantly asked How do you spell…again.

In the beginning there was the scream, it was a high-pitched wailing, the sound of pigs being slaughtered, only louder. Some in England compared it to the air-raid sirens during World War Two, oddly it was both joyous and hysterical, it could be heard a mile away, it was continuous.

If music is communication, self-expression and a record of the human experience in melody, no group epitomizes it more than the Beatles.

The story of the Beatles is the story of a city and of a skiffle group. Liverpool, a city full of fire and hope born out of the violence of the Second World War, full of musicians, writers and comedians from all parts of the world, with a unique beat of its own. The skiffle group, the Quarrymen, who in 1960 would become the Beatles, also had a unique beat of their own. For the Beatles, Liverpool was the beginning and music was their communication, self-expression and a record of their human experience. Later they would write ‘In My Life’, ‘Penny Lane’ and ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’: classic tracks from their memories of the city that they grew up in. Liverpool was also a neglected city still on rations up to the mid-fifties with bomb sites as playgrounds for children up until the early sixties. When John Lennon first arrived with the Beatles in Hamburg in 1960, he was amazed at how well that city looked and commented, Who Won the War?

All four Beatles were wartime babies. Ringo Starr was the oldest and the last to join the Beatles in August 1962. Born Richard (Richy) Starkey to Richard and Elsie Starkey of 9 Madryn Street, Dingle, on the 7th July 1940 and later moved around the corner to Admiral Grove. Richy, whose parents split up when he was three, was afflicted with illness for most of his childhood. His mother married Harry Graves when he was thirteen. Harry a keen music fan, bought the young Richy his first drum kit in 1957. In the late fifties he became a member of one of the best bands in Liverpool, ‘Rory Storm and the Hurricanes’ and changed his name to Ringo Starr.

John Lennon was the second-eldest Beatle, the son of Alfred and Julia (nee Stanley) Lennon of 9 Newcastle Road; he was born on the 9th of October 1940. He never really knew his father who was always away at sea. In 1945 John’s parents’ marriage broke up and his Aunt ‘Mimi’ Smith with her husband George, became his guardians, living with them at 251 Menlove Avenue (Mendips). During his teenage years, John began to see a lot of his mother, Julia, who lived nearby with her new husband, Bobby Dykins and her two daughters Julia and Jackie, his half-sisters. It was Julia who taught John his first chords on the banjo. She died on the 15th of July 1958, after having been knocked down by a car in Menlove Avenue. She had been visiting her sister Mimi. John was the leader of the Quarrymen which he founded in early 1957.

Paul McCartney was born to Jim and Mary (nee Mohan) McCartney on the 18th of June 1942. Paul’s mother was a midwife for the N.H.S. in Liverpool, so the family had to move frequently around Merseyside, living at various times in Anfield and Everton, sometimes in rented rooms. In 1946 the McCartneys settled in 72 Western Avenue, moving to nearby 12 Ardwick Road in 1950. Paul’s father Jim had been a trumpet player/pianist in his own band, ‘Jim Mac’s Jazz Band’ in the 1920s and later worked in the Cotton Exchange in Liverpool. The family had a piano in the sitting room and Jim encouraged his two sons, Paul and Michael to be musical. By 1955 the McCartneys had moved to a new house in Allerton, 20 Forthlin Road and it was there in October 1956 that Paul’s mother died from breast cancer aged forty-seven. The premature death of his mother was a trauma he never forgot, nor fully got over. Crucially, as far as the history of pop music is concerned, Paul reacted to the death of his mother by taking comfort in music. Paul McCartney joined the Quarrymen in the summer of 1957.

George Harrison was the youngest Beatle. The youngest of four children, George was born to Harold and Louise (nee French) Harrison of 12 Arnold Grove, Wavertree on the 25th February 1943. His father was a bus conductor, who had also worked as a ship’s steward on the White Star Line. Having moved to 25 Upton Green, Speke when he was six, he went to Dovedale Primary school, very close to Penny Lane, the same school as John Lennon. Guitar mad, his mother bought him his first guitar when he was fourteen. George became great friends with Paul McCartney, whom he first met on a bus when they were both on their way to college in the Liverpool Institute. It was on Paul’s recommendation to a reluctant John Lennon that George became a member of the Quarrymen in early 1958.

In the early sixties audiences in most parts of the U.K and in Ireland (the showbands) seemed only interested in top twenty numbers. Produce a carbon copy of a top twenty number and the crowd was satisfied. Yet in Liverpool and the greater Merseyside area, a group could play in their own individual style, perform numbers they were interested in and the audience would judge them on their own merit. The repertoires of the Mersey musicians was the music of American rock ’n’ roll and Rhythm and Blues artists, while generally, in the rest of the country, it was the music of the current artists in the British charts especially Cliff Richard and the Shadows and their foot movements.

Between 1963 and 1966 Liverpool became the world capital of pop. Before this, London had been the main hub for the music industry in the UK with the major record companies, their agents and recording studios, radio stations (BBC and Luxembourg) the national press and the entire musical press, all based in the capital. By 1963 the pendulum had swung to Liverpool. For fifty-nine weeks, between April 1963 and July 1964, a Merseybeat record was in the number one position in the UK charts, a phenomenal achievement. How did the city of Liverpool turn the music industry upside down, get a nation and then the world to dance to the Mersey beat?

John Lennon’s and Paul McCartney’s’ partnership wasn’t a marriage of opposites, it was a marriage made in heaven and for the Beatles it made all the difference.

1957

Liverpool artists Lita Roza (How much is that Doggie in the Window? 1953), Frankie Vaughan (The Garden of Eden 1957) and Michael Holliday (The Story Of My Life 1958) all had UK number one hits in the fifties. However, the first major musical influence in Liverpool was a Scottish born artist, Lonnie Donegan. He was a member of the Chris Barber Jazz Band, who had a major hit in 1956 with a high –tempo version of Leadbelly’s ‘Rock Island Line’ reaching the top ten both in the UK and US. It was the success of this single, the lack of a need for expensive instruments or high levels of musicianship that set off the British skiffle craze. The skiffle craze had passed by the late fifties and the better skiffle bands in Liverpool began to turn to rock’n’ roll influenced by American artists such as Elvis Presley, Buddy Holly, Little Richard, Chuck Berry and the Everly Brothers. By the early sixties Liverpool had become the cradle of rock, a town where entertainment was actively sought. The appetite was sharper and the demand was greater, more demanding, with over three hundred professional and semi-pro bands plying their trade all over the Greater Liverpool area.

Out of this musical bubble came the Beatles, John, Paul George and Ringo, who would later create music of such joy and inventiveness, artistry, simplicity and originality that it would surge beyond Liverpool and go on to capture the imagination of the world . Songs like 'She loves you’ and ‘Hey Jude’ had the power to pull the listener into a fantasy world where every moment oozed with possibility. For that moment to happen we will have to go back to a July day in 1957 when fate ordained that the sixteen-year-old John Lennon would meet fifteen-year-old Paul McCartney and so set in motion one of the 20th century’s great musical stories.

The meeting took place beside St. Peter’s Church in Woolton, outside Liverpool, on the 6th of July 1957. It was Woolton’s Annual Garden Fete and John was there with his newly formed skiffle band the Quarrymen. The teenagers were introduced by John’s childhood friend, Ivan Vaughan. As well as performing at the Garden Fete in the afternoon, John’s band had a second gig in the local church hall that evening.

Paul, "I strolled around the fete with Ivan. Then there they were, the Quarrymen on the back of a truck with John at the mike. He was singing the Dell-Vikings ‘Come Go with Me’, which I thought was great until I realized he was playing funny chords (banjo chords) and he was also changing the lyrics of the song. Later in the church hall before their second gig, I picked up a guitar, turned it up-side down and played Eddie Cochran’s ‘Twenty flight Rock’ I knew all the words and could tune their guitars. John was impressed. That’s what got me into the band.

Not long after this meeting Pete Shotton asked Paul on behalf of John if he’d like to join the Quarrymen.

John was torn between wanting to improve the band and just maybe inviting a possible rival leader to join. He opted for improvement, That evening in the church hall half the Beatles was formed.

John, "When I first heard ‘Heartbreak Hotel’ it just broke me up, I mean, that was the end, my whole life changed from then on, I was just completely shaken by it. To us it just sounded like a noise that was great, it just broke me up. When I heard ‘Long Tall Sally’, it was so great I couldn’t speak. I didn’t want to leave Elvis. Elvis was bigger than religion in my life". These two recordings by Elvis Presley and Little Richard, totalling a little over four minutes, altered the course of John Lennon’s life as they did the lives of Richy Starkey, Paul McCartney and George Harrison, who happened to be the right age at the rightest of times.

Paul, At home I played the guitar in the bath and sitting on the loo. The fine acoustic of the toilet area was always very appealing to me. It was also very private, about the only private place in the house. I used to sit there for hours, there in the bathroom. Dad would shout, Paul get off that toilet and I’d reply, I’m practising. It was my first guitar.

Although he rehearsed with the band regularly during the summer of 1957, Paul didn’t make his first public appearance with the Quarrymen until Friday the 18th of October at the new Clubmoor Hall, Broadway in Liverpool. By all accounts it was not a success, as he played lead guitar for the one and only time, ruining his version of Arthur Smith’s 1946 hit ‘Guitar Boogie.’ Paul, On my very first Quarrymen gig I blew the solo on ‘Guitar Boogie’ which is one of the easiest things in the world to play. I was just too frightened. After that I said forget me on lead and I never played lead again on stage. It wiped me out as a lead guitar player that night.

Paul had missed the band’s first-ever engagement at the Cavern club in Mathew Street, Liverpool on the 7th August, with the Quarrymen filling in during the interval between jazz sessions. Paul had been on scout camp in Wales so he had to wait until January 24th 1958 before he made his Cavern debut. Despite being a jazz venue, Skiffle, with its jazz origins was just about acceptable in the Cavern in 1957. This was to change with the popularity of rock ’n’ roll and a new owner in the early sixties. By the end of 1957, Paul McCartney began to think of the possibility of a friend of his from school (The Liverpool Institute) joining the band. His friend had taken up the guitar and was also into skiffle and rock ’n’ roll. Paul brought him along one day to meet John Lennon. His name was George Harrison. It would take Lennon a few months to accept Harrison into the band (he thought he was too young). But it wasn’t long before George became a member of the Quarrymen. Liverpool was packed with teenage boys strumming guitars, but very few were writing their own songs. Though John was writing poetry and Paul was conceiving songs, they now had found each other. The next step was to write together.

In December 1957 Liverpudlian businessman Brian Epstein opened a record shop in Great Charlotte Street Liverpool, displaying an advertisement in the local ‘Liverpool Echo’, ‘NEMS Ltd Come to Town’. Immediately under it was a classified ad for a ‘Quarrymen’ appearance. Epstein would by late 1959 move his record shop to Whitechapel Street in Liverpool city centre, which was two hundred yards from The Cavern club in Mathew Street where he would first meet the Beatles in December 1961. By early 1958 the Quarrymen would become a trio with the inclusion of George Harrison. A long four-year musical apprenticeship lay ahead for the trio, with numerous name changes from the Quarrymen to the Beatles and numerous drummers, before that meeting would take place.

Twenty-seven second recording.

Ivan Vaughan.

‘Lonnie’ Anthony Donegan

The New Clubhouse Hall.

Liverpool College of Art/Institute.

Quarry Bank High School.

1957 Biography/Location

A twenty-seven second tape was recorded on a Grundig TK8 reel to reel machine by amateur Bob Molyneux, in the church hall beside St. Peter’s Church in Woolton, outside Liverpool, on the evening of the 6th July 1957. It captured, for the first time in public, sixteen-year-old John Lennon’s vocals, singing a Lonnie Donegan number ‘Putting On The Style’ and Elvis Presley’s ‘Baby let’s play house’. Purchased by EMI in 1994 at a Sotheby’s auction for £78,000, the Molyneux tape was not used on the 1995 Anthology CD or video release, due to the poor quality of the tapes. The church hall in Woolton has changed little since the late 1950s. The old original church hall stage has recently been removed to enable redevelopment work to take place. The stage was presented to Liverpool City council and they have it in storage, so an important piece of Beatle history has been preserved.

IVAN VAUGHAN (1942-1993)

Ivan Vaughan was a boyhood friend of John Lennon and later a schoolmate of Paul McCartney at the Liverpool Institute, both commencing school there in September 1953. He was born on the same day as Paul in Liverpool. He played bass part-time in John’s first band the Quarrymen and was responsible for introducing Lennon to McCartney at the Woolton Village Garden Fete outside Liverpool on 6th July 1957, where the Quarrymen were performing. Vaughan studied classics in University College London and became a teacher. He married in 1966 and settled down to family life with a son and daughter. Lennon and McCartney never forgot the friend who brought them together and he was on the payroll of their Apple Corp for a short while. Vaughan’s wife Jan, a language teacher, was hired to sit down with Lennon and McCartney and help with the French lyrics to the 1965 song ‘Michelle’ (A track from the album Rubber Soul 1965). In 1977 Ivan Vaughan was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease. His book, ‘Ivan: Living with Parkinson’s disease’, was published in 1986. Vaughan’s death in August 1993 touched McCartney so deeply that he began to write poetry for the first time since he was a child. He wrote the poem ‘Ivan’ which was published in McCartney’s book, ‘Blackbird Singing’.

‘LONNIE’ ANTHONY DONEGAN (1931-2002)

Born in Glasgow, Scotland, Donegan was a skiffle musician with more than twenty hits to his name. Known as the King of Skiffle, he is often cited as a major influence on a generation of British musicians including The Beatles. Donegan was Britain’s most successful and influential recording artist before the Beatles. His debut hit, ‘Rock Island Line’ was a track on a Chris Barber album credited to Lonnie Donegan’s Skiffle group. Recorded during a tea-break in Decca studios in London in the summer of 1954, the record had Chris Barber on double bass with Donegan on guitar and vocals. Released 18 months later in January 1956, ‘Rock Island Line’ made the UK and US top ten charts, selling over one million copies. It was one of the songs sung by John Lennon on that first day John and Paul met on the 6th July 1957. Donegan went on to have 24 successive top 30 UK hits and two US top ten hits over the following years. He also co-wrote with Jimmy Currie ‘I’ll Never Fall In Love Again’, a UK top ten hit for Tom Jones in 1967. Donegan was forced into semi-retirement after a heart attack in 1976. He was awarded an MBE in the 2000 Queen’s honours list. Suffering from cardiac problems since the 70s, Lonnie Donegan collapsed and died in Market Deeping, Lincolnshire, during a British tour on the 3rd November 2002 aged 71 years.

THE NEW CLUBHOUSE HALL, (Conservative Club) Broadway, Liverpool 11.

A highly significant building in Beatle history, for it was at the Clubhouse on the 18th of October 1957 that Paul McCartney made his debut with the Quarrymen. Admission to this historic event was fifteen pence and there were about a hundred paying customers. Charlie McBain, the dance promoter, was responsible for the booking. Known as Charlie Mac, he ran regular rock ’n’ roll and skiffle nights at such venues as Wilson Hall in Garston, where George Harrison first met the Quarrymen.

LIVERPOOL COLLEGE OF ART, Hope Street.

THE LIVERPOOL INSTITUTE, Mount Street, Liverpool 1.

John Lennon was a student of the College of Art from 1957 to 1960. John met his first wife, Cynthia Powell, at the college where he also became close friends with fellow art student Stuart Sutcliffe. Paul McCartney and George Harrison were pupils at the Liverpool Institute High School, next door to the art college. Paul, George, John, and Stuart rehearsed at lunchtimes in the art college’s life-room, which was on the top floor of the building. John left the college in June 1960, after the Silver Beatles tour of Scotland with Johnny Gentle. The College of Art is now a Grade 2 listed building. It was bought by the Liverpool Institute of Performing Arts in 2012. The Liverpool Institute High School next door was also part of the purchase and is also a listed building The façade, the entrance hall and modified school hall still remain after reconstruction was completed in the early nineties. The old school assembly hall (now a working theatre)is now named the Paul McCartney Auditorium. After the schools closure in 1985, Paul donated one million pounds towards the restoration of the building.

QUARRY BANK HIGH SCHOOL, Harthill Road, Liverpool 18.

Quarry Bank was John Lennon’s senior school from September 1952 to July 1957. It was at the school that the Quarrymen made what was almost certainly their first ever live performance, with the newly formed band playing at a school dance in 1956. Despite his eagerness at the time to leave the establishment, he must have had some fond memories, as in the seventies he asked his Aunt Mimi to send him his old school tie

John Lennon, Meeting Paul was just like two people meeting, not falling in love or anything, just us, it went on, it worked. Now there were three of us that thought the same.

1958

On the 6th of February 1958 at the Wilson Hall in Garston, Liverpool, fourteen-year-old George Harrison, with encouragement from Paul McCartney came and watched the Quarrymen perform. After the show Paul introduced George to John Lennon. There ensued a chat in which the pair talked about musical instruments, guitars and music. The record that changed everything for George, it transpired was the same one that floored John Lennon, ‘Heartbreak Hotel’ (Elvis Presley’s first number one in 1956). John was immediately attracted to the fact that George’s influences favoured rock ’n’ roll, the direction John was trying hard to take the band in the face of what he considered the end of skiffle as a popular form.

It would take Lennon a few weeks before accepting Harrison into the band, but George’s pure persistence that saw him showing up at every Quarrymen rehearsal and gig eventually wore John down. Although he still thought George was too young, by early March of 1958, three-quarters of the Beatles line-up were in place and the band’s natural evolution into rock ’n’ roll had begun.

George I loved my association with John and Paul because I had something in me which I recognized in them, which they must have or could have recognized in me, It’s why we ended up together. It was great knowing there was somebody else in life who feels similar to yourself.

In the Spring/Summer of 1958, the Quarrymen, consisting of John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, Colin Hanton and John Duff Lowe, turned up at Phillips Sound Recording Service at 38 Kensington, about a