Beatles History

In the wake of events during the early 1960's the world was left shocked and confused. Drawing to a close was the last great age of innocence. The world had been rocked by the Cuban Missile Crisis, John F. Kennedy had been recently assassinated, the specter of conflict in Southeast Asia loomed dark on the horizon and the threat of the iron curtain grew yet larger to inhabitants of the western world. It was in this tumultuous environment that The Beatles, John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr stood poised to embark on a journey through pop culture that would forever change the face of modern music. The Beatles influence would reach beyond political, ethnic, religious and cultural boundaries to touch people in every corner of the world. Their political and social awareness would garner governments as enemies and create allies for the cause of peace.

John Lennon founded the Quarry Men in 1957 and laid the foundation of what was to become the most influential rock band in modern history. Originally calling the band ‘The Blackjacks’ Lennon played guitar and sang lead vocals, Eric Griffiths also played guitar, Pete Shotton was on washboard, Rod Davis on banjo, Colin Hanton drums, and Bill Smith on the tea chest bass. Bill Smith was eventually replaced by Ivan Vaughan and Vaughan would play a pivotal roll in engineering what would become one of the most prolific song writing teams in history.

Lennon became a huge fan of American rock and roll and in 1957 when he was introduced to a number of songs by Buddy Holly, Elvis Presley and Carl Perkins. On July 6th of that same year Ivan Vaughan invited Paul McCartney to see the Quarry Men perform at ‘The Woolton Parish Church Fete’ where McCartney was introduced to John Lennon. A few days later John invited Paul to join the Quarry Men. The following year McCartney introduced George Harrison to Lennon and Harrison agreed to join John’s band.

The Quarry Men knew they needed a bass player so John approached Stu Sutcliffe, one of his closest friends from ‘The Liverpool College of Art’ and asked if he wanted to join. In January 1960 Sutcliffe sold one of his paintings to a John Moores exhibition and bought a bass guitar. He wasn’t a very good musician, but John insisted that he join anyway. In fact if you look at photographs of the band performing from this time period, you will notice that Stu often has his back turned from the camera so that his poor technique isn’t documented.

After a few personnel changes and a brief stint as “Johnny and the Moon Dogs” the group changed its name to the ‘Silver Beetles’. It was at this time The Silver Beatles began experimenting with different drummers, starting with Tommy Moore who toured with the group in Scotland, then Norman Chapman who left after a few weeks. George Harrison suggested that Pete Best, the son of Casbah club owner Mona Best, should be approached about the available position. Paul contacted Pete Best and offered him the position of which he gladly signed on. After securing Best for their rhythm section, the group settled on the name ‘The Beatles’.

The Beatles began to concentrate more seriously on performing and set off for Hamburg, Germany and the Repabahn in 1960. In the red light district of Hamburg they were under immense pressure from club owner ‘Bruno Koschmider’ to “mach show” and performed for hours on end. Hamburg is where The Beatles honed their live performance skills and developed a strong writing relationship.

At the end of their first Hamburg tour, George was deported for being underage and a dispute with their current boss lead to a police complaint about an attempted fire to his club. Stu reluctantly left the group after becoming engaged to Astrid Kirchherr, a German photographer and artist. The Beatles were now a four piece band and McCartney took over as bass guitarist. On their subsequent tour of Hamburg, the band was greeted by Astrid Kirchherr and the news that Stuart Sutcliffe, the bassist who had left the group to stay with her in Germany, had died the previous day of a suspected blood clot on the brain. He was only 21.

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