John and Paul wrote about 50 songs in their first couple of years together. Only one was ever used later — ‘Love Me Do’.
The first thing they did when they started a new one was write ‘Another original by John Lennon and Paul McCartney’.
They were both getting more adept at playing the guitar, thanks partly to watching the big stars of the day on TV. ‘I watched the Shadows backing Cliff Richard one night. I’d heard them play a very clever introduction to “Move It” on the record, but could never work out how they did it. Then I saw them do it on TV. I rushed out of the house straight away, got on me bike and raced up to John’s with me guitar. “I’ve got it,” I shouted. And we all got down to learning it right away. It gave us a little bit of flash to start off our numbers. I also got some good chords from listening to “Blue Moon”.’
As they were always keen to enter any competition, however crummy, there was great excitement when the biggest competition organizer of the day arrived in Liverpool. The advertisement in the Liverpool Echo said that ‘Mr Star-Maker, Carroll Levis’ was due to pay a visit soon as part of his Carroll Levis Discoveries TV show. The show was going to be recorded in Manchester but he was to hold a local audition in Liverpool, at the Empire Theatre, to see which Liverpudlian talent was fit for the programme itself in Manchester.
John, Paul and George, like half the teenage population of Liverpool, went along for the audition. They got through and were invited to Manchester to do the real show.
Mrs Harrison remembers the excitement of it. ‘George was dead thrilled by this letter which had come through the post one day. I couldn’t see what all the fuss was about. The letter was addressed to some group called “The Moondogs”.’
The Moondogs was what they had become, a name thought up on the spur of the moment for the Carroll Levis Show. They were on the bill as ‘Johnny and the Moondogs’. All groups had a leader in those days, like Cliff Richard and the Shadows. So they put John’s name first. He was the leader anyway, if anyone was.
They did their bit in Manchester and got a reasonable amount of applause afterwards. The whole basis of the Carroll Levis Show was that at the end each group returns, does a few bars from its piece again, and the audience claps like mad, or otherwise. It is this final clap which is registered and the winners decided.
But Johnny and the Moondogs, being poor Liverpool lads, with no transport of any kind to get them back to Liverpool, couldn’t wait. The show was running late and they were about to miss their last train back to Liverpool. They hadn’t enough money for a night in a Manchester hotel. So when the time came for the final applause, they had gone.
Naturally, they didn’t win. They weren’t even spotted, or noticed, or given any encouragement by the talent spotters around.
For John, Paul and George it was a big disappointment. Their first time within touching distance of the big-time professionals had come and gone.
Family snap of George (centre), aged eight, with his parents, Harold and Louise, and, behind, his brothers, Harold (left) and Peter.
George, aged five.
John, aged eight, with his mother, Julia — a family snap taken in 1949. I have the original copy, which was given to me by John, but until recently I had never known who took it. It was John’s cousin, Stanley Parkes. Thank you, Stanley.
Polyphoto strip of John, aged five, looking a very sweet and innocent little boy, as his aunt Mimi always preferred to remember him.
Fred Lennon, John’s father.
John’s Aunt Mimi, who brought him up from the age of three.
Paul, aged nine.
The McCartney family at the races, 1968: Michael, Angela (Paul’s stepmother), Paul, Jim McCartney (Paul’s father and racehorse owner).
Paul (left) aged seven with his mother and brother Michael.
Ringo’s father, Richard Starkey.
Ringo, aged ten, with his mother, Elsie.
Ringo, aged about eight.
Ringo being silly, 1960.
George (right), aged 15 and with his hair up, at his first dance.
Ringo (right), aged 16 in an early job as a barman on a ferry boat.
9 stu, scotland and the silver beatles
At the Art College John and Stuart were becoming even closer friends. Stu spent most of his time following the group round and watching them practise. He and John together managed to persuade a college committee to buy them a tape recorder, ostensibly for use by all students. John took it over for himself, to record his group playing, so that they could hear what they sounded like. They also got a ‘public address system’ bought for use at college dances. This ended up as part of his group’s amplification equipment.
Stu was still as interested in art, despite spending so much time with John and his group. He entered some paintings for the John Moores Exhibition, one of the best exhibitions of its type, not just on Merseyside but throughout Britain. It is named after John Moores, a member of the wealthy Liverpool family that is connected with Littlewoods football pools and the mail order firm. Stuart Sutcliffe, although still a student, won a prize worth £60, a huge sum and a great success for one so young.
John, his best friend and biggest influence, immediately saw a way of using the money in the best possible way. Stu had always been saying that he wished he could play an instrument and really be in their group, instead of just hanging around. John said now was his chance to join. With his £60, he could buy a bass guitar. It didn’t matter that he couldn’t play. They would teach him.
Paul and George were equally keen on the idea, as they needed another member for the group. From what George remembers, Stu was offered an alternative — he could buy himself a bass or a set of drums. They needed both as they had three stars on guitars and no backing of any sort. ‘Stu had no idea how to play it,’ says George. ‘We all showed him what we could, but he really picked it up by playing on stage.’
In those early days, as can be seen from photographs, Stu usually had his back to the audience, so that no one could see how very few chords he was playing. They were doing more and more engagements, still earning only a few bob, playing at working men’s clubs and socials. But as the beat group boom took over Liverpool, little teenage clubs slowly began to spring up. They were basically coffee clubs, on the lines of the hundreds of coffee bars, serving espresso coffee amidst lots of rubber plants and bamboo, which had arisen all over the country. The Liverpool ones occasionally put on live shows for the teenagers, which gave the hundreds of beat groups somewhere to play.
The beat groups could never get into the traditional sort of clubs, like the Cavern. They were only for jazz fans and jazz bands, which was considered a much higher art form. The beat groups were all scruffy and amateur and Teddy Boyish. It was a working-class art form, full of electricians and labourers. There was a tendency to look down upon all beat groups and the people who played in them.
‘We were always anti-jazz,’ says John. ‘I think it is shit music, even more stupid than rock and roll, followed by students in Marks and Spencer pullovers. Jazz never gets anywhere, never does anything, it’s always the same and all they do is drink pints of beer. We hated it because in the early days they wouldn’t let us play at those sort of clubs. We’d never get auditions because of the jazz bands.’