The Beatles Boxed Set (5 page)

As
Paul’s influence in the band became more entrenched, the Quarrymen became a
band different than what it was before. Enough of the skiffle thing, they were
closer to the real thing, the American rock ‘n’ roll.

            That
meant that someone had to purchase an electric bass guitar. The obvious
candidate was Eric Griffiths, as John and Paul were already playing guitar. When
Eric balked, he was kicked out. Not literally, of course, but the guys scheduled
a rehearsal and never told Eric about it. Len Garry, the tea-chest bass player,
left after he was hospitalized when he contracted a near-deadly case of
meningitis. Rod Davis, the banjo and guitar player, left to concentrate on his
studies.

            Washboard
player Pete Shotton left as well. He told the biographer, Hunter Davies in 1967,
“It wasn’t the life for me. I didn’t like standing up there. I was too
embarrassed.”

            Even
though they left, there was one addition to the band. Paul had already met
George Harrison, a bus driver’s son, back when Paul and his family lived near
the Harrisons’ house on Upton Green. George would sometimes play hide-and-seek
in the bomb sites and vacant lots that the war had left.

The third addition to the band, George
Harrison, was too young to be a member of the group when they first met

            The
two met formally on the Bus No. 86, and Paul learned that George was also a
student at the Liverpool Institute. George appeared to be a full-on teddy boy
and a serious rock ‘n’ roll fan. He had a guitar with him and showed Paul a
thing or two about playing. Paul quickly noticed that George played with a fluidity
that he had never seen before.

            Paul
knew George was the perfect candidate to become a member of the Quarrymen and
told John about the boy. But George was just 14 years old and looked more
baby-faced than Paul. John didn’t want to have a kid that small in his band.

            But
Paul knew that if only John would sit long enough to listen to George play,
he’d be convinced. And so Paul arranged for a seemingly spontaneous meeting on
the upper deck of a bus where George whipped out his guitar and played his
rendition of Bill Justis’s cowboy-rock instrumental
Raunchy.

            Even
though John was impressed, he was still unconvinced. Undeterred, Paul made sure
that George was around when the Quarrymen attended a party at the Morgue, a
club run in an abandoned mortuary by the local musician named Rory Storm.

            Drummer
Colin Hanton recalled that the place was “a terrible dump. “There was a tiny
stage in the corner of the living room, and then this tiny guy came out with
this big guitar, and someone said, ‘That’s George.’ So this little kid with
this huge guitar started playing
Raunchy
, and he was very good.”

            Three
days later, John decided to let George into the band.

            There
was also another addition to the band. Paul knew a boy named John Lowe, known
as Duff, from the institute’s music class. They weren’t friends, but it changed
when one day, their teacher left long enough for Duff to sit at the piano and
play a Jerry Lee Lewis number. Paul was immediately impressed. He befriended
him and a few weeks later, asked him to join the Quarrymen.

            But
Duff didn’t stay long with the Quarrymen. He had a new girlfriend who didn’t
like the sound the band was making. Duff recalled, “So I stopped going, and it
was as simple as that.”

            Colin
Hanton also left the band. By then, he had already left school to work as an
upholsterer. He said, “I never felt we were going to get anywhere. I certainly
had no ambitions like that. I was in it for the fun and the Guinness.”

            During
one performance at a busman’s social club, the boys were offered a free pint
during their break after the first set went well. But they didn’t stop with
one. By the time they got around to their second set, they were drunk.

            Worse,
a manager who had come to the show to offer the Quarrymen a regular engagement
playing at bingo games decided to take back his offer. The boys, still drunk,
were dejected. They went to the bus stop and were on their way home when Paul
began talking with the distinctive slur of a deaf person. Paul had been doing
this with John, who would crack up at making fun of the handicapped. But they
didn’t know that Colin had a friend at work who had that disability and that
speaking voice. It was too much for him.

            Colin
remembered that night, saying, “I rounded on Paul and told him to bloody well
shut up. He looked shocked. He wasn’t expecting that. I knew he wasn’t
imitating anyone in particular, it was just a voice. But between that and the guy
from the [bingo hall], that was it for me. I put the drums on top of my
wardrobe, and that was the last time I saw them.”

            Paul
may have been busy with the Quarrymen, but he would find time to get away from
the band sometimes and go to Lime Street where he would mingle with grownups
and take to reading one of the serious books he’d taken an interest in. It
seemed unlikely for such a rock ‘n’ roll fan to have an interest in the works
of Tennessee Williams, Oscar Wilde and George Bernard Shaw.

            If
he wasn’t reading one of these, Paul would be looking at the faces around him,
wondering where they came from and what they were thinking. Sometimes he would
listen to their conversations, noting their jokes, laughs and sighs.

            Paul
said, “I was very conscious of gathering material. I really fancied myself as
an artist. I was preparing. I didn’t know how the hell I was ever going to
achieve it from my background … but my mind was full of it, it was an
intoxication.”

            The
years he spent at the Liverpool Institute nurtured Paul’s sense of intellectual
potential and the opportunities it might present to him. He became interested
by the literature classes of Dusty Durband, Paul’s instructor who stirred his
students’ appreciation for Chaucer and pointed out the adventure-movie-like
aspects in
Hamlet
.

            Durband
also recognized a hunger in Paul and would send him away to look for books that
other grammar-school students wouldn’t even think of reading for fun. It was
also Durband who helped Paul identify the connection between art,
intellectualism and rebellion.

            Paul
seriously took the habits of a real collegian, often collecting books and
attending lectures on art at Liverpool University. He would even buy tickets to
the dramas being staged at the Royal Court and Liverpool Playhouse. He said, “I
was trying to prepare myself to be a student.”

            He
even went as far as auditioning for a leading role in the school production of
George Bernard Shaw’s
Saint Joan
, but lost to an older student and had
to make do with a nonspeaking part.

            When
it came to his academics, Paul was less successful. He was more interested in his
guitar and the band, and his homework was sometimes neglected. Paul took the O
levels, or the General Certificate of Education exams, for over two years; he
passed Spanish the first time and passed five more subjects the next time. He
took two of the advanced, or A level, exams the following year and only passed
English.

            Paul
did his best in subjects that required natural abilities and hard work, but it
was as a visual artist that gave him top marks. In particular, his drawings and
paintings most often got him top marks and were usually included in school art
exhibitions. In December 1959, he won a special prize at the annual Speech Day
awards.

            Still,
Paul was unwilling to put in the hours of study required to get the scores and
test results he’d need to be accepted to a university. His father and his
teachers encouraged him to apply for a position at a teachers college.

            Paul
didn’t have his eyes to a career at a teachers college. This wasn’t his dream.
But then he applied to, and was accepted by, a teachers college in Hereford,
though he couldn’t help turning in another direction.

            John
Lennon would say a few years later, “I ruined Paul’s life, you know. He could have
gone to university. He could have been a doctor. He could have been somebody.”

            John
didn’t have to blame himself, because Paul knew what he wanted in his life and
who he thought would help him reach his goals. He wanted to be a songwriter and
musician, and John Lennon would be the perfect partner in his pursuits.

            However,
John had other things in mind. He was busy in art-school life and had himself a
girlfriend, a blonde from the Hoylake district on the Wirral, Cynthia Powell.
Also, John had met a talented painter by the name of Stuart Sutcliffe who
invited him to share a flat on Gambier Terrace with him. John agreed, and the
two became even closer. Their flat became the place for their friends who would
go for drinking sessions and all-night parties.

            Paul
made sure he wasn’t a stranger to John’s new friends. He became a regular at
the Gambier Terrace, often bringing his guitar with him for a bit of playing
and singing and songwriting. While John was still an eager music fan, he became
uninterested in the band, partly due to his deepening friendship with Stu. It
frustrated Paul, who was concerned about how the Quarrymen could improve if
John was so inv0lved in the Art College scene and the friends he found there.
Also, Paul was concerned about John’s new interest in Benzedrine and other
drugs that art students take during their all-night parties. Paul thought it
was dangerous.

            It
was George who found a gig for the band. By that time, George had joined the
jazz-and-skiffle centered Les Stewart Quartet. He and fellow guitarist Ken
Brown had heard news of a new rock ‘n’ roll club in the basement of a large
house in West Derby. It was in the house of the Bests, and their basement was
big enough to accommodate hundreds of visitors at once.

            As
it turned out, Les Stewart didn’t want to play at the Casbah or any other club.
So George approached his fellow Quarrymen and told them about being offered the
opening-night gig. They thought it was a good idea.

            With
the inclusion of Ken Brown as the fourth guitarist, the Quarrymen played at the
opening night on August 29, 1959. Despite having no drummer, the band’s
performance was a success. So much, in fact, that Mona Best, owner of the
house, offered them three pounds in cash for headlining the Casbah every
Saturday night. The boys agreed to the deal on the spot. They were back in
business.

The Quarrymen at the Casbah on August 29,
1959

            Stu
Sutcliffe became the newest member of the band as the bass player. The band
went by the name Johnny and the Moondogs by then and had no engagements after
stomping out of Casbah in October. They were annoyed when Mona Best insisted on
paying Ken Brown his share of the band’s salary on a night when he was too sick
to play. So the Quarrymen said goodbye to Mona Best and Ken Brown.

            Fortunately
for the Moondogs, they found a new rehearsal spot, the basement of their
favorite coffeehouse, the Jacaranda.

            Stu
proved to be a good addition to the band. Not only did he keep John focused on
the group, but he also helped to come up with a new, much better name for their
group. As he and John both liked Buddy Holly’s band, The Crickets, they hit on
Beetles
,
and then it changed to
Beatals.
The name evolved to
Beatles
, then
again to
John Silver and the Beatles
. Afterwards, it became just the
Silver
Beatles
, or the
Silver Beetles,
depending on who was doing the
spelling and the style of the day.