When They Were Boys

by Larry Kane

  “The four of us” included Rod Murray, Stuart’s roommate and best friend at the time. Harry enjoyed Rod’s company. The renegade four formed the nucleus of what would become a powerful teenage speaking and drinking club. The pub was the heart and soul of their conversations.

  Ye Cracke is a few steps up Rice Street, just off of Hope Street, near the Liverpool John Moores University (formerly the Art College) where Colin Fallows is a professor of sound and visual arts. Fallows is no ordinary professor; he’s a man who studies the past and weaves its fabric into the future. It is Fallows who brought Stu Sutcliffe’s girlfriend Astrid Kirchherr’s amazing photo retrospective to Liverpool in 2010–2011. It is Fallows who points out the physical nuances of the art school, such as the actual chair that John sat in during classes where he would glance over at Cynthia, sometimes with a nervous smile, other times with the bravado of a hunter. Fallows notes the small courtyard through which Paul and George would travel quickly from their school, the Liverpool Institute for Boys, into the lower level of the Art Institute.

  Fallows is a man who understands the Art Institute’s physical insides, and the real meaning of art to the artists’ world of popular music.

  He beams with pride when he remembers the work of Stu Sutcliffe, the young artist and writer Bill Harry, and the direct connection between his institution, the Beatles, and so much of the popular music that preceded and followed them.

  “In that day,” Fallows remembers, “British art schools were an incubator for many rock stars. Almost all of them, almost all the big ones, were artists. Rock and art, a very significant connection.”

  Harry, an artist on canvas as well as the artist of one of the world’s greatest verbal tapestries, agrees: “You can follow the beat generation. You can remember the days at Ye Cracke. All of it tied together. Rock and art. Art and rock.”

  Bill Harry remembers the makeshift rehearsals when George and Paul would join John in the art school canteen; Stuart often stayed behind, drawing.

  As life model June Furlong confirms, “Young Mr. Lennon was very talented, but the real student of art was Stuart Sutcliffe. He was the man with talent.”

  Bill Harry even suggested, not too subtly, that Stuart was a better artist than a bass guitarist. His advice to Stuart: paint, and paint more. Harry is a real gadfly when it comes to making a point. Through the years, he has caused tremors in the minds of journalists, serving as the ultimate proofreader and arbiter of truth and fiction in the early life of the Beatles.

  Harry’s humble beginnings, his rise from poverty to worldly knowledge, may have disguised his ability to seek out and know people just like him.

  After cultivating a warm and relaxed relationship with Stuart and John, and a good one with Paul and George, young Harry, inspired by the Dissenters, the group that met at Ye Cracke and other watering holes, began to survey the scene. By 1959, there were five hundred bands playing skiffle, jazz, and emerging rock in Liverpool. But there was little coverage in the established media of John’s young band, and the other troubadours. Harry had an idea.

  “I wanted to do a magazine that was part traditional jazz and modern jazz, called Stories of 52nd Street. I knew Sam Leach from Storyville Jazz Club, so I asked Sam if he would front the money, and he said he would get me the money I needed through the people from the club. So [my girlfriend] Virginia and I went up there. He was not there, and this happened four times. And I got dismayed. Now it was 1960.”

  The relationship with Bill Harry and Sam Leach has been strained for years, but never was it so intensely troubled as in 1960.

  Leach forgot to connect. Leach would later tell me, “What a mess that was. I would have tripled my investment. Who knew what would happen?” A lot of people still ask that question in Liverpool today.

  Harry knew. Although he had the greatest respect for Leach, he decided to look elsewhere and expand his outlook.

  “I also wanted to do a rock magazine,” Harry explains. “I wanted to [cover] other bands, too, like Gerry and the Pacemakers, Buddy Holly. I also wanted to do a music newspaper. So Virginia gave up her job and she lent me fifty pounds to do the magazine, newspaper, whatever. At that time, I finished the art-design course and I was supposed to travel to Europe, but I used the money as part of the startup.”

  The loan was repaid with decades of marriage, a partnership of love, long nights at the office, insightful news gathering, and ink-stained hands. The name of the newspaper/magazine became Mersey Beat. It was a catchy name, based on Harry’s view of a policeman “on the beat.”

  The couple’s Mersey Beat launched on July 6, 1961. Five thousand copies were printed. Five thousand copies were sold. Among the first distributors (and columnists) was Brian Epstein, the music merchant. Epstein’s fascination with the music scene, sparked by Mersey Beat, would lead him to uncharted worlds of excitement. In a way, with its up-to-the-minute reporting, lively articles, and recurring themes of teenager entitlement to love, dance, and rock ’n’ roll, Mersey Beat was the early-sixties version of social networking.

  For the boys, Mersey Beat was, as they say in the record business, solid gold. Bill Harry soon realized that his friend John’s band was ascending, and he covered that ascent with wild abandon. Yet, despite his love for Mersey music and the boy Beatles, Harry often let others sing their praises.

  Bill quickly became a reporter’s editor. Overwhelmed by John’s poetry and creative writing, he commissioned John to write the first autobiography of the Beatles. These are the founder’s words in the piece, titled “Being a Short Diversion on the Dubious Origins of Beatles (Translated from the John Lennon)”:

  ONCE UPON A TIME THERE WERE THREE LITTLE BOYS CALLED JOHN, GEORGE AND PAUL, BY NAME CHRISTENED. THEY DECIDED TO GET TOGETHER BECAUSE THEY WERE THE GETTING TOGETHER TYPE. WHEN THEY WERE TOGETHER THEY WONDERED WHAT FOR AFTER ALL, WHAT FOR? SO ALL OF A SUDDEN THEY GREW GUITARS AND FASHIONED A NOISE. FUNNILY ENOUGH, NO ONE WAS INTERESTED, LEAST OF ALL THE THREE LITTLE MEN. SO-O-O-O ON DISCOVERING A FOURTH LITTLE EVEN LITTLER MAN CALLED STUART SUTCLIFFE RUNNING ABOUT THEM THEY SAID, QUITE “SONNY GET A BASS GUITAR AND YOU WILL BE ALRIGHT” AND HE DID—BUT HE WASN’T ALRIGHT BECAUSE HE COULDN’T PLAY IT. SO THEY SAT ON HIM WITH COMFORT ’TIL HE COULD PLAY. STILL THERE WAS NO BEAT, AND A KINDLY OLD MAN SAID, QUOTE “THOU HAST NOT DRUMS!” WE HAD NO DRUMS! THEY COFFED. SO A SERIES OF DRUMS CAME AND WENT AND CAME.

  SUDDENLY, IN SCOTLAND, TOURING WITH JOHNNY GENTLE, THE GROUP (CALLED THE BEATLES CALLED) DISCOVERED THEY HAD NOT A VERY NICE SOUND—BECAUSE THEY HAD NO AMPLIFIERS. THEY GOT SOME. MANY PEOPLE ASK WHAT ARE BEATLES? WHY BEATLES? UGH, BEATLES, HOW DID THE NAME ARRIVE? SO WE WILL TELL YOU. IT CAME IN A VISION—A MAN APPEARED ON A FLAMING PIE AND SAID UNTO THEM “FROM THIS DAY ON YOU ARE BEATLES WITH AN ‘A.’” THANK YOU, MISTER MAN, THEY SAID, THANKING HIM. AND THEN A MAN WITH A BEARD CUT OFF SAID—WILL YOU GO TO GERMANY (HAMBURG) AND PLAY MIGHTY ROCK FOR THE PEASANTS FOR MONEY? AND WE SAID WE WOULD PLAY MIGHTY ANYTHING FOR MONEY.

  BUT BEFORE WE COULD GO WE HAD TO GROW A DRUMMER, SO WE GREW ONE IN WEST DERBY IN A CLUB CALLED SOME CASBAH AND HIS TROUBLE WAS PETE BEST. WE CALLED “HELLO PETE, COME OFF TO GERMANY!” “YES!” ZOOOOOM. AFTER A FEW MONTHS, PETER AND PAUL (WHO IS CALLED MCARTREY, SON OF JIM MCARTREY, HIS FATHER) LIT A KINO (CINEMA) AND THE GERMAN POLICE SAID “BAD BEATLES, YOU MUST GO HOME AND LIGHT YOUR ENGLISH CINEMAS.” ZOOOOOM, HALF A GROUP. BUT BEFORE EVEN THIS, THE GESTAPO HAD TAKEN MY FRIEND LITTLE GEORGE HARRISON (OF SPEKE) AWAY BECAUSE HE WAS ONLY TWELVE AND TOO YOUNG TO VOTE IN GERMANY; BUT AFTER TWO MONTHS IN ENGLAND HE GREW EIGHTEEN AND THE GESTAPOES SAID “YOU CAN COME.” SO SUDDENLY ALL BACK IN LIVERPOOL VILLAGE WERE MANY GROUPS PLAYING IN GREY SUITS AND JIM SAID “WHY HAVE YOU NO GREY SUITS?” “WE DON’T LIKE THEM, JIM” WE SAID, SPEAKING TO JIM.

  AFTER PLAYING IN THE CLUBS A BIT, EVERYONE SAID “GO TO GERMANY!” SO WE ARE. ZOOOOOM STUART GONE. ZOOM ZOOM JOHN (OF WOOLTON) GEORGE (OF SPEKE) PETER AND PAUL ZOOM ZOOM. ALL OF THEM GONE. THANK YOU CLUB MEMBERS, FROM JOHN AND GEORGE (WHAT ARE FRIENDS)
.

  John was always a man who enjoyed intriguing his audience. So in the interest of curiosity and history, Bill Harry offers an interpretation of the first Beatles biography:

  “The man with the beard cut off is Allan Williams, he of the Jacaranda Club, who first booked them in Hamburg [at slave-labor rates and conditions]. . . . The Casbah was a club . . . in West Derby . . . run by Mona Best, Pete’s mother. It was truly the first residence of the Quarrymen/Beatles, their first club.”

  Smiling, with a sense of great nostalgia, Harry remembers some other Lennon signals, which caused an editorial nightmare.

  JOHN’S PECULIAR SPELLING OF PAUL’S NAME [MCARTREY] MADE ME BELIEVE IT WAS HIS REAL NAME, SO I USED IT IN MERSEY BEAT FOR A WHILE. AS FAR AS THE “GESTAPO,” IT WAS A REFERENCE TO THE GERMAN ALIENS POLICE WHO FORCED GEORGE TO GO HOME TO LIVERPOOL BECAUSE HE WAS NOT YET EIGHTEEN. “GREY SUITS” WAS A HIT ON THE OTHER LIVERPOOL GROUPS, SINCE THE BEATLES, POST-HAMBURG, WERE IN BLACK LEATHER. ONE OTHER THING, IT WAS A THRILL FOR ME TO SEE THAT THIS PIECE, IN MERSEY BEAT, INSPIRED PAUL MCCARTNEY FOR HIS 1997 ALBUM, FLAMING PIE.

  WHAT HAPPENED IN THE SECOND EDITION [OF MERSEY BEAT] WAS NOTHING SHORT OF AMAZING. THE CAVERN’S DEEJAY, BOB WOOLER, WROTE A LANDMARK PIECE ON JOHN, PAUL, GEORGE, AND PETE. SEVERAL WORDS STAND OUT, WORDS THAT REFLECTED THE GROWING FEVER. “THE BEATLES,” HE SAID, “ARE THE STUFF THAT SCREAMS ARE MADE OF. . . . I DON’T THINK ANYTHING LIKE THIS WILL EVER HAPPEN AGAIN.”

  Wooler’s article, along with coverage of so many of the Merseyside bands, helped establish Mersey Beat as the publication of record for the music fanatics of the early 1960s. The paper became a twice-a-month chronicler of local music history, with a heavy accent on the Beatles. Mersey Beat clearly helped propel the Beatles, and the Beatles fueled the sales of Mersey Beat. It was a marriage of press and public relations rarely seen in England, or any other country. And Harry’s provocative readers’ polls would make big news for the Beatles, as Harry explains in a startling admission later in this book.

  News manipulation? Puffed-up journalism? No question about it. But Harry was also careful, despite being the Beatles’ biggest cheerleader, to promote as many bands as possible. And when it came to the Ye Cracke crowd, he had exclusives. Did you know that Paul McCartney was a “reliable source”?

  Harry remembers, “Yes, it was Paul that was the perfect PR person for me when he went to Paris with John, and to Hamburg, and he would write me all about it. He sent me all the stuff for Mersey Beat that was always so helpful to me. Although I was publishing all John’s stuff, I now had Paul’s stuff, as well. I was so pleased.”

  “Was his stuff detailed?” I ask.

  “Yes,” Harry replies. “But he put a good spin on everything, especially the crowd reaction.” This author has always believed that Paul would have been a great journalist. In fact, he probably is, considering the uncommon talent he has had for creating his own imagery and controlling the message.

  Paul was such a great “foreign correspondent” for Mersey Beat that Harry and Sowry were covered on every Beatles trip. Like George Harrison’s ghostwritten columns from North America in 1964 for a London newspaper, Paul’s “reporting” was invaluable to Harry and his staff.

  Mersey Beat was published through 1965. In 1964, Epstein bought a piece of the magazine, tried to turn it national, and partnered with Harry, but Harry resigned when he lost editorial control. It was a falling-out, no question about it, and it precipitated the end of the publication.

  Bill Harry continued as a writer for national publications but remained in close touch with his friends from Ye Cracke and the Art Institute. He and Sowry then moved to London, where this child of poverty emerged as one of the most successful promotion operatives in music history. His clients included Pink Floyd, Jethro Tull, Procol Harum, David Bowie, and Led Zeppelin, among many others. In 1994, the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers, and Authors presented him with its Lifetime Achievement Award.

  From the youthful sessions at Ye Cracke to the dark and sometimes primitive night spots of Merseyside, Harry left his mark. He also wrote twenty-three books. Mostly, though, he will be remembered for his guile and marketing genius in producing Mersey Beat, and for providing a bigger stage for his friend John and his Beatles.

  Like most good reporters, he could sense news happening before anyone else. In 1962, he wrote a piece titled “Take a Look Up North,” urging A&R (artists and repertoire) men to come to Liverpool and check out the spectacular music scene. It was a spirited piece, with the statistics and brief history to back up his claims.

  Not one of London’s record companies took his advice.

  To the fans of popular music, Harry’s books are a treasure. To the young people of the Art Institute, Harry was known for two talents: writing science fiction and looking east to the beat generation in New York City.

  As part of my preparation in writing this book, I recorded numerous long interviews on tape that I quote throughout, wherever specific lines fit with a particular subject. The following interview with Bill Harry, however, so authentically and completely describes the time, the place, and the people of Liverpool, that I want the reader to have the opportunity to read his complete story, unedited:

  MY OWN INVOLVEMENT WITH THE SCENE BEGAN IN 1958, WHILE I WAS ATTENDING LIVERPOOL COLLEGE OF ART. I WAS ASKED TO CONTRIBUTE TO A MAGAZINE PRODUCED BY THE LOCAL MUSIC STORE, FRANK HESSY. MR. HESSELBERG, THE OWNER, INSISTED ON THE RATHER UNCOMMERCIAL TITLE, FRANK COMMENTS, BUT GAVE COMPLETE EDITORIAL FREEDOM IN ALL OTHER RESPECTS. I DESIGNED THE COVERS AND PRODUCED INTERIOR ILLUSTRATIONS, REVIEWED LOCAL EVENTS, WROTE ABOUT JAZZ LEGENDS SUCH AS BUNK JOHNSON, AND EVEN PENNED A SCIENCE-FICTION JAZZ SERIAL.

  IN THE MEANTIME, STUART SUTCLIFFE AND JOHN LENNON WERE AMONGST MY CLOSEST FRIENDS AND WE USED TO SPEND A GREAT DEAL OF TIME TOGETHER, MAINLY DISCUSSING THE SUBJECTS YOUNG PEOPLE DISCUSS—WHAT THE FUTURE HELD, THE LATEST BOOKS AND FILMS, ART, ACADEMIC LIFE, AND SO ON.

  JOHN HAD A GROUP AND TWO OF ITS MEMBERS, PAUL MCCARTNEY AND GEORGE HARRISON, WERE PUPILS OF LIVERPOOL INSTITUTE, WHICH WAS SITUATED NEXT DOOR TO THE COLLEGE. THEY USED TO COME TO OUR CANTEEN DURING LUNCH BREAKS AND ALSO REHEARSED IN THE LIFE ROOMS. STU AND I WERE MEMBERS OF THE STUDENTS’ UNION COMMITTEE AND PUT FORWARD THE PROPOSAL THAT WE USE STUDENTS’ FUNDS TO BUY A PA SYSTEM, WHICH JOHN’S GROUP COULD USE WHEN THEY APPEARED AT OUR COLLEGE DANCES.

  I REFERRED TO THEM AS THE “COLLEGE BAND” AT THE TIME, AND THEY WERE BOOKED REGULARLY FOR OUR DANCES AS SUPPORT TO HEADLINERS SUCH AS THE MERSEYSIPPI JAZZ BAND.

  SKIFFLE MUSIC HAD BEEN POPULAR FOR THE LAST COUPLE OF YEARS, AND I USED TO STUDY THE HISTORY OF AMERICAN FOLK MUSIC AND RAILWAY SONGS AT PICTON LIBRARY, IN ADDITION TO PRODUCING A DUPLICATED MAGAZINE AT THE COLLEGE, SIMPLY CALLED JAZZ.

  WITH THE EXPERIENCE OF EDITING A NUMBER OF FAN MAGAZINES BEHIND ME, MY INVOLVEMENT WITH FRANK COMMENTS, MY ASSOCIATION WITH THEIR PRINTERS, JAMES E. JAMES, AND STUDIES IN TYPOGRAPHY, PRINTING, AND NEWSPAPER DESIGN AND LAYOUT AT THE COLLEGE, I HAD VISIONS OF PRODUCING A MAGAZINE CALLED STORYVILLE & 52ND STREET.

  ONE EVENING, WE ALL WENT ALONG TO LIVERPOOL UNIVERSITY TO HEAR A POETRY READING BY ROYSTON ELLIS. LATER, AT THE LOCAL ART COLLEGE DRINKING HOLE YE CRACKE, IN A DISCUSSION WITH JOHN, STU, AND ROD MURRAY, I POINTED OUT THAT ELLIS, IN COMMON WITH A LOT OF OTHER POETS, WAS INSPIRED BY THE AMERICAN BEAT POETS SUCH AS LAWRENCE FERLINGHETTI, ALLEN GINSBERG, AND GREGORY CORSO. MY FEELING WAS THAT PEOPLE WERE MORE LIKELY TO STRETCH THEMSELVES CREATIVELY BY EXPRESSING THEIR OWN ENVIRONMENT AND EXPERIENCE RATHER THAN BY COPYING SOMEONE ELSE’S. I SUGGESTED THAT WE SHOULD USE OUR CREATIVE TALENTS TO EXPRESS WHAT WE WERE PERSONALLY INVOLVED IN, THAT WE SHOULD TAKE A VOW TO MAKE LIVERPOOL FAMOUS: JOHN WITH HIS MUSIC, STU AND ROD WITH THEIR PAINTING, AND MYSELF BY WRITING ABOUT THE CITY. I EVEN SUGGESTED THAT WE CALL OURSELVES THE DISSENTERS.

  AT ONE TIME, STU AND I WERE GOING TO PRODUCE A BOOK ABOUT LIVERPOOL. I WOULD WRITE ABOUT INTERESTING AND UNUSUAL FACETS OF THE CITY AND ITS PEOPLE, AND HE WOULD ILLUSTRATE IT. WE NEVER DI
D THE BOOK, BUT THE SEEDS OF MERSEY BEAT WERE SOWN.

  IN ADDITION TO YE CRACKE, THE COLLEGE CANTEEN, AND VARIOUS STUDENTS’ FLATS, WE WOULD ALSO HANG AROUND THE JACARANDA COFFEE BAR, RUN BY A GREGARIOUS LIVERPOOL WELSHMAN, ALLAN WILLIAMS. IT WAS HERE IN MAY 1960 THAT I MET VIRGINIA. SHE WAS SIXTEEN YEARS OLD, WAS WEARING BLACK BARATHEA TROUSERS AND A GREEN SWEATER, AND HAD FLOWING AUBURN HAIR.

  THE LADS WERE PLAYING DOWNSTAIRS IN THE “COAL HOLE,” WHILE THEIR GIRLFRIENDS HELD BROOM HANDLES TO WHICH THEIR MICS WERE ATTACHED. IN THOSE DAYS WE WERE ALL SKINT, YET MANAGED TO GET BY, EVEN WHEN WE DIDN’T HAVE THE PROVERBIAL “TWO HALFPENNIES TO RATTLE TOGETHER.”

  VIRGINIA BECAME MY GIRLFRIEND AND THE VISIONS OF CREATING A MAGAZINE GREW. I’D INITIALLY BEGUN THINKING IN TERMS OF A JAZZ MAGAZINE BECAUSE THERE WAS A HUGE TRAD JAZZ BOOM AND LIVERPOOL WAS A THRIVING CENTER. THERE WERE CLUBS SUCH AS THE CAVERN, THE LIVERPOOL JAZZ SOCIETY, AND THE TEMPLE JAZZ CLUB, AND PROMOTERS SUCH AS ALBERT KINDER REGULARLY BOOKED ARTISTS OF THE CALIBER OF CHRIS BARBER AND LONNIE DONEGAN AT THE EMPIRE AND PAVILION THEATRE.

  ONE LOCAL PROMOTER SAID HE’D ADVANCE ME TWENTY-FIVE POUNDS TO LAUNCH THE JAZZ MAGAZINE, BUT HE NEVER DID.

  BY THIS TIME, MY THOUGHTS WERE DEVELOPING IN A NEW DIRECTION. MY EXPERIENCE WRITING FOR FRANK COMMENTS HAD TAKEN ME TO PLACES AROUND LIVERPOOL SUCH AS WILSON HALL, WHERE LOCAL ROCK ’N’ ROLL GROUPS USED TO PLAY. I BEGAN TALKING TO MEMBERS OF GROUPS WHO DROPPED BY THE JACARANDA AND SENSED THAT SOMETHING UNIQUE WAS HAPPENING IN LIVERPOOL. THE ROCK ’N’ ROLL SCENE WAS LARGER THAN ANYONE—EVEN THE GROUPS THEMSELVES—REALIZED.

  THE LITTLE RED NOTEBOOKS I CARRIED AROUND WITH ME BEGAN TO FILL UP WITH INFORMATION ON VENUES, PROMOTERS, AND GROUPS.

  I DECIDED TO WRITE TO NATIONAL NEWSPAPERS, SUCH AS THE DAILY MAIL, TO INFORM THEM THAT WHAT WAS HAPPENING IN LIVERPOOL WAS AS UNIQUE AS WHAT HAD HAPPENED IN NEW ORLEANS AT THE TURN OF THE CENTURY, BUT WITH ROCK ’N’ ROLL GROUPS INSTEAD OF JAZZ.