This version is so far from the truth that it casts doubts upon Bill Harry’s integrity as an editor. Was he merely Epstein’s mouthpiece? Was he the only person on Merseyside who thought it was an amicable split? He says, “I was working an 80-hour week on Mersey Beat and I took Brian Epstein’s word for some things I should have checked out. When he gave me the story about Pete leaving, he made it seem like a mutual agreement. I can see now that I was being manipulated.”
But surely Bill had known of the chaos at the Cavern, and surely fans had been calling his office? “Yes, we were inundated with calls but we had already gone to press. I never doubted Brian Epstein’s veracity when he gave me that story. We had to go to press 3 or 4 days beforehand – we were only a little job for the printers, Swales, who also published The Widnes Weekly News.”
Mersey Beat had gone to press before the full facts were known and being a fortnightly paper, the dismissal was old news by the time of the next issue as Ringo Starr was securely established as the Beatles’ drummer. Bill Harry: “I felt an injustice was being done, but not because Pete was getting kicked out on the brink of success. That’s the luck of the game. I felt that there should have been some truth about why he’d been put out. They should have said, “We’ve decided that we get on better with Ringo, and we want Ringo with us.” Instead, they suggested that Pete Best wasn’t good enough.”
Philip Norman’s Shout! The True Story of The Beatles says that Pete’s fate was decided in a pub meeting between Paul, George, Brian Epstein and not John Lennon but Bob Wooler. There may be some substance in this. Sixty-year-old Ted Knibbs was Billy J. Kramer’s first manager. Epstein bought his contract for £50 of which Ted got £25 and he never got the rest. He remembered a meeting shortly after the sacking. “Brian Epstein, Bob Wooler and I were having a few drinks in the New Cabaret Club and Bob said, ‘I’m going to tell the whole Pete Best story in Mersey Beat. I think the fans should know why Pete Best was dropped for Ringo.’ Brian went into a right flap – ‘You won’t, you won’t’ and Bob said, ‘I will, I will’ and this went on and on. I said, ‘I hope there’ll be no trouble.’ And Brian stood up, called the waiter, paid the bill and said ‘I’m sorry, gentlemen, but I must leave your company.’ If he’d had a cloak, he would have gathered it about him and stalked out. I said, ‘Now you’ve done it, haven’t you, Bob?’ He said, ‘Why shouldn’t I tell the story?’ I said, ‘Because you’re not a journalist, mate, you’re not relying on that for your living. You’re relying on Brian Epstein who employs you to put on his shows.’ He said, ‘Well what do you advise me to do?’ I said, ‘First thing in the morning, go round and tell Brian that you are sorry about last night and get it all over with.’”
Bob Wooler says, “I was annoyed about what happened to Pete Best because I couldn’t see any reason why he should have to leave the group. People said he wasn’t a very good drummer – well, it makes you wonder who is a good drummer these days because Ringo wasn’t even on the first record. But I was an outsider looking in. I was going to write an article called ‘Odd Man – Out!’ But it never materialised and I regret that very much.”
Did Bob Wooler repair his relationship with Brian Epstein? “Yes, sense prevailed and I made it up with the Nemperor. Ted Knibbs, who was older and wiser than me, said I had made my Declaration of Independence and that was enough.” Strangely enough, Bob’s concept of the odd man out was taken up by Albert Goldman, a writer not normally known for his perception. He wrote, “The odd man out had to get out – and the new man in had to be an odd fellow.”
But would the story have ever been published in Mersey Beat? Bill Harry: “Once Brian Epstein came into the picture, I felt we were being manipulated. We had a reporter in Widnes who was a Billy J Kramer fan. He would pick up the proofs and show them to us, usually on a Saturday. He also took the proofs to show Epstein, but we didn’t know he was doing that until we caught Epstein with them one day.”
More spin-doctoring took place on 23 August 1962 when John Lennon and Cynthia Powell were married. Paul, George and Brian Epstein attended the ceremony, but not Aunt Mimi. At the wedding breakfast at Reece’s Restaurant opposite Clayton Square, Brian Epstein told them they could live in his flat at 37 Falkner Street. Brian had used the flat for his furtive trysts and one of the first songs John wrote in the flat was ‘Do You Want To Know A Secret?’ There were a lot of secrets in the Beatles – Brian’s love life, John’s wedding and why they sacked Pete Best.
Cynthia Powell: “We were only children in those days, 20 and 21, and we were used to being told what to do and what not to do, so it wasn’t too much of an effort to keep our marriage a secret. That’s the way it seemed to be at the time, according to the pop world. Pop stars weren’t supposed to be married so we fell in with this thing. It was no problem to me as I knew that I had my man and I loved him and he loved me, and we were having a baby. Whatever anybody else thought didn’t really matter to me.”
Pete Best: “In the weeks that followed, Brian got in touch with me and said, ‘There’s another band I’m interested in promoting. Would you like to play drums for them? I’d like you to join the group and build it up into another Beatles.’ I said, ‘I’m flattered that you don’t want to lose me, but because of the vicious way it happened, the backhanded way it took place, I can’t agree to come back and let you be my manager.’ He said, ‘Okay, but the offer’s still there whenever you feel like it.’ In the meantime, Joe Flannery came down to my house and asked me to join Lee Curtis. He knew he wasn’t going to make a lot of money out of it but he wanted me to join the band and be part of the team. I thought about it for a couple of days and then rang him up and said, ‘Okay.’ I didn’t want to cash in on being an ex-Beatle and I often spoke to Joe Flannery about this when I saw, ‘Pete Best, the ex-Beatles’ drummer’ on posters.”
As it happens, Brian Epstein had even set that up. He had asked Joe to contact Pete with a view to forming Lee Curtis and the All Stars. Lee Curtis: “I was so delighted that he came and joined me because he was such an asset to us. Pete Best drumming behind you was a tremendous attraction, it really was. Joe came up with the name the All Stars as they were all stars in their own right from different bands.”
Unfortunately for Pete Best, Lee Curtis was the wrong vocalist for 1963 – his highly overcharged performances were too late for the Elvis Presley era and too early for Tom Jones.
Beryl Marsden also worked with Lee Curtis and the All Stars. “We used to rehearse at Peter’s house and his mum would be telling tales of how awful the Beatles were and how I mustn’t go near them, never speak to them or listen to their music. I thought it was a terrible thing for them to do, but I liked their music and I couldn’t stay away too long. I rang up one day and said, ‘I’m not very well. I can’t come in and rehearse.’ And I skived off to a lunchtime session at the Cavern. Unfortunately, I got caught out and got a really bad scolding from Peter’s mum, but it was worth it.”
Pete Best: “We played on the same bill as the Beatles on two occasions. One was at the Cavern when we were second on the bill to the Beatles. The other was in the Mersey Beat Pollwinners Concert. On both occasions we were on just prior to the Beatles, and we had to pass one another… face-to-face, yet nothing was ever said.”
By joining the Beatles, Ringo Starr had set up a chain reaction.
Rory Storm and the Hurricanes were Ringo-less at Skegness. Johnny Guitar: “Someone at the camp said he’d play drums for us. We said, ‘Are you a drummer?’ and he said, ‘No, I’m an actor.’ He was Anthony Ashdown, who had been in The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner. He got us by for a week or two until a relief drummer could come out.”
Drummer Dave Lovelady was returning from Hamburg and Ringo was going to replace him in Kingsize Taylor and the Dominoes: “About 10 days after the first letter, Kingsize got a second letter from Ringo saying that he was joining the Beatles instead. I came home and we did a swop with the Four Jays. Brian Redman took my place, and I joined the Four Jays or the
Fourmost, as they were to become.”
Brian Redman stayed 5 months with the Dominoes and then joined the country-rock band, Sonny Webb and the Cascades, who became the Hillsiders. Kingsize Taylor: “We then took Gibson Kemp to Hamburg, who was playing for Rory Storm at that time. As he was only fifteen, I had to go to London and sign a guarantee to get him out of the country. I had to act as a guardian for him. He was a cracking drummer, the greatest rock drummer who ever came out of Liverpool. I was so glad I took Gibson and everybody seemed to be happy about the changes right the way down the line.”
Except perhaps Rory Storm. Lee Curtis: “Rory Storm told me that he’d got another drummer. I said, ‘Why another one? Gibson Kemp’s a knockout.’ He said, ‘I’ve lost Ringo and now I’ve lost Gibson as well as he’s joining the Dominoes.’ I said, ‘What’s going on, Rory? Why can’t you keep your drummers?’ He said, ‘What can I say? I make ’em and they take ’em.’”
Ask me why: the ex-files
* * *
“What do you call someone who hangs around with musicians?” “A drummer.”
Musicians’ joke.
In this chapter I discuss the possible reasons for Pete Best’s sacking and hopefully reach a satisfactory explanation. This is not as easy as it sounds because even Pete Best doesn’t know why. “I wish I knew the answer. It would put a lot of heart-searching to rest. I may have been getting too much attention but it didn’t matter a dicky-bird to me. They said I was anti-social and non-conformist but each individual member had his own following and, when you added it together, the following was fantastic.”
Gerry Marsden praises the Beatles throughout his autobiography; I’ll Never Walk Alone, except when it comes to the sacking of Pete Best. “I thought it was a tacky thing to do for no apparent reason. I was very annoyed that when I’d asked Brian Epstein for a reason, he couldn’t give me a proper answer. I thought it was a sour way to start a recording career for the Beatles, firing a drummer who’d been with them for 2 years. I told Pete Best – who wasn’t particularly a mate of mine, but was an honest feller who got a bad deal – what I thought, but by then it was too late. The deed had been done. Ringo proved perfect, but the principle of Best’s sacking left a nasty taste in the mouth as the Beatles began their climb out of Liverpool to the world stage.”
The Ex-Files 1: Pete Best was a Lousy Drummer
First, the pro-Pete Best lobby. Excuse the repetition, but I want to emphasise that many musicians who heard Pete play with the Beatles had no reservations about his ability.
Johnny Guitar of Rory Storm and the Hurricanes: “I’d seen Pete playing for over 2 years with the Beatles and I’d never known anyone complain about his drumming.”
Brian ‘Noddy’ Redman, drummer with the Hillsiders: “There was no other group like the Beatles at the time and they were destined for the top all the way along. Pete Best was fine for the Beatles, but then nobody had seen any other drummer with them. At the time, we just accepted him so we were surprised when he was booted out.”
Wayne Bickerton, later to be part of the Pete Best Four: “Pete was a good drummer. All the stories of him not being able to play the drums properly are grossly exaggerated. There was nothing wrong with Pete’s drumming.”
John McNally of the Searchers: “I was surprised by the story that the record company didn’t think Pete was good enough. I somehow doubt it because he was superb. He was doing what all the punk bands did later – he was the first to do fours on the bass drum, bom, bom, bom, bom, which gives more power, as opposed to ba-bom, ba-bom, the jazz type drumming. It was powerhouse drumming with loads of cymbals and he was great. Ringo and Chris Curtis also did similar things and, if you listen to the Star-Club albums, you can hear that bass drum thump through everyone’s act.”
Chris Curtis (drummer with the Searchers): “You could sit Pete Best on a drum kit and ask him to play for 19 hours and he’d put his head down and do it. He’d drum with real style and stamina all night long and that really was the Beatles’ sound – forget the guitars and forget the faces, you couldn’t avoid that insistent whack, whack, whack.”
Earl Preston: “The Beatles had a unique sound and Pete contributed a lot to it. It was very, very raw rock ’n’ roll, a very fast driving beat that other drummers tried to emulate but never could. He had a unique style; he used both hands at the same speed. Most drummers play four with the cymbals and then one with the snare, but he doubled up so that both hands were doing the same rhythm which was a very effective, terrific sound.”
Beryl Marsden: “I didn’t see why the Beatles had replaced their drummer. When Pete joined our band, his drumming was great and he was also a great bloke.”
Steve Fleming of Mark Peters and the Silhouettes: “Although we knew the Beatles well, they weren’t very intimate or forthcoming about internal matters. All of a sudden when Brian Epstein took over, Pete Best disappeared. It was a tragedy as the Beatles sounded better with Pete Best than they did with Ringo.”
We’ll dampen this praise with a note of caution from Brian Epstein’s personal assistant, Alistair Taylor. “Brian told me that the other Beatles had come to him and told him that they wanted a different drummer. It was hard for Pete who had gone through all those years of rather dodgy venues with them, but I always told Brian that Pete’s drumming was a touch uneven and that he didn’t quite fit into the group.”
Pete, of course, wasn’t a lousy drummer as he could hold his own on stage with the Beatles as they were in 1962 even if not in the recording studio. However, if somebody’s personality fits, then they may be kept in the group even though they contribute little. The most famous example would be Gary Walker, who rarely played drums on the Walker Brothers’ recordings, and also there is Stu Sutcliffe with the early Beatles. But, with Pete Best, it is clear that the personality didn’t fit and so the quality of his drumming became another irritation.
The Ex-Files 2: Pete Best was not a Versatile Drummer
So far, we can conclude that Pete Best was not a lousy drummer, but there are indications that he was not a versatile one. He was a one-trick pony and Jackie Lomax of the Undertakers puts it succinctly, “Pete Best could only play one drum beat, either slowed down or speeded up.”
Brendan McCormack, classical guitarist, formerly with Rikki and the Red Streaks: “The role of the drummer wasn’t clear at that time. The vocalists were the important people, the bass didn’t really count and it is only in the 1980s that the bass came into focus. Drummers simply had to keep the band playing in time. It’s changed now, it’s changed radically. You should not view the sacking from today’s perspective.”
Fred Marsden, drummer with Gerry and the Pacemakers: “Pete Best was excellent for the Beatles – I don’t think you could have found a better drummer for the material they were doing, which was mostly Coasters-type stuff. But as they advanced, I don’t think he was technically good enough. I felt sorry for Pete Best because he was an excellent drummer in his field.”
Billy Hatton of the Fourmost: “His bass drum technique was four to the bar – bom, bom, bom, bom – which initially gave them that thumping sound, but when they started doing stuff that required more sophisticated drumming techniques, they needed a better drummer.”
There was no doubting the ability of the Beatles’ bass player. Bob Wooler: “Paul McCartney was the outstanding bass player on Merseyside. Perhaps Johnny Gustafson had the edge on him, but Paul was exceptional.”
Paul’s ability contributed to Pete’s downfall. Garry Tamlyn: “There was a very close association between the drummer and the bass guitarist in rock ’n’ roll bands. A bass guitarist would tend to base what he was doing on what the drummer was doing and forge a very close ensemble with the drummer, so Paul would pick up any fluctuation in tempo very quickly.”
This could cause friction. Bob Wooler: “The Beatles used to play the Cavern at lunchtime and sometimes they would stay behind and rehearse and just myself and the cleaners would hear them. One day, Paul showed Pete Best
how he wanted the drums to be played for a certain tune and I thought, ‘That’s pushing it a bit.’”
Maybe, but it was typical behaviour. Ritchie Galvin: “Sometimes after a lunchtime session in the Cavern, we would spend the afternoon in the Mandolin Club in Toxteth. Paul was showing Pete the drum pattern that he wanted on a particular song. Pete tried to do it but he didn’t get it. He did argue quite a bit with Pete, and Paul was a frustrated drummer, which is unusual as so many drummers are frustrated front-liners. He always made for the drums on jam sessions at the Blue Angel – Gerry Marsden would be singing and Wally Shepherd would be playing guitar.”
From this we conclude that McCartney was the Beatle who was most aware of Best’s limitations and, unfortunately for Pete, he was also the Beatle who wanted to expand their repertoire. While the Beatles remained a rock ’n’ roll band – and John Lennon, to some extent, was always a rock ’n’ roller – there were no problems with Pete Best’s drumming. A contrast can be made with the drummers who worked in New Orleans for Little Richard and Fats Domino. They came from a jazz heritage and weren’t allowed to produce ornate drumbeats.
If Pete Best was not a good enough drummer, could he have taken lessons and improved? Garry Tamlyn: “Rock ’n’ roll drumbeats are quite simple in comparison with jazz beats, for example, and so, given time, it doesn’t automatically follow that a rock ’n’ roll drummer would be able to do that. From what I’ve heard, I can’t gauge how talented Pete Best was, so I don’t know if he would have been able to cut things as well as a practised session drummer.”
It is argued that Pete Best would not have been suitable for what the Beatles did later; the strange time signatures of ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’ come to mind, but that was new music and who’s to say what’s right and what’s wrong? Ringo, as it were, wrote the book and became a very stylistic player. However, in 1962, Lennon and McCartney had no idea that they would be writing songs as innovative as that. Their musical aspiration was to be the next Goffin-King, i.e. to produce carefully-crafted pop songs along the lines of the Brill Building writers in New York. As Kingsize Taylor says, “There was no big change in their repertoire when Ringo joined, at least not at first, and so it was still the same songs.”
Best of the Beatles Page 7