Pete Best Reveals All

Liverpool Beatles Museum

23 Mathew Street

Liverpool

L2 6RE

 

On Tuesday I was invited to a special ticket only unveiling at the Liverpool Beatles Museum on Mathew Street

The museum was created by Roag Best, son of the Beatles’ Road manager / head of Apple Neil Aspinall and Mona Best, and the half-brother of Pete Best. 

As reported in my blog last September, with Covid restrictions hopefully easing for good,  Roag is planning on holding a number of ‘reveals’ during the year as important new pieces of memorabilia are added to the collection.

A good-sized crowd had assembled in Mathew Street ahead of the 9am opening. Once inside we were directed upstairs to the first floor of the museum where we were offered breakfast pastries, tea and coffee.  After 15 minutes or so of eating, drinking and catching up with fellow Beatle fans, historians and musicians it was time for Roag to open the proceedings.

There was a running gag throughout the morning which started when Roag  mentioned his son’s had recently started referring to him as ‘Pete Best’s brother’ after they decided to test their Amazon Alexa:

 

Q: Alexa, who is Roag Best?   

Alexa: I’m sorry I don’t know that one.

 

Q: Alexa, who is Pete Best?

Alexa: Pete Best is the former drummer in the Beatles. He joined the group in August 1960...

Q: Alexa, who is Mona Best?

Alexa: Mona Best is the mother of Pete Best. She founded the Casbah Club and was the first female booking agent...

 

Q: Alexa, who is Leanne Best?

Alexa: Leanne Best is a famous British Actress who has starred in such shows as Line of Duty, Four Lives.... She is the niece of Beatle Pete Best...

 

Q: Alexa, who is Pete Best’s brother?

Alexa: Roag Best is Pete Best’s brother!

 

After much hilarity it was time to introduce the special guest for the morning.

Ladies and gentlemen, the man who put the beat in the Beatles: Pete Best!!!

After receiving a warm welcome from the crowd Pete said his hellos, thanked everyone for coming and commented on how nice it was to see everyone’s faces after an absence of about 2 1/2 years.

Before ‘revealing the reveal’ Pete said, ‘I’ll tell you a little story’:

 

As you all know, I joined the band in August 1960, and we went out to Germany. We were playing at the Indra Club. We closed that one down after a month because we were playing too loud, and then we got moved to the Kaiserkeller.

 

We should have been there a month but Bruno Koschmider, who was the manager of the Kaiserkeller, kept extending the contract....and extending the contract. And we didn’t mind because we were getting booze, and birds, and women. We were loving it!  We were 17-18 year olds and it was another education for us.

 

But what we did talk about between ourselves was that regardless of what was going on in Germany, we wanted to be home for Christmas. We’d been there since August, and this was now getting to be the middle of November. So, I was like ok, regardless of whether we get extended again we’re going home for Christmas and then we’ll see what happens. So, I said I’m going to start promoting the Beatles in Liverpool, and I wrote to Neil (Aspinall) and said keep it under your hat, but we’re going to be coming home for Christmas, and I want you to do some posters. I said just basically tease the public. Don’t let them know who the Beatles are, just say they are coming, watch out for them. So, he did.

It’s important to remember at this point that before the Beatles went to Hamburg they were, to use their agent Allan Williams’ immortal words, a ‘bum group’. Nobody knew who they were in Liverpool, before going to Germany most of the bookings Williams got for them were on the Wirral. When they’d last played at the Casbah Club, ran by Pete’s mother Mo, they were still using the Quarry Men name.       

 

Pete: We had gone away a mediocre band and now we were coming back a powerhouse.

 

It was a lot of fun. We didn’t know what possible reception we were going to get back in Liverpool. We knew we’d basically become kings of Hamburg but coming back to Liverpool no one had really heard of us.

We got back a lot quicker than we anticipated because when we told Bruno Koschmider that we were going to the Top Ten Club he said, ‘you will never work in Germany again’, to which we went [mimes sticking up two fingers] ‘We will sir’....  that was the last thing we ever did.

 

All of a sudden George was sent home for being underage. Pete and Paul got sent home for allegedly trying to burn the Bambi Kino down. We didn’t succeed, thank God, and a couple of days after that John said to hell with this I’m going home. The only one who was happy to stay was Stu cost he’d fallen in love with Astrid, the beautiful Astrid Kirchherr.  The mysterious and lovely woman.

 

Anyway, we landed back home. Neil had started making posters like I’d said. He’d made two of each. He hadn’t started to put them up in the Casbah yet because we took them all by surprise (by returning early). I came back home and saw them, and the complete set (of three) was there in duplicate, so I took one complete set, and I kept them for my scrapbook. That was 1960, and I’ve had them ever since. So, what happened was, I kept them, and I kept looking at them up to today, and I said to Roag, it’s no good letting me look at them in my little vault, where I’ve got my other little bits and pieces. It’s about time we broke this out into the world.

 

So, I’m very proud to say that this is the only complete set of posters promoting the Beatles for the very first time, for their very first gig in Liverpool after the return from Hamburg.  And it is, I’m very proud to say again, the only complete set in the whole wide world, Ok? Now I’ve kept them for 60 odd years, I’m not going to keep them anymore I’m going to reveal them to you, and I think as I reveal them, you’ll see the importance of them. And then afterwards you can get up closer and see what I was talking about.

The first one. The Beatles are coming.  

 

Pete invited his brother to tell a story to tell about that.

 

Roag - The funny thing about that The Beatles are coming, as those of you who know, you Beatle historians and Beatles fans, when they first went to America in 1964 this was used as their tagline, The Beatles Are Coming. The first time that had been used was in Liverpool to promote their first show at the Casbah, so somewhere in their heads they’d remembered that and decided to use it again for the USA. Anyway, just adding that in! 

Roag’s world famous re-enactment of the Beatles remembering something in their heads. Uncanny. It's obvious who Leanne got her talent from. 

Pete: That's something I didn’t know. He’s the font of knowledge is Pete Best’s brother!

 

1964 promotional item ahead of the Beatles First US Visit

Here Soon. The Beatles.

 

Pete: Right.  Another tease OK.  The curiosity among the Casbah membership was building.  It was working.  

 

The the final one you'll find it a bit difficult to read from far off. The Fabulous Beatles direct from Hamburg, Germany.  Wait for it! Admission price: one shilling. In today’s money 5p. Now who wouldn’t want to see the Beatles for 5p?  I’d even spend 10p!  

 

But a couple of things about this and then I’ll let you have a look, The Fabulous Beatles. We were the first to use it and this got diluted own. It went in many different formats and used during the whole advent of the Beatle era It’s even still getting used today. It went from the Fabulous Beatles to the Fab Four to the Fab Beatles, the Fabulous Four, you name it. But it originated at a humble coffee club called the Casbah on 19 December 1960.

 

The other thing about it was this. I’ll tell you a little story about this particular poster. A lot of people don’t realise that with (The Beatles) being advertised as direct from Germany, when Mo gave us that first gig (the audience were expecting a German group).

 

John, George and Paul were going into the cellar to start the set and they went down and the kids in the Casbah turned round and went hang on a minute, they’re supposed to be The Beatles.  That’s John, George and Paul, who used to be in the Quarrymen.  'Ey?  What’s going on? 

Next minute Pete and Chas Newby, who was standing in for Stu Sutcliffe who’d stayed behind a while (in Hamburg) because of Astrid Kirchherr.... and who wouldn’t stay behind?  Again, it was the same thing, ‘hang on a minute, that’s Pete and Chas from the Blackjacks. Mona! Who are these Beatles?’  

 

And Mona said ‘be patient, be patient, I’ve heard great things about them. Listen to them play’.  So, we did, and we kicked off and played the first number and at the end there was quiet, and we looked at them (the audience) and went My God, what’s happened?’ The next minute the place erupted they all rushed to the back to see Mona; they were saying Mo! They’re absolutely fabulous, you’ve got to book them again. She said I will do be patient.

 

The next gig we played was at Litherland Town Hall. Now just to put you in the picture and rectify a myth, if I’m allowed to do that. (Roag confirmed that we were totally into rectifying myths), So it’s always been put down in books and on social media that Beatlemania started at Litherland Town Hall on December the 26^th. It didn’t. It started at the Casbah on December 19^th and the reason I stress this is because Mo opened the Casbah on December 26th, and the place was empty. The whole Casbah audience, and membership, had gone to watch us perform at Litherland Town Hall.  

So, Beatlemania didn’t start at Litherland Town Hall, it started at the Casbah, and it went on to sweep the world and that really is the history of these three posters. The complete set, the only set that still remains in the whole wide world today.    

Now 80, Pete was sharp, charming, full of fun and happy to accommodate everyone’s requests for photographs and autographs. I asked him how big the personal archive he'd mentioned was, were we talking a cupboard under the stairs, or a shipping container?  He said, 'that would be telling!'

Pete with my friend and fellow historian Angela Leighton-Jones

There was also a little surprise for him, a one-off, custom-made snare drum featuring portraits of his Pete, his mother, and the Beatles during the time that he was their drummer.  He seemed genuinely touched by the presentation.  

Pete Best and Roag 'Pete Best's Brother' Best

There was no rush to get off afterwards, the guests were permitted to have a look around the museum or just stand around and chat.  I did both and took the opportunity to photograph some of the ‘Best’ items on display. [ba-dum tish!]

Other highlights in the collection include the Beatles’ first drumkits.  Pete’s iconic Premier kit which was captured in many photos taken in Hamburg and Liverpool and his Ludwig kit which he bought about a month before he was replaced by Ringo Starr.

Receipts from Hessy's and Cranes for Pete's drumsticks

Pete's leather trousers from Hamburg

Pete's cowboy boots from Hamburg

Pete's pink cap from Hamburg.  The whole ensemble can be seen in the group photo below.

George, Paul and John on the roof of the Top Ten Club in Hamburg, Spring 1961

Roag’s daughter, the actress Leanne Best.

I like Roag and I like Pete. But which one is Best?

There's only one way to find out...

 

Thanks:

Roag and Pete Best and everyone at the Liverpool Beatles Museum,  Angela Leighton-Jones for letting me use some of her photos, Brian Lewis for taking the photos of me with the various guests, Chrisse Usenius, Jackie Holmes and Dave 'Jamo' Jamieson. 

The Gentle Giant : Mal Evans

Mal Evans by Guest Blogger Jackie Spencer

Hi there, I'm Jackie. I've been a tour guide in the City of Liverpool since 1995, and in the tourism business since I was only sixteen...all those years ago! My private tours are the real deal for Beatles Fans travelling Across the Universe to see my fabulous City. I hold the coveted Blue Badge, the top qualification in tour guiding as recognised by travel companies Worldwide and am one of Liverpool's few officially certified Beatle Guides.

 

After working on the Magical Mystery Tour bus for several years, I realised that some fans wanted more than just a coach tour and so set up the absolute first organised private taxi tours of The Beatles Liverpool in 1998 (a good 10 years before any of the others claiming to be the first). This won me the title of Merseyside Small Tourism Business of the Year in 2001. I have been awarded the Trip Advisor Certificate of excellence every year since 2011, which has now earned me a place in the Trip Advisor Hall of Fame.  More recently I was awarded the Bespoke Tour Operator of the Year, and Tour Guide of the Year categories at the Luxury Travel Awards.

 

I have been recognised as a Beatles expert (to me I'm just a fan) and was chosen to work with Cirque Du Soleil when they researched the ‘Love’ show. I've also worked with many VIP’s and celebrities, advised film & television companies including MTV & VH1 and have appeared in several Beatles documentaries. Most recently has been the upcoming Stars North production, "Pre:Fab', the life of Colin Hanton. I also collaborated with the wonderful Lush Spa as they created a Beatles themed treatment.

 

I can be heard regularly on Sirius Radio Beatles Channel talking about Liverpool Beatle Locations and was delighted when the producers of Carpool Karaoke featured my tweet on the most successful Paul McCartney edition. I'd love to think Paul OK'd that!

 

With the tourist industry currently at a standstill because of the pandemic I was happy to take up the offer to do a guest blog on ‘There Are Places I Remember’ (“about whatever I wanted”).

 

One of the main things I took from the whole ‘Get Back’ series was the fact that Mal Evans was always there for the Beatles. He’s one of the heroes of the film, especially in the final episode where he does his best to keep the Police detained until the Beatles finish their rooftop concert.  Officially their road manager and minder but so much more, one of the loyal and trusted friends from Liverpool who the Beatles took with them on their amazing journey and remained with them until the very end. I wanted to find out more about Mal and his early life and the important places in his story.

31 Lorne Street, Fairfield, L7

Malcolm Frederick Evans was born on 27 May 1935 at 31 Lorne Street in the district of Fairfield of Liverpool, not far from Newsham Park.  This was in fact his Grandparents home where his Mum had grown up.  His Mum was Joan Hazel Evans. His Grandfather was Alexander and according to the 1911 census he was a coachbuilder - a man from the motor trade. His wife was called Annie. 

It gets confusing because their daughter Joan Hazel Evans met and married Frederick William Evans, so she never changed her surname, and despite Evans being a very Welsh name we have to go back about five generations to find anyone in either family actually born in Wales.

When Mal was just a couple of years old his family were given social housing, a corporation house at 75 Waldgrave Road, Wavertree and this was where he was to live right up until his marriage.

75 Waldgrave Road, L15  

Mal lived here with his Mum and Dad, Fred and Joan and three younger sisters from around 1938 until 1957. 

Waldgrave Road is the home that Mal’s own children Gary and Julie remember visiting to see their grandparents.

He attended Northway Primary School, which is still there today, facing Mal's house, and later The Holt High School for boys on Queens Drive near Childwall Fiveways, known today as Childwall Sports and Science Academy.

Mal's father Fred worked in the fruit warehouses. Ironic that Mal was to work in one too.... the Cavern Club!

Mal met local Liverpool girl Lily White at New Brighton funfair, just a ferry across the Mersey.

They were married on 28 September 1957 in the magnificent St Agnes and St Pancras Church on Ullet Road, close to Sefton Park.

For the first couple of years of married life Mal and Lily Evans lived here at 12 Kenmare Road, a street of terraced houses off Smithdown Road, Wavertree near Sefton General Hospital.  

28 Hillside Road, L18

Mal had a decent steady job as a telephone engineer for the General Post Office and they moved to 28 Hillside Road, in the Mossley Hill district of Liverpool. A couple of years later their first child, Gary, was born in October 1961.

Mal, Lil and Gary Evans.

To put this area into perspective it’s a really nice part of Liverpool.  At the bottom end of the street, if you were to take a right turn that would bring you to the famous Penny Lane.  A left turn would take you to Allerton, the area where Paul McCartney was living. 

At the top end of the street is Menlove Avenue, where John Lennon was living with Aunt Mimi.

Paul makes an unannounced trip to Liverpool and other recent Beatles' related events

Hello everybody,

I hope you’re all keeping safe and well as we head into what promises to be a busy period for Beatles fans. Some of you are no doubt already enjoying the 50th anniversary re-release of the Let It Be album and, like me, looking forward to watching the companion film, Peter Jackson’s three-part ‘Get Back’ on the Disney+ channel starting 25th November. 

Ahead of that we get Paul McCartney’s The Lyrics: 1956 to the Present book on 2 November, and the recently published sequel to his Grandude children’s book. Not only that, but Abbey Road studios in London has also today announced they are opening up their world-famous Studio 2 for a series of lectures to be held over two weekends 13th-14th and 20th-21st November. 

As you might expect, with so much to promote there have been all manner of videos, social media postings, press and television interviews, a surprising number of which have featured a little nod to Liverpool in some way, most of which involve Paul. I thought it would be interesting to compile them all here because any new photo, film clip, document or anecdote is always interesting.

What We Did On Our Holidays: Cornwall 2020-21

Operated by Cavern City Tours, the colourful Magical Mystery Tour bus is a common sight on my travels around south Liverpool, our paths crossing as it takes its latest passengers on another fun and fascinating two hour tour of the Beatles' Liverpool, which, according to their website, promises to visit all the places associated with John, Paul, George and Ringo as they grew up, met and formed the band that would take the pop world by storm. 

Well, all the places that would more than satisfy casual fans or cruise-ship tourists with a couple of hours to spend on land, and that's fair enough. But as regular readers of this blog will know, that's really only the tip of the iceberg. By my current estimation I think there's in excess of 800 places in and around the city and the Wirral with a Beatle connection. Try cramming all of those into two hours! 

The livery of the modern tour bus is of course based on the coach used by the Beatles in their 1967 television special Magical Mystery Tour which featured several scenes filmed in Cornwall, south-west England. As the pandemic has pretty much restricted any foreign travel for the last two years, Cornwall has also been the destination for my own family holidays. (I refuse to use the word 'staycation', and so should you. It will fall out of use soon with any luck).

Liverpool, Merseyside (top centre) and Newquay, Cornwall bottom left (Google Maps image)

Newquay, a town on Cornwall's north coast is one of the UK's most popular holiday destinations. I spent several summers there as a child with my family, and several more with my wife before we had children. Last year was our first time back since 2003. I love the place. It's full of happy memories, playing on the beach, swimming in the Atlantic Ocean, bodyboarding, day trips to St. Ives, Land's End, the grey seal sanctuary and the Poldark mine, and in later years, drinking with friends on the beach. Away from Liverpool it's probably the place I feel most at home and certainly the most relaxed.

Newquay was (purely co-incidentally I promised my long-suffering wife) where the Beatles stayed for the three days in September 1967 during filming.  And so, in a dramatic break from the usual Beatles' Liverpool Locations I bring you:  

There Are Places I Remember Holiday Edition:

Cornwall Beatles Locations 1967 and 2020/1.

The Beatles Live! (Liverpool 1962) (part one)

1962

It was a choice of making it or still eating chicken on stage.  

Christmas with the McCartney family, 1968

Merseyside,

Christmas 1968

'They may not look much,’ Paul would say in adult life of his Liverpool family, having been virtually everywhere and seen virtually everything there is to see in this world. ‘They’re just very ordinary people, but by God they’ve got something - common sense, in the truest sense of the word. I’ve met lots of people, [but] I have never met anyone as interesting, or as fascinating, or as wise, as my Liverpool family.’

Fab: An Intimate Life of Paul McCartney, by Howard Sounes

The Beatles Live! (Liverpool 1961)

Following the positive reception to my recent post John Lennon: A Childhood in Photographs I thought I'd try something similar with all the photos I've collected which show the Beatles in performance at various venues in Liverpool and the Wirral.

It turns out that there are many more than I'd realised,  so many in fact that I've decided to break the post into three years - 1961, 1962 and 1963.

Of course the Beatles were also photographed in Liverpool in 1960. These images all originate from a single date, 10 May, when the group auditioned for Larry Parnes. I have already included these in an earlier post which you can view here.   

There are also a number of photographs from the Quarry Men and Japage 3 era.  No doubt there will be a post using these in the near future, but not yet, I'm still trying to create the definitive chronology of that 1956-59 period.

Photograph Smile

137 Gateacre Park Drive

Liverpool

L25 4UE

I've previously written about John and Yoko's visit to Liverpool in June 1969 on this blog (you can read about it here).  Another photo from the visit has just turned up. 

This is Yoko's daughter Kyoko Cox, and John's son Julian pictured on the driveway at 137 Gateacre Park Drive (see below) just before they set off on the long drive up to Scotland to see John's Aunt Mater and Uncle Bert in Edinburgh.

Mimi Mendip

251 Menlove Avenue

Woolton,

Liverpool,

Lancashire,

England

Circa 5 September 1960, John Lennon sent his Aunt Mimi a postcard from Hamburg. 

Dear Mimi,

Sorry I haven't written much but we're terribly busy and don't finish playing 'till about 2 in the morning and by the time we've eaten we're "dead beats."

This is the street we playing (the little yellow bit at the end). I'll write a proper letter soon as I get time. I hope you're well and everything  and don't worry about me I'm eating and sleeping well and keeping out of trouble xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx    Ok and no trouble. I'll be home in 5 weeks I think (we might be going to Berlin).

cheerio,

Love John

You can just imagine Mimi simultaneously smiling and tutting as she read it. 

The postcard appears in the new book, The Beatles Mach Shau in Hamburg, by Thorsten Knublauch, which looks to be the final, definitive word on the Beatles in Germany. 

The first run of 500 copies has already sold out. A reprint is currently underway, and you can order a copy here: 

Accosted by a Rozzer

Empire Theatre

Lime Street

Liverpool 1

I previously wrote about the Beatles last but one appearance in their home city here

Here are a couple more photos taken on the day of that appearance (8 November 1964). Paul making polite conversation with Joseph Wright Teesdale Smith, the Chief Constable of Liverpool before the Beatles' performance. 

The other three were presumably as far away as they could get.  

Liverpool Airport, Speke, 10 July 1964. The Beatles arrive for the Northern Premiere of 'A Hard Day's Night'. Note the imposing figure of Chief Constable Teesdale Smith to the left of Derek Taylor.  A home visit from the Beatles demanded the presence of the top man.