Jim Jones wrote:I was just too young to go to the original Cavern, but they were big in Liverpool first.
Regrettably I wasn't too young. Actually I was, I think you were supposed to be 16+, but the screening wasn't too rigorous. Remember, The Cavern wasn't licenced so the age limit was more about what we'd now call child protection, than legality. It was harder for underage girls to get in*, but depending on who was on the door all things were possible. There were three key venues back then, The Cavern, The Iron Door and The Peppermint Lounge. I always preferred The Iron Door, they seemed to get better groups. But the Cavern's lunchtime sessions could be attended from school, blazer in your duffel bag, plastic 'leather' jacket worn instead. The all nighters at The Cavern weren't as good as we told anyone who hadn't been there, wishing they could get out at 3:30am. The doors were locked, nobody out until 6am. What fire precautions?
The Beatles were big in Liverpool, but by no means acknowledged as the biggest. There were factions for most of the local bands. For myself I always held that the Mojos were streets ahead of anyone else (What became of them?) A couple of The Fourmost attended my school. And besides which, the music in the clubs was pretty secondary, it was just the soundtrack to getting off with as many 'judies' as possible. The Beatles were OK, but not really seen as anything special.
But as their national and international star rose we very soon switched to being fervent Beatles fans, as suddenly it was Liverpool against the world, and leading the world.
Before then there was Cliff, and there was Adam, and there was Tommy Steele. Real pop music came from the US and Britain was second rate. All Liverpool boasted was a crooner called Frankie Vaughan.
Then Beatlemania started and we hardly saw the Beatles again, the odd gig at The Empire is all I can recall. But the whole Merseybeat thing took off and the down-at-heel city's pride knew no bounds. What made it even better was that arch-enemy, Manchester, could only manage Freddie & The Dreamers and Herman's Hermits. Oh how we laughed!
If you have ever seen the film The Boat That Rocked it really was exactly as portrayed. Before The Mersey Sound the whole of life in Britain was a dreary monochrome. Then suddenly, first with the Mersey Sound and later with psychedelia which the Beatles blazed a trail for, everything was brilliant colour.
I went to an ATC camp at Swinderby just as
Please Please Me and
Twist and Shout were dominating the hit parade (Then-speak for the music charts). We went to a dance in Lincoln. Girls down one side of the lifeless dance hall, swede bashers down the other side. The word soon spread that the small (outnumbered) group of lads were from Liverpool. The girls were the first to take an interest. Of course we all knew the Beatles, they were round our house all the times, Jimmy Gaunt had helped Paul McCartney master the guitar and taught him all he knew ... etc etc..
The Swede bashers took an interest later and we had to leg it into the town pursued by a vengeful mob. They hadn't liked us monopolising the girls they had been lusting after from the opposite wall. As we were heading for the bus to take us back to camp we stumbled across a couple of the Lincoln lads who had become separated. It wasn't pretty.
It was a truly great time to be a scouser. Like most years
Rob P
*Well it wasn't, but that's probably better glossed over; some of the doormen are probably still around and Operation Yewtree ...