THE group of young musicians who could neither read music nor write it, and who are known as the Beatles, conquered the United States of America on February 7th, 1964, and by implication—since America is the heart and soul of popular music—the Beatles ruled the pop world.
By May this year the Beatles had become a world-wide phenomenon, like nothing in any of our life times, and like nothing any of us will ever see again. If there was a turning point in their career—a specific date on which the breadth and scope of their future was to be altered, then it was the day their Pan-American Clipper touched down at John F. Kennedy Airport, in New York, to a welcome which has seldom been equalled anywhere in history.
Nobody—certainly not me, though my optimism was persistent from the very start, could have foreseen the excitement and the drama, and the incredible curiosity aroused by the arrival on American soil of these four long-haired lads from Liverpool.
I remember very well the night earlier that month in Paris, when a cable arrived from New York which said simply, ‘Beatles Number one in Cashbox Record Chart, New York with “I Want to Hold Your Hand”.’ We simply could not believe it. For years the Beatles, like every other British artiste, had watched the American charts with remote envy. The American charts were the unobtainable. Only Stateside artistes ever made any imprint. And yet I had known that if the Beatles were to mean anything in America, and if the Beatles were to make a record which would sell in America, then ‘I Want to Hold Your Hand’ was that record.
At all stages of the Beatles career I and they seemed to have reached what we believe to be the ultimate—first of all it was the recording contract with E.M.I, away back in 1962. This, to us, was the greatest thing that could happen. Then it was the success of their first record; but this of course was only the beginning. The next ultimate was the number one position of ‘Please, Please Me’. There could be, we believed then, nothing more important or dramatic or thrilling than to be number one in the British record charts. But one goes on and on and—with the qualities of the Beatles—upwards and upwards, and our next high spot was the first appearance on Sunday Night at the London Palladium—the top television show in Europe.
So what’s left? Came November 1963 and the Beatles were selected for the Royal Variety Show before the Queen Mother. Another ultimate. …
With all this behind us so few things seem to remain for them to conquer. Always America seemed too big, too vast, too remote and too American. I remember the night we heard about the number one position in Cashbox I said to John Lennon ‘There can be nothing more important than this,’ adding a tentative ‘Can there?’
A journalist sitting nearby, eavesdropping as journalists do, said ‘Well Carnegie Hall would be fairly big.’ And even then though we knew we were on the way to some sort of eminence in America we rejected this because Carnegie Hall was surely the world’s greatest concert platform, rarely, so far as we knew, accessible to pop artistes, however great.
But on Wednesday, February 12th, the Beatles topped the bill at this great hall and a few days earlier I had been forced by pressure of commitments to turn down an offer of several thousand pounds for the Beatles to appear at Madison Square Gardens in New York! We were living in a state of extreme turbulence and excitement which left everybody, except the bland, down-to-earth Beatles, reeling and dazed.
Operation U.S.A. started in November, 1963, so far as I was concerned. The Beatles have always been happy to leave timings, plots, plans, schemes and the development of their career to me because they were good enough to trust me and because they knew that if there was some important decision to make I would consult them to sound their remarkable instincts and to gauge their reactions.
In November, I took Billy J. Kramer—another very successful British artiste whom I had signed in Liverpool—to New York, first of all to promote him and secondly—and more importantly as it turned out—to find out why the Beatles, who were the biggest thing the British pop world had ever known—hadn’t ‘happened’ in America.
As I said, I did not imagine that they would be the immediate answer to Sinatra but I did think they would have made some little mark on show business over there because their charm and their musical ability was undeniable, and in America there has always been a receptivity to talent.
The trip for Billy J. Kramer cost me £2,000 because I booked into an extremely good hotel and we lived demonstratively and well in order to impress the Americans that we were people of some importance. Actually, of course, we were people of no great importance to the Americans. We were two ordinary travellers—nobody knew me and I didn’t know anybody over there beyond three contacts whose names were in my pocketbook.
It was like London in the early days and, as in London in 1962, I started the rounds of the various companies—the television people, the recording firms, and the first people I spoke to were Vee-Jay. During this time, of course, the Beatles were becoming very big in England.
The press had started to write about what they termed Beatlemania in October as a result of the Palladium and the Royal show and little news items were beginning to filter through to New York and into the American Press, and I learned that it was pretty well decided that the next Beatles record—previously they had had no success on the two labels for whom they had recorded—was going to be issued on Capitol.
I went to Vee-Jay, however, because they had done a very good job for Frank Ifield who was a successful young British star. But of course Ifield had only limited success in America, like every other British artiste since the war. There had always been some curious deficiency in British pop stars as far as the Americans were concerned. The view was that whatever the British did at their best, an American at his best would do very much better.
Moving around New York I found that there was without question an American ‘sound’ on disc which appealed to the American public If you have an instinct for this sort of thing—and I believe, modestly, that I have—you can sense these things. I believe I know a British hit and in November I felt that there was a certain American feeling. This feeling, I was certain, existed in ‘I Want to Hold Your Hand’.
Recording is the core of pop music and I felt very strongly that ‘I Want to Hold Your Hand’ was going to be a success—however moderate—in the U.S.A.
But I still persisted with other companies because one had learned not to rely on one outlet. I contacted Walter Hofer who has since become my American attorney, and more important than anything else so far as the Beatles’ visual impact was concerned, I met Ed Sullivan.
This came about because there was an enquiry from the Talent Officers’ Room at C.B.S. almost on my arrival in New York. I made an arrangement to see Sullivan and on the same day had a call from a leading British agent asking me if I would like him to fix an Ed Sullivan Show for the Beatles. I turned this down because I preferred to do direct business and this policy paid off.
I went to see Ed Sullivan at his hotel in New York and I found him a most genial fellow. After a lot of discussion we arranged bookings for three Ed Sullivan Shows for the Beatles, two Ed Sullivan Shows for Gerry and the Pacemakers, and a fine working and personal relationship was set up between the two of us.
There were contractual difficulties and it took all of four days to resolve a certain point. My point was that the Beatles should in fact receive top billing on each occasion. This was contested vaguely by Sullivan who seemed to sense the importance or coming importance of the Beatles but who rejected my view that they were going to be the biggest thing in the world. His producer—a friend of ours now—has told me since that he told Sullivan that it was ‘ridiculous’ to give me top billing because a group hadn’t made it big in the States for a long long time and certainly not an English group.
However, we got our top billing and I returned to England with these contracts.
I came back to England delighted and excited and told the Beatles what was to come. They were pleased because they learned that one of the shows was from the Deauville Hotel in Miami, Florida, which meant that they would have a very pleasant few days in the sunshine. In fact they did have a small holiday there but by the time they arrived the Beatles were so hot in America that I agreed to do the Carnegie Hall Show and also a very big concert in Washington D.C. So their planned holiday was brief.
On February 7th, they arrived at Kennedy International Airport to the sensational welcome from 10,000 fans.
As we waited until the passengers got off the ‘plane and the four Beatles made their first appearance on American soil there was a tumult of wild screams and applause from a fantastic crowd.
It seemed the entire building—the whole of the top of the airport—was filled with people. It was tremendously exciting and one of the most memorable moments of my life. I have never before or since seen so many photographers lined up anywhere in the world, except perhaps when the Beatles actually returned to England from the American tour.
From then on it was crowd scenes, wild demonstrations and that extraordinary ‘We Love You Beatles’ song, from New York to Washington. There were vast seas of faces in front of the Plaza. American D.J.s were on the ‘phone by the minute, and the Beatles were beside themselves with delight and amazement. I had a suite on the twelfth floor of the Plaza Hotel and it seemed that even from the moment I got there this room was filled with people, all talking, all selling, all buying, all very much in business with me and my Beatles.
This was my first experience actually of the extraordinary number of telephone calls which come to any hotel where I am staying when on tour with the Beatles.
If radio interest in the Beatles in the U.S. was hysterical and youthful out of all proportion to the ages of the D.J.s, then press interest was no less extensive. Tens of thousands of words were written in serious newspapers and magazines, and searching attempts were made by star writers to probe the immediacy of the Beatles’ success. In the Saturday Evening Post, Vance Packard wrote: ‘The Beatles—under Mr. Epstein’s tutelage, have put stress on filling other subconscious needs of teenagers. As restyled, they are no longer roughnecks but rather lovable, almost cuddly, imps. With their collarless jackets and boyish grins, they have succeeded in bringing out the mothering instinct in many adolescent girls.
‘The subconscious need that they fill most expertly is in taking adolescent girls clear out of this world. The youngsters in the darkened audiences can let go all inhibitions in a quite primitive sense when the Beatles cut loose. They can retreat from rationality and individuality. Mob pathology takes over, and they are momentarily freed of all of civilization’s restraints.
‘The Beatles have become peculiarly adept at giving girls this release. Their relaxed, confident manner, their wild appearance, their whooping and jumping, their electrified rock-’n’-roll pulsing out into the darkness makes the girls want to jump and then scream. The more susceptible soon faint or develop twitching hysteria. (One reason why Russia’s totalitarian leaders frown on rock-’n’-roll and jazz is that these forms offer people release from controlled behaviour.)’
In the same edition the bearded, questing Alfred Aronowitz followed the Beatles from New York to Miami and described his first impressions thus: ‘Amid a fanfare of screeches, there emerged four young Britons in Edwardian four-button suits. One was short and thick-lipped. Another was handsome and peach-fuzzed. A third had a heavy face and the hint of buck-teeth. On the fourth, the remnants of adolescent pimples were noticeable. Their names were Ringo Starr, Paul McCartney, John Lennon and George Harrison, but they were otherwise indistinguishable beneath their manes of mop-like hair.’
Later in his article he wrote: ‘In the United States, Capitol Records, which has first rights to any E.M.I, release, originally turned down the Beatles’ records. As the craze grew it not only issued them but poured $50,000 into a promotion campaign. “Sure there was a lot of hype,” says Capitol vice-president Voyle Gilmore, “But all the hype in the world isn’t going to sell a bad product”.
‘Nevertheless, that hype helped stir the interest of thousands of fans who greeted the Beatles at Kennedy Airport. Many thousands more waited for them at New York’s Plaza Hotel. Outside the hotel, stacked up against barricades, the mob chanted “We want the Beatles! We want the Beatles! “According to one maid, the Beatles found three girls hiding in their bathtub. Dozens of others climbed the fire exit to the twelfth floor wing in which the Beatles’ entourage had been ensconced. Still others, with the names and pocketbooks of prominent families, checked in at the hotel and tried to get to the Beatles via the elevators.
‘On the twelfth floor the Beatles rested in their suite while the ‘phones rang with requests for interviews and autographs. One call was from a man who wanted to produce Beatle ashtrays. Another was from a promoter in Hawaii who wanted to book the Beatles.
‘Telegrams came in by the handful, and boxes loaded with fan mail.’
My new American secretary and I coped as best we could with an indescribable volume of interest which poured into the hotel by cable, telephone and personal representation. I could not believe what was happening around me. Of course, it is part of life now, but at that time it seemed as if the whole Beatle business was almost beyond control.
It was and still is impossible to attend in detail to every single enquiry about the Beatles because it is not an overstatement to say that the whole world wants the Beatles. And in America it seemed that every American wanted them. It was marvellously exciting but the strain was immense.
On the Tuesday after the Sullivan Show the Beatles went by train in a snow-storm to Washington to perform to 8,000 people. They had intended to fly of course, not because they enjoy flying but because it is the only way to conserve time. Snow however, prevented the flight and after a very frightening and violent fight to the station through hysterical crowds they attempted to relax on the train for their first visit—and mine—to the American capital.
I was looking forward to the visit because I felt I might be able to absorb some sense of American history as an antidote to the 1964 Beatle-type tumult of New York.
In fact, neither the Beatles nor I had much opportunity to see Washington because if anything it was wilder than New York. The reception at the British Embassy was given by the British Ambassador Sir David Ormsby-Gore, later Lord Harlech, and his very charming wife.
Both Lord and Lady Harlech are extremely nice English people but as is so often the way, their friends and guests were not quite as pleasant as the hosts, and the Beatles loathed the reception, the people, the atmosphere, the attitudes and since then they have refused practically every invitation of this type because they know what happens.
And what happens is that the Beatles, who are originally invited to see and to be seen, to hear and to be heard, to enjoy and to be enjoyed, become in fact, simply autographing-automatons and a butt and a receptacle for every type of challenge, insult, demand and query imaginable and that, when the guests believe themselves to be important or very significant young Englishmen with marvellous educations, can be extremely difficult and unpleasant.
What happened at the embassy was that Ringo had a lock of his hair snipped off, that John was told ‘Sign this’ by a pink-faced young Britisher and said ‘No’, which I thought quite justifiable but the response from the Englishman was ‘You’ll sign this and like it’.
‘Oh,’ said John, and he left the reception and went home in a considerable temper. Ringo, Paul, George and I stuck it a little longer, buffeted, pulled and pushed and only left when the writer’s cramp became too much to bear.
Lord and Lady Harlech were very sorry and said so to the British press, who reported the event in full on their front page. If we made a few friends at the British Embassy we made millions on the air through the wild hysterical comedian of American Radio. I was incredibly overwhelmed by the high pressure salesmanship of Americans and by the techniques that they employ generally in gaining news and interviews and tapes.
I cannot say that I admired this enormously but nevertheless it was there and it was something which was quite stunning in its way. Since the visit numerous attempts have been made to produce interview, long-playing records which are not legal and which our lawyers have dealt with fairly severely, but it was interesting to notice that even the road manager, the transport managers and anyone else in any way involved with the Beatles was devoured by the D.Jays and by the interviewers for their views. This has since become a feature of Beatle-ism that it is considered an asset to have some contact with someone who knows the Beatles. One of my staff tells me that his father was asked for an autograph not of the Beatles but of his own because he was the father of a member of the staff which was connected with the Beatles. Tenuous, but, in the extraordinary context of the Beatles, quite everyday.
America taught the Beatles one lesson and that was not to be taken for a ride if they could possibly help it—and if they were, to make it as gentle a ride as possible. The D.J.s—the folk heroes of the airwaves—had them in the palms of their microphones on the first tour.
The Beatles and the road managers could be secured for a handshake to say anything at all to a microphone. Paul would say ‘And listen to the 1,2,3 Show, it’s the greatest’ and John would say, ‘Listen to the 3,4,5 Show, it’s the most’, and Malcolm Evans, the road manager, likewise. With four, strong, temperamental people like the Beatles and the lively young men around them, it was difficult to convince them that what they were doing was promoting commercial enterprises, not only without any reward but without any discernment or discrimination.
The D.J.s had a grand time but within a few days I had to stop it very severely. This warning was heeded and now they themselves refuse at all times to do promotions or to isolate one product from another, whether it is a commercial radio station or a toy balloon. It is extraordinary that the Beatles were taken in for so long, but then America is the land of the hard sell and their sales resistance at that time was not as strong as it is now. Now it is the strongest and most solid block of sales resistance in the world, and it is just as well because everyone in the world has something to sell to the Beatles, and not always are the products very good.
One of the problems of organizing the lives of pop artistes and planning their careers is that interest must be sustained even when the artistes are not either in the country or on television, or on radio in person. The difficulty is how to maintain disc sales without personal appearances. I was not at all sure that when the Beatles left America interest could be maintained, although the D.J.s promised that because the Beatles were so good they would keep up the output and activity on their behalf.
I need not have worried. When ‘Can’t buy me Love’, their fifth hit record, was released in America it went immediately into the number one position, topping five other Beatle discs which had previously occupied the first five places in the charts. Thus one group occupied all six places and we knew that when we next entered the U.S.A. by the back door—that is through San Francisco—we were going to be a sensation and the challenge and the responsibility was a little frightening. We learned that a ticker-tape welcome was planned and the Beatles—not being demonstrative people and still maintaining a sort of bland modesty—wondered whether this was quite the thing for them.
We decided to agree to the open-car drive through this very beautiful city because, we argued, it was part of show-business.
Our recollections of the first American tour still dominate what has happened since November 1962, when the first Beatles record was issued. For although there had been many important events—chief among which was the royal premiere of the Beatles’ first film in July this year in London—and though the Australasian tour was, in terms of crowd numbers, wilder and bigger than the American reception there is, undeniably, something about the U.S.A. which exceeds every other nation in practically every respect.
We knew that America would make us or break us as world stars.
In fact, she made us.