Monday Minutiae

* Note: A similar blog entry was posted today on George, John and Paul's blogs, but since Ringo's experience of Hamburg Germany in 1960 was somewhat different due to being a member of a different band, I wanted to write a different entry for him. This will help round the story out a bit, I hope, of how everything happened during that particular time.

While John, George and Paul were in Hamburg, Germany with the other Beatles- Stu and Pete, Ringo also happened to be there with the band he was in at the time, Rory Storm and the Hurricanes. In 1960, Rory Storm was a big deal, much bigger than the Beatles and they were topping the bill at the Kaiserkeller club.

They would play 90-minute sets 5 or 6 times per day, alternating with the Beatles, so Ringo would often stick around and listen to them perform while he took a break. He got to know the lads quite well, and became good friends especially with George.

From the 2005 boook by Bob Spitz "The Beatles: The Biography":

"The stage of the Kaiserkeller was made of planks of wood balanced on the top of beer crates, so the two groups made a bet to see to who would be the first to break it. After punishing the stage for days, a slight crack appeared, and when Storm jumped off the top of the upright piano, during a performance of "Blue Suede Shoes", it finally broke. Byrne remembered that as Storm hit the stage, it cracked loudly and formed a V-shape around Storm. He disappeared into it, and all the amplifiers and Starr's cymbals slid into the hole. Koschmider was furious, and had to replace the live music with a juke box. Both groups went across the road to Harold's cafe for breakfast, but were followed by Koschmider's doormen with coshes, who beat the musicians as punishment."

The first recording to include all 4 of the Beatles as we know them now (John, Paul, George and Ringo) was in Hamburg, Germany during the time they were all there with their respective bands in 1960. On October 15 of that year, the four of them plus Lou Walters recorded Walters' song "Summertime" at Akoustik Studios, with the Beatles members singing back-up and Ringo on drums.

Over the next two years, Ringo would fill in for the Beatles here and there when they needed a drummer for a show that Pete wasn't able to do and in 1962 when they decided Pete wasn't cutting it, they approached Ringo to ask him to be an official member of the Beatles.

Some early 1960's photos of Rory Storm and the Hurricanes, right around the time they would be playing shows with the Beatles in Hamburg and Liverpool (as a matter of fact, George is in the first picture):







---------------------------------------------------------------------------------