Genius that made the Sixties sing

From The Beatles to Gerry and the Pacemakers, picture that captures the raw talent – spotted by one man – that sparked a pop revolution

There never was a time like it for these boys. Just look at the joy in their smiles. So young and fresh-faced in their inexpensive suits and ties, sensible, unshowy haircuts and polished black shoes.

At a glance you might think they are a works football squad, celebrating, along with their young coach from accounts, a lucky away win in an amateur cup first round with a ‘jump for joy’ photo-shoot.

But look more closely and those four young men on the left may seem rather familiar. As well they might, because they are John Lennon, ringo Starr, George harrison and Paul McCartney.

What they are celebrating — along with their friends Gerry and the Pacemakers and Billy J. Kramer and the Dakotas — isn’t goals, but No. 1 records in the pop charts.

As for the fellow on the far right, watching over them like the proud tactician he was, it’s the man who made it all possible, manager Brian epstein. he was just 28, but, in the eyes of his youthful proteges, practically middle-aged.

It was the summer of 1963 and a cultural earthquake was resetting the foundations of British popular music. And from being a place usually more associated with breeding comedians, the city of Liverpool had overnight become the capital of pop.

The Beatles had started it with No.1 hits From Me To You and She Loves You, but then right behind them came Gerry and the Pacemakers’ how Do You Do It? and I Like It — followed by Billy J Kramer’s Do You Want To Know A Secret? and Bad To Me.

Suddenly, it was cool to have a Scouse accent — whether or not you could sing.

Six months earlier, when these 13 young men were still following each other on stage at the tiny Cavern Club in Liverpool, to have imagined that such success could happen would have seemed lunatic.

The previous year, Brian epstein had virtually to beg to get a record deal for The Beatles. And it was only when The Beatles defied London’s showbiz sneers and took off that he began to realise, and also to sign up, the depth of untapped talent on Merseyside — which came to be known as the Mersey Sound.

Something was happening right across the country in those early Sixties days. Not only in music and not only in Liverpool.

Schools, universities and art colleges were turning out ambitious young people from working class and lower middle-class homes, whose backgrounds had not been privileged, but who, energised by education, were reaching out to grab the future and shape it in their own peculiarly British way.

It could be felt in the arts, business and fashion at a time when suddenly everything seemed possible, and when the world appeared to be growing younger.

Take another look at the photograph of these young men: they aren’t knowing, cynical City- slickers or super-fashionable posing dandies. Dressed in their stage suits, possibly for some of them the only suits they possessed, so sudden had been their ascendance to stardom, their expression carries the glow of surprised excitement.

epstein liked his groups to look respectable, but before long that image would be replaced by fancy dress, kaftans, beads and bells, before glitter and platform shoes became the rage, along with perms and hair dyes, then make-up — and glam and punk led to the Mohicans as pop became about how you looked as much as what you sang.

Then there would be the custom-made torn jeans and T- shirts, the bandanas, tattoos and eyebrow, nose and ear-rings, and the sheer fashionable phoniness of it all.

But, back then, consider Paul McCartney, only just turned 21, laughing as his pal Gerry Marsden grabs hold of him in mid-air.

how innocent they all look: how unaffected, how grateful to be alive and part of this extraordinary revolution of youth. Time, however, moves relentlessly on. For some in the photograph, fame would turn into a prison; for others, it would become a fleeting memory as the hits dried up.

And, for Brian epstein it would be a death sentence. Just four years later he would die from a drugs overdose.

But right there on that summer’s day in Liverpool in 1963, there was confidence, camaraderie and the well- scrubbed optimism of youth. Those really were the days.

WHAT HAPPENED TO THEM?

1 JOHN LENNON, murdered in Manhattan, New York, aged 40, December 1980. 2 RINGO STARR, 77, has just played Las Vegas after releasing his latest album, Give More Love, last month.

3 GEORGE HARRISON, died aged 58 from lung cancer in Beverly hills, California, in November 2001. 4 PAUL McCARTNEY, 75, played Brazil last night during his current world tour. 5

GERRY MARSDEN, 75, lead singer/guitarist with Gerry and the Pacemakers, is currently on a farewell UK tour.

he had No. 1 hits (all 1963) with how Do You Do It?, I Like It and You’ll Never Walk Alone. Ferry Cross The Mersey reached No. 8 in 1964.

Marsden made a brief return to No.1 in 1985 with a superstar recording of You’ll Never Walk Alone to benefit victims of the Bradford City stadium fire. The PaceORIGINAL COPY . ORIGINAL COPY . ORIGINAL COPY . ORIGINAL COPY . ORIGINAL COPY