Beatles (70 page)

In 1967, while doing the book, I met Pete, got his memories, and was there when John arranged for him to have £20,000 for the purchase of a shop. Pete seemed an affable, amusing bloke, but I didn’t see him making a success of a shop, or anything really. I said to John it was a waste of money, he’d never get it back. John said he didn’t care, that Pete would have done the same for him if the roles had been reversed and Pete had turned out the wealthy one.

I never knew what happened to Pete’s shop, or what became of any of the other Quarrymen, until 1998 when I happened to be in Cuba working on a book about the Caribbean. I chanced to arrive in the middle of the Third International Beatles Conference. Somehow, I’d completely missed the first two.

On the plane I’d met Pete Nash, the noted Beatles expert, who talked me into giving a little lecture. On the same bill, it announced that the Quarrymen were going to appear. I thought it must be a Cuban lookalike group – but no, it was the five original Quarrymen, now late middle-aged gents approaching their sixties like me.

In 1997, never having met each other for 40 years, they had been invited to the Cavern’s 40th birthday party. They got on stage, but only pretended to play as they’d drunk too much. They enjoyed it so much that afterwards they decided to get out their old instruments, see if they could still play together. They reformed and ever since have been travelling round the world and playing at Beatles events – but only part-time, still carrying on with their own jobs and own lives. All had got married and had children.

To my amazement, Pete had become a multi-millionaire. He’d made a success of that first shop, a little supermarket, and paid John back his money. Later he had gone on to open a chain of steak restaurants, Fatty Arbuckle, which he had recently sold for a large sum. He was now based mainly in Dublin and was doing a bit of leisurely property investment, moving round the world, enjoying himself.

He had continued to be in touch with John and had worked with him for a while in the late Sixties, pre-Yoko, as his PA, and then later at Apple. He went back to concentrating on his own businesses when John moved to the USA with Yoko.

Meanwhile Rod, having finished Cambridge, had for a time been on the dole, then had led overland adventures, before becoming a lecturer in tourism.

After leaving school, Eric had gone to sea as a merchant navy officer for eight years, then did odd jobs till joining the Civil Service. He rose to be Head of Planning and Production for the Scottish Prison Service, based in Edinburgh. He then retired from the civil service and had his own small chain of dry cleaners.

Len had emigrated to New Zealand, then returned to Liverpool, working as a care worker. Colin, the drummer, had remained all the time in Liverpool, still working as an upholsterer.

I was so fascinated by their stories when I met them in Cuba, and also, of course, by Pete’s first-hand knowledge of John from the age of six to the end of his life, that I did a book about the Quarrymen, past and present, which came out in 2001.

Eric Griffiths has since died – in Edinburgh in 2005 – leaving a wife, Relda, and three sons. Pete Shotton has retired from playing with the present-day Quarrymen.

The last time I met Pete, in 2007 when he visited me in London, he seemed to be living mainly in Cyprus. He’d come in contact again with John, so he maintained, through an American medium. This didn’t sound like Pete, who had always appeared a no-nonsense sceptic, but he swore that John was now communicating with him, talking about the old days, and they were making music together.

However, the other three were still doing Original Quarrymen gigs in 2009, playing old skiffle music at Beatles functions around the world, and had produced several successful CDs. They had been joined by John Duff Lowe who had also been an early member of the Quarrymen – having played the piano on that first amateur record. During all those intervening years, before meeting up again, Duff, as he was always called, had settled in Bristol and become a financial advisor.

Let’s hope the Quarrymen continue for a few more years. After a gap of four decades, they did finally make it, doing world tours, making records, just like the Beatles.

They even attract groupies. ‘The trouble is,’ so Pete told me in Cuba, ‘they’re all getting into their sixties, but at our age we can’t be choosy …’

Discography of Beatles’ original records

all compositions by Lennon and McCartney unless otherwise stated

Germany 1961

As the backing group for singer Tony Sheridan they recorded eight numbers. Only one was an original composition, an instrumental number called ‘Cry For A Shadow’, written by Lennon and Harrison. On one other, ‘Ain’t She Sweet’, John Lennon was the lead singer. On the other six they were simply the backing group: ‘My Bonnie’, ‘The Saints’, ‘Sweet Georgia Brown’, ‘Take Out Some Insurance On Me, Baby’, ‘Why’, ‘Nobody’s Child’.