I grew up a few miles outside Liverpool, at the best time to be growing up – just as The Beatles and what became the Sounds of the Sixties were emerging.
The first LP I bought – and they were LPs in those days, not albums – was The Beatles’ first LP, Please Please Me. I badgered my parents for the money to buy it. It was released on March 22, 1963, just a couple of months after the single, Please Please Me, had been released, on January 11th. The single reached number 1 in two of the pop charts but only number 2 in the Record Retailer chart, which later morphed into the official UK top ten chart.
I first saw the Beatles on a local news program, Scene at 6.30, which came on after the national Six o’clock News and which our family always watched as it of course had all our local news. One week they did a short film about the Beatles because their first single, Love Me Do, was about to come out. They filmed them live in the Cavern… and I was hooked. The film was in black and white but now we can see what it might have looked like in colour. Notice how the boys had dressed up for the occasion of their TV debut, under the influence of Brian Epstein, instead of wearing their usual leathers and jeans.
https://youtu.be/PuZDCIafUIA?si=mjC_VBLC8OMcpgOV
I managed to buy the LP, which cost £32/6d (£1.625) by persuading my parents to advance me several weeks of pocket money and to regard it as my next birthday present too – even though my birthday was three months away. But it worked!
It probably worked to their regret, as I wore out the needle on my record player (remember when you needed a sharp needle to listen to music?) by playing the record over and over again, especially the final track, Twist and Shout.
It was the start of what would become a life-long dedication to The Beatles, and later to other groups (they weren’t yet bands) in the Sixties. My second-favourites were The Hollies, just ahead of The Rolling Stones and The Searchers, but really I loved so many groups, including The Animals, The Dave Clark Five, Gerry and the Pacemakers, Manfred Mann, The Kinks…. and on and on.
And that’s who this website is devoted to… the Sounds of the Sixties, which all began with Love Me Do.
