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Beatles, Music et al, Music of the 60s

John Paul Nerk Twins

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John Paul Nerk Twins

April 23 & 24, 1960 
John Paul Nerk Twins
From a Daily Mail article. “Rookie rockers: Paul McCartney and John Lennon in 1960, soon after their not-so-successful gig at the Fox and Hounds”

Les Paul and Mary Ford, “The World Is Waiting For The Sunrise”

John Paul Nerk Twins

Names

The Beatles went through several name and personnel changes before they became that group with that name that arrived on our US shores in 1964.

According to the “I Am the Beatles” site, here is the sequence of names:

  • The Black Jacks
  • The Quarry Men
  • Johnny and the Moondogs
  • The Nerk Twins
  • The Beatals
  • The Silver Beetles
  • The Silver Beats
  • The Beatles
  • The Silver Beatles
  • The Beatles
John Paul Nerk Twins

Any gig will do

Today  I’ll briefly explore those two nights in April 1960 that John and Paul were the Nerk Twins.

It is always good to keep in mind that the boys were simply young struggling musicians who found gigs however they could.

Fox and Hounds 

Betty Robbins was Paul’s cousin. Betty’s husband, Mike, and she ran the Fox and Hounds in Caversham on the outskirts of Reading, Berkshire.

John and Paul hitchhiked from Liverpool to the tavern and worked behind the bar  for a week. Mike Robbins, aware that they were musicians recommended that they play on Saturday and Sunday nights.

John Paul Nerk Twins

A Nerk

They made posters and the Nerk Twins were born. According to Bill Heckle, owner of The Cavern Club in Liverpool, “In Liverpool, a nerk is a derogatory term for somebody completely without street cred.” Knowing John’s sense of humor, perhaps it was his self-deprecating idea.

Professional advice

Mike Robbins had been an entertainments manager hosting talent contests and asked them what song they’d start with? Paul said “Be Bop A Lula.” Mike asked them if they could do anything more upbeat. Upbeat was the best way to start a show. According to Paul, they took that advice to heart and used it for arranging future shows.

So they decided to play a cover of Les Paul and Mary Ford’s “The World Is Waiting For The Sunrise.” It’s the Les Paul and Mary Ford version from 1953 that you hear at the top of today’s entry.

No relics

No one recorded the Nerk Twins. And the few patrons who heard them those April nights cared. According to Mike Robbins, one of the locals said, “They were a load of bloody rubbish but they brought a bit of life into the pub.”

What about those handmade posters? No one has ever found one and I suspect that if someone does it’ll be worth a few bob.

John Paul Nerk Twins
Beatles, Music et al, Music of the 60s, Peace Love Art and Activism, Today in history

John Paul Record Ballad

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John Paul Record Ballad

John and Cynthia

John Lennon met Cynthia Powell when they were students at Liverpool Art College in 1957. In 1962, she became pregnant. John apparently said “There’s only one thing for it Cyn – we’ll have to get married” and on  August 23 that’s exactly what they did.  

On the verge of succeeding as a band particularly with many female teenagers, manager Brian Epstein kept the marriage low key.

On April 8, 1963 Julian Lennon was born.

John Paul Record Ballad

John meets Yoko

On November 7, 1966, John  visited the Indica Gallery in London. He met Yoko Ono displaying her art.

Ballad of John and Yoko
poster for Yoko’s exhibition

Of that meeting, John later reflected, “The old gang of mine was over the moment I met her. I didn’t consciously know it at the time, but that’s what was going on. As soon as I met her, that was the end of the boys, but it so happened that the boys were well known and weren’t just the local guys at the bar.” (from All We Are Saying, by David Sheff)

On November 8, 1968 Cynthia Lennon and John divorced.  Cynthia had filed for divorce in August 1968 no longer able to ignore John and Yoko’s relationship.

Miscarriage/Marriage

On November 21, 1968,  Yoko suffered a miscarriage.

On March 20, 1969 John and Yoko married in Gibraltar.

John Paul Record Ballad

Ballad of John and Yoko

On April 14, 1969, John Lennon and Paul McCartney recorded “The Ballad of John and Yoko.” John had written the song in the days following his and Yoko’s marriage. Work on the Let It Be album had often been contentious among the then less-than-Fab Four.

A break-up was imminent, but Paul McCartney later reflected, “John was in an impatient mood so I was happy to help. It’s quite a good song; it has always surprised me how with just the two of us on it, it ended up sounding like The Beatles.” (from Many Years From Now by Barry Miles)

They recorded the song at Abbey Road’s Studio Three in a session beginning at 2:30 pm and ending at 9 pm.

It was then mixed for stereo, and was finished and ready for release by 11 pm. According to George Martin, Yoko Ono was present in the studio, although she appears to have played no part in the recording.

John Paul Record Ballad

George Martin

George Martin later said in Anthology, “I enjoyed working with John and Yoko on The Ballad Of John And Yoko. It was just the two of them with Paul. When you think about it, in a funny kind of way it was the beginning of their own label, and their own way of recording. It was hardly a Beatle track. It was a kind of thin end of the wedge, as far as they were concerned. John had already mentally left the group anyway, and I think that was just the beginning of it all.” 

In 1966, John comments regarding the Beatles and Christianity had gotten no reaction in the UK but blew up in the American press. Some radio stations refused to play Beatle music.

Aware that the Ballad line “Christ you know it ain’t easy” could re-ignite that controversy, the song was kept “secret” until its release.

Apple released it on May 30 in the UK and on June 4 in the US. True to expectations, some top-40 US stations refused to play it and some played a version with the word “Christ” reversed in an attempt to avoid criticism.

Ironically, the Spanish government had no issue with the word Christ, but did have a problem with the line “you can get married in Gibraltar near Spain” as Spain considered Gibraltar part of Spain not the UK.

Ballad of John and Yoko
cover of John and Yoko’s wedding album

 

The lyrics tell the story:

Standing in the dock at Southampton
Trying to get to Holland or France
The man in the mac said
You’ve got to go back
You know they didn’t even give us a chance(chorus) Christ you know it ain’t easy
You know how hard it can be
The way things are going
They’re going to crucify me Finally made the plane into Paris
Honeymooning down by the Seine
Peter Brown call to say
You can make it O.K.
You can get married in Gibraltar near Spain(chorus)Drove from Paris to the Amsterdam Hilton
Talking in our beds for a week
The newspapers said Say what’re you doing in bed
I said we’re only trying to get us some peace(chorus)Saving up your money for a rainy day		 Giving all your clothes to charity
Last night the wife said
Oh boy when you’re dead
You don’t take nothing with you but your soul, thinkMade a lightning trip to Vienna
Eating chocolate cake in a bag
The newspapers said
She’s gone to his head
They look just like two gurus in drag(chorus)Caught the early plane back to London
Fifty acorns tied in a sack
The men from the press
Said we wish you success
It’s good to have the both of you back (chorus)

John Paul Record Ballad
Beatles, Music et al

John Lennon Meets Brandy Alexander

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John Lennon Meets Brandy Alexander

March 13, 1973
“Remember” By Harry Nilsson

John Lennon Meets Brandy Alexander

The 1970s arrived and the Beatles departed. Each Beatle recording albums, releasing singles.

Separately.

After the commercial flop of his “Some Time in New York City” album, John Lennon’s post-Beatle life became reckless. Many continued to blame Yoko and him for the Beatle break-up. In reality, the seeds of disunion were from within. The band too often ignored gentle George Harrison’s musical contributions. They had put aside the affable Ringo Starr. “He was just lucky, not talented” was a common misconception. John and Paul, who had rarely truly collaborated on songs, had gone in different directions long before 1969.

John Lennon Meets Brandy Alexander

May Pang

John Lennon Meets Brandy AlexanderJohn and Yoko’s marriage was floundering and they mutually agreed to separate. In fact a separation that included John’s living with May Pang, their common assistant.

Lennon and Pang spent time in both New York City and Los Angeles. John referred to his and Yoko’s time of separation as “The Lost Weekend.”  [Wikipedia entry on movie]

John Lennon Meets Brandy Alexander

Harry Nilsson

The Beatles admired Harry Nilsson and John looked up Harry when he and May arrived in LA. Nilsson loved to party and was very good at getting others to party with him and equally good at getting others in trouble.

According to May Pang, John…”loved his energy; he loved his writing. What he loved in Harry was the beauty of his friendship and relaxed personality. That’s what he saw. Harry drank, a lot. But Harry was the type of guy that if you go out drinking with him, he’d be sure at the end of the night that there would be a big brawl and that you are the one who’s in trouble, even though he started it. Harry would keep feeding John drinks until it was too late.”

CBS TV had cancelled the Smothers brothers show and they were returning to live club performances. They were at the Troubadour on March 13, 1974. John Lennon was drunk on Brandy Alexanders (thank you Harry) and disrupted the brothers’ act with relentless heckling (thank you Harry who told John that the brothers worked best if heckled). Smothers’ manager Ken Fritz said, “I went over and asked Harry to try to shut up Lennon. Harry said, ‘I’m trying – don’t blame me!’ When Lennon continued, I told him to keep quiet. He swung and hit me in the jaw.”

Lennon and Nilsson were hustled out of the Troubadour, knocking over a few tables in the process. “It was horrendous,” Tom Smothers recalled.

John Lennon Meets Brandy Alexander

The Last of Lennon-McCartney

The Troubadour incident was a wake-up call for Lennon and Nilsson. Lennon soon announced he would produce Nilsson’s next album, ‘Pussy Cats.’ They decided that the LP’s musicians should live together during the sessions. Lennon and Nilsson, along with Ringo Starr and Keith Moon, moved into a Santa Monica beach house.

Two weeks later on March 28, Stevie Wonder and Paul McCartney unexpectedly joined Lennon, Nilsson and others for a midnight jam. Ringo had been there, but left earlier, so McCartney sat in on drums and sang harmony to Lennon’s lead vocals. Lennon also played guitar with Wonder on electric piano. Despite the star-studded lineup, standards like ‘Lucille’ and ‘Stand By Me,’ marred by technical problems, were disappointing.

By evening’s end, Lennon and McCartney agreed to see each other again but it would be the last time the two ex-Beatles would play together in a studio.

John Lennon Meets Brandy Alexander