Live! at the Star-Club in Hamburg, Germany; 1962.

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Booklet (pages 6-7)	Booklet (pages 8-9)	Booklet (pages 10-11)

Back cover

Another release of the Hamburg tapes variation. See also Puttin’ On The Style (Black Dog BD 009) and Road Runner (Positone Records B4-1235).

Очередная вариация из огромного множества релизов Гамбургских записей группы. Смотри также информацию в Puttin’ On The Style (Black Dog BD 009) и Road Runner (Positone Records B4-1235).

Disc One:

Disc Two:

Linear Notes:

THE BEATLES LIVE! - GERMANY 1962

What can be said about the Beatles that has not already been said or written many times before? The truth is - very little. The history of the Liverpudlian group has been chronicled many times during the last 15 years and inevitably will be repeated in the years to come. More than any pop group before them, and any who have followed since, the "Fab Four" from Liverpool created a whole new wave of music which long ago installed them safely in the annals of pop history. Now though, for the very first time, Beatles' fans can hear the embryo music which paved the way for what was to erupt on an unsuspecting world in the mid and late Sixties. Any pop fan could tell you about how the group's early performing days at the Hamburg Star-Club in West Germany first showed their potential to an audience outside of Liverpool - until now however that music has been lost to all except those relative few who were privileged to hear it first-hand. What you are now holding in your hands is effectively a large slice of pop history ... this CD album contains some two dozen songs given the inimitable Beatles treatment, blemishes and all. Many of the songs were to appear later on the group's first studio albums for Parlophone, EMI, and became essential conclusions in their stage performances during the ensuing months after they swept to success with "Love Me Do" and "Please Please Me", others had seemingly been lost for all time, at least until the production of these albums which now enable everyone to hear the Beatles as they were during those long-ago but still raw and exciting years when every beat group from Liverpool worth its salt was attempting to become part of "the Hamburg Scene".

The appearance on record of this unique Beatles recording has in itself being a major saga worthy of inclusion in a Cecil B. DeMille-type movie. During the Sixties Ted "Kingsize" Taylor and the Dominoes were an integral part of this Hamburg Scene - as well as claiming to be the first beat group to come out of Liverpool -

and it was during one such visit to the Star-Club that Taylor recorded some three hours of performance with his domestic tape recorder and using a single microphone. Amongst the groups whose music was caught on tape were Taylor and the Dominoes, Cliff Bennett and the Rebel Rousers, and - the Beatles.

When the Beatles returned to Liverpool, the tape was for a time forgotten. Kingsize Taylor later offered the material to Brian Epstein who turned it down on the grounds that it would not be commercially viable - although he did offer £20 all the same. The tape was eventually rediscovered.

These Hamburg recordings include pre-EMI versions of "Twist and Shout", "A Taste of Honey", "Kansas City", "I Saw Her Standing There", "Roll Over Beethoven", "Long Tall Sally" and "Ask Me Why". It has been said that the Beatles' best years as a performing group was between 1962 and 1963 but these recordings firmly illustrate that even before the group signed with EMI, their potential was dynamite. A lot of time and considerable financial investment has been spent on each of the 20-plus tracks, transferring the original mono takes to 16-track form and improving their sound quality. It should be emphasised however that no way has the actual music been interfered with - nothing has been added or detracted from the Beatles' original performance, all that has been done is that the tape has been "cleaned" and what were originally very raw recordings have now become extremely listenable product.

Of course the music isn't what you would expect to hear from a studio in 1977 but despite that these recordings were made before the Beatles became 'name' artists, their music even then had that undeniable drive which took them to the top. The music has immense appeal, both as a collector's item and as a general item. What you will be listening to is a piece of musical history, and an album which must become treasured additions to any Beatles fan's record collection.

To recap on those Hamburg days, the Beatles first visited West Germany in late 1960 when the group's line-up was still John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, Stuart Sutcliffe (who was to die tragically young) and drummer Pete Best. Playing in Hamburg either made or broke every Liverpudlian beat group that worked there but it was soon obvious to everyone that this was one group which would be going places. After returning to Liverpool in early 1961 to do a residency at the now-legendary Cavern Club, the Beatles made a second trip to Hamburg in April 1961 during which visit they recorded several titles with Tony Sheridan for a German record company. It was during one visit to Hamburg that these tapes originated and, as luck would have it, although Ringo Starr did not officially join the group until August 1962, which was just about the time the Beatles were having their first recording sessions for EMI, he happened to be "sitting in" for Pete Best on the very night that Ted Taylor decided to make some amateur recordings with his portable machine.

And so to the actual recordings. After a rather garbled German introduction we go straight into "I Saw Her Standing There" which features an identical arrangement to that which appeared on the Please Please Me LP.   "Roll Over Beethoven" has George giving a full-throated vocal; "Hippy Hippy Shake" was a number two hit for Swinging Blue Jeans in early 1964 but even two years before that the Beatles were featuring it as a standard inclusion in their live performances. John Lennon comes to the fore on "Sweet Little Sixteen".

The album throws up a few surprises - for instance a complete rip-off of Frank Ifield's best-seller of that period, "I Remember You", featuring Lennon on the harmonica. Paul McCartney does a surprisingly straight version of the old Marlene Dietrich classic "Falling In Love Again", while George Harrison features on the Phil Spector classic, "To Know Her Is To Love Her".

No matter how many thousands of words were written about the Beatles, the only way for anyone to appreciate their full appeal is to listen to the music. It explains everything. The Beatles' music has managed to span every generation and as ambassadors of pop, no-one is likely to beat them. The Star-Club recordings tell all. The music, is raw, vital and exciting and goes a long way to demonstrating why John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr became such musical legends. The humour, the sheer talent and the audience excitement almost hits you in the eyes...

Until now these tapes have already been heard by no more than a handful of people but it is right that these Hamburg moments should be shared with the millions of Beatles fans worldwide. Four years ago the respected British pop music magazine Melody Maker reviewed the Hamburg tapes as they were in their original state and declared that the music neither injured the reputations of the artists or insulted the intelligence of the listeners. The writer declared that the recordings were a "unique and important document" of the most musical unit of the last decade. More than that they are history and provide the best insight into the early life of the Beatles which most people had thought lost for good.

CHRIS WHITE

London, March 1977

Rock 'n roll music emanating from the USA caught the imagination of the youth of the late 1950s and early 1960s, and its influence spread quickly to Europe through records and radio. Budding young musicians modelled themselves on their American heroes. Competition among the night-clubs on Hamburg's notorious Reeperbahn required a steady flow of the best available musical acts playing the latest sounds for the discerning, and not too forgiving audiences. Night-clubs fiercely competed to be the biggest and the best, and Manfred Weissleder and Horst Faecher's opening of the Star-Club on Friday, April 13t 1962 realised their ambitions. The Star-Club was venue to a host of already "living legends" from across the Atlantic (Little Richard, Ray Charles, Bill Haley and the Comets, Chuck Berry, Gene Vincent, Jerry Lee Lewis, Chubby Checker, Brenda Lee, Everly Brothers etc.), and support acts in its early days included almost every band that you can think of that went on to chart success in the mid-1960's, including the Beatles (historically recorded live on New Year's Eve 1962), Gerry and the Pacemakers, the Searchers, the Walker Brothers etc.

The club's success owed much to the determination of Manfred Weissleder and Horst Fascher that "the show must go on".

K.en Clarke, Lingasong