There Goes Pete Best
Randolph Peter Best (born November 24, 1941 in Madras, India) is a British musician, best known as the original drummer for The Beatles.
Early years
Pete Best is the son of Mona Best, the owner of the Casbah Club, where The Beatles later played.
During 1961-1962, Neil Aspinall became good friends with Best and subsequently rented a room in the house where Best lived with his parents. During one of the extended business trips of Best's father, Aspinall became romantically involved with Mona, who was 20 years his senior. Aspinall fathered a child by Mona (Vincent "Roag" Best) who is Best's half-brother.
The Beatles
The British cover of My Bonnie.Finding themselves drummerless before their upcoming engagement in Hamburg, on 12 August 1960 the group invited Best to become their drummer. Best had played with The Blackjacks in the Casbah Club, owned by Pete's mother, Mona Best. This was a cellar club in West Derby, Liverpool, where The Beatles had played and often visited. In the documentary The Compleat Beatles, Allan Williams said that Best "played not too cleverly, but passable".
The Beatles first played at the Indra club, sleeping in small, dirty rooms in the Bambi Kino, and then moved (after the closure of the Indra) to the larger Kaiserkeller. In October 1960, they left Koschmider's club and worked at the "Top Ten Club", which was run by Peter Eckhorn. When Best and Paul McCartney went back to the Bambi Kino to get their belongings they found it in almost total darkness. As a snub to Koschmider, they found a condom, attached it to a nail on the concrete wall of their room, and set fire to it. There was no real damage, but Koschmider reported them both for attempted arson. McCartney and Best spent three hours in a local jail and were deported, as was George Harrison, for working under the legal age limit.
The reunited Beatles returned to Hamburg in April 1961. While playing at the Top Ten Club they were recruited by singer Tony Sheridan to act as his backing band on a series of recordings for the German Polydor Records label, produced by famed bandleader Bert Kaempfert. Kaempfert signed the group to its own Polydor contract at the first session on June 22, 1961. On October 31 Polydor released the recording "My Bonnie (Mein Herz ist bei dir nur)", which appeared on the German charts under the name "Tony Sheridan and the Beat Brothers", a generic name used for whoever happened to be in Sheridan's backup band.
Dismissal
Best, Sutcliffe, and Harrison in 1960.The Beatles played a Parlophone audition at Abbey Road Studios for George Martin in June 1962. The session convinced Martin that the group was good enough to be signed to a contract, but with one exception: Martin and his recording engineer did not like Best's playing. (Martin used Andy White on the third session for "Love Me Do" on September 11).
When the group heard that Martin did not like Best's playing, John Lennon, McCartney and Harrison asked Brian Epstein, who had taken over as manager in January, to fire Best from the band. Epstein agonised about the decision, and asked Bob Wooler if it was a good idea, to which Wooler replied that Best was too popular with the fans to get rid of. Epstein dismissed Best on 16 August 1962.
Aspinall was waiting downstairs in Epstein's NEMS record shop after Best's dismissal, and was the first one to talk to then ex-Beatle in The Grapes pub, across from The Cavern. Aspinall was furious and said that he would stop working for them as wellhe had been employed as the band's road manager and personal assistantbut Best strongly advised him not to. Aspinall decided to stay, but ended his relationship with Mona (and his three-week-old baby, Roag). Aspinall asked McCartney and Lennon at the next concert why they had fired Best. They replied, "Its got nothing to do with you youre only the driver."
Ringo Starr took Best's place, as Starr had previously played with Rory Storm and the Hurricanes, and had previously stepped in to drum with The Beatles when Best was ill or unable to play. When word of Best's replacement broke in Liverpool (through outlets like Mersey Beat), many Beatles' fans were upset, and one gave Harrison a black eye. Many female fans considered Best to be the band's best-looking member and at many early shows, Best had his own group of female fans present in the audience. Fans would cheer "Pete forever, Ringo never!"
Reasons
There was speculation by some that Best's popularity with fans was a source of friction. In addition, Epstein had become exasperated with Best's refusal to adopt the distinctive hairstyle as part of their unified look. While Lennon, McCartney and Harrison usually spent their offstage time together, practicing their music or socialising, Best generally went off alone. He therefore was not privy to many of the group's experiences, references, and in-jokes.
When the group adopted the mop-top-style Beatle haircut, Best did not follow suit. In a 1995 BBC Radio Merseyside interview, Astrid Kirchherr, who was former bassist Stuart Sutcliffe's girlfrend at the time, explained this:
My boyfriend, Klaus Voorman, had this hairstyle, and Stuart liked it very, very much. He was the first one who really got the nerve to get the Brylcreem out of his hair, and asking me to cut his hair for him. ... Pete Best has really curly hair, and it wouldn't work.
Pop historian and Radio Merseyside presenter Spencer Leigh wrote a book chronicling Best's firing, suggesting that the other members, McCartney in particular, were jealous. Leigh reiterated Mersey Beat's report that during the Teenagers' Turn showcase: "John, Paul and George made their entrance on stage to cheers and applause, but when Pete walked on, the fans went wild. The girls screamed! In Manchester his popularity was assured by his looks alone. Pete was almost killed with kindness at the stage door afterwards by attentive females while the other members were allowed to board a ticking over charabanc, after signing a few autographs." McCartney's father Jim was present at this incident and admonished Best: "Why did you have to attract all the attention? Why didn't you call the other lads back? I think that was very selfish of you."
McCartney's father later encountered the dismissed Best in the Cavern Club when a Beatles' gig was being recorded for the ITV series Know the North, and said "Great, isn't it! They're on TV!" Observers reported that Best bit his tongue, and quietly left.
After The Beatles
A few days after Best was dismissed, Epstein tried to console him by offering to build another group around him, but Best was not interested. Best instead joined Lee Curtis & the All Stars, which then broke off from Curtis and became Pete Best & the All Stars. They signed to Decca Records who had previously rejected The Beatles, signing the Tremeloes instead and released the single "I'm Gonna Knock On Your Door". The single flopped.
Best then relocated to the United States along with songwriters Wayne Bickerton and Tony Waddington. As the Pete Best Four and later the Pete Best Combo (increasing their number to five), they toured America with a combination of 1950s songs and original tunes, recording for small labels, but had little success. They ultimately released an album on Cameo Records titled Best Of The Beatles (a play on Best's name, leading to disappointment for record buyers who expected a Beatles compilation). The group disbanded shortly afterward. (Bickerton and Waddington were to find much greater success as songwriters in the 1970s for a series of hits by the Rubettes.)
Best decided to leave show business, and by the time of Hunter Davies' 1968 authorised Beatles' biography, he was neither willing to talk about nor otherwise cash in on his Beatles association. Best became a baker, earning 8 a week and marrying a girl named Kathy who worked at the biscuit counter at a Woolworth's store. He later became a civil servant.
Later years
In time, Best began giving interviews to the media, wrote about his time with The Beatles, and served as a technical advisor for the television movie Birth of the Beatles. Thus, Best eventually found a modicum of independent fame, and toured as leader of the Pete Best Band. He has admitted to being a fan of his former band's music, and owning their records.
When the surviving Beatles released their Anthology in 1995, which featured a number of tracks with Best as drummer, Best received a substantial windfall apparently between 1 million and 4 million from the sales. He was not interviewed for the book or the television documentaries, and later disputed Harrison's statement that he remembered Best missing several live gigs, with his future replacement, Starr, sitting in for the night (this is documented to have occurred on at least one occasion). His image on an early group photo used on the cover was prominently and purposefully obscured by a cut-out of Starr, contrasting with the cover collage's inclusion of fellow former early Beatle Stuart Sutcliffe's portrait. (However, Best is visible in another, less prominent, photo also appearing on the cover.) Additionally, "Ain't She Sweet," one of the early tracks included on the compilation album to feature Best on drums, was presented in its 1964 U.S. mono single mix, which had been remixed (by Atlantic Records for release on its Atco label) with another studio drummer playing over Best's original drumming. Best recently appeared in a television special built around him titled Best of The Beatles, telling his life story.
PB touring in the new millennium
Pete Best has been regularly touring the U.S. with his Pete Best Band. The current PBB line-up as of Fall 2007 features three vocalists and outstanding harmonies: Phil Melia on lead guitar, Tony Flynn on rhythm guitar and Paul Parry on bass guitar. Best shares the drumming chores with his younger brother Roag Best.
July 6, 2007, marked the 50th Anniversary of the day John Lennon and Paul McCartney were introduced to each other in Woolton. While the reunited Quarrymen were performing across the pond in Liverpool, the Pete Best Band was appearing in Liverpool, NY, on that same evening for American Beatles fans.
Pete Best was inducted into the All You Need Is Liverpool Music Hall of Fame as the debut Charter Member. Paul Davie presented Pete Best with a framed certificate before the PBB commenced their performance. Pete Best and his seasoned road band are hard at work in the Casbah Club recording studio preparing a new studio album for release in 2008.
Randolph Peter Best (born November 24, 1941 in Madras, India) is a British musician, best known as the original drummer for The Beatles.
Early years
Pete Best is the son of Mona Best, the owner of the Casbah Club, where The Beatles later played.
During 1961-1962, Neil Aspinall became good friends with Best and subsequently rented a room in the house where Best lived with his parents. During one of the extended business trips of Best's father, Aspinall became romantically involved with Mona, who was 20 years his senior. Aspinall fathered a child by Mona (Vincent "Roag" Best) who is Best's half-brother.
The Beatles
The British cover of My Bonnie.Finding themselves drummerless before their upcoming engagement in Hamburg, on 12 August 1960 the group invited Best to become their drummer. Best had played with The Blackjacks in the Casbah Club, owned by Pete's mother, Mona Best. This was a cellar club in West Derby, Liverpool, where The Beatles had played and often visited. In the documentary The Compleat Beatles, Allan Williams said that Best "played not too cleverly, but passable".
The Beatles first played at the Indra club, sleeping in small, dirty rooms in the Bambi Kino, and then moved (after the closure of the Indra) to the larger Kaiserkeller. In October 1960, they left Koschmider's club and worked at the "Top Ten Club", which was run by Peter Eckhorn. When Best and Paul McCartney went back to the Bambi Kino to get their belongings they found it in almost total darkness. As a snub to Koschmider, they found a condom, attached it to a nail on the concrete wall of their room, and set fire to it. There was no real damage, but Koschmider reported them both for attempted arson. McCartney and Best spent three hours in a local jail and were deported, as was George Harrison, for working under the legal age limit.
The reunited Beatles returned to Hamburg in April 1961. While playing at the Top Ten Club they were recruited by singer Tony Sheridan to act as his backing band on a series of recordings for the German Polydor Records label, produced by famed bandleader Bert Kaempfert. Kaempfert signed the group to its own Polydor contract at the first session on June 22, 1961. On October 31 Polydor released the recording "My Bonnie (Mein Herz ist bei dir nur)", which appeared on the German charts under the name "Tony Sheridan and the Beat Brothers", a generic name used for whoever happened to be in Sheridan's backup band.
Dismissal
Best, Sutcliffe, and Harrison in 1960.The Beatles played a Parlophone audition at Abbey Road Studios for George Martin in June 1962. The session convinced Martin that the group was good enough to be signed to a contract, but with one exception: Martin and his recording engineer did not like Best's playing. (Martin used Andy White on the third session for "Love Me Do" on September 11).
When the group heard that Martin did not like Best's playing, John Lennon, McCartney and Harrison asked Brian Epstein, who had taken over as manager in January, to fire Best from the band. Epstein agonised about the decision, and asked Bob Wooler if it was a good idea, to which Wooler replied that Best was too popular with the fans to get rid of. Epstein dismissed Best on 16 August 1962.
Aspinall was waiting downstairs in Epstein's NEMS record shop after Best's dismissal, and was the first one to talk to then ex-Beatle in The Grapes pub, across from The Cavern. Aspinall was furious and said that he would stop working for them as wellhe had been employed as the band's road manager and personal assistantbut Best strongly advised him not to. Aspinall decided to stay, but ended his relationship with Mona (and his three-week-old baby, Roag). Aspinall asked McCartney and Lennon at the next concert why they had fired Best. They replied, "Its got nothing to do with you youre only the driver."
Ringo Starr took Best's place, as Starr had previously played with Rory Storm and the Hurricanes, and had previously stepped in to drum with The Beatles when Best was ill or unable to play. When word of Best's replacement broke in Liverpool (through outlets like Mersey Beat), many Beatles' fans were upset, and one gave Harrison a black eye. Many female fans considered Best to be the band's best-looking member and at many early shows, Best had his own group of female fans present in the audience. Fans would cheer "Pete forever, Ringo never!"
Reasons
There was speculation by some that Best's popularity with fans was a source of friction. In addition, Epstein had become exasperated with Best's refusal to adopt the distinctive hairstyle as part of their unified look. While Lennon, McCartney and Harrison usually spent their offstage time together, practicing their music or socialising, Best generally went off alone. He therefore was not privy to many of the group's experiences, references, and in-jokes.
When the group adopted the mop-top-style Beatle haircut, Best did not follow suit. In a 1995 BBC Radio Merseyside interview, Astrid Kirchherr, who was former bassist Stuart Sutcliffe's girlfrend at the time, explained this:
My boyfriend, Klaus Voorman, had this hairstyle, and Stuart liked it very, very much. He was the first one who really got the nerve to get the Brylcreem out of his hair, and asking me to cut his hair for him. ... Pete Best has really curly hair, and it wouldn't work.
Pop historian and Radio Merseyside presenter Spencer Leigh wrote a book chronicling Best's firing, suggesting that the other members, McCartney in particular, were jealous. Leigh reiterated Mersey Beat's report that during the Teenagers' Turn showcase: "John, Paul and George made their entrance on stage to cheers and applause, but when Pete walked on, the fans went wild. The girls screamed! In Manchester his popularity was assured by his looks alone. Pete was almost killed with kindness at the stage door afterwards by attentive females while the other members were allowed to board a ticking over charabanc, after signing a few autographs." McCartney's father Jim was present at this incident and admonished Best: "Why did you have to attract all the attention? Why didn't you call the other lads back? I think that was very selfish of you."
McCartney's father later encountered the dismissed Best in the Cavern Club when a Beatles' gig was being recorded for the ITV series Know the North, and said "Great, isn't it! They're on TV!" Observers reported that Best bit his tongue, and quietly left.
After The Beatles
A few days after Best was dismissed, Epstein tried to console him by offering to build another group around him, but Best was not interested. Best instead joined Lee Curtis & the All Stars, which then broke off from Curtis and became Pete Best & the All Stars. They signed to Decca Records who had previously rejected The Beatles, signing the Tremeloes instead and released the single "I'm Gonna Knock On Your Door". The single flopped.
Best then relocated to the United States along with songwriters Wayne Bickerton and Tony Waddington. As the Pete Best Four and later the Pete Best Combo (increasing their number to five), they toured America with a combination of 1950s songs and original tunes, recording for small labels, but had little success. They ultimately released an album on Cameo Records titled Best Of The Beatles (a play on Best's name, leading to disappointment for record buyers who expected a Beatles compilation). The group disbanded shortly afterward. (Bickerton and Waddington were to find much greater success as songwriters in the 1970s for a series of hits by the Rubettes.)
Best decided to leave show business, and by the time of Hunter Davies' 1968 authorised Beatles' biography, he was neither willing to talk about nor otherwise cash in on his Beatles association. Best became a baker, earning 8 a week and marrying a girl named Kathy who worked at the biscuit counter at a Woolworth's store. He later became a civil servant.
Later years
In time, Best began giving interviews to the media, wrote about his time with The Beatles, and served as a technical advisor for the television movie Birth of the Beatles. Thus, Best eventually found a modicum of independent fame, and toured as leader of the Pete Best Band. He has admitted to being a fan of his former band's music, and owning their records.
When the surviving Beatles released their Anthology in 1995, which featured a number of tracks with Best as drummer, Best received a substantial windfall apparently between 1 million and 4 million from the sales. He was not interviewed for the book or the television documentaries, and later disputed Harrison's statement that he remembered Best missing several live gigs, with his future replacement, Starr, sitting in for the night (this is documented to have occurred on at least one occasion). His image on an early group photo used on the cover was prominently and purposefully obscured by a cut-out of Starr, contrasting with the cover collage's inclusion of fellow former early Beatle Stuart Sutcliffe's portrait. (However, Best is visible in another, less prominent, photo also appearing on the cover.) Additionally, "Ain't She Sweet," one of the early tracks included on the compilation album to feature Best on drums, was presented in its 1964 U.S. mono single mix, which had been remixed (by Atlantic Records for release on its Atco label) with another studio drummer playing over Best's original drumming. Best recently appeared in a television special built around him titled Best of The Beatles, telling his life story.
PB touring in the new millennium
Pete Best has been regularly touring the U.S. with his Pete Best Band. The current PBB line-up as of Fall 2007 features three vocalists and outstanding harmonies: Phil Melia on lead guitar, Tony Flynn on rhythm guitar and Paul Parry on bass guitar. Best shares the drumming chores with his younger brother Roag Best.
July 6, 2007, marked the 50th Anniversary of the day John Lennon and Paul McCartney were introduced to each other in Woolton. While the reunited Quarrymen were performing across the pond in Liverpool, the Pete Best Band was appearing in Liverpool, NY, on that same evening for American Beatles fans.
Pete Best was inducted into the All You Need Is Liverpool Music Hall of Fame as the debut Charter Member. Paul Davie presented Pete Best with a framed certificate before the PBB commenced their performance. Pete Best and his seasoned road band are hard at work in the Casbah Club recording studio preparing a new studio album for release in 2008.
