St Paul's Church, Covent Garden: Paul pops up.

As ye will shurely know by now, Paul done a pop up in Covent Garden today...and I was there! What's more, it was the second time in 3 days that I'd got within pantie-chucking distance of the great man (Errr...are you sure about the "panties" bit? - "Smalls" Ed.), having also been fortunate enough to get in to Wednesday's Maida Vale Radio 6 session (via a jammy mate who'd won tickets).
Lizzie Bravo emailed this morning to say it was happening, and so off I did scoot, pausing only to attend to my appearance; today I brushed all 4 of my remaining teeth. I got to Covent Garden with undue haste, to be greeted by the above scene...and within 10 minutes or so, there was Sir Macca plus band, as follows, running through a nifty 20 minute set:

At the "magic" piano:

The following two quite extraordinary pictures are available for licensing to the major agencies:

...and before ye knew it, over it all was:

I'd also been meaning to get a Nau at the newly re-opened HMV on Oxford Street, and today seemed like the day. Paul, of course, was signing copies of "New" there after the Covent Garden show, and it was all fairly chaotic. Here's how the shop looked when Brian turned up all those years ago, plus the present day consequences:

So, a fairly interesting couple of days then. One of the many good things about Mr Lewisohn's tome is that it treats all 4 of them as equally important to the story; there's no bias. There's no John bias, no Paul bias, no George bias, no Ringo bias. Basically, what I'm trying to say is that there's no bias.
By contrast, it can't be denied that this blog has a certain Lennon-centricity. A Lencentricity, if ye will. But, lest there be any doubt, and to paraphrase someone, if there is such a thing as a genius, then I think Paul is one...and if there isn't, I don't care either.
The Maida Vale gig on Wednesday took place in a small room, and to be 10 feet in front of "THE BASS", and actually hear Paul's superlative playing coming straight out of his amp, to trouser-flapping effect, was a truly fantastic experience. He really is quite good, isn't he? That is all.

Saltney Street/Dublin Street, Liverpool: Bonded Tea Warehouse.

Oh, wot a statement: the four of them pitched up on a patch of wasteland in front of a derelict warehouse, and a very odd sort of glamour, even now. Having made a few desultory attempts to track down this locale, I'd long since given up. Surely it had gone the way of much else immediately north of the Pier Head? Amazingly enough, no. It's still there - the Bonded Tea Warehouse on Dublin Street.
The adjacent Saltney Street was, according to Mr Lewisohn's esteemed tome, the very place where John's Irish ancestors had been domiciled in what were fairly appalling conditions (cholera etc). The housing is long gone, but the arrow marks the warehousal spot: tea, Indian tea, but no biscuits:

So, co-incidentally, here they appeared in late September 1962, and the warehouse has not changed one little bit half a century later:

In the interim, the patch of scrubland (formerly cholera-ridden housing) has been re-built upon, and currently accomodates a motley collection of wholesalers, car part suppliers et al, thus making it impossible to obtain an exact Then unt Nau, but the spot must lie roughly towards the back of this yard:

His Very Bobness also pops up here in 1966, around a fortnight before being captured on film talking shite with John in the back of a car (possibly coming from Kenwood) for Eat The Document:

Note the Brown Cow pub:

The building still there on the corner, next to the warehouse:

There are quite a few great pics of Bob on Dublin Street (a Google search will reveal several more), and one wonders how co-incidental this was. Bob has form, even turning up on a National Trust tour of Mendips a few years back, sly little Beatlemaniac that he is.
Anyway, I was very pleased to discover this not so little relic remains.

Mark Lewisohn's All These Years: 10.5/10.

(I've pretty much finished the trade edition of Mr Lewisohn's tome, and so here are a few mercifully brief thoughts. Before I begin, I should state that Mark is a mate, and a good one, so don't take this as a review, but rather a recommendation.)

It's been called The World At War of rock biographies, in that this is an enormous work of layered history, but what it puts me most in mind of is War and Peace. Obviously, Tolstoy's "whoppa" is historical fiction, and Mark's "bewk" has been written specifically to counteract the various and manifold fictions that have crept in to endless re-tellings of "the 20th century's greatest romance". Yet the structure of the thing, with multiple personal histories unfolding in parallel against the backdrop of a rapidly changing society, really reminds me of Lev's "big-boy". And these books are both, of course, very big-boys indeed.

All These Years is a magnificent piece of work, dense and detailed, but fast moving and, usefully, written free from hindsight-based comment, thus allowing the story to unfold as it happened. Mark's prose is clear, clever and highly readable. The big events are fully explained for the first time, and the small ones are, in many cases also for the first time, err...also explained. I haven't read another book which manages to convey the atmosphere and gathering excitement of those times as well as this.

I only have one real criticism, and, funnily enough, the very same one I'd level at War and Peace: it's too short. (Luckily, this will be rectified next month.)

If you are entertaining any doubts about reading yet another book about the Beatles, then cast these aside immediately, buy a copy and prepare to learn a lot (including why a sandwich would be the best symbol for John Lennon International Airport in Liverpool).

Roll on Volume 2 (no bread based punnery intended).

Kenwood: summer, 1968.

Screencaps filched from further footage, filmed at Kenwood beside the pool and in the sunroom, circa summer '68:

...no doubt the same day as the similar colour footage which has been up on YouTube for a while:

Ya nevah know, some naughty person might put this up one day too.

Mark Lewisohn: new ATY interview.

One month to go...

Hong Kong: Tiger Balm Garden/Mandarin Hotel.

In June 1977, John took Sean to Hong Kong, accompanied by a small retinue. The postcard above captures the location of the Tiger Balm Garden location, as visited by all concerned. The Gardens were a popular tourist spot, featuring, as they did, many gaudy statues, including the wedding ceremony of a pig and a rabbit, and a huge depiction of the 18 levels of hell from Taoist teachings. Inevitably, the whole lot was demolished a few years back in order to put up four skyscrapers, though some of the statuary was salvaged.
Whilst in HK, John, Sean plus all important small retinue stayed in the Mandarin hotel, where John happened to bump into David "Dave" Bowie one day.
Quoth the Dame: "Last time I saw John Lennon was in Hong Kong, we went to a Hong Kong market and there was a stall that sold old clothes and there was a Beatles jacket on the stall, and I did something that is not usually in my character—I asked him to put it on, so that I could take a photograph. I took a photograph, and I still got the photograph. The jacket doesn't fit properly, it looks like John has outgrown it.”
Here's a pic, taken that day in the garden of the aforementioned Mandarin:

Bowie and Lennon were acquaintances in the mid-1970s, of course, and Dave has recounted a couple of amusing anecdotes, to wit:
“It's impossible for me to talk about popular music without mentioning probably my greatest mentor, John Lennon. I guess he defined for me, at any rate, how one could twist and turn the fabric of pop and imbue it with elements from other artforms, often producing something extremely beautiful, very powerful and imbued with strangeness. Also, uninvited, John would wax on endlessly about any topic under the sun and was over-endowed with opinions. I immediately felt empathy with that. Whenever the two of us got together it started to resemble Beavis and Butthead on "Crossfire."
The seductive thing about John was his sense of humor. Surrealistically enough, we were first introduced in about 1974 by Elizabeth Taylor. Miss Taylor had been trying to get me to make a movie with her. It involved going to Russia and wearing something red, gold and diaphanous. Not terribly encouraging, really. I can't remember what it was called -- it wasn'tOn the Waterfront, anyway, I know that.
We were in LA, and one night she had a party to which both John and I had been invited. I think we were polite with each other, in that kind of older-younger way. Although there were only a few years between us, in rock and roll that's a generation, you know? Oh boy, is it ever.
So John was sort of [in Liverpool accent] "Oh, here comes another new one." And I was sort of, "It's John Lennon! I don't know what to say. Don't mention the Beatles, you'll look really stupid."
And he said, "Hello, Dave." And I said, "I've got everything you've made -- except the Beatles."
A couple of nights later we found ourselves backstage at the Grammys where I had to present "the thing" to Aretha Franklin. Before the show I'd been telling John that I didn't think America really got what I did, that I was misunderstood. Remember that I was in my 20s and out of my head.
So the big moment came and I ripped open the envelope and announced, "The winner is Aretha Franklin." Aretha steps forward, and with not so much as a glance in my direction, snatches the trophy out of my hands and says, "Thank you everybody. I'm so happy I could even kiss David Bowie." Which she didn't! And she promptly spun around swanned off stage right. So I slunk off stage left.
And John bounds over and gives me a theatrical kiss and a hug and says "See, Dave. America loves ya."
We pretty much got on like a house on fire after that.
He once famously described glam rock as just rock and roll with lipstick on. He was wrong of course, but it was very funny.
Towards the end of the 70s, a group of us went off to Hong Kong on a holiday and John was in, sort of, house-husband mode and wanted to show Sean the world. And during one of our expeditions on the back streets a kid comes running up to him and says, "Are you John Lennon?" And he said, "No but I wish I had his money." Which I promptly stole for myself.
[imitating a fan] "Are you David Bowie?"
No, but I wish I had his money.
It's brilliant. It was such a wonderful thing to say. The kid said, "Oh, sorry. Of course you aren't," and ran off. I thought, "This is the most effective device I've heard."
I was back in New York a couple of months later in Soho, downtown, and a voice pipes up in my ear, "Are you David Bowie?" And I said, "No, but I wish I had his money."
"You lying bastard. You wish you had my money." It was John Lennon.”
Bowie has also said that he captured some footage of John in 1975, whilst filming test material for a proposed Diamond Dogs film:
"Every now and then the camera catches sight of [John Lennon] in the background, sitting there with his guitar playing hits of the day and saying, ‘What the bloody hell are you doing, Bowie? It’s so negative, all your shit, all this Diamond Dogs mutant crap!’”
As far as I know, this delightful filmic exchange has yet to see daylight.

Kenwood: Vroom etc.

Some photos of John's old Ferrari, briefly returned to Kenwood, in order to publicise the recent sale of same. Above in almost the very spot where cousin Stan posed back in the day. Below, up the drive:

I find these a bit odd, for some reason.:

And there are more knocking about on-line, for them that can be bothered to seek:

Wolsey Road, Esher: Quill Cottage.

John bought several houses for those close to him, including this one in Wolsey Road, Esher, which served as home to Cyn's mother Lilian, for a while at least. The above pic of Julian plus all-important "Nan" was probably taken around 1966. "Lil", however, was out by early 1967, when Terry Doran moved in.
Readahs will no doubt recall the Kenwood bit in Hunter's bewk, wherein Tezza turns up and rolls a few for John, before heading off around midnight. The drive from St George's Hill to Esher is a short one, or an interminably long one, depending upon the strength of the etc.. But I digress.
Presumably this was taken in the back garden:

Here's a wider shot of the house, as it is these days:

Afore ye rush en-masse, ye Lennonites, to visit the above, bear in mind that John may well never have been there in actuality; I wouldn't be surprised if it was all handled via various third parties, as much was in those days. "Lil" or Doran maniacs, on the other hand, have at it!
The above pic taken by Mr Lewisohn, so fanks, as ever, to him. (I wonder if the present owners are aware of any of this.)(Not the photographer, obviously, but the history.)(I digress.)

28 New Row, St Martin's Lane, WC2: The Theatre-Zoo.

MMT: IATW: FFT: Ever wondered where Ver Fabs got those deliciously creepy costumes? Eric Gledhill, that's where, and his Theatre-Zoo in WC2. Close "scritiney" of the invoice reveals the full feral "fundown" (if you will). Clockwise - Hippo, March Hare, Parrot, Walrus:

And, wouldn't yer know it, here's a film of the source, namely the Theatre-Zoo itself, dating 1956. Click on the picture to be "transpotered" to Pathe's page where ye can view the film, and thrill to the very MMT-like creepiness of the cossies:

THEATRE MASKS

Whither the titular Dyke Richens and Eric Gledhill? I know not...but I see that the Beatles only hired their costumes, which means that relatives of one or other of these aforementioned gents might just still have them...assuming they were ever returned, o' course.
(A further invoice from the Theatre-Zoo details the purchase of "17 Bald Pates (charged as 15) at 10 shillings each", destined, no doubt, for Egg-Men.)

Goo-goo-g'etc..

More Quarry Bank: September, 1952.

An anonymous "readah" has very kindly sent a first generation scan of the above pic, providing much more detail. Such as:

In slightly related shiznizzle, a pic of the Old Dutch on Penny Lane, co-proprietor of which was, o' course, for a while, Mr Pete Shotton, and a place much frequented by them Beatles on their way home from city centre gigs:

As previously noted, the sign endures, though little else does.

Quarry Bank: September, 1952.

Ex hoc metallo virtutem, indeed. Above, Form 1R, featuring the infamous Shennon and Lotton, top left. Regulah readahs of this drivel will know of the fondness round 'ese parts for Pete Shotton's autobiography, so I was especially pleased to stumble upon this pic the other evening, as it puts faces to at least a couple of names in the aforementioned tome.
Apparently John, as a youth, would invariably push people to see what he could get away with; the trick, as always, was to push back and Pete, to his credit, didn't put up with any shit from young Master Lennon.
The book recounts a couple of occasions when John took the piss once too often, both times being rewarded with a blow, meted out by the aggrieved Shotton, to his not inconsiderable schnozz...and thus was a friendship cemented. Ahh, schoolboy violence.
Anyway, it's all in the bewk, but following the second such outrage, Pete remained in a state of high dudgeon, such that for a couple of weeks he ignored John and took up with another classmate, David Jones. To wit, circled:

This stalemate was brought to an end by the time honoured remedy of John nicking the unfortunate Jones' bicycle, and appearing before Pete astride the contraband with a cheeky grin. The scamp... and thus was a friendship cemented. Ahh, schoolboy petty larceny.
The most memorable anecdote regarding the Quarry Bank era concerns Pete finding a stash of old dinner tickets, worth a shilling each, which he and John wasted no time in selling to classmates at half price, a lucrative ruse brought to an end only when the school started to get suspicious, and staff began noting down the numbers of any tickets used.
John and Pete managed to buy back all the unused tickets from their classmates in time - except for one, owned by a Donald Beattie, who refused to return the offending item to the pair, and proceeded to use it to obtain lunch.
Our titular miscreants were, naturally, convinced they were about to go to prison, particularly when Beattie was summoned to the Head's office the next day to explain how he had come to use an old ticket. Master Beattie, circled:

As it turned out, Beattie was a bigger wind-up merchant than John, and had only refused to sell it back in order to put the shits up them (to coin a phrase), something in which he succeeded spectacularly. He fobbed the Head off with a story about having had an old ticket left from a prior occasion when he'd skipped lunch, and was rewarded with a suitable display of gratitude from John and Pete...and thus was a friendship etc. Ah, etc.
Pete has rather gone to ground these days. Last sighted living in Paphos, Cyprus, he is apparently badly afflicted by arthritis. Impossible not to feel a deal of affection for him, fanks to the bewk wot he writ, so one hopes he is enjoying his dotage, and still managing to get up to at least a small amount of mischief, despite the maladies of old age.

Wardour Street: 1943-2013.

Very little remains of Soho as ver Fabs knew it, back when blah blah blah. Or so I thought, but having recently been gifted a photocopied London Street Directory ca. 1966, which lists each and every business in central London at the time, it's surprising to note how many premises have maintained some type of continuity - restaurants have remained restaurants (albeit of a different stripe), pubs have stayed pubs (albeit etc.), and so on.
And so to a little corner of Soho: the bit of Wardour Street adjacent to Rupert Court. Above, the aforementioned "bit" as pictured in 1943 (Second World War), 1977 (Punk Wars) and 2013 (My Personal War On Everything And Everyone). Note example of aforementioned restaurant/pizza related continuum (and click on pics for a better look).
So what? No real reason, other than extreme boredom, but, o' course, this "bit" (aforementioned) is also dreeping o' Beatle association.
Rupert Court, as ye will surely know, was where those four cheeky lads with their toe-tappin' chart toppers were captured (not literally) heading along the aforementioned Court towards Wardour Street:

On the corner of Wardour St/Rupert Court stood Garners Restaurant, purveyors of fishy "fud" to Ver Fabs, amongst others, and here it is pictured in 1963, around the same time as the above:

The second floor dining room, circa 1977:

Here they are again. Note dummies on the left, in the window of Kravetz Maurice & Sons, tailors to ladies:

The opposite side of the street, as pictured in 1960. The arrow marks the then future premises of the Kontakt cafe, outside of which did Ringo purchase the ice creams seen above being stuffed in Ver gobs of etc.:

That historic moment, when the course of ice-cream history was changed forever (together with the same spot now):

New heights of trivia:

Returning to Rupert Court, the entrance (oddly) to number 29 Wardour Street, where Dezo used to have his studio:

Some more pics dating 1977 - in the 60s, the first floor housed Kurz A & S (more tailors to ladies), the second was home to a travel agency called Continental Travel Link, whilst the third was where Dezo plied his etc.
That's quite possibly Mr Kurz still there in '77, that might still be a travel agency in pic 2, and the final shot shows the stairs leading up to Dezo (who was still there in '77):

Thanks to Messrs L & C, as ever, and the London Metropolitan Archive.

Quarry Bank: May 1957.

These unfortunates were tasked with educating one J. W. Lennon, being the teaching staff at Quarry Bank during his time there. John, o' course, held them in low regard generally, verbally (and possibly even physically) assaulting them, and so being sent to the Head to be assaulted in turn. Such was the fairly brutal nature of educashun at that time.

There was one pedagogue, however, whom he latterly recalled fondly (I believe this was his English teacher, who appreciated John's writing and recognised "something". I have some footage of John and Yoko being interviewed on the roof of their Bank Street apartment in NYC, where he talks about etc.).

How old they all seem. (The teachers, that is.)

Winterbourne House: HDN locale.

It goes without saying, so I won't, and this is certainly one of them. Iconic photos of the manic-era Fabs, as per above left, are all about running, jumping, waving, posing with soft-toys, and crawling on hand and knee from Dutch bordello at 6 in the morning (errr..has anyone actually seen that photo? Maybe I have but didn't peg it as such). I digress.
HDN parodied much of this in fine post-modern style, o' course, and never more so than in the famous scene where Ver Fabs are chased up a dead end, only to etc.. The intrepid trio ('oo else?) of Lewisohn, Schreuders and Smith tracked down the locale, a tricky job as the cul-de-sac in question is long gone.
However, on-location photos reveal a bit more detail, including Winterbourne House in Notting Hill Gate, still very much there:

Buy The Beatles' London, sez I, and not for the first time.

23 Mount Street: Robert Fraser.

As Miss Cyril "Cilla" Black might put it, there's been a lorra lorra history in these rooms. Plus a lorra lorra skag.
For this was once the second floor flat cum "salon" of art dealer to the stars Robert Fraser, much frequented by Paul and JohnandYoko. Here they would come to hang out with passing Pop artists, indulge in whatever might be indulgeable (pretty sure that's not a word), and lend unrecoverable sums of money to the titular Bob.
Fraser, o' course, was also well in with the Stones, and it was whilst looking out of these very windows upon a storm-lashed Mayfair that Keef wrote "Gimme Shelter":

Mr Richards also recalls, in his highly entertaining memoir, how Fraser would often disappear off to riffle through the pockets of the finely cut suits hanging in these very "cupboards", seeking stray heroin "jacks":

Pharmaceutical heroin was available on the NHS back then, provided one was a registered junkie. The musicians' chemist of choice for this purpose was, apparently, John Bell & Croyden of Wigmore Street; still there, though no longer a dispenser of "doojee".