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have to be in thrall to American culture. ‘We sat there in the Cracke and thought Liverpool is an exciting place,’ remembers Bill Harry, a founder member of this student group. ‘We can create things and write music about Liverpool, just as the Americans [do about their cities].’ Although the Quarry Men, and later the Beatles, would play rock ’n’ roll in emulation of their American heroes, importantly John and Paul would create authentic English pop songs, with lyrics that referred to English life, sung in unaffected English accents. The same is also true of George Harrison.
    When Paul slipped next door to the art college to have lunch with John, his friend Georgie would often tag along. John treated Paul more or less as his equal, despite the age difference, but George Harrison was a further year back, and he seemed very young: a skinny, goofy little kid with a narrow face, snaggly teeth and eyebrows that almost met in the middle. Lennon regarded this boy with condescension. Paul did, too, but he was shrewd enough to see that George was becoming a good guitar player, telling George to show John how well he could play the riff from the song ‘Raunchy’. John was sufficiently impressed to invite Harrison to join the band. George’s relationship with Paul and John was thus established. Ever afterwards the two senior band members would regard George as merely their guitarist. ‘The thing about George is that nobody respected him for the great [talent] he was,’ says Tony Bramwell, a Liverpool friend who went on to work for the Beatles (John Lennon called Bramwell ‘Measles’ because he was everywhere they went). ‘That’s how John and Paul treated George and Ringo: George is [just] the lead guitarist, and Ringo’s [only] the drummer.’
    Ringo is not yet in the group. But three of the fab four are together in John’s schoolboy band, Paul and George having squeezed out most of John’s original sidemen. When the resolutely unmusical Pete Shotton announced his decision to quit the group, John made sure of it by breaking Pete’s washboard over his head, though they stayed friends and, like Measles Bramwell, Shotton would work for the boys when they made it. Eric Griffiths was displaced by the arrival of George, while Len Garry dropped out through ill-health. Only the drummer, Colin Hanton, remained, with Paul’s school friend, John Duff Lowe, sitting in as occasional pianist. Of a Sunday, the boys would sometimes rehearse at 20 Forthlin Road while Jim McCartney sat reading his paper. ‘The piano was against the wall, and his father used to sit at the end of the piano facing out into the room, and if he thought we were getting too loud he’d sort of wave his hand. Because he was concerned the neighbours were gonna complain,’ says Duff Lowe, noting how patient and kindly Paul’s dad was. ‘At four o’clock we’d break and he’d go and make [us] a cup of tea.’
    Despite Paul’s drive to make the Quarry Men as professional as possible, they were still rank amateurs. So much so that Duff Lowe got up from the piano and left halfway through one show in order to catch his bus home. It is also a wonder that their early experiences of the entertainment industry didn’t put them all off trying to make a living as musicians. On one unforgettable occasion, auditioning for a spot at a working men’s club in Anfield, the Quarry Men watched as the lad before them demonstrated an act that was nothing less than eating glass. The boy cut himself so badly in the process he had to stuff newspaper into his mouth to staunch the blood. Paul’s show business dreams were not quelled. Indeed, he seemed ever more ambitious. At another audition at the Locarno Ballroom, seeing a poster appealing for vocalists, Paul told John, ‘We could do that.’
    ‘No, we’re a band ,’ replied John severely. It was clear to Colin Hanton that Paul would do anything to get ahead in what he had seemingly decided would be his career; or