Do You Want To Know A Secret?

‘Before Abbey Road There Was Teme Street’ is an account of the visit by the Beatles to the small country town of Tenbury Wells in April 1963. Next April will mark the 60th anniversary of that landmark event and a three-day festival will be held in the town to celebrate all things Beatle including a talk by Mark Lewisohn, the world-renowned Beatles historian, poets, tribute bands and I will be talking about this book.

So,

Listen,

Do you want to know a secret?

What was the setlist on that April night? It followed the release of their first LP (Please, Please Me) on March 22nd and their third hit single (From Me To You) on the previous Thursday, 11th April.

There is no documentary evidence but I have interviewed many people who were there and researched the known setlists for March and April and believe I have tied it down.

Paul counted them in “1, 2, 3, 4” then with three tight chops on George’s guitar they were off. It was the first track on their newly released LP

I Saw Her Standing There a massively popular early rocker which Paul had originally written as ‘Seventeen’ with the lyric ‘She was just seventeen, never been a beauty queen’.

Fortunately, he played it to John Lennon who suggested the immeasurably better and more suggestive…

She was just seventeen, You know what I mean.

Next, a second track from the new record,

Do You Want To Know A Secret?

George Harrison sang it in his broad scouse accent and it went down well with the audience even though it was not known to many on that night. However, it was released by Billy J Kramer and the Dakotas two weeks later 26th April and went to No 1 in the NME charts.

Staying with the new album they then played

Please, Please Me. It had just spent two weeks at the number one spot and for most people outside Merseyside it had been their first experience of The Beatles and Merseybeat generally. The lyrics are interesting. Written by John and influenced by a song ‘Please’, which his mother used to sing to him; a Bing Crosby number that played on the homophone’s pleas and please.

Then I saw it as a platonic plea for involvement, later I learned that it was about oral sex and that the pleas concerned fellatio!

Next up came a favourite from their days in Hamburg and the Cavern Club.

Long Tall Sally was a hit for Little Richard in March 1956. It was a staple of their live act from the beginning and the last song played at their last concert in San Francisco in 1966. It was not however recorded until 1964 when it was released on the Beatles 5th EP in June 1964.

Misery was popular song at this time, a hit for a young black singer called Kenny Lynch. Lynch was on the bill of their first tour in February, and the song was offered to him by Lennon and McCartney while on the tour bus. It became the first cover version of a Lennon and McCartney song and appeared on the Beatles first LP.

Some Other Guy was another staple of their early live act having been written by the famous Lieber and Stoller with Richie Barrett who had a hit in 1962.

Money was another early favourite. An early Tamla Motown hit for Barrett Strong in 1959, it had the raw, R&B quality suited to John’s voice and later in 1963, it became the closing track on their second LP, With The Beatles.

The trick with choosing cover songs was to choose American R&B songs with a driving beat that were not widely known in England.

Thank You Girl. was an original song having only been released on the previous Friday as a ‘B’ side to From Me To You. When written it was planned as an “A” side but it now seems to most that From Me To You was the better song. It was a great success in the room that night. A feature of early Beatle hits was their clever and attractive use of non-verbal vocalisations – most famously “Yeah, yeah. yeah!

But also, ‘Oooooooh’, ‘Da-da-da, Dada Dum Dum Da’, ‘Owh’. They were all rhythmic, sexual, attractive and borrowed from American rhythm and blues records – black music like the Awop bopaloobop Awop bam boom of Little Richard, sexual and scary – scary when seen in the context of the unprecedented emotion it created in a climate so repressed and conventional.

Next, Lennon slouched forward to the microphone as he pulled a harmonica from his pocket. “Here is our first hit record…I hope you bought it!”

Hunched around his mouth organ he began the familiar whining strains of

Love Me Do. The recognition factor brought forth the biggest screams and shouts yet and suddenly, a strange phenomenon was observed. No one was dancing! The entire heaving throng was facing forwards looking at the band, gently beating their thighs with the flat of one hand and smiling! This was not a usual experience. If that song went down well, the next raised the roof!

From Me To You

Da, Da, Da, Dada, Dumb, Dumb, Da. This curious piece of nonsense had been in everyone’s head all weekend, having been released on Friday.

As the song ended the house lights went up, the stage lights went down and they were gone!

Screaming really started now, feet stamping such that the bar staff downstairs feared a collapsed ceiling. Tony observed that the small Vox amplifier was still humming and the little red light was still twinkling so he led a modified chant that led to steady, rhythmic chanting and stamping in unison. After a few minutes they tumbled back into sight.

Paul thanked everyone, you’ve been a great audience etc and then said “We’ve got time for one more and you can join in – clap your hands and stamp your feet.

Twist and Shout

This song had it all; brilliant lyrics, references to the Twist, which was so popular in Tenbury at that time where the Young Farmers held regular, twist competitions. Above all it had Lennon’s passionate screaming:

Aaah, aaah, aaah, aaah, wow, Yeah!

Erotic, orgasmic, orgiastic, careless,

When they went off this time the amp lights went out, they were gone. In all, the band had been on stage for 58 minutes including encore. It had been fast, furious…and fantastic!

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