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A rejection of my musical talents!

EVERY DECEMBER 8^TH I HAVE HUGE MIXED EMOTIONS – SADNESS ABOUT JOHN’S DEATH AND HAPPINESS THAT I WAS ONE OF THE LUCKY ONE’S TO HAVE MET HIM AND PAUL, GEORGE AND RINGO. THIS IS THE STORY OF…

How I got to…

Meet the Beatles

The Place: Lewisham Odeon, London

The date: December 8^th 1963

How Come?

Some time in August 1963 I entered a competition in DISC* - a now defunct UK "pop" magazine - the competition was to suggest a name for a Beatles Lp. The prize - to meet the Beatles… my entry was… er… "MEET THE BEATLES" (Good eh?) Don't think the US album got the title from me - but I like to think so…

On a Saturday (forget the exact date) in October 1963 I started queuing for tickets for the December show… I was number five in the queue… It was cold and wet - but it was fun… The ticket office opened at 9 o'clock Monday and I bought the maximum allowed four tickets for the second row (front row all reserved!). I was over the moon… and I got as detention for my pains, the head not thinking that queuing for Beatles tickets was a good enough excuse for arriving very late, dirty and tired for school…

THEN… My group "The Deens" got an amazing gig… sort of… we were young and eager to play to anyone. So we played an opening set before the Saturday Morning pictures at… the Lewisham Odeon… Now, singing to a bunch of 8-year-olds at 8.30 am while they waited for the movies to start is not a very rewarding thing to do, but we did it for six months (hey, a gig is a gig - and we got to see the movies for free!)

THEN - in November I got a letter from DISC magazine saying I'd won two front-row tickets for The Beatles - and I get to meet them backstage after the show…

…earlier that same day…

The photo of THE DEENS was taken on December 8^th 1963 (I'm the one with the mike - two guitars and a mike through one VOX amp!) - we hoped to "bump into" the Fabs setting up as we took our kit away - but they threw us out! But I didn't care - I had tickets… the other guys were GREEN! That night I gave my Dad the two of the four tickets I'd bought (I'd sold two already) and asked him to sell them for me. After the show he said he'd sold them for "almost what I'd paid" and he thought I was lucky to sell them on the night!!! (not a natural ticket tout!)

I took Diane with me - she lived in my road and I really fancied her… she tapped her foot quietly, whilst I screamed! The cinema filled with a growing aroma of urine and the noise was deafening… And Twist and Shout was amazing!!! I nearly wet myself as well! Then the show as over… and we were escorted into a maze of green-painted brick tunnels to the tiny dressing room…

… earlier that same night… from "The Beatles - A Diary"

OK, "What was it like?" I hear you ask… well, there were some other people there - friends of the manager, etc., don't really know who they were… John was tucking into beans on toast and we all had a cup of tea. I was too gob-smacked to say anything coherent apart from "I'm in a band…" Paul seemed interested and amused that we played Beatles songs to kids at 8.30 in the morning - George didn't say much and Diane cornered Ringo. I got my programme autographed (still got it) and then we left…

This was my one and only date with Diane… think what I – who I - could have… but that's all done, now, and I was young an innocent then…

…a few weeks later they sent me a photograph…

I wrote a song about it… it’s called “I Want To Be A Superstar!” (mp3 900kb )

I met John and Paul again on 9^th May 1965… but that's another story for another page…

email me if you wanna… tell me what you think of my story, my foto… and my song…

· If anyone has copies of DISC magazine from around that time, let me know… Thanks