4 - Soup & Sweat & Rock & Roll

Episode 1 - Keeping Cool With Lemonade Alan Sytner saw Le Caveau in France and wanted to emulate it in the UK. The Cavern opened on 16 January 1957 but the question as to whom played the first notes at the Cavern is problematic. The White Eagle Jazz Band was taken to see the site before the work took place and had a blow to test it out (12 August 1956); the Merseysippi Jazz Band were starring on the opening night and had had a test run but the first notes in front of an audience were played by the Wall City Jazz Band from Chester who opened with, of all things, ‘The Miller Of The Dee’. Alan Sytner’s real interest was modern jazz but it drew poor audiences. By mid-1957 skiffle bands including the Quarrymen were being used as an interval act. As the skiffle gained momentum, you can sense that rock and roll was on its way. The importance of the Cavern not being licensed was a clever move from the start: it eliminated drunken fights and hence lessened the problems and there were also fewer regulations for non-licensed premises. Besides, the Grapes and the White Star were only a few yards away. On crowded clubs, Bill Heckle says, “People like concerts when it is too jammed and too packed.” (Performance) Fright Train Brendan McCormack (Unissued) It Ain’t What You Do Swinging Bluegenes (Performance) Mean Mistreater Tommy and Hil Hughes

Episode 2 - Need A Shot Of Rhythm And Blues When Ray McFall took over the Cavern in 1959, he knew it needed shaking up but the first rock and roll band he employed, Wump and his Werbles, was not the best choice. As the drummer John Cochrane states, “You couldn’t get out of the Cavern without the cooperation of the audience.” It was a good move to talk to the catering staff but I didn’t realise how good Betty Fegan and Thelma Hargrove were going to be. Thelma says, “Cilla Black’s singing was like a glass of water getting up and screeching.” Indeed, there are first-rate views from audience members in this episode. The Shadows talk about the night when the Remo Four were better than they were and Brendan McCormack demonstrates how a low ceiling and a wooden stage led to a compressed sound which was very effective. “The maximum speakers were 15 watts and now people have 125 watts in their bedrooms.” (Unissued) Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On – Gerry & the Pacemakers (1961) (Unissued) Walk – Don’t Run The Remo Four (Unissued) Bonaparte’s Retreat Swinging Bluegenes (Unissued) Fever Cilla Black

Episode 3 - Come Go With Me Perhaps I should have called this episode, The Whitechapel Year. It goes roughly from November 1961 (Brian Epstein seeing the Beatles at the Cavern) to November 1962 (‘Love Me Do’ making the charts). The lunchtime gigs were highly successful (and ‘unheard of’ elsewhere says Mick Green of the Pirates) and the young musicians, notably the Beatles, would go to NEMS in Whitechapel during the afternoon to hear new releases and determine songs for their repertoires. This is also the Bob Wooler episode as his imprint is all over the Cavern. His acronym for the bands was AIM – Attitude, Image, Music – with, as Bob said with dry humour, “Music at the bottom”. Some perceptive speakers include Willy Russell on hearing the Beatles and the Big Three; Norman Killon on Bob Wooler; and Bob Wooler on just about anything – “If B.E. had not been feeling that way that day, it never would have happened – okay?” The observations throughout this episode seem spot on. Willy Russell: “It was amazing that just six miles from where I lived I could hear music that had the same DNA as the American records I heard on the radio.” Absorbing stories of guest artists playing the Cavern – Johnny Kidd and Davy Jones from the UK and Bruce Channel and B.Bumble and the Stingers from the US. All four experiences are very different. (Unissued) So How Come Merseybeats (Unissued) Pretend Gerry & the Pacemakers (1961) (Unissued) What’d I Say Gene Vincent at Cavern

Episode 4 - You Better Stop Drinking That Wine, Sonny Boy For the most part, this episode is about the larger-than-life blues and gospel artists who played the Cavern and made such an impression on the musicians. It deals with the highly unconventional musicians - Sister Rosetta Tharpe (and her husband, Lazy Daddy), John Lee Hooker and Sonny Boy Williams, whose ‘Good Morning Little Schoolgirl’ was a chat-up line. Alexis Korner made a live blues album from the Cavern and when the Animals parked their van, Alan Price asked, “Do you like R&B round here?” he got the reply, “Like it? We invented it.” The Roadrunners, the Almost Blues and, to some extent, the Hideaways played blues at the Cavern, although Billy Butler said it was “exactly the kind of music I didn’t like, slow and gloomy.” Billy, however, was thrilled when he heard the Moody Blues playing the opening notes of their new record, ‘Go Now’, at the Cavern. Mike Brocken points out that it wasn’t down to the city whether it was a blues city or not: it depended on what key club owners wanted. Eric Haydock of the Hollies said that club owners wanted groups that would appeal to the girls as otherwise, “No women, no men”. Paul McCartney complimented a girl by saying she had “child-bearing hips”. Had he picked this up from his mother who was a midwife.

Episode 5 - When We Was Fab It is 1963: the Beatles have left the Cavern, although they return for a final gig on 3 August. I say that this was their 275th appearance but I can’t find my calculation. Bob Wooler had originally told a reporter that the Beatles had played 292 times but he didn’t put much thought into this. And what does it mean? Do you include the Quarrymen? Is an evening appearance followed by an all-nighter two shows? It’s a difficult one. The episode concentrates on musicians who remained including Freddie Starr and the Hideaways, whose American member John State was killed in Vietnam. Noel Walker talked about producing the Big Three at the Cavern and then a multi-artist LP for Decca. The Hamburg band the Rattles played the Cavern for a week and reveal that Cavern girls wanted to “sleep with a Nazi”. Says Dickie Harrach, “We were kept pretty busy.” An innovation was the weekly Junior Cavern Club for those under 16. (Commercial) Tick-a-tick Timex The Hideaways (at the Cavern)

Episode 6 - Roll Over Beat Oven Oh dear. That title’s a bit forced but you can’t win all the time. Over to the Liverpool 8 art set with Adrian Henri organising Happenings at the Cavern and showing Allen Ginsberg around Liverpool. Bob Wooler went to see Yoko Ono at the Bluecoat Chambers. The soul artists at the Cavern included Little Stevie Wonder and Ben E King and the young bands visiting the Cavern included Jon Anderson and Mick Fleetwood. However, the party had left town. The expenses were rising with the addition of the recording studio, Cavern Sound. The renovations bankrupt the club and after a siege, the bailiffs moved in and there was a march to the Town Hall. This series might have ended here but the Cavern didn’t die. (Rag week record) Universal Layabout Tom & Brennie

Episode 7 - This Empty Place The episode opens with a full place as the Prime Minister, Harold Wilson, in 1966 is reopening the Cavern. Plenty of tales from the opening and how Alf Geoghegan and Joe Davey were the unlikely owners. Comments on soul legends appearing at the Cavern as well the club dipping into psychedelia with the Klubs. The Cavern was forced to move across the road in 1973, an unnecessary move as it happens, and it closed in 1976, and although the owner Roy Adams, denies it, it was because the Stadium could afford bigger and better acts. In 1981 Cavern Walks was developed and the underground pool under the Cavern is fascinating. I don’t know how I missed the pun that the Beatles walked on water. The first owner of the new Cavern was the Liverpool footballer and hard case, Tommy Hughes.