The casbah coffee club

Mona Shaw was born on January 3, 1924 in Delhi and married John Best in India before moving with him and her two children, Pete (born 1941) and Rory (born 1944) to Liverpool - her husband’s homeland (1945) , where several apartments were changed ^[2] . In 1948, Besty moved to Queenscourt Road , where the family lived for the next 9 years. In 1954, Rory told his mother about a large Victorian house on Haymans Green . The Bestov family claims that after this, Mona decided to lay all her jewelry in order to bet on the horse of the jockey Lester Piggot Epsom Derby at the races with a coefficient of 33/1 (on the slang - “Never Say Die”) ^[3] . After the victory, the woman spent the win to buy a house, which was acquired by Bestami in 1957 ^[3] . The mansion, built in 1860 by an unknown architect, previously belonged to the West Derby Conservative Club , and differed from most other residential buildings in Liverpool - it was located away from the highway, it had 15 bedrooms and about 4000 m² (1 acre ) of land adjacent territories ^[4] . All rooms were painted in dark green or brown tones, the garden was wild and groomed, and the cellar was used to store coal ^{[5] [6]} .

The idea of ​​creating a club arose after watching a television report about The 2i's Coffee Bar in the London quarter of Soho , where several local musicians spent time. On August 29, 1959, Mona decided to open a club in the basement of her house so that her sons, their friends and other youth could meet and listen to the popular music of that time. The institution should be favorably different from the local “ Cavern Club ”, whose leadership, at that time, approved only the jazz repertoire ^{[7] [8]} . An annual membership in the club cost half a crown - to “weed out rowdy people” - and supplied visitors with soft drinks, snacks, cakes and coffee from an espresso machine , which at that time was not in any other city institution ^{[9] [10]} . The music was played on a small player company Dansette whose sound was amplified through a 3-inch speaker ^[11] . Mona invited Les Stewart Quartet , which included Harrison, to perform at the opening of The Casbah, however, the musicians canceled the performance due to a quarrel between Les Stewart and Ken Brown, after the latter missed the rehearsal ^[5] . Since 300 membership cards had already been sold, Harrison said that he has two friends in a group called The Quarrymen who will play instead of Les Stewart Quartet ^[5] . Lennon, McCartney and Harrison went to The Casbah to arrange a performance, Mona agreed, but noting that she needed to finish painting the basement first. All four took up their brushes and helped Monet finish painting the walls with spiders, rainbows, stars and dragons, however, since Lennon was short-sighted, he took on the brilliance of for emulsion paint, which dried for a long time in a dark damp room. Cynthia Powell, later Lennon’s wife, painted his silhouette on the wall, which remains there to this day ^{[12] [13] [14]} .

The Quarrymen played in The Casbah a series of seven concerts of 15 shillings for each, and performances were held on Saturdays from August 29 to October 1959. Despite the constant composition of the participants - Lennon, McCartney, Harrison and Brown - a characteristic feature of these shows was the fact that the group performed without a drummer, and only one microphone was connected to a small local amplifier system ^{[15] [16]} . A concert in honor of the opening of the club was attended by about 300 local teenagers, however, since there was no air conditioning in the basement, and people were constantly dancing, the temperature in the room rose very high - some found it difficult to breathe ^[17] . Following the success of their debut performance, Mona invited The Quarrymen to become residents of the club with a salary of £ 3 per show. ^[18] Each week, the size of the audience wishing to visit the club and look at the group, only increased, in this regard, Mona began to charge one shilling for entry in addition to the annual membership fee ^[19] . Since The Casbah wasn’t equipped with amplifiers, Lennon persuaded Mona to hire a young amateur guitarist named Harry to perform in front of The Quarrymen with a short set, but this was only so that the band could then use his 40-watt amplifier ^{[ 20]} .

While studying at the University Gymnasium Best decided to create his own music group, so Mona bought him a drum kit in the Blackler store. Best's team received the name Black Jacks, later on he regularly performed at the institution of his mother ^{[5] [21] [22]} , becoming a resident of the club ^[17] . In addition to Pete, the composition included Ches Newby, as well as Ken Brown, who at that time had already left The Quarrymen ^{[16] [23] [24]} . Brown's reason for leaving was the incident when he came to The Quarrymen's performance with temperature (it was the band’s 7th Saturday show in The Casbah), so Mona sent the young man to rest in Best’s room. This caused a stormy negative reaction from the rest of the collective, since when Mona paid them, she divided the salary into four, although the musicians wanted Brown’s money to be divided between the three, motivating them with the three of them. However, Mona insisted on her decision, after which the musicians refused to be residents of The Casbah and hastily left the club ^[25] . Although subsequently sometimes they nevertheless performed in it and often went there ^[17] .

Colin Manley from The Remo Four also received an offer to perform in a club, which was the only place where unknown, amateur groups at that time could try their hand ^[18] . Subsequently, The Casbah also featured artists such as Silla Black , Rory Storm and the Hurricanes ( English ), The Searchers and Gerry & The Pacemakers ^[26] . It was at The Casbah that Lennon and McCartney convinced Stuart Sutcliff (who had been with The Beatles for several years) to buy a 500/5 Höfner bass guitar - known in Europe as the President bass - with the money he won at the John Moors art exhibition ^{[27] [28] [29]} . Despite the fact that subsequently the list of club members exceeded more than a thousand people, Mona decided to close the club on June 24, 1962, with The Beatles becoming the last group to perform there ^[30] .

In 2006, following a recommendation from the Commission on Historic Buildings and Monuments of England , Minister of Culture David Lammy announced that the best coal cellar Bestov should be assigned the status of a historical building of the II degree and the corresponding blue memorial tablet ^[13] . The basement is currently open as a tourist attraction in Liverpool, along with the adolescent houses of McCartney and Lennon at 20 Fortlin Road and 251 Menlaw Avenue, respectively ^{[31] [32]} . The former clubhouse is 5.6 km from Liverpool city center, with only pre-booked excursions held inside ^{[31] [33]} . According to McCartney: “It's a good idea for people to learn more about The Casbah. They know about “The Cavern”, they know about some related things, but “The Casbah” was the place where it all began. We helped to draw there and the like. We regarded him as our personal club ” ^[34] .

Bob Hawkins, Head of Heritage Protection for the North of England, said: “The basement of The Casbah is historic because it provides tangible evidence of the formation of The Beatles, their growing popularity and their lasting cultural impact. worldwide. Since its closure in 1962, the club has been preserved in surprisingly good condition, with wall and ceiling paintings of spiders, rainbows, dragons and stars - painted by original members of the group, as well as musical equipment from the 1960s, amplifiers and original chairs. We do not know a single place so well-preserved, neither in Liverpool nor elsewhere ” ^[35] .

• Kamchatka (boiler room)

• Best R., Best P., Best R. The Beatles: The True Beginnings . - Thomas Dunne Books, 2003 .-- 204 p. - ISBN 978-0-312-31926-7 .
• Lennon C. John . - Hodder & Stoughton, 2005 .-- 416 p. - ISBN 978-0-340-89512-2 .
• Miles B. Many Years From Now . - Vintage-Random House, 1997 .-- 656 p. - ISBN 978-0-7493-8658-0 .
• Spitz B. The Beatles: The Biography . - Little, Brown and Company, 2005 .-- 992 p. - ISBN 978-0-316-80352-6 .

Documentaries

• Wonfor G. The Beatles Anthology (B00006GEMA). - DVD: Apple Corps, 2003.

• Interview with Pete Best
• Interview with Mona and Pete Best
• Peter Best Interview with Steve Marinucci
• Peter Best Interview with Stephen Cook
• The Casbah Coffee Club on Facebook