The Beatles Are Here! (18 page)

That resonant chord, the one that opens
A Hard Day’s Night
—and there are those four lovely boys running toward us—opened a glowing moment in our history. The further into the past it recedes, the more “quaint” it becomes. But it was not. It was intensely real. The ability to experience joy, and perhaps to hold on to it, is in our grasp, if we let it be.

In the last scenes, the Beatles get down to work, or play. Winsome Paul, witty John, thoughtful George, goofy Ringo. You can pick up a DVD, or download them on an electronic device, and have them with you now.

Up, Up, Up

by Lisa See

ON
AUGUST 23,
1964, my father and his girlfriend took me to see the Beatles at the Hollywood Bowl. I was nine years old, a graduate of third grade. I wore a jumper, a long-sleeved white blouse with an embroidered collar, and patent leather Mary Janes. I held my dad’s hand as we walked up, up, up through an effervescent and animatedly delirious river of girls—who were only a couple of years older than I was, but old enough to make me feel like I was still a little kid—until we reached the very top of the Bowl. We sat in the second to the last row of seats. The Beatles were so far away that they looked like little toy soldiers no more than two inches high. I hated all the screaming. I mean, SCREAMING. We could barely hear the songs.

I was not a Beatles fan. At the time, the musical taste in my mother and stepfather’s house ran to Little Richard, Ray Charles, Chuck Berry, Gary “U.S.” Bonds, mariachis and cojuntos, and Pacific jazz. My dad, who lived in a bungalow in Venice, liked to listen to pop music on his transistor radio while he painted. He often sang or whistled along to the Dixie Cups’ “Chapel of Love,” Lesley Gore’s “You Don’t Own Me,” and Dion’s “The Wanderer.” My aunt, who was thirteen or so, loved the Beach Boys—a local group—so I loved them too. As for the Beatles, I thought they were dopey. “I Want to Hold Your Hand”? Yuck! “She Loves You”? So girlie! But I guess my dad thought the concert would be a nice treat for me . . . or maybe his girlfriend, an ethnomusicologist, was doing research.

I don’t recall the opening act(s). This morning, when I looked online to see if I could find out, people seem to have all kinds of guesses: Sonny and Cher? The Righteous Brothers? (Perhaps we were there to see the Righteous Brothers, because my dad loved them.) Back then, the Hollywood Bowl had a large reflecting pool in front of the stage. What I remember most about the concert—apart from covering my ears and feeling very superior—is that girls started jumping into the pool, either in a desperate attempt to reach the Beatles or from their hysteria. Security guards hauled the girls out of the water, and even from so far away they looked like half-drowned cats. Dripping wet, they still struggled and fought, arms stretched out, legs flailing, to touch their favorite Beatle. I couldn’t imagine doing anything so dumb. All around us, girls cried, screamed, wiped their eyes, screamed, held their cheeks, screamed, held onto each other, and screamed some more. I couldn’t imagine doing any of those things either. (But not many years later, when I was a teenager myself, I would scream, jump, and dance at Cream, Hendrix, and Stones concerts. No public sobbing, though.)

On YouTube, I found photographs, a few clips, as well as the entire recording of the concert. The Beatles came on at 9:30 and played for just thirty minutes before being whisked away. In the audio, you can hear John, Paul, and George tuning their guitars. They sing “All My Loving,” “Twist and Shout,” and “You Can’t Do That.” Between every song, they take deep synchronized bows. (I’m sorry, but they still look like total dweebs.) At one point, John says, “The next song we’re going to sing is an oldie . . . from last year.” Then the boys break into “She Loves You.” Later, Paul encourages the girls in the audience to clap their hands, stamp their feet, and “make as much noise as you’d like ’cause it’s not our place anyway.” You can hear them go wild as he sings the opening bars to “Can’t Buy Me Love.” The Beatles must have been on the road for some time already, or perhaps their voices were strained from trying to sing above the cacophony of screams, but both John and Paul sound hoarse.

It’s odd to look back at that time now. As a country, we were still so innocent, as folks like to say. It had only been nine months since John F. Kennedy was assassinated, and more terrible things were about to come, but in that moment the future still looked bright and promising. My mother and stepfather fulfilled the American Dream by buying a house in Topanga Canyon, and I was enrolled in fourth grade in a new school. Right around the corner was the release of
A Hard Day’s Night
, which would “loom large in our family legend.” (See my mom’s piece earlier in this volume.)

When I was in fifth grade, a new boy joined our class and was assigned the seat next to mine. His dad was an artist, whose photo would be included on the cover of
Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band
in 1967. That same summer, my stepfather would go to Haight-Ashbury and come home a very changed man, with armloads of very different music. Not long after, I would smoke pot for the first time with my grandfather and the rest of the family. I was twelve.

Today the Hollywood Bowl’s reflecting pool has been replaced with exclusive box seats. My husband and I are fortunate to have one of those boxes. Eight summer nights a year, we invite friends to join us for concerts. I often tell people about my experience seeing the Beatles from the second to the last row. If they are of a certain age, they think it’s cool. But if my son comes and brings a date, she looks at me as though I’m the oldest person on earth. Perhaps I am.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Joann Marie Pugliese Flood, fan

(the girl on the far left in the photo)

I
HEARD THEY
were a sensation. It was near the end of ’63.

“I Want to Hold Your Hand” was what we heard first. The music was upbeat. It was happy. There was something about it that just pulled you right in. There was something about the sound. It was very different and unique.

I went to my local record store in the Bronx. I said, “This group, the Beatles? I heard their album’s coming out. I want you to hold one for me.” When the store owner called to tell me the album was in, I was so excited I ran to the store. I don’t think I’d ever seen a picture of them at that point. I was just so excited about hearing more of their music.

When I saw the cover of
Meet
the Beatles
with their faces half-shadowed out and their hair so long I thought, “How different! How cute!” There was something adorable about each one of them. But when I looked at Paul McCartney, I thought, “Oh boy!” He was just so cute and sweet looking. His eyes were so dreamy. There was just something about those eyes and that face. From that moment on he won my heart.

Vickie and I had known each other since we were four or five years old. We became best friends and were really close. We were together all the time. Vickie was at the apartment of her aunt—we called her “Auntie”—in the same building as my parents. I knocked on the door and Vickie and her cousin answered. “Vickie, look!
Meet
the Beatles
!” Now we were over the top. That’s how it started, really. We’re staring at the album like they’ll come out and talk to us. We played it, and screamed, “They’re great! They’re great!” We just loved the sound.

I HAD A
big, reel-to-reel Webcor tape recorder and I used it to tape
The
Ed Sullivan Show.
Vickie came to my house and we sat side-by-side on the floor and screamed in unison as we watched. My father was holding his ears because we were so loud. I turned off all the lights in the room and started taking pictures with my Kodak Brownie from the TV screen. We were so excited when we saw how the photos came out.

My father was in construction. He was a bricklayer and most of his work was in Manhattan. One day, after working in the lobby of the Warwick Hotel, he came home and said, “Guess what? I saw your friends the Beatles at work today. I was working in the lobby when this elevator door opens up and four guys came walking through.”

He said, “You know, they’re all kind of homely looking, except that one you like. You know, Paul? He was kind of cute.”

Vickie, me, and a few other friends from school started running around to different hotels and someone on the street stopped us and said he was selling Beatles’ mementos. The owner of the Riviera Idlewild Hotel, which was opposite the JFK International Arrivals building, sold forks, dishes, and bath towels that he said had been used by the Beatles. Each item came with an affidavit from the manager saying that it had been used by the band when they stayed in his hotel. I bought a piece of towel with a photo of Paul McCartney attached. I think I paid a dollar for it.

I still have that and a lot of other Beatles memorabilia, including my concert ticket stubs. My uncle Jack worked for BOAC [British Overseas Airways Corporation, now British Airways]. They had a Beatles Bahamas Special after the band finished filming
Help!
in Nassau and were on their way back to London. My uncle gave me a BOAC Welcomes Aboard the Beatles, March 1965 menu from their flight. They served fresh Canadian salmon with mayonnaise.

WE WENT TO
the concert in Forest Hills, Queens, New York, on August 28, 1964. Vickie’s parents drove us. It was just crazy, pandemonium, with people screaming so loud you couldn’t hear a thing. We couldn’t wait to hear the Beatles. We didn’t really want to hear those “other guys” first but then later my cousin, Linda Belfi, said “Oh, they weren’t too bad.” It turns out “they” were the Righteous Brothers.

The concert is like a blur. We were sitting pretty far away from the stage. I think the Beatles were helicoptered in. They only played for about forty-five minutes. (I also went to their concert at Shea Stadium the following year.)

Vickie, my cousin Linda, and I decided to go down to the city on September 20. We knew the Beatles were going to be at the Paramount Theatre giving a benefit concert that evening, so we decided to hang out. They were staying at the Delmonico Hotel and we thought somehow we might see them. We wanted to be part of the whole scene. I took pictures of the hotel and crowd.

Linda made the sign. She’s the girl on the right who has on an “I Love George” button. Back then she lived in Monsey, New York, up in Rockland County. Her father dropped her off at my house in the Bronx. We were going to take the train into the city. She had the sign and we were just so excited. I think she’d made the sign at her house in Monsey.

When she showed me the sign I said, “Guess what?” She had spelled the band’s name B E A T E S. I got some Magic Marker and I put a little
L
in. You can see in the photo that it’s small.

When we got to the hotel, we stood behind the police barricade and set up the sign. The curtains would move. I remember a hand waving out of the window on the fourth or fifth floor and everyone screaming.

I definitely remember a guy walking by with a camera. He saw the sign and he saw us and said he wanted to take a picture. He said he was a photographer for . . . but we didn’t hear him. “Are we going to be in the newspaper?” we asked. He said, “Yeah, you probably are. Look for it this week.”

Vickie and I were buying the
New York
Daily News
for weeks, and the
Post
, too, looking and looking but it never appeared. My father read both papers regularly and he checked them, too. We never knew it was the
New York Times
. Or that the photo would become somewhat iconic.