Beatles History: How Poor Were The Beatles In Their Early Days

Back in their pre-Beatle days, the Fab Four weren’t so fancy in comparison to who they became right when they got so popular. The Beatles were so poor before that they need to find some clever ideas to keep performing, and had to endure a whole lot of hardships just so they can always put on a show.

The band first started to call themselves The Quarrymen and when George Harrison joined, the group, they replaced it with Johnny and the Moondogs. According to Joshua Greene’s book Here Comes The Sun: The Spiritual And Musical Journey Of George Harrison, the group accepted any performances that were offered to them, regardless of whether or not they were paid. “If a sponsor complained about there not having a drummer, they would argue that the rhythm was ‘in the guitars,’” Greene wrote. “Their ambition knew no limits—any venue would do, including men’s clubs, pubs, and amateur competitions.”

After being offered a two-week concert in Scotland, the band rebranded themselves as The Silver Beetles. John recruited his art school pal Stuart Sutcliffe to play bass, and he found a drummer from a local bottling industry to fill out the rest of the band. But it didn’t take long for them to come back to Liverpool, due to a series of unfortunate events that prompted them to return.

Allan Williams, the Jaracanda club owner, decided to give the band a shot and offered them a gig slot for his club. But he had no idea that the band was struggling so much in terms of money.

“The night they first played here,” Williams said [via Greene] “George came up to me earlier in the day—he was only seventeen at the time—and said, ‘Hey, Al, have you got a broom?’ I told him the floor was clean enough, but he said, ‘and a mop as well? I found out why that evening. You see, they were so poor in those days that they didn’t have microphone stands. Their girlfriends used to tie the mikes on the broomsticks and they’d be sitting in the front row holding up these brushes and things all night long.”

After that, Williams got them booked in Hamburg, Germany where they earn at least 15 pounds a week performing. It made their lives a bit more comfortable to live until they had to depart the country when the police found out about George’s real age.

They came back to Liverpool and continued to play gigs there. Faith then took a turn when Brian Epstein saw them and decided to be their manager. And the rest is history.