Yet it packs all the urgency and drive of a live performance. They’d only recently returned from wild Hamburg dates, and weren’t yet fully recovered.
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Denied the opportunity of a full studio recording, much to the horror of the group itself, “Some Other Guy” was a 1:41-minute track lifted directly from their audition tape done at Decca’s basement No.2 studio. Written by classic hitmakers Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, and originally recorded by Richard Barrett, it was a staple of the Mersey-group scene, so it was the ideal candidate for the Big Three debut ‘A’-side.Īnd on the brink of the year that would transfigure British Pop for ever, the Big Three became the third Liverpool ‘Merseybeat’ group to chart. So, although it was not a Beatles song, “Some Other Guy” was emphatically Beatles-related, and there was no version of it by the Fab Four available at the time. I saw it when it was shown on the Granada tea-time TV-slot ‘People And Places’, hosted by Bill Grundy and Gay Byrne. But the first that most everyone in northern England – outside of Liverpool itself, got to see of the Beatles, was a brief film-clip of them doing “Some Other Guy” live on stage at the ‘Cavern’ (22 August 1962). The Big Three were never gifted with a Beatles song. Tommy Quickly’s debut – “Tip Of My Tongue”, was another slighter Beatles effort. Cilla Black’s first single, “Love Of The Loved” was written by them. Later, the Fourmost would use a cast-off Beatles song – “Hello Little Girl”, as their passport to the Top Ten. Billy J Kramer’s first string of hits was with John and Paul songs. Epstein’s rise was essentially predicated on Beatles songs. Solid, stripped-down to the raw basics of bass, drums and lead guitar – what would later become known as the ‘Power Trio’ in the hands of Cream or the Jimi Hendrix Experience, the Big Three had played all the major Liverpool clubs claiming a repertoire of some six-hundred songs, had a mighty fan-base, and regularly topped ‘Mersey Beat’ magazine polls. And within that roster, he’d signed The Big Three. A stable of artists with a hits-ratio second to none in Brit-Pop. With the Beatles, Billy J Kramer With The Dakotas, and Gerry And The Pacemakers all racking up an unprecedented grab of no.1’s, and Cilla Black signed and ready to follow. And 1963 started out with the Epstein touch at its most Midas-gold. At a time when British Pop had become slick, and dull, the sudden upsurge of raw working-class northern music represented a reversion to a more primitive form of Rock ‘n’ Roll. The first indication that his Pop empire might not be entirely infallible. You could say The Big Three were Brian Epstein’s first failures.