The Quarrymen in 2001

Video: “John Lennon’s Original Quarrymen - The Untold Story”:

During the spring summer of 2001 two final year Media Production students from Staffordshire University, Alan Hamilton and Steve Harwood decided to make a video about the Quarrymen as part of their Degree Project. Alan had been on placement with film makers Planet Wild and found himself working on the editing of the TV film “The Real John Lennon” in which the Quarrymen appeared, which was screened in the autumn of 2000.

Alan felt that the story of the Quarrymen would make a great video and so he proposed making a start on this project by putting together a short feature dealing with just part of the history of the group. The scale of this was limited by finances and the time constraints imposed by their University course requirements. This meant they could could not cover the whole group so they concentrated on  Colin Hanton and Rod Davis.

Alan, Steve and their student video crew came down to London where they videod Rod at home and made several trips to Liverpool, filming Colin and doing location shots in Rosebery Street, St Peter’s Church Hall and of course the Cavern. The result was a ten minute video entitled “John Lennon’s Original Quarrymen - The Untold Story” which includes many original photos, some video footage of the Quarrymen performing and a cameo appearance of Sir Paul McCartney himself, shot at his book signing in Liverpool, in which he wishes the Quarrymen good luck!

Yes, Alan and Steve both gained their degrees and they are now both working in the TV industry. The film was shown at the Liverpool Beatles Convention in 2001 and the boys hope to persuade some TV company to expand their video into a full-length feature. Watch this space!

New Clubmoor Hall, 16 June 2001

  On Sat 16 June Len, Colin and Rod (Pete says he has now DEFINITELY retired from public washboard playing - and Eric is on holiday) played at the New Clubmoor Hall for a special celebration of Paul’s Birthday (which is on 18 June). This was the first venue he ever played with the Quarrymen in 1957 (having replaced Rod) and it is notorious because he had a few problems with playing “Guitar Boogie”. The modern day Quarrymen gave it their best shot.

Tony Sheridan and Rod Davis at “My Bonnie” Convention:

Rod had a great time at the My Bonnie” 40th Anniversary Convention in Glauchau in Germany on Sat 23 June. Tony Sheridan brought his band from Hamburg for the occasion, which was organised by Edmund Thielow who runs the “Beat Archiv” Museum in Glauchau, a little town in Saxony not far from Dresden. Also joining in the fun were Hans-Walther Braun, Paul’s friend from his Hamburg days, Karen Kassulat, Robert Weinkauf and of course the fantastic Beatles lookalike band from Austria, Beatles Unlimited. Rod got to jam on a few numbers on stage with Tony, who put on a great show. This brief performance, just three numbers- “In the evening”, “Come go with me” and “Twenty Flight Rock”, with Rod on vocals and rhythm guitar and Tony on lead guitar, has now been made into a CD. This was a totally unrehearsed, spontaneous jam, they had never played together before, even backstage! You can even hear Rod shouting some of the chords to Tony in “Come go with me”, a number which Tony didn’t actually know, still he mad a great job of it! See Quarrymen photo index for pictures.

Get your own copy of this unique CD - Scorpion Publications had just a few copies available but we have now run out, so you will need to contact the Beat Archiv website to see if they have any left!

Quarrymen portrayed in film of "The Young John Lennon"
   The Quarrymen, played by actors, appeared in the Warner Bros film "The Young John Lennon" which was shown recently on US tv and was premiered in Liverpool at the Odeon Cinema in December.
   In Feb 2001 it was shown on Spanish TV and we are expecting to hear shortly about when it will be shown in the UK!
   The group's reactions were rather mixed, they would have liked to have been consulted about the details as some of it was definitely off-beam. John was portrayed as very self-confident, which was not the case, the lads all spoke with strong scouse accents, again unrealistic.
   The actor playing Len Garry was rather small and wore a knitted cardigan which would have got Len thrown out of the band! The actor playing Pete Shotton was far too good-looking, apparently he had spent hours in make-up trying to get the right look, but in vain! (Joke, Joke)
   To cap it all, another band was used to play the Quarrymen's music, what a pity the film-makers did not get in contact with the real thing! However, they DID get one of George Edward’s original band, Dennis Roscoe, who played sax and clarinet, to play in the Cheshire Yeomanry military band in the film! Maybe next time eh?

John Lennon’s
Original Quarrymen