Customer Reviews

Hamburg Days

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The Beatles have said much about Hamburg, including that they believed that it was there that they did their best performances, and it was there that they really learned how to be a band.

Astrid Kirchherr and Klaus Voormann were kids growing up in Germany, whose early memories included all the chaos that Germany went through in the last days of the Third Reich and the aftermath of the war. As college students, they rebelled against the old order, and came upon a band that seemed to bring with it something entirely new - The Beatles.

They all became friends, so much so that Astrid got engaged to Stu Sutcliffe and took the first professional photos of the band, and Klaus would later design the covers for the Beatles' albums "Revolver" and "Anthology" as well as play bass on albums of Ringo, George, and John, after the Beatles' breakup.

This two-volume set is absolutely gorgeous. The first volume, besides photographs and documents, goes into the story of what kind of state Germany was in after the war, and why it was that the Beatles' type of music attracted many young people to it, as well as telling how the band came to get there, and what kind of conditions these very young men were willing to put up with in order to pursue their passion of music. Most of the text is by Voormann, but George Harrison and Paul McCartney also wrote short pieces to go into this book.

The second volume is a collection of art pertaining to the Beatles done by Voormann. I saw Voormann and some of these pictures at Beatlefest 2001 in Chicago, and these are interesting too, as something that belongs in part of this collection.

The main problem with this book is that it is a prohibitively expensive limited edition. However, it is a perspective of the era and the Beatles that is carefully done by people who have known the Beatles since this time, and were qualified in putting a project like this together.

This is the kind of thing Beatle fans, Harrison and McCartney fans in particular would love to own. Each Beatle has admitted that he cut his musical teeth performing in Hamburg Germany. It was in this training ground that the Fabs learned to come together as a band.

Beatle friends, Astrid Kirchherr and Klaus Voormann were viewed as part of an esoteric intellectual group called "Exis" (for existentialists.) In 1960, they were students who befriended the Beatles and watched them develop musically in the rough German venues where they played. As post WWII young adults, they rebelled against traditional order and found that rebellious experience in the Beatles.

Astrid later married Stu Sutcliff, who died from a brain hemorrhage in 1962. She took the first publicity pictures of the future Fabs; gave them their famous fringed Beatle coiffure; Klaus, an artist drew pictures of the boys throughout their career including the wonderful 1966 "Revolver" album cover. They are important parts of Beatle history.

This is a 2-volume treasure chest and Beatle pirates will love it. Volume 1 provides an overview of Germany and German history in the aftermath of WWII; the pictures are nothing short of spectacular. The times were the ideal breeding grounds for rebellion and dissension to flourish; the Beatles, with their different, distinctive sounds and the dues they were willing to pay to move forward musically is well chronicled in this book.

Klaus Voorman provided much of the text, but Beatles George Harrison and Paul McCartney contributed as well. That makes a good thing even better.

Volume 2 is power packed with Klaus Voorman's Beatle drawings. A talented artist, Voorman has created the cover for the Beatles' "Anthology" album as well as the famous 1966 "Revolver" cover. I had the pleasure of reading this at the 2002 and 2003 Fests for Beatle Fans in Chicago and the 2002 Fest in Boston. Sadly, this book is prohibitively expensive and to date, I do not own it for this reason.

What makes this book so special and distinct is that it is the work of those who were there from the inception of the Beatles to their meteoric rise to fame. My two favorite Beatles (the Messrs. Harrison & McCartney) have added their voices to it as well, which makes this book even more desirable.

Still, this is a serious book that should be affordable to all who really want it. The high price tag has made it an unreachable brass ring to many fans who would really love to have it. This book covers an era beautifully and portrays a time when the Beatles and their then new musical style would flourish.

250.00 bucks!?!? get real, IT IS DEFINATELY something beatles fans would want, but do they think were millionaires? Or is this only for the privlidged few? I think Lennon would have a problem with this, the people who would like to read it the most are the ones who wont be able to, while the ones who are able to are the people who would have steered clear of Hamburg- Beatles & all, because they would have been afraid if they entered the reepherbahn they would have been mugged, & theyed have been right, & it COULD have been John Lennon with his "crimey" Pete Best who might have done the mugging in those days, It was one of their favorite pastimes.

This is a shameful disgrace!

$599??

Astrid and Klaus are loved and respected among Beatles fans for their key role in the development of the early Beatles.

But charging said fans this disgraceful price for a story that is, however insider, hardly new to most veteran fans, is unforgivable.