"The Introduction" by Eric Cash
Today is the 52nd anniversary of the day John Lennon met Paul McCartney: June 6, 1957. The 16 year-old Lennon's band The Quarry Men was playing a gig at the local village fete in Woolton, which is a part of Liverpool. After the show, Ivan Vaughn—a mutual friend of both John and Paul—introduced the 15 year-old McCartney to Lennon. Paul's energetic performance of "Twenty Flight Rock" convinced Lennon to invite him to join the band. John was impressed that Paul could tune a guitar and "looked like Elvis."
"I remember John singing a song called 'Come Go With Me.' He'd heard it on the radio. He didn't really know the verses, but he knew the chorus. The rest he just made up himself.
I just thought, 'Well, he looks good, he's singing well and he seems like a great lead singer to me.' Of course, he had his glasses off, so he really looked suave. I remember John was good."
—Paul McCartney
Believe it or not, an audience member actually recorded the Quarry Men's performance that day. In 1994 the tape was rediscovered and auctioned off. EMI bought it for £78,500, but it was never released because the sound quality was so poor.
There is a book titled The Day John Met Paul in which author James O'Donnell reconstructs the movement of John and Paul that day in narrative form. Though slightly hokey, it reads like a novel and is a must for diehard Beatles fans .
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