 |
| Adrian Killen |
I have decided to come on to this website to correct some mistruths that exist about the audio recordings made from the Granada People and Places T.V. programme in 1962.
I am the 16 year old Adrian Killen (now74) who made those audio recordings in 1962. On the day of the first recording I was actually at the Cavern lunchtime session when Bob Wooler announced that the boys were heading straight to Granada studios after the lunchtime session.
I was actually on daytime release from work as an apprentice printer and was attending the printing college in Hope Street next to the Liverpool institute college (now Lipa) and that is the reason why I was at the lunchtime session.
The first appearance
We finished college at 4.00pm and I immediately went home and "acquired " a 3 inch reel of audio tape from my brother's collection as he had a Phillips reel to reel tape recorder linked directly to the loudspeaker socket of the T.V.
And so, the first two recordings were made- a live performance of «Some other Guy» and «Love me Do» followed by some not too complimentary comments from my Mum and Dad who thought their haircuts were horrendous.
From memory they appeared in their black roll neck sweaters and at the end of the performance of «Some other Guy» put their hands up in front of their faces and slightly above their heads making weird waving and finger gesticulations and shouting gobble-de-gook and words to the effect "I ,or we, love you".
The second appearance
As I was an avid reader of the Mersey Beat newspaper I was aware of their second appearance which was videotaped and shown while they were over in Hamburg. Although I recorded «Love Me Do» as well as «A Taste of Honey», I immediately scrubbed the recording of «Love Me Do».
It might seem sacrilege now, but at the time none of us in Liverpool could imagine just what a phenomenon that they would become. Hindsight is a wonderful thing. Unfortunately it appears that Granada scrubbed the tape and only the transcripts remain, but there are photographs of that second performance taken by Mike McCartney from the T.V.
The third appearance
The third appearance was yet again "live" but unfortunately I didn't record «Love Me Do» at all as I already had the first live recording and also by this time the record on 45 r.p.m.
The aftermath
I sat on these recordings for over 30 years until I decided to contact E.M.I.and I was invited down to Abbey Road studios where I met Mike Heatley and Mark Lewisohn. The reaction after playing the recordings was not really what I was expecting, and although an offer was made to purchase, I took the decision to decline the offer.
And so I sat on them for a further few years. It was only when Liverpool Football club opened their Museum that things started to progress, As a life long season ticket holder and collector of L.F.C.memoribila, I introduced myself to the new curator who himself was also an ardent Beatle fan. As time progressed I played these recordings to him and as he had an association with Mike McCartney, I allowed Mike to listen to parts of the recordings on cassette tape
These in turn were relayed to Paul and the request was that we should enter negotiations with Apple with a view to sell these recordings.
I never (as it is presently documented) auctioned these tapes. The curator of LFC and myself were invited to Apple's headquarters in London and sat around the large boardroom table where many a Beatle negotiation had taken place and a deal was made with Neil Aspinall and myself for the purchase of the four tracks plus expenses. These negotiations took place between late 1999 and early 2000.
I still have a copy of the cheque signed by Neil Aspinall for a 5 figure sum. I also signed a non disclosure agreement and have remained silent ever since, although Apple were aware that I had a digital copy of the tracks for my own pleasure.
YouTube
I was quite shocked in December when parts of these recordings appeared on YouTube, along with information about myself and I immediately contacted Mark Lewisohn to make him aware that after signing a non disclosure agreement with Apple that I had no part to play in the uncovering of these recordings, and also the information about my having «auctioned off» these recordings in the past and the sum that I was supposed to have acquired.
I hope that this correct information will now be passed on to the numerous websites that exist about the Beatles as I hate incorrect information, especially concerning myself .
Why have Apple never released these recordings? I don't really know, but what I would like to know is WHO is behind releasing these recordings on YouTube and the incorrect information that accompanies them.