Get Backbeat
Part Two of our interview with The Backbeat Beatles.

Gary Harmon ('George')
Nina: What are your favourite Beatles songs to perform live and why?
Gary: I like playing 'Drive My Car'. It's good song to play for me and it's got some interesting bits in it.

N: How did you get into being George?
G: I was probably the best guitarist out of all of us so I had to be the lead guitar...
N: What had you been doing before that?
G: Just playing in various bands around the town lived in …
N: Liverpool?
G: St Helens. Just outside.

N: What has been the Backbeat Beatles greatest moment for you?
G: Starting to do these theatre tours really. That's the best thing for us, that's happened in a long time. Just getting out of the nightclubs!

N: What's your greatest ambition for the Backbeat Beatles?
G: Just to make a lot of money out of it! I'll bet they've all said that haven't they?
N: No actually they haven't! But you must like the music to play the same stuff everyday?
G: Of course I'm a big fan. I do enjoy the Beatles. It's just to do it; I suppose to do it the best we can really.

N: What's your favourite Beatles album or Beatles song?
G: I think it would have to be 'Revolver'.
N: That's the general consensus…
G: It's just my favourite album I like all the songs on it and the way it's done.

N: If you weren't Backbeat Beatle who would you portray in another tribute band?
G: Jimmy Page.
N: You've got half of Led Zeppelin then - Dave said he'd be John Bonham!

N: If you could be George at any moment in Beatledom when would it be?
G: Probably when they did the Shea Stadium gig. Have the others said that as well?
N: No I would have said that! That would be amazing!
G: I think it would have to be that really. It was a big thrill for them. Playing to so many people.
N: It was bit of a difference to The Cavern wasn't it!?
G: Yeah. A bit different!!

Paul McDonough ('John')
Nina: Firstly, when did you start playing the guitar?
Paul: The guitar, when I was fifteen years old
N: Did you just teach yourself?
P: Yeah, I totally taught myself! Can't you tell? I come from a very musical family, everybody's always sung and played and everything and I was a big Beatles fan. I'm quite arty - I went to Art College and all that…
N: Did you? Not the Liverpool Art College…?
P: Oh yes! I don't know it was just something that seemed very natural to me I was always singing and playing. My uncle always had a guitar and I always loved the sound of it. I still feel very bad about this actually because my younger brother, got the first guitar and I kind of took it off him and zoomed and he's been working ever since and I still feel guilty to this day… He's bigger than me too…

N: What are your favourite Beatles songs to perform live and why?
P: Well I find that a really impossibly difficult question because I like all of it and I find it very hard to nail one down. Because of what you'd have to leave out! It's the same with the set - its 'what do you leave out?!' Everything's so good isn't it? If I could say in general what I like about The Beatles - I like when all three of them are singing on something, Also a contributory song, being that it was when they really did work on it (and I think they worked on it more than they cracked on), like 'She Loves You' in the early days was a really big hitter, and in the middle years I suppose I love 'Drive My Car'… but I'm saying this, and I like 'Ticket To Ride', and I like 'Day Tripper'! I don't know, it's really really hard to do. I love 'Come Together'. I'm a John fan but I'm a Beatlefan too!

N: What has been the Backbeat Beatles greatest moment so far, or your greatest moment as a Backbeat Beatle?
P: Probably first theatre really because it really is playing on a different level, I was working with another Beatle band before and we did a lot of corporate work, but to do theatre and do well in a theatre is really hard. You come in and everyone's sober, and they've come to see you; so you'd better be good! So therefore, it's more fulfilling and more rewarding that we do do well. So the first theatre is the first step on the ladder of going somewhere else.

N: And leading on, where do you want to go what is your greatest ambition for the Backbeat Beatles?
P: Well, we all started by doing our own songs, which is why we ended up being Beatles by default. So I think once we get the theatre tour sorted out I think that, as a parallel life, we'll start doing our own stuff again.
N: Doing like smaller venues or something like this?
P: Wherever they'll have us!

N: What is your favourite Beatles album or Beatles song?
P: Ah that's impossible isn't it, that. And you know that, that's why you ask it.
N: I know I can't answer it either!
P: I don't know I haven't got a favourite. I like them all. You know how 'Beatles For Sale' is supposed to be a little bit of a dip, but the performances on it are magical, absolutely magical! It's all acoustic, it's very country and western, and the vocal performances on that album are superb… and that's a bad one!? I don't think they've got a bad one!! And I can't pick a good one! One of the things about the Beatles I think you can say is that consistently they were superb, from beginning to end. I think they are underrated! I mean I know they got accolades all around the world but they're underrated really. The more you strip away a Beatles song the more you realise how good they really were. So I can't answer that!!

N: What about solo stuff. If you were going to listen to something that wasn't Beatles …
P: Honestly I believe that they couldn't really function without the others because they sort of dwindled. I think John did 'Imagine', the album, and thought "Well that's it. I've done it now!" Paul did 'Band on the Run' - eventually, and he thought, "Done it," and 'All Things Must Pass' was the other one. And I really think without the others they really couldn't function. And that's why I think if you analyse it, 'Free As A Bird' probably wasn't as good as anything they'd done together, but what it did have is the magic of the four of them. And when the four of them work on one thing together, magic happens. It's no accident at all!

N: If you weren't a Backbeat Beatle who would you like to portray in another tribute band?
P: None. There's only one band and there's only one tribute band - anybody else can just **** off... They're nothing. Just forget it boys - there's no personality!!
N: What do you reckon to Oasis?
P: Oasis? Oasis are OK. I think they shouldn't do as much pastiche as they do of the Beatles. I think they'd be better if they took them as their influences and then became what they were. They're good though, because they really play, but I wouldn't want to be in an Oasis cover band. There's only one band you can cover and that's The Beatles, The only one you can have integrity doing and it's them.

N: If you could be John at any moment during the Beatles career. When would it be?
P: 1964 when they made 'A Hard Day's Night'. I actually think that was probably his happiest period of his early Beatle period. I think with drugs he lost the plot completely. I love him to death but I think he did lose it. John I love you but there you go. I'd just like to say before I go…(sings) "Oh Danny Boy the pipes the pipes are calling…"

Nina Douglas with The Backbeat Beatles.
Special Thanks to Reg Heath.
TWIL Issue Six November 2001