Flying the Friendly skies

June 4, 1964 -  George, John, Paul and Jimmie are ready to kick off the Beatles 1964 World Tour.  Ringo is in the hospital praying that they aren't planning to kick him out of the group. 

The Fab 3 and Jimmie in Darwin

Photo by Josephine Saunders

With the recent announcement of  Jim Berkenstadt's great book about Jimmie Nichol being turned into a movie, there has been a new interest in the short time Jimmie played drums with the Beatles.    So I thought I would post this photograph that I found on Twitter of the guys and Jimmie being interviewed at the Darwin airport in 1964.

A Hong Kong Welcome

Fish-eye on a boat

Arriving in Hollard

Jimmie in the front seat

"Psst---You aren't replacing Ringo for ever..."

This has to be the funniest Beatles photo I have seen in a long time.   Why on earth is Neil Aspinall on the stage during the performance telling Jimmie Nichol something?   Couldn't it have waited until after the concert?    And what is George doing?   He has two mics and both Paul and John are looking at him in a way that makes me think he just sang the wrong words to the song!  

Coming in from the rain

  Things were pretty chaotic for the Beatles when they  arrived in Australia because it was raining.   As we know the Beatles (well three plus Jimmie) exited the plane and were driving around on the back of truck to wave to fans.    But looks at the wet scene from when they finally arrived at the hotel.  

Hello Hong Kong!

Three Beatles and a Jimmie on the tarmac

The Bottles!

I know I have seen  photos of the Beatles   (well three Beatles and Jimmie Nichol---can't call him a Beatle--sorry Jimmie)  performing at this concert a million times.   Yet I never noticed that the bottles above their heads have on Beatle wigs!   Haha!  That is cute!

First time in the Netherlands....

So Paul is performing in the Netherlands and I am really excited for all of the fans there to see Paul on tour.    Remember 51 years ago when he first played there?

The semi-Fab four

This time of year always makes me want to post photos of the Beatles and Jimmie Nichol---who truly was the luckiest person to have played drums with the Beatles.    

All photos under creative commons Nationaal Archief

Something got their attention

I like how the newspapers they are holding have an ad about Peter & Gordon on them. 

PC in HK

And Jimmie just stands there

Young fans flock to Paul and George for autographs and poor Jimmie is just standing there.....maybe Jimmie should have gotten in line for an autograph as well! 

Either an autograph or a shopping list....

Melbourne press conference

With Ringo now back with the group, having Jimmie at the press conference was basically pointless, as he was not asked many questions from the press and he even sat a tad bit away from the others.   It was pretty obvious that no one cared much about Jimmie, and this is something he would get used to in the future.  After some photos with the five of them, Jimmie was sent back to the hotel to pack and was no longer a Beatle.

Five Beatles on a balcony

10 minutes after the other Beatles and Jimmie arrived at the hotel in Melbourne and met up with Ringo, they appeared on the balcony to wave to the fans.   They moved quickly because the fans were getting dangerously hurt outside of the hotel.   Over 150 fans had been taken to receive medical treatment.  Well over 20,000 fans were pushing and shoving themselves to the glass window in the front of the hotel.   Quoting from The Beatles Downunder by Glenn Baker

All five Beatles were rushed out into the first floor balcony in order to ease the crush on the front doors.  All appeared to be cold, with Ringo approaching a shade of blue in the icy winds.  The deep resonance roar obliterated any words that the objects of duration preferred, so John held one finger to his upper lip and threw a series of Nazi salutes, shouting "Sieg Heil."  Below, the surge increased instead of abated.  One policeman later explained, "they pushed forward 20 feet so we mustered all our strength and moved them back 15 feet then it started all over again."   Before the repeated five foot losses of ground could bring the fans to the glass walls, the Beatles retired from the balcony and the satisfied mass quickly dispersed, leaving a loyal core of a few hundred.  When fainted girls awoke to find that they had missed the appearance, they became hysterical, some rolling about on the floor weeping and screaming, "I hate the Beatles."

Meeting up with Ringo

So on June 14, 1964 John, Paul, George and Jimmie left Adelaide and headed to out to Melbourne, where they were to meet up with the band real drummer, Ringo Starr!  Yeah!