Even in The Beatles’ earliest performances, they were able to whip their audience into a frenzy. The band played nightclubs in Hamburg, Germany in the early 1960s. They developed their stage presence, grew closer as a band, and learned to dodge the blows the members of their audience were throwing. The crowd got so riled up at their shows that they often ended in fights. According to George Harrison, there was one song that always resulted in violence.
The Beatles could provoke their audience into fighting by playing one song
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The Beatles cut their teeth in Hamburg, playing long performances each night in clubs. They grew used to seeing fights break out in their audience.
the barmen were gangsters,” Harrison said in The Beatles Anthology. “They were tough guys, anyway; they were fighters, and there would always be fights.”
These fights broke out while they were performing. It happened so frequently that the band could even predict what songs would rile up their crowd. Harrison said one song in particular worked people up.
“The most popular tune to fight to, not only in Hamburg but in Liverpool too, was ‘Hully Gully’. Every time we did ‘Hully Gully’ there would be a fight,” Harrison said. “In Liverpool they would be hitting each other with fire extinguishers. On Saturday night they would all be back from the pub and you could guarantee ‘Hully Gully!’”
People would even spray tear gas into the room when they heard the song.
“I remember there were many nights in Hamburg when they pulled tear gas guns out,” Harrison said. “But on one particular night you could smell the Players and Capstan cigarettes and we thought, ‘Oh, eh up, the British are here.’ Soldiers were in, and I remember telling one not to mess around with the barmaid, that she belonged to the club manager — one of the tough guys. But this soldier was getting drunk, trying to make it with the barmaid, and the next minute ‘Hully Gully’ was playing and all hell broke loose. By the end of the song we had to stop playing because of the tear gas.”
The Beatles said their audience often fought during shows
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While Harrison noted that the crowd got particularly violent when they heard “Hully Gully,” many of their shows ended in violence.
“They had truncheons, coshes, knuckle-dusters. There was a shop just around the corner from where we lived where you could buy all this stuff,” Harrison said. “They would have fights and beat the hell out of each other and then the bad guy would get thrown out of the back door, and so an hour later he’d come back with reinforcements and then it was really wicked — blood everywhere.”
The band had to get used to finishing out their shows despite the tear gas.
“It happened a lot, especially when the troops came in,” Harrison said. “The seamen and the soldiers would come into town; they’d all get drunk and inevitably it ended in blood and tears. And tears for the band, too, with the gas in our faces.”
Their concerts were still chaotic after fame
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While The Beatles moved on to larger venues with less violent crowds, the concerts for the rest of their career were hectic and loud. Fans screamed for the entirety of their sets and pelted the band with gifts. Ringo Starr recalled one show where the band had to perform behind fencing for their own protection.
“I remember we were in a cage at that gig, because it got so crazy,” he said. “It was like being in a zoo, on stage! It felt dangerous. The kids were out of hand. It was the first time I felt that if they got near us we would be ripped apart.”
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Because of this, The Beatles stopped touring in 1966.
