In this episode we talk about some of the confident eccentrics who influenced the Beatles, fellow travelers who marched to the beats of different drummers.
The Beatles were quite busy in the winter of 1962/63, as we’ve talked about before. A Pair of two-week stints in Hamburg, radio and television appearances, recording sessions, ‘Love Me Do’ rising in the charts. And as the winter turned into the Big Freeze, called the worst winter weather since 1739, there was more than just the beginnings of ‘Beatlemania’ happening in the UK.
The other side of the Big Freeze would bring with it a flowering of modern culture. Women wore shorter skirts and mod hairstyles. The Profumo Affair scandalized an already weak establishment. A decade-plus of Tory government would be ending. Fashion, scandal, and the pill were turning the UK into something different. The Beatles would be a large part of the transition.