Beatles 1960 Kaiserkeller Poster - Hamburg, Germany – Totally Genuine & Authentic, Pt. 1

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• published: 23 Aug 2015
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http://www.postercentral.com A valuable, historic Beatles German concert poster advertising their appearance at Hamburg’s Kaiserkeller night club in late 1960. This piece represents the earliest known such advertising poster using “The Beatles,” the name they finally arrived at after trying several others (such as The Quarry Men and Long John & The Silver Beatles). This Beatles Hamburg poster board was not printed conventionally, it was hand-painted on a piece of cardboard. There are two similar genuine examples that are much larger and were done on paper, but this is the only one near this size and done on board. This particular Beatles Kaiserkeller show poster has a basic yellow background, whereas the two larger door signs have white and dark blue backgrounds. I show you images of both of those door signs at one point in my video… but that’s over in part two. I digress. This Beatles German window display advertises the talents of no fewer than SIX original Beatle members… can you name all six? There’s John Lennon, Paul McCartney and George Harrison, of course; and then there’s Stuart Sutcliffe, drummer Pete Best and – let’s not forget – drummer Ringo Starr in Rory Storm & The Hurricanes! So this Beatles Hamburg window poster is one of only two Beatles concert posters ever to feature SIX present and future mop-tops. In this video, once again, I show you a photo of the only other poster that has all six boys playing on it (Feb. 14, 1961 in Liverpool). It’s spectacular that this Beatles Kaiserkeller show placard says “England – Liverpool” along the bottom. Really identifying where they’re from. This is the only one of their concert posters I can ever remember fully spelling out “Liverpool” like that… all their standard Liverpool concert posters would just identify what part of town they were playing in (like New Brighton). Even though we call this a Beatles 1960 concert sign, it’s really a “Rock ’n Roll music” advertising poster, with the actual bands being secondary. Even if the two groups had gained a strong foothold in England by now – which they hadn’t – nobody in Hamburg would have ever heard of them. The audience was there to hear cover versions of famous American rock songs, period. Artist Erwin Ross painted this Beatles German street poster, little knowing at the time what a masterpiece of history he was creating. So if you have anything at all that’s been printed in any fashion, it’s not original, it’s one of the thousands of existing souvenir after-prints. The three originals are all unique, hand-painted works. I love the way the bright, light blue “Rock ’n Roll” jumps out at you from this cardboard Beatles Hamburg poster. The font is just great. Artist Ross made very effective use of rotating his three word colors: blue, red and black. And then you have “Rory Storm and his Hurican” floating in a white cloud. Very nice. Although the months of “October, November and December” are listed across the top of this Beatles Kaiserkeller window card in German, the boys never made it to the month of December. They played there during October and November, but then quit the place in disgust, and George was deported back home for being under age anyway. If only a Beatles 1960 placard existed for their short stints before this at the Indra Club and Top Ten Club in Hamburg. Wouldn’t that be amazing! Then they moved on to the Star Club, where there was a full-sized Hamburg Beatles Star Club poster made and used, with their name in tiny print at the bottom. Either one could be considered a Beatles German in-person poster, but I’d take this one hands down, any day, over the Star-Club concert poster. For one thing, that one was printed on paper, and is a drab one-color design. This thing is beautiful with its flashy four colors. Given the fact that the group was virtually unknown, it makes sense that you hardly ever see a real Beatles Hamburg billboard. For one thing, they were just a club band… not out there giving concerts. So there was no call for conventional concert posters, most of the time. Just a sign here & there. It’s just a shame this Beatles Kaiserkeller concert placard wasn’t printed or produced in any kind of quantity… that eliminates you & me from being able to “collect” or obtain one. It’s a museum piece all the way, and should be treated practically as a piece of art, rather than just a concert poster. This piece of Beatles Hamburg concert memorabilia is proudly presented to you by lifelong Beatles fanatic and collector Pete Howard – me. I can be emailed at pete@postercentral.com, or phoned on my cell at (805) 540-0020. And to see a few more early, rare Beatles concert posters (but none as great as this), just pop over to this page on my Web site - http://www.postercentral.com/beatles.htm