Fifty years ago in December 1961, Brian Epstein made a leap of faith that he could change his life and the lives of four young musicians. He could not foresee that he would change Western civilization. A few weeks earlier, the Liverpool businessman had heard the din of the Beatles in a claustrophobic former vegetable cellar and had seized upon the idea of transforming the band into something the world could embrace. He seems to have had few second thoughts about his decision, even as he allowed that he might fail.
His objectives posed challenges, the most significant of which included identity and image. During the Beatles’ time in Hamburg, they had adopted the leather-jacket look of American rocker Gene Vincent and a stage presence that conveyed the casual charm of hoods on holiday. During sets of randomly chosen songs, they spiced their stage banter with profanity, flirted with women, left cigarettes burning on the edges of their amplifiers, gnawed on sandwiches, and emptied bottles of Coca Cola into their thirsty mouths.
But a catharsis had already begun in the form of the European “pilzen kopf” hairstyle that John Lennon, Paul McCartney, and George Harrison had adopted from German students, and in this detail the ever fashion-conscious Epstein may have seen an opening for a broader transformation. He would exploit their willingness to experiment in a metamorphosis from leather-clad punks to latent mods adapting European clothing trends to a rock-and-roll culture. Within two years, they would be wearing replications of Pierre Cardin’s modernist collarless jackets.
But other obstacles protruded into Epstein’s path.
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