Brian Epstein often spoke about wanting to sell The Beatles. Paul McCartney revealed how the band reacted to this.
When Brian Epstein offered to serve as The Beatles’ manager, he had no experience in that type of role. He believed in the band, though, and they agreed to work with him.
In their years together, Epstein helped The Beatles as they became the biggest band in the world. Despite their success, Epstein continually spoke about selling the band. Paul McCartney said they all found this highly offensive.
Though The Beatles became the biggest band in the world with Epstein as their manager, he felt a bit out of his depth. According to McCartney, he spoke on more than one occasion about selling the group.
“Brian was quite often trying to sell us, which was another thing that used to offend us mightily, because I remember one time, when we’d been touring, I think 364 days of the year, I know it was a pressurized period for us, because I remember once he came to Thank Your Lucky Stars, which was a record show we used to do, and we were trying to tell him, ‘Look, we’re really pressured, ya know? You’ve got us working too hard,’”
Paul recalled in the book All You Need Is Love by Steven Gaines and Peter Brown. “I remember somewhere about that time he dropped the idea that he wanted to sell us to Lew Grade. We were just appalled because it had been a much more personal thing, it hadn’t been a business for us.”
The band told Epstein that if he sold them to Grade, they would never record a good song again.
“We said, ‘If you sell us to Lew Grade, the first and all the records that we will make from now on will be out-of-tune versions of ‘God Save the Queen.’ That’s all we’re gonna record from now on. You can sell us, but he’s gonna get a bag of worms, Grade. You try to sell us, and that’s all we’re ever gonna do. We’re just gonna lay down.’”
Epstein backed down. Despite their protestations, McCartney said he later tried to sell them to Robert Stigwood.
When The Beatles first met Epstein, they couldn’t help but feel impressed by his polished appearance and mannerisms. They saw him as a “sophisticated businessman.” In later years, though, McCartney said this perception of Epstein shifted.
“One of the words that I’ve used ever since about Brian is that he was green — I never realized how green he was,” he said. “To us, he was a sophisticated businessman, but ever since I’ve been in the London business scene, and understood that when it becomes the norm, you realize that the sophisticated guy coming down isn’t as sophisticated as you think he is. He was provincial, and so certainly his deals were pretty provincial — you can see that now.”
Paul said nobody ever blamed Epstein for this, though. They viewed him as naive, not malicious.
“I never blamed him for it,” he said. “I thought, actually, that it was amazing that he even did so well.”
The band felt lost following Epstein’s death: While Epstein made some “provincial” deals, he played a crucial role in The Beatles’ operation. When he unexpectedly died in 1967, they felt lost without him.
“I remember the moment that Brian died,” Beatles associate David Puttnam said. “Oh God, they seemed to begin to be entirely self-destructive, entirely. From that moment onwards, I don’t remember hearing from Paul a sensible word, not one, single … I don’t remember a cohesive idea was followed through.”
“It’s discipline we lack,” he said in The Beatles: Get Back. “We’ve never had discipline. We had a sort of slight, symbolic discipline. Like Mr. Espstein. You know, he sort of said, ‘Get suits on,’ and we did, you know. And so we were always fighting that discipline a bit. There really is no one there now to say, ‘Do it.’ Where is, there always used to be. Daddy’s gone away now, and we’re on our own at the holiday camp.”
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