The Beatles did not reach mainstream fame until the early 1960s. Before that, they were performing live at every possible opportunity. Their adventures eventually took them to Hamburg, Germany, where they played a daily sojourn for weeks at a time before venturing back to Liverpool, UK, and signed by Brian Epstein. Before that, however, they secured a gig like a famous one star support group
While in Hamburg, manager Tony Sheridan called the Beatles and asked them to be their next support band.
The English singer and songwriter needed a new group of musicians to record an upcoming track for him called My Bonnie.
The Fab Four agreed, and their recording session went so well that they were allowed to record two more tracks with Sheridan.
They put the instrumental song Cry For a Shadow. But George Harrison later mentioned how frustrated they were with the experience.
“It was a bit disappointing because we were hoping to get a record deal for ourselves,” Harrison explained in The Beatles Anthology.
In fact, the Beatles wrote and recorded two new songs for Sheridan, but they were eventually overlooked when it came time to hit the record.
“Although we did Ain’t She Sweet and the instrumental Cry For A Shadow without Sheridan,” Harrison continued. “They didn’t even put our name on the record.”
The official release of these songs has been attributed to Tony Sheridan and The Beat Brothers – really, the Beatles.
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They noted that Cry For a Shadow was completely inspired by a song from The Shadows called Apache.
In fact, it started as a cover before they even started changing course entirely.
Harrison noted in 1987: “In Hamburg we had to play for a long time, we were actually playing Apache. But John and I were just ***** ng bulls one day, and he had this new little Rickenbacker with a funny kind of wiggle on him And he started playing with it, and I just walked in, and we did his work, right away.”
The Fab Four’s work was later re-released on a compilation album titled The Beatles with Tony Sheridan and their guests in 1964.
This time around, the band was at the forefront of all marketing and featured a lineup of tracks with The Beatles playing alongside some of the big names, including Sheridan and The Titans.
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