Eighteenth
Annual Beatle Convention in Liverpool.
Wednesday 26th August - Tuesday 1st September 1998
A
Scouse welcome to friends old and new.
Eat, drink and be merry; the best music in
the world in the best city in the world.
What more could you possibly want? (Viagra?).
Please
note: Friday and Saturday evening shows
are at The Royal Court Theatre. Saturday
afternoon and Sunday night shows are now
at L2.
Sunday,
11pm:
Adelphi Nightclub. Apple Band, Machine
Guns and Friends — 3 bands (f2.50 on the
door). Late bar for residents on a Cavern
City Tours package. This is an extra gig.
Convention
Monday:
A “Beatle Fringe” festival will
take place throughout the day featuring
live sets for over five hours. The bar
will be open throughout the day. This is a
new addition to the Convention: please
support it.
Mathew
Street Festival
Monday, 12 noon-7pm:
Regulars will know that Cavern City Tours
organised the last four Mathew Street
Festivals and that the event did not take
place last year due to a lack of public
and private funding. This Festival was a
great loss for Liverpool as it had
attracted 100,000 people in 1995 and 1996.
It
was a great shock to Cavern City Tours to
receive a phone call from the new Liberal
Council in May, to ask if we could
resurrect the festival. They promised
funding and in-kind support. After much
soul searching and heartache, we decided
that we have to give it a go for the
city’s sake.
It was a mammoth commitment and
undertaking time, but we have been
impressed by the new Council who have
recognised the importance of The Beatles
industry to the local economy.
The new head of the Liverpool City Centre
Partnership, Mr Layth Bunni, has already
made a significant impact upon the local
business community and it is to him that
we express our thanks for breathing new
life into the Mathew Street Festival,
which the Labour Council were all too
willing to let die. So, in short, the
MSF is on; but where does that leave the
Convention on Monday, the same day?
We
implore all Beatle fans to stay at the
Convention site fora number of
reasons. First it
is the biggest and
best Convention that we have ever put
on.
Please support the bands who have been
rehearsing “The Album Convention” for
over six months!
Second,
please support the dealers who make
the
Liverpool Convention
Europe’s biggest
annual Beatle flea market.
If
the Mathew Street Festival is a success
again, we intend to go back next year to
the old format of the Convention on Sunday
and The Mathew Street Festival on Monday.
It may seem strange as we have organised
both events, but please support the
Convention and give the Mathew Street
Festival a miss.
The way we see it this year, is that we
have organised the Convention for you and
we have organised the Mathew Street
Festival for the people of the North
West.
Farewell
Party,
Tuesday, 730pm:
Due to the very large numbers of people
staying over on Tuesday evening, Cavern
City Tours are throwing a farewell party
at The Cavern Club. Entrance is free. Five
bands — Beetles (Japan), Hard Night’s
Day (USA), Ringer and Beatcombers
(Scotland) and The Beats (Argentina). On
the same evening at The Cavern Pub, Red
House (the resident band) will be
providing the entertainment until 11 pm.
Again entry is free.
Forthlin
Road:
We jumped the gun in our brochure re
visits to Paul’s former home during the
Strawberry Field party. Unfortunately
trips are not available on Sundays,
Mondays or Tuesdays of any week. The
National Trust has a very strict agreement
with the local residents re visits. Thus
it is not possible to visit during the
Strawberry Field Garden Party. Furthermore,
the limited number of trips available
during Beatle Week have all been booked
up.
(Wednesday, 2 September is probably the
first available trip). We urge people to
book these scarce places themselves next
year or whenever you are in Liverpool. It
is a wonderful visit.
Other
things to do and see
The Walker Art Gallery:
is holding an exhibition of “Linda’s
Pictures”. This small exhibition
features 14 silk screened prints of her
best photographic work. Also on show is
Stu Sutcliffe’s “Hamburg Number
2”. The exhibition can be found on the
gallery’s ground floor
Beatles
Auction:
This has moved to the Masque Theatre, 90
Seel Street (again see map on page 20).
Central Hall, the venue for the last four
years, has undergone a massive facelift
and renovation programme and is due to
re-open as a bar and restaurant complex.
The auction takes place on Saturday
morning from 10.00am-2.00pm
Sgt
Pepper Show:
Our good friend Karl Lornie and friends
are staging this show at the Neptune
Theatre, which boasts a Brian Epstein
plaque commemorating his contribution to
The Beatles success. Thus the theatre is
now affectionately known locally as The
Neppy! It’s a great show and well worth
a visit if you can squeeze it in.
Linda
McCartney Cancer Ward:
In July this section of the Royal Teaching
Hospital in the city centre was
dedicated to Linda and the dedication
was overseen by Cheri Blair (Liverpudlian
wife of our Prime Minister, Tony Blair).
If you do go to see this, please remember
it is a working hospital and not a tourist
attraction.
Beatles
Story
(Albert Dock):
If you’ve been before, there are no new
significant exhibits so you may wish to
pass on this one. However, if you
haven’t been yet, do go and see it, you
will enjoy it immensely. I defy anybody
to go into
the White Room and not be moved. Beatle
Story and of course The Beatles Shop in
Mathew Street are the best places to go
for general Beatles souvenirs. If you want
to buy a ticket for Beatles Story, we
have had a number donated to Cavern City
Tours at a special discounted price of
£4. This is a substantial saving.
Furthermore any tickets we sell, the
proceeds will go to the Mathew Street
Festival (thanks to Shelagh at Beatle
Story). Tickets from the Cavern City Tours
shop in the Adelphi foyer.
Cavern
City Tours venues
Cavern Pub:
Entertainment
all day and night Thursday (free of
charge). A great place for a pintanda pub
lunch and an opportunity to buy your
Cavern souvenirs. Entertainment Tuesday
all day and night, Free entry.
Cavern
Club:
Anybody showing this programme can gain
free entry to the Cavern Club on Thursday,
Friday and Saturday night. A great
alternative to the Adelphi Hotel after the
evening shows.
De
Coubertins:
Our sports bar and restaurant has won
accolades and awards in its first year of
operation. We can say this with absolute
confidence, you will not get a better
meal anywhere in Liverpool.
Sporting memorabilia from all over the
world. (Round the corner from the Cavern
Club
Give it a try, you will not be
disappointed. We are probably prouder of
this venture than anything we have ever
done. Incidentally, if you look at the
building it is in, you will be looking at
The Hard Day’s Night Hotel, which we aim
and hope to open in the year 2001 (sounds
a long way off, doesn’t it!).
On
behalf of all Beatle fans on the 1998
Beatle weekend.
Cavern City Tours are proud, very proud,
to donate two sums of money on your behalf
over the course of the weekend. We will
present ‘The Cavern City Tours
Scholarship on behalf of Beatles fans’
to LIPA on Thursday evening. This
scholarship for £2,000 will pay the
course fees for a LIPA student in 1998/99.
Secondly, we will present a cheque for £3,000
to Strawberry Fields Children’s Home on
Sunday. This is our way of putting something
back on your behalf. Thank you.
Highlights
Our personal highlight of the year was to
win a libel case against our very own
Liverpool Daily Post and Echo.
Last year’s conventioneers may recall
that after our own amazing Cavern 40th
Anniversary Party in Mathew Street, The
Daily Post decided to devote the front
page and two further pages to an unfounded
vicious attack on Cavern City Tours, suggesting
that we were charging tourists £12 to
have their photographs taken with the
Lennon statue outside of the Cavern Pub.
They also alleged that we illegally closed
off Mathew Street. Well, we had three
thousand witnesses, the whole event was
also on close-circuit television and the
first slur was very easily refuted.
Unbeknown to the newspaper we had also
(obviously) received official permission
from the Council to cordon off Mathew
Street, and we had full public liability
insurance etc etc. The Daily Post and Echo
duly published a retraction and full
apology. Thank you to all of those people
that supported us throughout this
difficult and painful ordeal.
The
Low Point
Well that’s an easy one isn’t it? We
were all shocked at Linda’s death and we
received calls from all over the world. We
sent our own personal condolences to Paul
via Geoff Baker, who we believe performed
heroics in dealing with the world’s
press in such a protective and dignified
manner. I met Linda on two occasions and
she was such a naturally warm person, who
genuinely seemed interested in what we
were doing.
I felt privileged to have met her on those
occasions and our thoughts, and indeed
those of all of us, remain with the whole
McCartney family who will perhaps never
recover from such a tragic and premature
loss.
I’d
like to finish this welcome by officially
dedicating the whole week to the memory
of Linda McCartney, a multi-talented and
corn passionate human being who will be
greatly missed by all. We also remember
Princess Diana who died a year ago this
week.
Bill
Heckle
July 1998
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