Liverpool Cellar Clubs
Rock To Beat Groups

LIVERPOOL, ENGLAND - Dec25 - Something significant is happening in a disused fruit cellar in this town.

The place is called the Cavern. It is entered from a dark, half-derelict lane called Mathew Street. The Cavern is scarcely noticeable from the street, but from its depths emerged the Beatles.

So did the Dakotas, Jerry and the Pacemakers, and a string of other loud, long-haired, guitar-plucking, twisting and jumping young extroverts with a strong beat and amplifiers.

These beat groups have gripped the imagination of teen-agers all over Britain, and in places beyond, with music known as the Mersey sound, named after the murky river that flows past Liverpool into the sea.

They have also created a cult of clothes, haircuts and conversation, and are responsible for a craze of girlish screaming that Frank Sinatra might have envied a few decades ago.

Questions have been asked in Parliament why the Beatles, besieged as they are, should have to be given police protection.

The headmasters of several schools have threatened boys with suspension for coming to classes with their hair in bangs almost to the eyebrows.

The skipper of the carrier Bulwark, Comdr. W. H. Hoyle, has posted a strict injunction, beginning with these words: "I note with alarm an increasing number of peculiar haircuts affected by teen-aged members of the ship's company.

The Cavern is not the only home for these famous and fame-seeking groups. There are 200 noisy little clubs like it, according to city authorities, all packed in a sleazy neighborhood of warehouses and market buildings behind the docks.

But the Cavern, according to Philip Brown, the manager, gets the best groups, at least on some nights. Last night the Beatcombers were supposed to be there, but one was sick.

"We still have the Mastersounds and Oerry and the Pressmen, and also the Shondelles," he said. He seemed apologetic.

While the Mastersounds were plugging in their electric guitars, a long line of teen-agers filed down the narrow staircase to pay the equivalent of 84 cents to get in. About 700 entered the dark, damp cellar, comprised of three narrow vaults each about 15 yards long, with arches opening one to the other.

Then the Masersounds took off. They screamed and shook their bangs as though the electric current had gone through their bodies. A member shoved fiercely at an electric, portable piano as though he were trying to extricate himself from it. The drummer hammered away relentlessly, eyes closed.

The dancers wobbled, hands outstretched but feet unmoving, as though held by the electricity. Some bent a knee and straightened it furiously with each beat. A brunette standing in one of the arches said that was the "Cavern Stomp."