Looking for Lennon

“We were born in Liverpool but grew up in Hamburg”, John Lennon once said. This feature documentary seeks to find the truth in those words. The long and winding road that the Beatles took to worldwide fame passed through Hamburg, Germany in the early 1960s. Only a couple of years before they became household names, the former Quarrymen were cutting their musical teeth on nightclub stages in the city. Hamburg had become the vice capital of Europe after World War Two, its neon-lit streets home to sailors, sex workers, drug dealers, gangs and low life. Meanwhile, the English band was still developing, still young and virtually unknown. By the time of their last German visit in 1966, the Beatles were an international phenomenon. 'No Hamburg, No Beatles' explains how learning their trade in this fascinating city helped propel them to global stardom.

It’s a great pop music myth that in Liverpool everything began and ended with the Beatles. It didn’t. Get Back documents the real story of the city’s music outpourings, from post war years to present day. It’s a story of a city where literally thousands of bands and artists, hundreds of clubs, promoters and managers put on the biggest, loudest and longest party in history. The golden era of The Cavern and Merseybeat generated a massive tectonic shift in popular culture and in the 1970s it started again with a new scene and yet another cellar club at its heart – Eric’s. Bands such as Deaf School, Echo and the Bunnymen and OMD led the way. Then Frankie Goes to Hollywood, the Farm, the La’s, the Christians. And more recently it continued, the city’s bands always inventive and always re-inventing, with the Zutons, Coral, Wombats and more. The story is unending but Get Back offers music fans a chance to enjoy the narrative and the sounds created so far in the city that rocked the world…