Living History

Personal account of The Beatles Tour of Australia

When The Beatles came to Melbourne, I was working in a bank at the top end of Collins Street, Melbourne. One of our customers ran a music and booking shop, so I was one of the first to buy advance tickets to The Beatles concert at the Old Stadium. The day The Beatles arrived in Melbourne was chaos - crowds at the airport and later outside the Melbourne Town Hall, where they appeared on the balcony. They were given a reception and the keys to the city. Streets were absolutely jammed tight with screaming girls, and every vantage point was taken to view them on the Town Hall balcony. I would have loved to have taken a ‘sickie’ off work but couldn’t.

The Southern Cross Hotel, where The Beatles were staying, was only around the corner from my work and I planned to nip around there in my lunch-hour to see them and nip back to work. Ha Ha, little did I know! Nobody at work would change lunch-hours and I was devastated when I couldn’t get away, I almost cried all afternoon. But the next day when I read the newspaper, I realised what a terrible crush there had been at the hotel, police to control crowds, streets jammed, I would never have got out! The CBD of Melbourne was brought to a halt by The Beatles and Beatlemania had hit Melbourne in a big way.

That night my sister and I saw their concert at the Stadium (Festival Hall). Our seats were right in the centre of the front row. As my sister later told Mum 'We were so close we could see up their nose!' - True. I really wasn’t impressed; they had no stage presence in my opinion, and certainly no rapport with the audience, no chat, jokes, nothing. Very dour. They played, mumbled a few words, and went off. Everything was completely drowned out by the incessant screaming of all the girls, it was horrible. We came out with a headache. That was my close encounter with the legendary Beatles - and I just wasn’t all that impressed! I only wish I’d kept the program and tickets; they would be worth a lot now!

Pamela, Cooktown, Queensland

Look at more contributions:

previous | next