While they were still performing live, the Beatles would regularly pull in crowds in the many thousands.
However, one evening in 1961, before the band had reached the peak of their powers, the Fab Four played a gig in Aldershot to a crowd of just 18 people. Accounts differ on why so few people turned up, however one of the more popular theories involves issues advertising the concert.
According to the book The Beatles: The Biography, the band's then manager had sent a cheque to a newspaper to advertise the gig, however the paper required a cash payment for first time advertorials, resulting in the band's ad being left on the cutting room floor.
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The Aldershot gig was also the first time the band had ventured out of the north west and into the areas surrounding the capital, playing many of their early gigs around Liverpool- namely the Cavern. London, at the time, had a huge music scene of its own, and four lads from Liverpool would have a tough job breaking in.
Speaking about the gig in an interview years later, drummer Pete Best said: "Halfway through one number, George and Paul put on their overcoats and took to the floor to dance a foxtrot together, while the rest of us struggled along, making enough music for them and the handful of spectators.
"We clowned our way through the whole of the second half. John and Paul deliberately played wrong chords and notes and added words to the songs that were never in the original lyrics.”
The Beatles released Please, Please Me the following year, which would propel them into global superstars- ensuring they would never play a crowd as small as that night in Aldershot ever again.
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