#stuart and Astrid

[eppysboys]

Stu drew something special for Astrid :)

[ludmilachaibemachado]

Via Something About the Beatles’ Girls FB🌻🌻🌻

[anulight]

John Lennon abandoned Paul for a girl and now McCartney is stuck with Stuart Sutcliffe and Astrid Kirchherr for the night. To entertain her not so favorite guest, Astrid pulls out the Tarot Deck!

[imagine-mokey]

A cute story of the pre Epstein Beatles. Paul is stranded at Astrid Kirchherr and Stuart Sutcliffe apartment, while John spends the night with a Bridget Bardot look alike.

Astrid pulls out her Tarot deck, and does a reading for Paul!

[harrisonsbabygirl]

John and George visiting Stuart Sutcliffes room. Photographed by Astrid Kirchherr.

“After Stuart’s death, John and George really cared about me. They used to come and see me in my home. It was actually John’s suggestion. John said, ‘Can I see where he used to paint?’ So I said, ‘Of course, you can.’

“In that moment, I had to take a picture of them. I just grabbed this old chair and put it there. And John was so full of emotion, being in the same room where his friend was just painting, that he nearly burst out in tears. And George was all a bit worried. So I just said to George, ‘Well, stand behind him.’ You could see how quickly George understood what it was all about, death and being alive.

[dontleavemewaitinghere]

♫⋆｡ The iconic attic photoshoot which features George Harrison and John Lennon. Located in Hamburg, Germany in 1962, in Stuart Sutcliffe’s Art Studio, photographed by Astrid Kirchherr

It is shown that Lennon was standing in the same place as where Sutcliffe stood for an earlier photo that Kircherr had taken.

“It was like a merry-go-round in my head, they looked absolutely astonishing… My whole life changed in a couple of minutes. All I wanted was to be with them and to know them.” - Astrid Kirchherr commented on The Beatles (Snap Galleries).

[kaiserkeller]

A lesser shared photo of Jürgen Vollmer.

[evrythingisabeatlesreferance]

On this day in 1962, the original bassist of the Beatles Stuart Sutcliffe died of a brain haemorrhage. Stu died on the way to hospital in Hamburg, Germany, and in the arms of his girlfriend Astrid Kirchherr. He was only 21.

[beatle-stories333]

i love how john, cynthia, astrid, paul, klaus, jürgen, and sometimes ringo talk about george like he’s their lil baby boy

[gardenwalrus]

Stuart was going to stay in Hamburg, cos he’d fallen in love with this girl Astrid [Kirchherr], who was part of a little set who called themselves the Exi’s, existentialists. They were very cool in black, tight trousers, little high-heeled boots. She was blonde, she had a short Peter Pan pageboy haircut, she looked dead cool. We’d never seen a chick like it. She dressed like a boy, a very slim little boy, so it was all, Fuckin’ hell, look at her!  I think we all fancied her but she fancied Stuart, who’d been the one guy who’d never been able to pull anything in our band. We’d always pulled before old Stu, but he got these great shades and struck a James Dean pose, got his hair going groovy like James Dean, so she went mad for him. And their group used to really like Stuart. I think it went: Stuart, John, George, me, Pete Best. That was their order of preference. They took some great photos of us. 

- Paul McCartney interview in Paul Du Noyer, Conversations with McCartney (2015) pp.34-35

[eppysboys]

Astrid Kirchherr and Stuart Sutcliffe, from the Museum of Liverpool

[ludmilachaibemachado]

Stuart Sutcliffe and Astrid Kirchherr in Hamburg, 1961🌻🌻🌻

Photographed by Jurgen Vollmer🌻🌻

Via @thebeatleswomen on Instagram🌻🌻

[anulight]

An entire story based on a tarot reading!

[imagine-mokey]

John gets a letter from his old friend Astrid, along with pictures of their shared lover, Stuart Sutcliffe.

[crepesuzette2023]

So whats like the general consensus about Stu and John? Do we think they ever messed around or not?

Ooooh, I won't burn and scar my typing fingers on anything like "general consensus," and my cop-out answer is: depends on who you ask. I mean, if you're living in a world where 'a man being with a woman' = straight, or 'a man who never came out unequivocally as queer' = straight, then John and Stu very much never messed around, and, more importantly, didn't feel the desire to.

But I think if you look at it with an open mind, without being afraid of the possibility, you'll see it's more likely they did than that they didn't.

First, you have John, with his life-long romantic idea of being in love with your creative partner (see: his comments on Yoko and Paul)—an idea that fits Stu seamlessly, and perhaps even started with him. In the Hunter Davies bio, John (in '67) calls Stu Paul's predecessor in the 'my trusted partner in art' role.

There is also this conversation with Stu's girlfriend, Astrid Kircherr, as related by Backbeat director Iain Softley:

Paying tribute to Astrid this week, film director Iain Softley revealed her moving words from his interviews with her when he made 1994 movie Backbeat about her and Stuart’s romance.

They hint at a complex relationship between her, Stuart and John. She said it was only after Stuart died that she and John “took a load of pills” and talked for 12 hours about “all the things on our minds about Stuart”. “‘He was jealous when Klaus and I fancied Stuart more, and took him home and left John out,” she told Iain.

“He told me he really loved Stuart, but was afraid of the feeling.”

Iain adds: “I think she thought he meant as a friend, I don’t think there was any suggestion they were in a relationship. But Stuart had always been John’s best friend, they shared a flat in Liverpool. John would write to Stuart as ‘Jesus Christ to John the Baptist’, in the sense Stuart was showing him the way. He looked up to him.

“There was a sense John didn’t want Stuart taken away from him, he didn’t want Stuart to stay in Hamburg.

“At the same time he was very fond of Astrid, but I think there was a conflict there.”

If John was afraid of the feeling, then I'm thinking he felt something that, at the time, and probably still today, was a scary thing to feel. I'll leave it at that.

Also, they were, what? 18, 19, 20 years old? At that age, odds are you do fool around, even if you regret it afterwards. Nothing wrong with that.

Look at this picture of Stu (r.) with Astrid and Astrid's ex, Klaus Voormann. Klaus, who later said he and Astrid didn't work as a couple because she wanted him to be exactly like her image of him, and whose marriage (to a woman) was a platonic marriage of convenience, according to himself. We have now reached the beautiful stage of come onnn! "Straight" was at the party, but so were many others. These relationships were messy! That's awesome!

And how do we feel about John feeling up Gene Vincent, while Paul and George look on knowingly, and Pete Best blanks out? We feel joyous and unsurprised.

A word about Paul vs. Stu, since we're (sort of) at it.

It's possible (what an understatement) to think of their rivalry as sexual rivalry. This is, once more, hinted at in Backbeat, where Stu is more or less giving away John to Paul.

And yet. I think it was more than that. I think everyone, back then, was fighting for more than a bed-partner. They were fighting for their future, for a life unlike their parents'. Paul was fighting for the band, Stu was fighting for John to join him on his artist's way (even giving 'rock'n'roll' a try), and John..

John was, on the one hand, the person either of the others felt he needed in order to realize his dream. But on the other hand, he was the least decided of the three. He may have perceived that, within the trio, he had the fewest fall-back options: Stu had his obvious, much-mentored artistic talent. Paul had a possible academic future bwxt to his musical talent, plus a clear determination to make it in music. John had talent in spades, but perhaps less of a clear-cut idea of where and how to apply it. So he tried keeping both of them close...?

With fun scenes like these as a result:

John sure is feeling campy/cuddly, while Paul is incandescent with rage. A hot look for both of them.

In the end, we don't know if they ever did fool around. My usual reply in those cases is: I hope they did, if they both wanted it. I hope it was good.

I need to check out this book:

John and Paul look happy.

[dontleavemewaitinghere]

♫⋆｡ The Beatles in Hamburg, Germany 1960, before Ringo Starr joined the band. The ‘5 Beatles’ were featured in Astrid Kirchherr’s photographs (1938-2020).

The 5 Beatles in 1960 members were; Pete Best, George Harrison, John Lennon, Paul McCartney, and Stuart Sutcliffe, 1960.