A great street-level history of one of the world's most famous small music venues. This inside story is the real thing. — John May The Generalist
Mini-skirted Debbie Greenberg’s... first-hand, fan’s-eye, gossipy chit-chat and fashion notes have tactile authenticity, from resident DJ, Bob Wooler’s ‘Hi there, all you cave-dwellers,’ to bassist Stuart Sutcliffe standing with his back to the audience ‘so no one could see how he was playing’, and Pete Best (‘sultry, fiercely good-looking and oozed sex appeal’). — Andrew Darlington, R2 magazine
A fab read for any 60s music fan. Richly illustrated with... rare photos, posters and press cuttings... The day Paul McCartney popped in with his new girlfriend, Linda, to show her where the Beatles story began is particularly special. — Simon Fine sixtyplusurfers.com
As a teenager Debbie Greenberg was spending far too much time at the Cavern Club in her hometown of Liverpool, England. It was already the most famous music club in the world, where she had been dazzled by the Beatles’ debut performance and had witnessed their rise to stardom for two years before watching the local heroes leave home.
Then in 1966, after the previous owner declared bankruptcy, her father asked her out of the blue if she thought it would be a good idea to take over the club. It was an offer she couldn’t refuse. She’d been a Cavern fanatic since it was a jazz club, hardly missing a lunchtime or evening rock session until its closure a few weeks before – amid mass protests by Liverpool youth.
Now she was suddenly part of a new family business, faced with the task of helping to breathe new life into the now dilapidated rock ’n’ rollin' launchpad of the legendary Mersey Beat.
This first-hand account of her ten years frequenting and eventually helping to run the original Cavern Club is an authentic inside story of this unique Beatles shrine, full of triumphs and failures – and surprise celebrity encounters.
Richly illustrated with dozens of photos, posters and press clips.
Born in 1945 in Liverpool, Debbie Greenberg attended the Morrison School on Greenbank Road and, after passing her eleven-plus, New Heys High School for Girls. Leaving school at seventeen, she started working with her father, Alf Geoghegan, who ran three butcher’s shops. By age 20 she was managing the family business and also working part-time as a fashion model. Her life changed forever when her father took over the lease of the Cavern Club in 1966 after the previous owner went bankrupt. Debbie lives with her husband Nigel in Liverpool and partners with him in their 44-year-old business, Solo Security.