Episode Details

Before the screaming fans and matching suits, the Beatles were five rough Liverpool teenagers playing eight-hour sets in Hamburg strip clubs. They slept behind a cinema screen, took pills to stay awake, and became the tightest band in rock without realizing it.

This episode covers the full arc from Hamburg’s red-light district to the rooftop of Apple Corps, tracing how the greatest band in history was forged in squalor and destroyed by success.

• They played roughly 1,200 hours of live music in Hamburg before becoming famous
• Pete Best was replaced by Ringo Starr weeks before their first hit single
• Their final live performance was the unannounced rooftop concert on January 30, 1969
• The legal dissolution of the Beatles partnership was not finalized until 1975