This is part 1 of a multi-part post about Paul’s relationship with Icke Braun, as portrayed in Icke’s autobiography. The book is in German, and we’ve included the original German text at the bottom of the post. Translations provided by the wonderful @paulsrighthand and her Mum! (Thanks!)
In Icke's autobiography, he's explicit that he was closer to Paul than the other Beatles
The best contact I had was with Paul, not only because he was the only one who spoke German, but to me he was the most likeable. I went with him a few times to the Raa-Wiese.
Raa-Wiese is where Icke was living. This wording and other moments we'll discuss later seem to suggest that Paul stayed with Icke on a handful of occasions. It's very possible that by saying "a few times" Icke is minimizing something that was very important. We know of two instances at least that Paul stayed the night, and there's a moment later in the book that suggests it was more often (we'll get to that later.)
The meet-cute:
On the way from Ahrensburg, we came past a great strawberry plantation. Because there were no people around, Kathia said, let’s steal a few strawberries. The strawberries were small, red and sweet and after we had eaten enough, we said, let’s take some for The Beatles. Kathia went into a barn and came out with a big basket. We picked so many strawberries that the basket overflowed, and on the way to the car, most fell into the road. We put the basket behind my seat and drove off.
At 10pm at the Top Ten, The Beatles were already in full swing, and the dance floor was thick with people. Between two sets, we took the strawberries to the stage. The other guests joked and called us the young strawberries. We could have invited them for a round of beer or schnapps, like the sailors or rockers did, but the strawberries were something else. The Beatles were overjoyed like children, and Paul said ‘what a wonderful idea, you can do this again!’ (He said this in bad German, which he had learnt in school).
The four boys started to eat and couldn’t stop. The interval became longer and longer because the basket was so full and took a long time to empty. The public began to protest, so John decided to start throwing strawberries at people, and then Paul and the others copied him. The public then threw back the squashed strawberries and it became a food fight…Luckily most of the strawberries had been eaten.
Paul then came down from the stage and asked Kathia and myself if we had a musical wish. There was a song which we liked called ‘Till There Was You’ and Kathia whispered to me that we should choose this song. It was a love song and didn’t actually fit into the whole rock n’ roll genre that they normally played. Unfortunately Paul didn’t understand that this was Kathia’s music choice and thought for years that this was my favourite song. Every time that I went to the Top Ten or The Star and he saw me, he would play ‘Till There Was You’, which was quite embarrassing for me because it wasn’t my taste of music at all, and also because the rockers bombarded me with rude gestures and remarks.
Years later, when the boys were already famous, and I was allowed backstage, we were sitting in the Ernst Merck hall and George Harrison mentioned ‘Till There Was You'. I told him that it was actually Kathia’s music taste and not mine. So he understood, but there is still footage from The Star Club where one can hear ‘And now we will play ‘Till There Was You’ for Icke’.
There's a lot to unpack here. For starters, this isn't the story we've been told in the past.
Typically, Kathia takes credit for this entire interaction
He looked like an angel with big eyes. He found it hard to say my name so he would play a request for “the girl with red hair” and sing “Till There Was You.” I wished that he loved me but I was not his type: he liked small, tender blondes. But he did like me and we talked. I could speak English, which not many could do; I told him the Beatles would be famous and he laughed. The Beatles were sexy. Very. You couldn’t decide who was sexiest. They didn’t try to be sexy, they just were, and they were natural.
This is from Tune In, cause, of course, it is. What we've learned over the course of our research is that Lewisohn has created a narrative that fits what he wants it to. We have half a mind to think that Lewisohn asked leading questions of his interviewees to get the exact narrative he wanted to portray.
Another interesting thing to note in this conversation is this web page. This is the only source we can find to Paul calling Kathia "strawberry." We'll talk more in depth about Kathia in a later posts, but these stories both seem in direct contraction to Icke's own recollection, and we trust Icke way more than we trust Lewisohn.
So now that we know what we've heard about this encounter before, let's break down the info Icke provides.
Before knowing this info it was very easy to assume that "Till There Was You" came out of Paul's love for musicals, which he tried to pretend didn't exist for most of the existence of the Beatles. After reading this it seems clear he really didn't know the song because of The Music Man. And it wasn't a song he liked because of the Peggy Lee version either. Icke asked for it, and Paul then played it literally every time he was in the room, going as far as to dedicate it to him.
It's crazy that it was based on a misunderstanding, but this is frankly one of the reasons we think Icke is so trustworthy. Throughout the book, or at least this chapter, he shares his insecurities. From this story to literally turning around outside Paul's gate in the 80s, cause he was scared Paul wouldn't remember him (from everything we can gather and the 3 pages on the subject, PiD scared him a lot and since he and Paul weren't in touch he internalized it a bit.) You can't fake that, or, I guess you can, but you have to be a really good writer to do so, and he enlisted a second author to help him write this. Not to mention, we are probably two of less than 100 people who have even read this book. So what would be the purpose in lying?
Anyway.
Based on what he said about George, it sounds like George assumed it was a romantic thing and then confronted him about it in 66. We wonder how George reacted, cause Icke doesn't share that, and if George told Paul or if to this day Paul thinks it was Icke's favorite song.
The song first appeared on their setlists in 1961 (the year they met Icke). It was one of the songs they played at their Decca audition (1 Jan 1962) and made it onto With The Beatles (recorded July 1963 – 7 months after their last stint in Hamburg).
As for the strawberries, we have a few theories about that as well.
For starters, we know from Paul and John that they both had this strong belief in telepathy. We all have always assumed it was just an assumption between them, but what if it wasn't?
Here's the theory. Strawberry Fields started as John's safe space when he was growing up, but then he invited Paul into that safe space and it became Paul's safe space too.
So given Paul's assumptions about telepathy and all that jazz, when Icke and Kathia go to literal strawberry fields and bring back strawberries cause they just felt like the Beatles would appreciate that, it's very possible he thought that was a sign of some sort. Maybe that Icke knew him in a really deep personal way. It's very easy to see Paul take that and start falling for Icke as a result.
Also, there aren't many mentions of "strawberries" in Paul's songs. But there are two:
In "Venus and Mars" which is all about psychic horoscope things:
Red lights, green lights, strawberry wine
A good friend of mine, follow the stars
Venus and Mars
Are alright tonight
And in the early 90s, two years after he saw Icke for the last time, he released an instrumental album called "Strawberries Oceans Ships Forest" which was also the title of the 7th track.
We have a theory that all the tracks on this album correspond to a lost or current love (but more on that later).
We could write a full essay on this section, but we'll leave it here.
Original German:
Den besten Kontakt hatte ich zu Paul. Nicht nur dass er der einzige von ihnen war, der in bisschen Deutsch konnte, er war mir auch am sympathischsten. Mit ihm war ich auch ein paarmal auf der Raa-Wiese.
—
Auf dem Weg von Ahrensburg nach Hamburg über die B 75 kamen wir an einer großen Erdbeerplantage vorbei. Es waren weit und breit keine Menschen zu sehen und Kathia sagte, lass uns ein paar Erdbeeren klauen, ich habe da mal gejobbt, ich weiß, wie man da reinkommt. Die Erdbeeren waren klein, rot und süß. Als wir satt waren, sagte ich, lass uns für die Beatles welche mitnehmen. Kathia ging in einen Schuppen und kam mit einem großen Korb zurück. Wir sammelten den Korb zu voll, auf dem Weg zu meinem Auto purzelten die Erdbeeren reihenweise in den Dreck. Wir aßen soviel wir noch konnten von oben weg, obwohl wir pappsatt waren, und verstauten den Korb hinter meinem Sitz.
Um 10 Uhr im Top Ten, eigentlich war das viel zu früh, die Minderjährigen wurden gerade nach Hause geschickt, aber die Beatles waren schon wieder voll in Action und die Tanzfläche war dicht. Zwischen zwei Sets brachte ich den Jungens den Korb Erdbeeren auf die Bühne. Die anderen Gäste machten sich zum Teil darüber lustig und nannten mich den Erdbeerjungen. Aber mir war das egal. Wir hätten sie auch zu einer Runde Bier oder Schnaps einladen können, wie die Matrosen oder die Rocker, aber Erdbeeren waren doch mal was anderes. Die Beatles haben sich jedenfalls gefreut wie Kinder. Paul sagte,
„What a wonderful idea, Icke, du kann immer widder macken."
Er hatte etwas deutsch auf der Schule gelernt. Die vier fingen an zu essen und konnten gar nicht mehr aufhören. Die Pause zog sich immer mehr hin, weil der Korb so voll war und nicht leer werden wollte. Das Publikum fing an zu johlen und zu protestieren. Da ging John dazu über, die Erdbeeren auf die Leute zu schmei-Ben, und Paul und die anderen machten es ihm nach. Die Leute aus dem Publikum schmissen die matschigen Beeren natürlich zurück und es gab eine regelrechte Erdbeerschlacht. Zum Glück waren die meisten Erdbeeren schon aufgegessen, sonst wäre die Schweinerei wohl noch größer geworden. Paul kam danach von der Bühne runter und fragte Kathia und mich, ob wir einen Musikwunsch hätten. Es gab ein Lied, das hieß Till there was you. Kathia flüsterte mir zu, ich sollte mir dieses Lied wünschen. Das war ein Liebeslied, passte eigentlich also gar nicht zu dem Rock 'n' Roll, den sie sonst spielten. Leider hatte Paul nicht mitgekriegt, dass ich nur Kathias Musikwunsch weitergegeben hatte, und jahrelang gedacht, dass das mein Lieblingslied sei. Jedes Mal wenn ich ins Top Ten oder später in den Starclub kam und er mich sah, spielte er Till there was you. Mir war das ziemlich peinlich, einmal, weil es gar nicht meinem eigenen Geschmack entsprach, und zum ande-ren, weil die Rocker mich mit schwulen Gesten und Andeutungen ärgerten. Viel später, als die Jungs schon berühmt waren und ich mal in den Backstage durfte, wir saßen da in der Ernst-Merck-Halle, hat mich George Harrison auf Till there was you angesprochen. Da habe ich ihm das dann erzählt, dass der Musikwunsch eigentlich auf Katja zurückging. Das hat er auch verstanden. Aber es gibt Auf-nahmen, die irgendwann im Starclub mitgeschnitten wurden, auf denen man hören kann: „Und nun spielen wir für Icke Till there was you."
