Andy White (drummer) - The Beatles

The Beatles

In September 1962, White received a call from Ron Richards asking him to attend a Beatles recording session at the EMI Studios at Abbey Road in London. Richards was record producer George Martin's assistant at the time and had used White in the past. The Beatles had recorded "Love Me Do" twice already: at an EMI audition on 6 June 1962 with Pete Best on drums when he was still a member of the group; and again on 4 September 1962 with Ringo Starr on drums, with Starr having replaced Best the previous month. Martin had disapproved of Best's drumming and was now also unhappy with newcomer Starr's drumming. On 11 September 1962 Richards, who was in charge of recording that day, wanted the song recorded again, and The Beatles played "Love Me Do" a third time, this time with White replacing Starr on drums and Starr relegated to playing tambourine. "P.S. I Love You" was also recorded during this session with White playing a "lightweight cha-cha-chá beat" and Starr playing maracas. White says he was paid £5 for the session and 10/- (50p) for bringing his drum kit, and he did not earn any royalties from the sale of the records.

The version of "Love Me Do" with Ringo Starr playing drums was used on the early British pressings of the single in 1962. The version with Andy White playing drums was used on the first American pressings of the single in 1964, all later releases of the single, on The Beatles' debut British album, Please Please Me in 1963, and most subsequent albums that included the song. The version with Starr on drums has also been reissued on occasion; it appeared on the 1980 Rarities North American compilation in 1980, and received worldwide release on the Past Masters compilation in 1988. A 1992 single included both the Starr and White versions. An easy way to distinguish between the two versions of the song is that if there is a tambourine, then it is White playing drums. The Pete Best version of the song, initially thought to be lost, was released for the first time in 1995 on Anthology 1. "P.S. I Love You", with White drumming, was released on the "B" side of the "Love Me Do" single, and on the Please Please Me album.

In a 2012 BBC interview, White claimed that during the 11 September session he also played on a recording of "Please Please Me" and this performance was used on the hit single: "From the drum sound I can tell that I was on it, because it was a vastly different sound to Ringo's drumset at that time. This was before he got the Ludwig kit. Each drummer gets an individual sound, first of all by the way they tune the drums and then by the way they play the drums."

This was the only time White played with The Beatles, but it was enough to get him "into the history books", and the distinction of being one of the so-called "Fifth Beatles". White said that on that day in the studio the only members of The Beatles he worked with were Paul McCartney and John Lennon, because they were the songwriters. "They didn't use any written music, and what I had to do was play the routines with them to get an idea what they wanted before we could even start recording."