The fifth Beatle, Derek Taylor

t happened quickly, Derek Taylor’s transformation. You can see it in three pictures, ­captured over four years. The earliest comes from 1964 when Taylor was The Beatles’ press officer. Accompanying the band on their first full American tour, the one stoked by Beatlemania, he was more like a circus ringmaster than a PR. The snapshot, taken during a Dallas press conference on 18 September, shows him dressed immaculately and negotiating the ensuing chaos – police officers, reporters and fans all pushing and grabbing. This was a timeless look, though the tab-collar shirts, thin-lapel Italian suits, mid-length hair now epitomises the Sixties. Taylor – then a 32-year-old whose background included national service and an educational stint on Fleet Street as a reporter – is in the eye of the storm with his long-haired charges, a solid phalanx battling as best they could.

Source: John Savage/gq-magazine.co.uk

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