BEATLES AUTHOR DISPELS UGLY JOHN LENNON RUMOR

Renowned Beatles author Phillip Norman dispels then ugly rumor that John Lennon caused the brain injury that led to original bassist Stuart Sutcliffe's death. Norman is no stranger to writing about the "Fab Four," having published the groundbreaking 1981 book Shout - The Beatles In Their Generation, 2009's John Lennon: The Life, and most recently 2016's Paul McCartney: The Life. It was while working on the Lennon biography, that Norman -- who has always had a chilly relationship with Paul McCartney due to how he felt he was perceived in Norman's Shout! biography -- dispelled a longtime rumor. Sutcliffe died of a cerebral hemorrhage on April 10th, 1962 at the age of 21, with most sources attributing his death to a blow to the head, which he received after a post show run-in with local Liverpool thugs. In the months leading up to his death, Sutcliffe, whose brain was literally swelling against his skull, would fall into incredible fits of rage due to the pain, and was often rendered blind by the agonizing attacks. In 2002, his sister Pauline Sutcliffe published her second book on her brother, titled The Beatles' Shadow: Stuart Sutcliffe & His Lonely Hearts Club, in which she accused Lennon of brutally attacking Sutcliffe in a jealous rage, which led to his death, and has asserted that she believed her brother and Lennon were actually lovers.

• Shortly after her claims became public, author Alan Clayson -- Pauline's collaborator on her first book on her brother -- Backbeat: Stuart Sutcliffe: The Lost Beatle -- told The Independent that Pauline's claims contraindicated their research, saying, "We concluded that Stuart wasn't beaten up by John Lennon -- his condition was brought on by an overuse of amphetamines." Clayson added that the only report of Stuart being attacked took place in Liverpool in early-1961, citing the "only involvement Lennon had was to wade in and help him."
  
• Today, Phillip Norman, who had been close to the Sutcliffe's for decades, has been frozen out by the family for digging for the truth about the alleged Lennon attack: "I had a lot of cooperation from Sutcliffe's mother and his sister, Pauline. We were friends for a long, long time. And it seemed to be quite late in the day that Pauline advanced this story that John had attacked Stuart. Stuart was nearly out of the Beatles by that time. And that could have been the cause of the hemorrhage that killed Stuart. She said that the only witness was (Paul) McCartney -- and that was something else I asked him, when I did the John book. You would not forget seeing John launch a murderous attack on Stuart Sutcliffe. And Paul said he had no memories; nothing stands out remotely like that incident. And I did have to write that in the John Lennon book and Pauline took that very amiss."