Paul McCartney finally posted a tribute on his social media platforms to early-Beatles photographer and muse, the late-Astrid Kirchherr. Kirchherr — the fiancee of bassist Stuart Sutcliffe — died of cancer on May 12th, only days before her 82nd birthday.
McCartney posted on special media a tribute to Kirchherr which read:
Very sad news this week about Astrid Kirchherr.
Astrid was a dear friend from my Hamburg days with The Beatles. Another friend, Klaus Voormann, told me she had passed away and this brought back memories of our days in the clubs in Hamburg. Astrid looked unique. She had a short blond haircut and wore a slim black, leather outfit which made her look like a funky pixie. She would come to the club with Klaus and another friend, Jürgen Vollmer, and the three of them made quite an impression on us four lads from Liverpool. Their wit and conversation was really stimulating and we fell in love with Astrid’s style.
Astrid took beautiful photographs of us. She used black and white film and achieved a stunning mood in her pictures that we all loved. She had a great sense of humour and later went on to marry (sic) Stuart our bass player. I have so many fond memories of our time together in the club or her home or a trip to the nearby seaside resort, Lübeck.
So sad for all of us who were her friends to lose such a lovely lady from our lives. I will miss her but will always remember her and her cheeky grin with great fondness. God bless you Astrid, see ya love! – Paul
Paul McCartney obviously remembers the Beatles' early days in Liverpool and Hamburg as being the first high point of the group’s incredible career: “You’re in Hamburg. You’re 18. You’ve never been abroad in your life and you’ve got a bit of money in your pocket and you go drinking on a Saturday night. Y’know, and you end up on the Sunday morning and you do a couple of loony things — like most 18-year-old or servicemen on abroad, y’know, there’s always some lunacy. And it just grows. Someone remembers and they say, ‘Oh, do you remember that?’ — it’s the old story — and it grows into this amazing legend about, “Whew, I remember them, they were tough days’ — but y’know, it wasn’t that much different from now. A little bit more lunacy, that’s all. (Laughs) Quite a bit more lunacy, but it was only kind of good clean fun. Good dirty fun (laughs), actually.”
