I Can See You - by Paddy Summerfield c. 1986

Monday, February 02, 2026

Will Howard looks at the Scouse Magical Mystery Tour . . . . . DANGEROUS MINDS

 Magical Mystery Tour: the time portal in the middle of Liverpool

There must be something in the water running through the Mersey, because Liverpool proudly stands a little bit apart from the rest of the country it’s nominally a part of. 

You can ask any dyed-in-the-wool resident of the city, and they’ll tell you that to them, they’re “Scouse, not English”. There’s a staunch civic pride to being from Liverpool that overrides any kind of nationality, which has lead to the city having a strange kind of mysticism to it that you just don’t get anywhere else. Amazing urban myths and legends permeate the place more than Beatlemaniac tourists do, and that’s saying a hell of a lot.

There’s Bella and Bertie, the Liver Birds that sit on top of the Royal Liver Building, cast in metal because if they ever saw each other, they’d fly away and the city would fall. There are ghost stories like that of the Green Lady who haunts Childwell Hall and the floating torso of Lime Street. There’s the legend of William McKenzie, a Scouse merchant who lost his soul to the devil in a game of cards and was buried in a tomb large enough for him to sit at a table in, ready to play Satan again to win his everlasting soul back. 

Seriously, you could go for hours before running low on things that make Merseyside a little bit magic. My favourite of all of them, though, is one that concerns Bold Street, the centre of independent business right in the heart of L1. Many people who’ve walked down Bold Street, in the shadow of the Church of Saint Luke, have taken one wrong (or possibly very right) step and found the most shocking thing imaginable. The city around them disappears for a few moments. 

At least, the way they knew it

Read on at the link above (at the top) 


THE BEATLES - MAGICAL MYSTERY TOUR from 1967

As Merseyside is my home town of birth there is this . . . . .When I fort went to the States to work the wonderful staff who hadn’t all met Brits before and when they heard where I was from asked whether I knew the Beedles!?!


The Beatles - Magical Mystery Tour - Flying
which of course we all were!

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