Pete Best

Poor Pete Best. He had a pretty good gig, drumming for a promising young band from Liverpool that was starting to get some traction. He went to Hamburg with them, played the dingy clubs, and was there for the early, gritty days. He was even, some say, the best looking of the bunch, earning him a dedicated following in the early fan base.

Then, one day in August 1962, he was unceremoniously fired. The official line was that manager Brian Epstein wanted a better drummer (which, let's be honest, Ringo Starr was). But rumors persist of personality clashes, jealousy, and perhaps a touch of his mother's overbearing involvement.

He missed out on all the fun, the fame, the fortune, and the knighthoods. While the other four Fab Four went on to conquer the world, Pete Best was left to pick up the pieces, eventually playing in a few other bands and pursuing a civil service career. He even tried to sue The Beatles at one point. It's a tale as old as time, or at least as old as rock and roll: wrong place, wrong time, wrong drummer.

Eventually, he did receive some royalties from The Beatles' Anthology 1 project, which featured some of his early recordings. A small consolation, perhaps, but enough to ensure he's not entirely forgotten. And honestly, isn't being the answer to a trivia question almost as good as being a Beatle?